Pascal's Wager

The French Philosopher Blaise Pascal must have been a betting man. I make this observation based on his idea of belief in God's existence being a wager; a wager of eternal reward or eternal damnation. Pascal's Wager stated that it is in a person's best interest to believe in God's existence because belief in God could result in eternal life and happiness and to not believe in God is to run the risk of being condemned for the rest of time. Pascal even created a Decision Matrix to help demonstrate the possible outcomes of the wager you decide to make:

God Exists God doesn't Exist

If we believe eternal reward wasted piety but better people

If we don't believe eternal damnation no reward, no punishment

Pascal stated that you have nothing you loss. If you follow God you will be a virtuous person and you will not participate in activities that could possibly be harmful to you. And, if in the end you find out that there is no God you will know that you still lead a good life and were a better person than you might have been without your faith. Pascal also says that to not believe in God means that you essentially have no hope. You will either die and nothing will happen or you will die and find out that God really did exist and because you did not believe you will be condemned to hell for the rest of eternity.

Pascal's Wager is solely based on logic and is a very mathematical way to view faith. Pascal plays off people's rationality to back this argument. According to Pascal the possible downfalls strongly outweigh the few extra pleasures you might encounter if you were to not follow God.

I feel that there are many problems with Pascal's Wager as an argument for faith in God's existence. Namely, Pascal makes a great deal of assumptions about the nature of the God that does exist.

The first argument is that if God does exist that would be a forgiving, merciful God and even if one was to wager against him he would still recognize a good heart and good person and reward them with eternal life. Or, God might just forgive all his children and bestow eternal life on every human being.

Pascal also assumes that God rewards blind faith over other things such as skepticism and truth seeking. God could value things such as honest reasoning over simply accepting a belief that has been passed down to you through tradition. The skeptic that is constantly searching for truth will more than likely hold his truths in higher regard because he is constantly evaluating them and questioning their relevance. Thus, the skeptic will have a stronger grasp on what it is they believe is right and wrong over the person that blindly accepts a faith to follow. Therefore, God would favor the skeptic because he holds his truths more soundly and has become the more moral person after all.

Another objection to Pascal's Wager is that God will grant eternal life solely on belief. Or, in other words, either you believe and you are saved or you don't and you are condemned. This is far too black and white. By believing that God exists based solely on this argument you are trying to "cover all your bases" and make sure in the end you are safe. This is not true faith. You do not have faith in God because you are in awe of your creator or because you truly believe that he exists and love him but because you are afraid of what might happen. It seems to believe in God solely based on this wager is a very selfish way to approach faith and if God does really exist he would see through this as a ploy to protect yourself and would still not grant you salvation.

This argument also assumes that reward is infinite and that anyone who believes is entitled to the rewards of an afterlife with God. There are several sects of Christianity that believe that there is only a predestined few that can receive the divine rewards of the afterlife. If this is true only some chosen few will ever receive the gift of eternal life those people have already been established and there is nothing in this life that we can do to change that.

Another issue with the Wager is not every person will weigh each option on the Decision Matrix the same. Some people might find that living a life of "sin" is more appealing to them than a life with God in heaven and some will find salvation much more appealing.

Pascal's wager also does not take into consideration the life the so called believer leads. A person