Reply to message 314 By: Fredric Rice To: John Brawley Re: Pick a god -- any god St: Local ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ @MSGID: 1:218/890@FidoNet 500eb8c8 @REPLY: 1:100/435.1 7e3b1b03 @PID: FM 2.02 jb> 1) Pick a god jb> 2) Apply Pascal's Wager (or my expansion of same) to it jb> 3) The Wager works just fine. FR> Pick a card -- any card. Out of a deck of 52 cards, if you don't FR> draw the ace of spades, a group of neo-Nazi Christians are going jb> (*sigh*) Utterly incorrect analogy. No it taint! In fact, would it help if I were to draw the faces of specific gods and goddesses on the cards? jb> Improved analogy: jb> Imagine picking a card -- any card. Okay. I've got one. It's a good one I can live with. Or die with. "Hello, card. Sorry all you other cards, I'll dance with this one. I hope you don't mind and punish me for my decision in the event it was the wrong one." jb> Now wager that _that_ card exists or doesn't exist, and that jb> if it does, no neonazis appear, but if it doesn't, they do. That's a different Wager entirely. The Wager isn't about whether a specific god or goddess is the right one, it's about "winning" eternal life by picking the right god or goddess from the available pantheon -- a concept, by the way, which I personally find selfish and egotistical. _NOT_ picking one is a binary solution. Betting that the one that was picked is, as you say, also a binary solution. But the Wager makes the assumption that the other gods and goddesses disappear -- and that invalidates the Wager entirely since they don't just disappear. jb> (Once you pick the card, the other 51 cease to exist for all jb> practical purposes--the wager works with ONE card; the rest jb> become unimportant after the pick.) By what mechanism do the other 51 cards disappear? jb> The fact remains that if you pick out a god --ANY one god-- jb> from the list of gods, and apply Pascal's Wager to that one god FR> But you're not. You picked a card from a deck of 52 cards. You jb> But I _am_. I have NOT involved the other 51; they might as jb> well have never existed as far as the Wager is concerned. You _have_ involved them by -- as fundoids like to say -- "turning your back" on them and "worshiping false cards." Those other cards you've "denied" have a 51 out of 52 percent chance of punishing you for the audacity of denying them. jb> I can't seem to get _through_ to you guys! Because you're ___wrong___, John. You would be right _if_ you could get the other cards to disappear. You would also be right if there were only one or two cards where either selecting a card or not remains a binary choice or picking one of the two cards is a binary choice. jb> Pascal's Wager is NOT about _picking_ a god out of a field jb> of many; it is about figgering out what's "smarter" once one jb> has postulated a god--to accept its reality or to deny it. What makes you think that the Wager doesn't include all the cards there are? Pascal argues that if you don't play, you can't win and, in any event, if you pick and the card actually doesn't exist, you're no worse off than if you hadn't of picked. The _flaw_ is that there are thousands of cards to choose from. jb> WHY can't you people _see_ that? Because we understand the flaw in Pascal's argument. It looks like you don't see it. FR> have _involved_ all 52 cards even though you've left 51 on the table FR> -- and the _probability_ is that the ace of spades is not in your FR> hand. jb> (*sigh*) You et.al. keep missing the point. I'm about to give jb> up trying to explain it to you; I can only put up with a limited jb> amount of repetition.... You're attempting to shift the blame onto others, John. jb> The Wager will work with a group consisting of all possible jb> gods, or with one of them. It has nothing whatsoever to do jb> with CHOOSING one from the group. You _must_ pick a card from the pile to play the Wager. The instant you do so you are involving _all_ the cards in the deck. If you can destroy the 51 cards that you didn't pick, _then_ the Wager is valid. jb> The Wager does not bet that the one chosen is the _right_ one, jb> it bets that IF the one chosen IS the right one, it's "smarter" jb> to believe in it than not. That's not an accurate description of the Wager. The Wager states that if the selected card exists, you had better pick it. It ignores the fact that there are thousands of gods to pick from and that in the act of picking you only increase your odds of "winning" by a miniscule amount. jb> (In the former case, of all possible gods, the right one is jb> included in the group, which is why the Wager works for the jb> _whole_ group as well as for the 'right' one, but NOT for jb> choosing one FROM the group.) Unless you can destroy the other cards, the Wager doesn't work. FR> It makes no matter that you want to focus