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    Carmelics

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that It is rational for an atheist or agnostic who initially follows a mixed strategy (e.g., tossing a fair coin to decide whether to wager for God) to repeat that mixed strategy indefinitely after each tails result, because with probability 1 the coin will eventually land heads and the agent will wager for God.

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    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.Rationality is temporally indexed: an agent facing an infinite sequence of deferred decisions cannot treat each iteration as decision-theoretically equivalent to the first.
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    • 2.Each repeated tails result constitutes new evidence that the agent is disinclined to wager for God, rationally updating the prior that the mixed strategy will converge to wagering for God.
      ?

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    • 3.William James's 'will to believe' doctrine holds that genuine belief-relevant decisions must be live, forced, and momentous — a strategy of indefinite deferral renders the decision neither forced nor live at any given moment.
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      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Reason for 2 of 2
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    • 1.The claim conflates probability-1 convergence with rational obligation: almost-sure events in measure theory need not ground practical rational requirements, as Cain's objection to dominance reasoning in infinite decision theory demonstrates.
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    • 2.An agent who commits to repeating a mixed strategy after each tails result has effectively adopted a policy indistinguishable in practice from never wagering for God, since no finite tails sequence triggers revision of the strategy.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
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    • 1.After a tails result, the agent's expected utility reverts to that of an atheist or agnostic with no prospect of infinite reward.
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    • 2.Since the original mixed strategy was rational under those conditions, repeating it under the same conditions is equally rational.
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    • 3.A fair coin lands heads with probability 1 over an infinite sequence of tosses.
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