Blaise Pascal must be turning in his grave. Duterte just mangled Pascal's wager and re-stated it to support the reimposition of the death penalty. "Let's impose the death penalty just in case there is no god." says Duterte. Yet, Pascal encourages us to take the win-lose nothing bet, which is -- there is a God, rather than the lose-lose nothing bet, which is the case if there is no god. The win-lose bet takes our interest to mind, as we win if we believe there is a god and act accordingly, and indeed there is a god, and lose nothing if there is no god, as all is lost anyway. The lose-lose nothing bet, which is there is no god, loses if there is a god -- "Oops! There is a god, damn" and loses nothing if there is no god -- "I was right but I'm still dead". But Duterte -- he's asking us to reconsider the lose-lose bet. And he's saying the lose-lose bet supports the death penalty. Jeez, non-sequitur. It's really another way of saying, there is no god, let the State kill if it wants, and never mind if it turns out that God exists.
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