14 Facts About Pascal's wager

Pascal's wager is a philosophical argument presented by the seventeenth-century French mathematician, philosopher, physicist and theologian Blaise Pascal .

Original wager was set out in Pascal's posthumously published Pensees, an assembly of previously unpublished notes.

Pascal's wager charted new territory in probability theory, marked the first formal use of decision theory, existentialism, pragmatism, and voluntarism.

Pascal's wager assumption is that, when it comes to making the decision, no one can refuse to participate; withholding assent is impossible because we are already "embarked", effectively living out the choice.

Pascal's wager then argues that it is simply unconscionable by comparison to betting against an eternal life of happiness for the possibility of gaining nothing.

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Possibilities defined by Pascal's wager can be thought of as a decision under uncertainty with the values of the following decision matrix.

Pascal's wager intent was not to provide an argument to convince atheists to believe, but to show the fallacy of attempting to use logical arguments to prove or disprove God, and to persuade atheists to sinlessness, as an aid to attaining faith .

Pascal's wager put forward two new objections, undermining the foundations of the wager: the impossibility to know, and the obligation of playing.

Pascal's wager intended book was precisely to find other ways to establish the value of faith, a justification for the Christian faith.

Criticism of Pascal's wager began in his own day, and came from atheists, who questioned the "benefits" of a deity whose "realm" is beyond reason and the religiously orthodox, who primarily took issue with the wager's deistic and agnostic language.

Pascal's wager argued that abstaining from making a wager is not an option and that "reason is incapable of divining the truth"; thus, a decision of whether to believe in the existence of God must be made by "considering the consequences of each possibility".

Many-religions objection is taken more seriously by some later apologists of the Pascal's wager, who argue that of the rival options only those awarding infinite happiness affect the Pascal's wager's dominance.

Since Pascal's position was that "saving" belief in God required more than logical assent, accepting the wager could only be a first step.

Two differences from Pascal's wager are posited regarding climate change: first, climate change is more likely than Pascal's God to exist, as there is scientific evidence for one but not the other.