Philosophical Argument 

    One of Blaise Pascal’s most influential arguments was about the necessity of believing in God, which became known as Pascal’s wager. Pascal presents the wager in Pensées, his personal notebook that was published posthumously. The wager is presented as a conversation between Pascal and another person. Pascal initially posits that the belief in God is God-given, saying “the conduct of God, who disposes all things kindly, is to put religion into the mind by reason, and into the heart by grace” (Pascal 52). The wager is not an argument for the belief in God, as one cannot gain that through reason, but an argument for the desire to believe in God. Pascal is trying to persuade people to alter their lives to live in accordance with God. Pascal thinks that it is not wrong to not believe in God, it is only wrong to not try to find belief. Those who do not want to believe are foolish and do not care about themselves because “duration of this life is but a moment; [that] the state of death is eternal” (Pascal 59). So everyone should care about this, according to Pascal. Ultimately humans cannot know the true nature of God or if he even exists, as we are finite beings with limits while God is an infinite being with no limits. Because reason cannot give us information about God, we must wager on it. There are two options, the first being that God exists, and the second being that God does not exist. There is no third option that one can use to opt out of wagering. The wager presents the idea that there is much more to gain from believing in God than there is to lose, while there is much more to lose from not believing in God than there is to gain. Pascal highlights happiness as a key factor in the wager. If one wagers that God exists, they will gain eternal happiness if he does and lose nothing if he does not. If one wagers that God does not exist, they will lose eternal happiness if he does and gain nothing if he does not. So Pascal says there should be no hesitation in the wager for God’s existence. He argues that there is so much more to gain from wagering on God’s existence than there is from wagering against it, so one should obviously do the former. Pascal acknowledges the contrast between certainty and uncertainty, as one is staking certainty in life for uncertainty in eternity, but he argues that despite this the wager is necessary and we should not abstain from it because of uncertainty. He highlights the fact that humans do many things of uncertainty such as sea voyages and battles (Pascal 69). Additionally, there is the obvious question of whether or not one is putting too much at stake by wagering on God’s existence, as one would have to give up their self-love and many pleasures of life in order to live in accordance with God (Hazelton 192). One could argue that the promise of eternal happiness is well worth the high stakes. Pascal responds that the wager is ultimately in one’s own interest and a leap-of-faith is necessary to possibly save their life. 

    Pascal’s Wager has been a popular topic of discussion since its conception. The wager relates to the larger debate of the nature of God. Pascal is a clear believer in God, but he adopts a unique argument of not attempting to prove God’s existence, as other philosophers, such as Descartes, do. Pascal adopts a naturalistic stance in his argument when he says “let us now speak according to natural lights”(Pascal 66). This means that Pascal gives up his ability to use “revelation, transcendence, or supernatural beings” to make his points (Hunter 113). Between this and his lack of appeal to reason, he does not have a lot to work with to make his argument. Descartes also adopts a naturalistic stance, but contrary to Pascal, he relies solely on reason to prove God’s existence. Pascal’s argument can only be viewed as successful when it is emphasized that he is not attempting to prove God’s existence, as it would be incredibly difficult to do this with the restrictions he puts on himself, but is instead trying to persuade people, specifically non-believers, to alter their lives to act as if they did believe in God. Pascal’s Wager does fit into the debate of the nature of God, but perhaps only slightly. In the Pensées, Pascal indeed talks about the nature of God, for example saying “God has set up in the Church visible signs to make Himself known to those who should seek Him sincerely” (Pascal 53). However, this is not directly part of the wager itself. Pascal’s wager can instead be seen as part of the larger debate of how people should act. Pascal is advocating for civil obedience motivated by a desire for eternal happiness. The wager can also be tangentially related to the debate of what happens after death. Although he does not elaborate on it much, Pascal implies that there is an afterlife of sorts, where people who led holy lives will go to be in eternal bliss, and those who did not live holy lives will go to live in eternal damnation. God will decide where one goes based on how they lived their life. 

    Pascal’s Wager reflects Blaise Pascal’s alternative interests in mathematics. He is combining his philosophical ideas with his mathematical ideas of probability. Despite mathematics often being more objective than philosophy, Pascal’s application of it to the question of God’s existence fails to remove the uncertainty. This highlights the difficulty of proving God’s existence. Perhaps Pascal is right that the belief in God is a gift from God and one cannot understand or prove it through reason. 

Glossary

 

Life: Pascal uses life in two ways. The first describes life after the original sin, or life for us today. The second is life as God intended it to be. If one wagers to believe in God they must alter their life, as in, life after original sin, to be in accordance with God.  

 

Wager: Pascal uses wager (or game) as a metaphor for belief organization. He wants one to look at their beliefs and how they come to their beliefs in a different way. 

Certainty/Uncertainty: One has certainty of something when they know what is going to happen, while uncertainty results from a lack of knowledge of what will happen. In Pascal’s case, what will happen after death is uncertain, while what will happen in our lives is certain.