this post was submitted on 18 Jun 2024
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xkcd #2947: Pascal's Wager Triangle (xkcd.com)
submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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In contrast to Pascal's Wager Triangle, Pascal's Triangle Wager argues that maybe God wants you to draw a triangle of numbers where each one is the sum of the two numbers above it, so you probably should, just in case.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago (7 children)

I’m not sure I get what this is saying.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

Blaise Pascal is famous for 2 things:

  1. Pascal's triangle. This describes how to expand expresions of the form (a+b)^n as well as to compute how many ways there are to pick k objects out of a set of n (ignoring order.

This triangle is computed by starting with 1 at the tip, then having each element be the some of its 2 parents (except the diagonal edges with only one parent, which remains as 1)

  1. Pascal's wager. This is a theological argument for a belief in god that goes "if you believe and god doesn't exist, nothing happens. If you don't believe and he does exist, you suffer for eternity. The logical choice is therefore to believe"

The natural conclusion is therefore to believe in all gods. If procelatizing happens in just the right way, and no one realizes people are talking about the same god, you end up with a triangle of polytheists, where the number of gods they believe in is given by Pascal's triangle.

Edit: gid -> god

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (2 children)

All hail Gid!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

Gid is gud

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Finally something to believe in.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Thanks! I wasn’t familiar with 1.

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