Re:South African authorities admit to mass surveillance
by gargravarr on Tuesday September 03, 2019 @09:49AM
(#20866419)
See also: Pascal's Wager[1]
The leaks about mass-surveillance don't fit the criteria, as best I can tell. It's in their best interests not to, as you state.
Re:South African authorities admit to mass surveillance
by derpherpsson on Tuesday September 03, 2019 @10:57AM
(#20867076)
Pascal's wager suffer from the fact that it can be any of the myrriads of religions that are correct. The chance of picking the correct one is infinitely small (assuming there are aliens that also have religions). Only a subset of the religions have anything like hell/heaven, further diminishing the risk.
Re:South African authorities admit to mass surveillance
by Shorel on Tuesday September 03, 2019 @12:47PM
(#20868429)
I think the main issue with Pascal's wager is that it puts all its eggs in the basket of some afterlife being a certainty.
You can very well waste all your life in pointless prayer, like the monk who basically imprinted his feet on the wooden floor by praying several hours a day for decades.
Even getting out of that room to help someone in a trivial task would have been much more useful than the praying.
Not to mention the huge amount of censorship over your own thoughts that some religions impose on your life.
So, IMO, if you get the wrong end of Pascal's wager, you can waste your only life, every infinitely valuable second of it (because there's no afterlife), over a non-existent afterlife.
That's a hell of a wager to lose.
Isn't it obvious? In both cases people do the smart thing (which is not necessarily the "objectively correct" thing).
Faith in Allah, God etc, is a good social glue, and is personally comforting, helping regulate emotions, etc.
Similarly, not believing the Snowden story helps them fit with their social group (e.g. republicans), relaxes their mind from a whole lot of worries and concerns, helps re-enforce their personal beliefs (e.g. in good government), etc -- and most importantly, has no real disadvantage in their day to day life and work...