TY - CHAP
T1 - Pascal's Wager (Substantive 2022 Revision)
AU - Hajek, Alan
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - “Pascal’s Wager” is the name given to an argument due to Blaise Pascal for believing, or for at least taking steps to believe, in God. The name is somewhat misleading, for in a single section of his Pensées, Pascal apparently presents four such arguments, each of which might be called a ‘wager’—it is only the third of these that is traditionally referred to as “Pascal’s Wager”. We find in it the extraordinary confluence of several important strands of thought: the justification of theism; probability theory and decision theory, used here for almost the first time in history; pragmatism; voluntarism (the thesis that belief is a matter of the will); and the use of the concept of infinity.
AB - “Pascal’s Wager” is the name given to an argument due to Blaise Pascal for believing, or for at least taking steps to believe, in God. The name is somewhat misleading, for in a single section of his Pensées, Pascal apparently presents four such arguments, each of which might be called a ‘wager’—it is only the third of these that is traditionally referred to as “Pascal’s Wager”. We find in it the extraordinary confluence of several important strands of thought: the justification of theism; probability theory and decision theory, used here for almost the first time in history; pragmatism; voluntarism (the thesis that belief is a matter of the will); and the use of the concept of infinity.
UR - https://ojs.tnkul.pl/index.php/rf/article/view/558
M3 - Entry for encyclopedia/dictionary
VL - 82
BT - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
A2 - null, Edward N. Zalta
A2 - Nodelman, Uri
PB - Stanford University
CY - Stanford
ER -