Entries that relate to Pascal’s wager.
If you’re intrigued by Biblical “undesigned coincidences” in, especially, the Gospels and Acts, you might want to check out some videos. You can go to YouTube and search for undesigned/coincidences/mcgrew, and you can also look specifically at the series there, “Beginner’s Guide to Undesigned Coincidences” (23 of them). See if you agree that these coincidences … [Read more…]
The author of this book is a French conservative and classical liberal. His take on the famous Wager — in chapter 2 — is that Pascal is urging the reader to adopt a mindset in which he is at least open to the possibility of Christian belief; in that regard I note (21-22, footnotes omitted) … [Read more…]
At the end of his sermon this week, our pastor noted Dilbert-creator Scott Adams’s recent conversion to Christianity, in which the cartoonist cited his own imminent death as the motivation. And our pastor noted the irony that death, Satan’s malign doing, and human trepidation of it and what comes after have resulted in driving so … [Read more…]
I’m happy to begin the New Year with this blogpost: I noted earlier my excitement on hearing about a new biography of Blaise Pascal, and I successfully solicited it as a Christmas gift. This blogsite is, after all, named for works by Pascal and my other great Christian hero, C.S. Lewis. *** The book did … [Read more…]
One of the blurbs on the back of the cover jacket describes Charles Murray as, “Arguably, the most consequential social scientist alive.” Yes, indeed, and so I was delighted to hear of this book and to get an advance copy of it. It is similar to another book published earlier this year, Ross Douthat’s Believe: … [Read more…]
There’s a new Blaise Pascal biography out, and I’m looking forward to reading it. You can listen to the author, Graham Tomlin, discuss it and, especially, its subject here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFeo0LTQONA . The full title of the new book, by the way, is Blaise Pascal: The Man Who Made the Modern World. Addendum: Here’s my discussion … [Read more…]
It is exciting to have a book of Christian apologetics on the New York Times best seller list — debuting at number eight among nonfiction hardbacks! I will give you a quick summary and my bottom line first: The book begins with chapters on how recent science on fine-tuning, human consciousness, and supernatural events like … [Read more…]
That’s the title of this short piece I posted the last Sunday of January on National Review Online. I’ll note that the post has attracted 168 comments so far, but I have no idea whether that is a high or low number for this venue. Anyway, here’s the post (and I hope all my fellow … [Read more…]
Just FYI and FWIW: I typed in “fine-tuning god arguments summary” into my Chrome search engine, and here’s what its AI says: AI Overview The “fine-tuning argument” for the existence of God claims that the universe’s physical constants and initial conditions are so precisely balanced to allow for life that it indicates a deliberate design, implying … [Read more…]
I was googling “best gospel books” or something like that and, lo and behold, I found the subject of this blog post, namely Leo Tolstoy’s The Gospel in Brief. My thought then was, well, Tolstoy was one of the great writers of all time, and a committed Christian, and so it would make a lot … [Read more…]