Edit: To clarify, when I say "accept Pascal's Wager" I mean accepting the idea that way to do the most (expected) good is to prevent as many people as possible from going to hell, and cause as many as possible to go to heaven, regardless of how likely it is that heaven/hell exists (as long as it's non-zero).
I am a utilitarian and I struggle to see why I shouldn't accept Pascal's Wager. I'm honestly surprised there isn't much discussion about it in this community considering it theoretically presents the most effective way to be altruistic.
I have heard the argument that there could be a god that reverses the positions of heaven and hell and therefore the probabilities cancel out, but this doesn't convince me. It seems quite clear that the probability of a god that matches the god of existing religions is far more likely than a god that is the opposite, therefore they don't cancel out because the expected utilities aren't equal.
I've also heard the argument that we should reject all infinite utilities – for now it seems to me that Pascal's Wager is the only example where the probabilities don't cancel out, so I don't have any paradoxes or inconsistencies, but this is probably quite a fragile position that could be changed. I also don't know how to go about rejecting infinite utilities if it turns out I have to.
I would obviously love to hear any other arguments.
Thanks!
My thoughts are pretty similar to those already expressed by ryancbriggs and MichaelStJules, and some others.
What does it mean to accept Pascal's Wager?
I understand Pascal's Wager to argue that it's more rational to believe in God than not because you end up in Heaven if you believe in God and not if you don't, and heaven is infinitely more valuable than any alternative. So even if your rational credence in God existing is very very low, it's still more rational to believe in God than otherwise.
I take the correct core of the argument to be that sometimes it can be prudential to believe in something you think is likely false (such as the existence of God and Heaven), or pursue some outcome you think is very unlikely (getting into heaven), because the value of the reward is high enough.
The general form of this argument is generally accepted and acted upon. People do similar sorts of things all the time when they pursue success in competitive or challenging environments with high rewards to the biggest winners, like high level professional sports, startups, tenure track academia, etc etc.
I'm don't know if Pascal's Wager has any implications beyond this?
In real life, there is no binary choice between 'Believe in God and have a chance of getting into heaven' and 'Don't believe in God and have no chance of getting into heaven'. There are several different major world religions, some very different sects inside the same religions, your own individual interpretation, the possibility of infinite utility from technological sources, etc. And this is without getting into how one actually achieves going to heaven in religions - sometimes it's not 'belief in our god and you'll get into heaven', but rather something involving structuring your life around the religion. And of course, many of these directly or indirectly oppose each other even apart from the opportunity cost.
Perhaps Pascal's Wager could be an argument to set one's life up to deliberately pursue even one source of infinite utility rather than none. I don't think this is the worst argument in the world and it could work as part of a cluster of arguments, but it's a pretty weak one in a vacuum since it's completely silent about crucial matters such as how to choose between any of these possible infinite utilities or how to pursue them.
I clarified in my edit at the top of my post what I mean by "accept Pascal's Wager". To repeat I see it as accepting the idea that way to do the most (expected) good is to prevent as many people as possible from going to hell, and cause as many as possible to go to heaven, regardless of how likely it is that heaven/hell exists (as long as it's non-zero).
As for what this entails I have no idea. For now I'm just trying to decide whether to pursue this aim or not. The way I would actually do that comes later, if I choose to accept.