Tonight is a simple post of a philosophy of one of my favorite writers, Blaise Pascal: A revolutionary French intellectual who stood firmly on the fact that a belief in a God, though seemingly pointless at times, may be an endlessly beneficial sacrifice.
"God is, or He is not"
A game is being played... where heads or tails will turn up.
According to reason, you can defend neither of the propositions.
You must wager. It is not optional.
Your reason is no more shocked in choosing one rather than the other, since you must of necessity choose.
Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing.
Wager, then, without hesitation that He is.
There is an eternity of life and happiness (to gain if correct)
There is here an infinity (length) of an infinitely happy life to gain, a chance of gain
A finite number of chances of loss
What you stake is finite
When one is forced to play, he must renounce reason to preserve his life
When there is the finite to stake in a game where there are equal risks of gain and of loss, and the infinite to gain."
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Monday, January 24, 2011
The Gaps Filled in
The Human mind is always racing with thoughts and ideas to, like a mop to dust, gather and scavenge for knowledge and information, storing and thirsting for more. This knowledge becomes immense, more vast than the that of the most technologically advanced super-computer. Each cell in the brain finding and delivering knowledge to it's beholder in a constant stream of thought.
However, every now and again we, as humans, come across a piece of knowledge that we cannot possibly hope to understand or comprehend. These lost subjects of ponderance tend to leave small, yet significant empty spaces in the constant stream we strive so hard to solidify. We are then left with no choice but to fill in these gaps with invalid beliefs, justifications, and theories. A majority of the time we don't even recognize the harm we are causing on our own sense of truth and logic, yet we need to. This is human nature, to fill in the gaps and solidify our peace of thought.
The purpose in writing this blog is to find the gaps we have filled in both personally and socially, and refill them with novel ideas that make sense to us. We are absolutely aware that you, the reader, may not agree with everything written here. The philosophies that will appear throughout this blog are our own personal ideas that we are using to fill our gaps. We hope we can help you to fill in your own.
Thank you for reading.
-N
However, every now and again we, as humans, come across a piece of knowledge that we cannot possibly hope to understand or comprehend. These lost subjects of ponderance tend to leave small, yet significant empty spaces in the constant stream we strive so hard to solidify. We are then left with no choice but to fill in these gaps with invalid beliefs, justifications, and theories. A majority of the time we don't even recognize the harm we are causing on our own sense of truth and logic, yet we need to. This is human nature, to fill in the gaps and solidify our peace of thought.
The purpose in writing this blog is to find the gaps we have filled in both personally and socially, and refill them with novel ideas that make sense to us. We are absolutely aware that you, the reader, may not agree with everything written here. The philosophies that will appear throughout this blog are our own personal ideas that we are using to fill our gaps. We hope we can help you to fill in your own.
Thank you for reading.
-N
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