on your one card -- the jb> It is the _entire_ matter, sir. That's what Pascal's Wager jb> is about! That the Wager is about the Christian god is obvious jb> by default; that's the one Pascal was talking about. It ignores the fact that thousands of other gods and goddesses are in the available pantheon. jb> NOWHERE in the stuff on Pascal's Wager can I find a shred of jb> evidence that he was speaking about PICKING a god from a field jb> of many. Which is why the Wager is invalid. It ignores the other gods and goddesses. FR> available pantheon of cards doesn't disappear when you make your FR> selection. If all the other 51 cards disappeared, THEN the Wager FR> would be a valid one. jb> They DO disappear. That's the POINT. By what mechanism do they simply disappear? jb> If they don't, then you are still in a "pre-Wager" state; No you're not. In a pre-Wager state you have a 1 in 52 percent chance of picking the right card. After you've made your selection the 52 cards remain in existance. You're still at a 1 in 52 percent odds. jb> you're not arguing the Wager specifically; you're still jb> arguing whose god is the 'right' god, which is obviously jb> not part of the Wager. Pascal dismissed all gods but the Christian gods. That's a mistake. jb> Pascal's Wager is nowhere near as vague as the 'randomized jb> theological crap-shoot' that's here being claimed to be what jb> it is. Sure it is. Pascal ignored the other gods and goddesses. jb> the Wager is a valid statement about jb> choosing to believe or not believe. FR> So you believe in the card that's in your hand... big deal. You FR> can believe it's the ace of spades all you want yet the _probability_ FR> is that the ace of spades is still sitting on the table and you've FR> picked the wrong one. jb> You're pre-Wager in that case. And after. All the other cards still exist, right on that table next to you. jb> You can't make the wager until you have a (_one_; "the"; a jb> chosen) card to use in it. That's true. In order to play the Wager one must draw a card from the deck. jb> Look: the Wager isn't about whether or not the card in your hand jb> is the Ace of Spades; it is about whether or not the card is or jb> is not _in your hand_. No it's not. If there was only one card to pick, _then_ the Wager would be valid. Then the card is either in one's hand or still unchosen, resting on the table. jb> It doesn't matter what the card is. It does if it's the wrong card. jb> It could be the Three of Hearts, for all it matters to the Wager. But it's the Ace of Spaces sitting on the table which is the one that'll grant you "eternal life." By playing the game and not picking the right one, the card will punish you. FR> The Wager simply doesn't take into consideration that FR> there are unselected cards on the table. jb> THAT is PRECISELY correct! Why aren't you applying that? I am. (There! See? You made me sound like one of the cards!) }:-} You want to make them disappear; I want them to stick around and punish you for picking the wrong card. jb> The Wager doesn't take it into consideration jb> because the Wager _isn't_about_choosing_a_god_; Sure it is. Pascal wants to pretend that there's one card. If there really were only one card, his Wager would be valid. jb> it is about assuming that the god it is referring to IS jb> the "correct" god, and then applying decison-making metalogic jb> to decide whether or not to 'accept' that that god exists and jb> should be deferred to. No, it's about picking the right card from a deck of cards. In Pascal's world, there's only one card -- an assumption which was due to his occult bias. That's what makes his Wager false. jb> You guys keep completely missing the purpose of Pascal's jb> Wager or my expansion of it. I don't know _why_.... Well, it _could_ be a conspiracy or perhaps something in the water yet I think the most reasonable and most likely reason is that _you_ are _wrong_. FR> As another side, suppose you pick your card without looking at it FR> and someone turns over one of the cards still on the table. It's FR> not the ace of spades. You're given the choice of replacing the FR> card you selected and then selecting a different card from the table. FR> Do you do it? jb> Looks like the old Monty Hall thingie, in which I'm told it jb> is _always_ better to make the switch. I've forgotten WHY jb> it's better, but I do remember that that was the conclusion. Yeah, it's the same thing. Monty has imparted a bit of information about the cards and that information increases the probability values _only_ if you pick a new card, otherwise the information is of no value to you. Monty could turn over 50 cards and, even though only two cards remain hidden, the odds are that the card in your card is the Ace of Spades is still 1 out of 52 -- not 50%. Trade in your card and you're at 50%.