by Severisth
Michael Trollan is the founder of SecularAction.org, former chairman of the Secular Coalition for America, and serves on the board of directors for Sunday Assembly New York and for Ideas Beyond Borders. He's been an activist since December 2012.
Pascal’s wager is a popular argument used by believers in an attempt to assert that it’s reasonable to believe in a supernatural god. It’s important to understand why believers use this logic and why it’s ultimately flawed.
The main problem with this reasoning is deciding which god to believe in. Humans have worshiped thousands and thousands of gods throughout history. Should you worship Vishnu? Allah? Zeus? Thor? How could you possibly apply this wager to all the gods and supernatural entities that are worshiped throughout the world?
It’s also important to realize that if you spend a lifetime worshiping a supernatural force that doesn’t exist, you don’t “lose nothing.” You lose this life and all the precious moments on this earth. This life is all we have, so we should not waste it at the expense of an afterlife that doesn’t seem likely to exist.
One could spend some time countering this wager, but these are the two main and easiest arguments against believing in a God by default, just in case you’ll spend an eternity in hell.
Additional Reading:
http://godisimaginary.com/i46.htm
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pascal-wager/
http://www.greatplay.net/essays/why-not-to-take-pascals-wager
With a stated mission of "Helping Humanity Move Beyond Religion", Secular Action strives to connect activists with actions they can take, large and small, to further the cause of separation of church & state.
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