Like this:

Over at Atheist Dave, Dave offered up a post on Pascal’s Wager. While I tend to agree with the conclusion that Pascal’s Wager is not the best starting point for apologetics  the fallacious manner in which A.Dave offers his critique of the Wager (hereafter PW)  has garnered my attention. A. Dave is not a professional philosopher (nor am I for that matter) however that does not excuse being overtly dismissive of someone with the intellect of Blaise Pascal.

Here are A. Dave’s opening remarks

“Fortunately, most moderately intelligent theists won’t bother playing the Pascal card when debating religion, but nevertheless there are many who do.” 

Here are my list of gripes with an opening comment like this:

i. Only an imbecile would use PW in argumentation with an atheist (at least that’s the implication)

ii. What exactly does A. Dave mean by playing the Pascal card? Certainly, this is perjorative however does it follow that playing the Pascal card is always a bad thing? What if the pragmatic utility of the argument opens up further dialogue? 

iii. Why does A. Dave conclude that the theist not using PW is a *fortunate* occurence? Is the forthcoming atheistic refutation of PW so devastating that the theist might end up de-converted ? How or why would this be thought of as *fortunate*?  Perhaps A.Dave has so much experience refuting PW that he has become bored and simply cannot fathom having to *yet* again provide the refutation for any fool who haphazardly uses such a pedestrian line of reasoning.

Something tells me that A. Dave will not stop at simply asserting that only theists who are either mildly retarded or backwoods fundies use PW, no I believe he is going to attempt to convince his audience (the gentle readers who may be reading this rejoinder) that PW is flawed and badly so.

Consider this quote from A. Dave atheistic defender of rationality (perhaps  that was uncalled for?) if so, my apologies.

“I make no attempt to prove or disprove the existence of any god in this post; just to counter the Pascal’s Wager argument.”

So A. Dave, takes as his project offering a refutation of PW.

Brief Interlude:

This should be good. I am almost giddy with excitement, I mean Pascal was afterall a genius but still I am sure A. Dave will handily dispense of this pesky Wager that has hung around for several centuries. I mean years from now the Wager along with the pet rock,  the AMC Pacer, and parachute pants will only be known in  museums and perhaps in Wikipedia under the heading of “Arguments for God soundly defeated by obscure atheists”  

So, without further ado here is A. Dave’s first point contra PW (Remember these are A.Dave’s points)

1. First, being that he was Christian, it’s clear Blaise Pascal was referring to belief in the Christian god. To the skeptic, however, one need only swap the name God for another name (Allah, Zeus, Odin, et al) because the fact is that most mainstream gods demand worship and punish those who don’t offer it. So which god should I bet on? How do you know the god you’re betting on is the right god? Is anybody really making a safe bet? (http://atheistdave.wordpress.com/)

Ok, I am a little disappointed with this first point.

i. First, A. Dave says that you can substitute the name God for another name…he then catalogs a list of proper names for conceptions of God. In other words he says you substitute a generic name *God* for a proper name *X,Y,Z*   I really hate to be picky but wouldn’t you want to do the exact opposite of what A. Dave has just stated? In other words why would you move from simple to complex?  The term *God* is generic and could mean any number of things to any number of people. While proper names (and he strangely omits the proper name of the Christian God to which he says Pascal was most certainly arguing in favor of) are far more complex as they communicate specific properties of the respective deity. A point made by Lycan and Schlesinger in their defense of PW (see here)

Well, point number one left a little to be desired but I am sure A. Dave has something spectacular planned for point number two. Let’s see: (Again the following is from Atheist Dave)

2.Second, belief is not a light switch. One can’t just say “Oh, in that case I believe.” In order to believe something is true, one must be convinced of its truthfulness. Threats like Pascal’s Wager do nothing to convince anybody of anything.(http://atheistdave.wordpress.com/)

I am stunned. I really did not anticipate the sadness I would feel seeing PW crumble under the weight of A.Dave’s critique. There is only one point that I would like to make in response.

ii. If belief is not open to being changed then by good and necessary consequence his post is pointless. However, assuming that he does not really believe  what he has written let me have a go at interacting with his comment.  He does not deal with *what* constitutes a justified true belief. Furthermore, he makes a statement that is roughly analogous with saying *all married men are no longer bachelors* by saying to believe something one must be convinced of its truthfulness. This *must* then leave open the possibility that someone somewhere could be convinced of the existence of God by PW. This is different than saying *I* am not convinced of the theistic position but that is not what A. Dave wrote.

Sadly, the merry-go-round of refutation must come to a halt. I do not think that Dave’s objection is all that serious nor is it philosophically refined enough to be taken seriously. PW has enjoyed serious discussion for many years (even centuries) and though Dave wants to dismiss it as a tool for the novice apologist this post has just scratched the surface as to the issues that could be raised in defense of PW.

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