Everybody would. But The Church teaches some are damned. It's silly. And if Jesus appeared to me right now, I'd demand, and in fact, command, that he cause Hell to cease to exist because logic dictates that NOTHING can justify Hell.

Thanks; yes that's my only point that if nothing else you have nothing to lose by saying to the say top 5 gods yeah if you're real i want what you want...something like that - again it's a low appeal but as i am sure you know the only real debate today is between orthodox christianity and atheism imho at least.

Anyway thx for engaging and all the best.

Thx for that; there's alot there.

You're welcome, and apologies if my responses seem unnecessarily long-winded. Brevity is not my strong suit.

Ok, so no matter what if all the millions of gods prove to be false you
lose nothing as you are dead and don't know you lost anything you are
just gone forever and ever.

You're assuming that atheists and agnostics don't gain
anything after they die. Most atheists would probably agree with you, but
there are other possibilities besides just meeting your creator vs ceasing to
exist, such as progression to another plane of existence, or hanging around as
a ghost, or being reincarnated. None of these require the existance of gods to be
possibilities.

But if you're wrong and you "wake up" at least one of those millions
of gods will have proven to be true therefore if 1 way leads to nothing
just death and another way, even though it may be extremely unlikely
like say 1 in a trillion trillion, leads to a god then why not make a
wager for that 1 god? Even though your odds are crazy it still makes
sense to place that bet.

So are you
essentially arguing here that if the odds of any particular god existing
is the same as any other particular god existing, we should aim to
maximize our expected gain in the afterlife by "betting" on the god that
offers the greatest reward to believers?

If this is the case I
would suggest that the Buddhist concept of reincarnation is
the bet that gets the most gain, since it lets you play again, and
again, and again... for eternity! Also, Buddhism makes no claims on
which god, if any, is real, so you could attempt to cover more bases by
directing worship toward one or more proposed deities that do not
require exclusive worship. Either way it would be hard to justify
betting on the Abrahamic god, which is ironic since I've only ever seen
Pascal's wager used by Christians.

So i am not saying wager as in start going to church and praying i am
saying if one is truly confidently agnostic or atheist he will have no
reason not to "pick a number" by saying something like "christian god,
in spit of everything i will think do and say in my life, i want you to
know that if you exist that i want your love and eternal life with
you"...that's it and never think about it again - if i was certain of my
atheism i would do that immediately.

I've
never heard the wager explained in this way but if so, then yeah,
there's nothing to loose by trying to reach out to any deity that might
be listening.

Thx for that; there's alot there.

Here's how i think pascal's wager works even if you see no evidence for any god: no matter what, no matter what, you know you will die, agree?

Ok, so no matter what if all the millions of gods prove to be false you lose nothing as you are dead and don't know you lost anything you are just gone forever and ever.

But if you're wrong and you "wake up" at least one of those millions of gods will have proven to be true therefore if 1 way leads to nothing just death and another way, even though it may be extremely unlikely like say 1 in a trillion trillion, leads to a god then why not make a wager for that 1 god? Even though your odds are crazy it still makes sense to place that bet.

Say i don't believe that a cosmic lottery exists one for which you don't "buy a ticket" but enter the lottery by imagining a number and that number somehow magically gets taken down and entered into the lottery. Even if the odds of that being real are 1 in a trillion it still makes sense to "pick a number" so to speak as it costs me nothing but may result in a big win.

So i am not saying wager as in start going to church and praying i am saying if one is truly confidently agnostic or atheist he will have no reason not to "pick a number" by saying something like "christian god, in spit of everything i will think do and say in my life, i want you to know that if you exist that i want your love and eternal life with you"...that's it and never think about it again - if i was certain of my atheism i would do that immediately.

In case you are curious if i was not a christian, say if judaism and christianity and islam never existed i would DEFINITELY be something else maybe a hindu or a buddhist or some kind of pagan but definitely would place a wager on something. I am not saying i would "go all in" for buddhism or hindu but i would make that bet in my head just to cover my bases.

I would start with the appearance of lawfulness in nature, the degree to which nature appears lawful/orderly, the mathematical complexity and subtlety that appears to undergird reality and the "moral law" which all humans beings seems to have and which in turn seems to result in an insatiable "thirst for justice" among all ppl.

Thanks for this, Mike. I think we've finally got around to the heart of the issue, which is that Pascal's wager is only useful if you already have sufficient evidence pointing toward the existence of any particular god(s) over the multitude of others. Therefore I think it would be far more helpful to the conversation if theists could simply lay out the evidence for their beliefs, rather than appealing to a pragmatic argument that is only useful to those who are already leaning in a certain direction. So I really appreciate that you listed your evidence as points to consider, which I will.

