Le Cafe Mouse - Helen's musings on the web - Java Skills and Thrills
"God who creates and is nature is very difficult to understand, but he is not arbitrary or malicious." OR "God does not play dice." - Einstein
Le Cafe Mouse - Helen's musings on the web - Java Skills and Thrills
"God who creates and is nature is very difficult to understand, but he is not arbitrary or malicious." OR "God does not play dice." - Einstein
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
As long as you can endure the suffering of hell?
Le Cafe Mouse - Helen's musings on the web - Java Skills and Thrills
"God who creates and is nature is very difficult to understand, but he is not arbitrary or malicious." OR "God does not play dice." - Einstein
Le Cafe Mouse - Helen's musings on the web - Java Skills and Thrills
"God who creates and is nature is very difficult to understand, but he is not arbitrary or malicious." OR "God does not play dice." - Einstein
Pascal's Wager is a prudential argument for cultivating a belief in
God's existence. An undogmatic atheist must admit that there is at least a
small chance that God exists. However, God assigns believers infinite bliss
and unbelievers infinite blitz. Thus the expected value of theism is
infinite. So however much finite good accrues from secular living, the
religious life is the best bet.
Le Cafe Mouse - Helen's musings on the web - Java Skills and Thrills
"God who creates and is nature is very difficult to understand, but he is not arbitrary or malicious." OR "God does not play dice." - Einstein
42
Pascal's Wager is a prudential argument for cultivating a belief in
God's existence. An undogmatic atheist must admit that there is at least a
small chance that God exists. However, God assigns believers infinite bliss
and unbelievers infinite blitz. Thus the expected value of theism is
infinite. So however much finite good accrues from secular living, the
religious life is the best bet.
42
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
42
42
Le Cafe Mouse - Helen's musings on the web - Java Skills and Thrills
"God who creates and is nature is very difficult to understand, but he is not arbitrary or malicious." OR "God does not play dice." - Einstein
Originally posted by Warren Dew:
I've never found the St. Petersburg 'paradox' to be at all paradoxical. If you take the actual amount of money that the house has as a limit to what it can actually pay you, the value of the bet ends up being small.
And even if it weren't, using some form of arctan as one's utility function - or, indeed, any bounded utility function - fixes things.
Le Cafe Mouse - Helen's musings on the web - Java Skills and Thrills
"God who creates and is nature is very difficult to understand, but he is not arbitrary or malicious." OR "God does not play dice." - Einstein
I think you have that wrong. Christianity (at least a strict interpretation) says that no one can be saved unless they have been baptized. Heretics were burned because they were a danger to society not because they can't be redeemed. If the king is claiming to be king by the will of God, what would it mean if you are claiming that his God is not the real God! There is no reason that a heretic can't confess their sin and be redeemed.Originally posted by Jeroen Wenting:
Christianity makes a clear distinction between heretics (those who believe in other gods) and unbelievers.
Unbelievers can be converted (in the case of Mormons even post-mortem), heretics can never be redeemed (which led in the past to them being burned at the stake to show one's own dedication to god).
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Originally posted by John Smith:
TP: Note: Technically there is a distinction but all go to hell...
Heretic - a Christian who abandons one Christan sect for another
Let me try to understand this. A Christian who was a catholic and becomes a protestant is a heretic and he goes to hell? How about a protestant who becomes a catholic? Or do you mean to say that it's OK to switch sects as long as both of them are Christian?
42
Originally posted by Warren Dew:
Helen Thomas:
The surprise ending I believe is that if you were completely rational in the economic sense of the term- maximizing your expected utility- an eternity in hell would be the sure outcome.
Ah, but it's an infinitesimal amount of time compared to the subsequent eternity I get to spend in heaven.
42
Originally posted by Mohanlal Karamchand:
if saintly lady dies and goes to heaven, of what use to her is a covey of virgins ?
42