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danc4498 ,

I’m not sure I get what this is saying.

homura1650 , (edited )

Blaise Pascal is famous for 2 things:

  1. Pascal's triangle. This describes how to expand expresions of the form (a+b)^n as well as to compute how many ways there are to pick k objects out of a set of n (ignoring order.

This triangle is computed by starting with 1 at the tip, then having each element be the some of its 2 parents (except the diagonal edges with only one parent, which remains as 1)

  1. Pascal's wager. This is a theological argument for a belief in god that goes "if you believe and god doesn't exist, nothing happens. If you don't believe and he does exist, you suffer for eternity. The logical choice is therefore to believe"

The natural conclusion is therefore to believe in all gods. If procelatizing happens in just the right way, and no one realizes people are talking about the same god, you end up with a triangle of polytheists, where the number of gods they believe in is given by Pascal's triangle.

Edit: gid -> god

danc4498 ,

Thanks! I wasn’t familiar with 1.

BradleyUffner ,

All hail Gid!

Ookami38 ,

Gid is gud

Crashumbc ,

Finally something to believe in.

TeddE ,
@TeddE@lemmy.world avatar

Pascal was a famous thinker of their time, particularly in mathematics.

Two of the ideas they're remembered for are Pascals Triangle and Pascals Wager.

Their triangle is a helpful tool for combinations of things. Their wager is a (kinda bad in my opinion) argument for why you should believe in the Christian God.

The xkcd comic is a combination of both ideas

BradleyUffner ,

Ahh, so I did actually understand it... I thought for sure I was missing something since they are usually way more clever than this.

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