One other way to start is from the end, with death. If you care about what happens to you after you die, if you think that nothing happens to you when you die you may be interested in what other traditions say about that most talked about thing.

I'm not sure what you mean by this, what other traditions believe happens when we die is interesting but without any way to put these claims to the test in this world I have no way of judging the veracity of one claim against another. Seems it would be a lot easier to see how claims about objective reality stack up against one another, using evidence similar to what you listed (apparent lawfulness in nature, etc)

Thanks for the link to the Dr. Kreeft video. I appreciate his approach to the question of agnosticism but ultimately found his logic to be lacking. At one point in his speech he argued that Clifford's rule - that one should always proportion their beliefs to the evidence for that belief - shouldn't apply to the question of God's existence because it reduces God to a claim and not a Person. Likening God to a friend or a spouse he says, "No friendship could be formed, much less a marriage, if we were not prejudiced in favor of our friend, or our spouse."

But agnostics are not reserving judgement on a personal question of whether to be friends, or spouses, with God (a question which already presupposes God's existence), agnostics are reserving judgement on the philosophical question of whether God, or any deities, truly exist. This claim should held to Clifford's rule the same as any other philosophical or empirical claim about reality, and judgement should be reserved until one finds sufficient evidence to make a decision one way or the other.

Kreeft does address this objection toward the end of his speech ("But what if there is no Romeo, no marriage proposal?") but unfortunately he answers it by invoking Pascal's wager, which is useless to those who are truly agnostic, as I've already argued here. For all his genuinely admirable talk about truth as a moral absolute, and the insistence that each of us examine whether we are honestly searching for the truth, his argument against agnosticism ultimately fails. It would have been far better for him to have presented the evidence for the existence of God as he sees it, and argued that agnosticism is an unreasonable position in light of the evidence.

They know God through creation and conscience - an empty statement. My point was that they had no knowledge that would help them towards salvation.

I deliberately chose examples which can not be labelled as "our fault", e.g. pre-Columbian Americans. Their lack of knowledge cannot be blamed on Christians.

Please provide supporting evidence that "really no other societies" "produce atheists". Especially in the light of recent news of Muslim atheists. And Socrates was put to death for atheism about 400 years before Jesus was born. And there are many atheists in Asia, in which monotheism never dominated.

First, I don't think they have no knowledge of God at all. They know God through creation and conscience.

Second, their lack of knowledge is mostly our fault. We failed to evangelize and so people failed to learn about God through us.

Thirdly, your argument fails on empirical grounds. Christian societies produce atheists. Really no other societies do. Remote Chinese villages don't have atheists.

I would start with the appearance of lawfulness in nature, the degree to which nature appears lawful/orderly, the mathematical complexity and subtlety that appears to undergird reality and the "moral law" which all humans beings seems to have and which in turn seems to result in an insatiable "thirst for justice" among all ppl.

These are "things" accessible to all ppl and are a good starting place for investigating how the various traditions account for these "facts" etc.

One other way to start is from the end, with death. If you care about what happens to you after you die, if you think that nothing happens to you when you die you may be interested in what other traditions say about that most talked about thing.

Ultimately it depends on whether you care enough to begin investigating or whether you are content with not knowing or knowing that it is impossible to make any progress in knowing - if this is you check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJ9WQ4x8QSM

I'm a history buff, so I do enjoy comparing world religions through a historical lens, learning how the beliefs of past cultures affected, and were affected by, the world they lived in.

But if I am going to examine these beliefs as hypotheses that could possibly explain reality , then I have a responsibility to treat each possible hypothesis (of which I posit there are an infinite number of hypotheses that can be called possible) as equally likely until there is sufficient evidence to justify elevating any one hypothesis, or collection of hypotheses, to the level of individual consideration.

I understand the temptation to start by considering the hypotheses of the world's major religions, after all you have to start somewhere. But unless you have sufficient reason to believe that the true hypothesis is within this group of hypotheses put forth by the major religions of the world, I argue you are no nearer to finding the truth than the detective that arbitrarily considers a limited number of individuals as possible culprits.

It's not enough to just expand a finite set of hypotheses to include more esoteric beliefs, there needs to be sufficient evidence to warrant considering a finite set of hypotheses in the first place.

Then again, maybe I am over complicating the exercise. If so, I'm hopeful that you or someone else reading this can illustrate where I went wrong.

Thx for that detailed reply but i think you're over complicating it; however if you want to include more esoteric beliefs by all means go ahead - a good comparative analysis goes a long way.

Good luck in your search and if you're not searching, take care and all the best.