Thanks. I emailed this same question to "Diamond" Jack Holgroth who wrote this article on game theory on some crazy creationist website. Cannot f**king wait for a response, this guy seems totally legit.

I clicked on the link, and now I feel cheap.

That site's kept me laughing for a couple of days now. My favourite bit is where the guy cites the existence of the Loch Ness Monster as proof that humans and dinosaurs have always co-existed.

The best answer is that if you accept the reasoning behind Pascal's Wager, you should regard following a religion as a freeroll. That is, there isn't any reason to think that being a Christian is more likely to get you an eternal reward than being a Muslim, but it is better than being non-religious, as that would have no possibility of an eternal reward.

Welcome to the forum.

Ok so we're getting a freeroll, makes sense. So if you think it's +EV to take this freeroll, why is it not more +EV to apply it to every god and believe in everything? If the answer to this is that you can only truely believe in one god, then surely the fact that the same argument applies to every conceivable god means that the whole thing is a worthless argument for the belief in one particular god?

The problem is that several of these religions require exclusivity--you don't get the promised reward if you follow more than one religion. So you can't follow all religions at once. In fact, Pascal's Wager only applies to religions that are exclusive. If you can get the infinite reward without being a member of that particular religion, then you no longer have a prudential reason for joining it.

I didn't follow the argument in your last sentence. It seems to be repeating the point you originally brought up and that I already responded to.

Christians present Pascal's Wager as an argument to believe in their God. What I am saying is that it (if you accept the logic) is an argument to believe in a god, but not any one specific god.

Fair enough. Obviously that is a mistake.

Death of the chat thread in uFR drive you to RGT, Ron? Run. Run far and fast. This forum is the crack cocaine of time wasters.

It's just something I've always been interested in, and I don't get much chance to engage in debate on the subject irl. As I expected though, there doesn't seem to be much actual intelligent debate as as soon as the tough questions start being asked, the Christians etc seem to disappear/ignore the question.

It would be, but

• there are many lurkers who read the arguments posted here
• our posts often show up in major search engines on these topics, and
• in the future, anthropologists will discover that not everyone believed in superstitions in 2011

I was going to post this link in SMP then found they'd already posted a similar one:
Particles Moved Faster Than Speed of Light?

"Crazy" neutrino find has many physicists skeptical, still backing Einstein.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...stein-science/

Science, always a changin'...makes you wonder how you can build a worldview off of it when it's so changeable...

Why do you keep posting statements like this, when many people have pointed out previously, that science never claims to be 100% right( unlike religion) and science is happy to change when new information is revealed or discovered( unlike religion).

Its almost like you dont read any of the replies to any of your posts, just go on blissfully thinking that you have made groundbreaking posts that threaten the very foundation of "atheist" thinking.

LOL..find the words "100 percent" in the bible.

Science and religion are both progressions though on different paths.

so on one hand you are expressing surprise and contempt at the fact that science is a progression, next you are stating that both science and religion are a progression?

you are not making sense

They need to change this forum's name to RVA for Religion Versus Atheism. It'd be more accurate.

Currently, it's RGT with a subtitle that says: Discussion of God, religion, faith, theology, and spirituality.

It neglects to tell everyone that many threads are about atheism and that the forum is populated by a majority of atheists.

So I move for a forum name change. Any possibility of that occurring?

how many times do you suppose you've asked for them to change the name of the forum. Do you think anyone cares what its called besides yourself?

I want to hear from a mod.

Absolutely no chance of ever changing the name of the forum.

Why not?

Because it is not necessary.

Accuracy isn't necessary when describing itself and the habits of the typical forum poster?

This sounds like a splendid idea. RVA is much more suitable for this forum.

What about the Deists And the Agnostics and the Pantheist and the Pagans and the Wicken and ..... It would have to be RVAVDVAVPVPW......

Matter changes. Matter changes. Matter changes. Matter changes.

Matter changes. Matter changes. Matter changes. Matter changes.

Matter changes. Matter changes. Matter changes. Matter changes.

Matter changes form all the time.

So I don't know how a materialist can deny the resurrection. It's matter changing form. If God intended a massive change later and wanted to let us all know then it'd be reasonable of Him to give us an example or two and leave a few witnesses of it so word gets around.

From Wiki Answers:

Matter changes with everything.

Example: breathing, your lungs change the oxygen into carbon dioxide, and plants change it back into oxygen, that's matter changing. Burning coals, the fire changes the carbon in the coal into carbon dioxide, and the plants do their photo synthesis bit and change it into oxygen.

Another Example: sand is heated until it becomes molten, then it cools to form glass.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_does_matter_change