Skeptic’s Wager

What have you got to lose? In another article I discussed the faults of Pascal’s Wager. As a reminder it suggests a belief in a god just in case. A certain wager with no drawbacks. However, Pascal doesn’t specify which god to worship or mention that an omniscient deity would know you’re just faking a belief to avoid eternal punishment. For this article I’d like to discuss the flip side to this coin, a Skeptic’s Wager. Some claim there is no harm in committing a whole life to Mormonism. The following is what you have to lose.

The law of chastity is an excessively strict and ambiguous set of dogmatic rules enforced with no verifiable evidence. Don’t question authority, but practice strict obedience. The only rare exception to the law is happy healthy married couples on the same level of sexual libido. For everyone else they are denied healthy sexual gratification. Single people can’t masturbate. Dating couples can’t express love. Homosexuals must be abstinent for life. I’m not advocating for a wild unbridled raging orgy of fornication, but certainly not a suffocating restriction enforced by suicidal guilt. Food, water, shelter, safety, and sex are essential to complete health. Happiness blossoms from a balance of psychological, emotional, physical, sexual health.

The average household income in Utah is $65,977 which means that Mormon families are surrendering $6,598 every year adding up to hundreds of thousands over the course of a working career. “But the Church helps with humanitarian aid” is an offensive excuse. If you found out The American Red Cross only contributed some 3% of your donation to charitable causes you’d be outraged. The real estate of the Church is estimated at about $35 Billion. Someone’s gotta pay the electric bill and keep all the temples excessively lit at all hours of the night because God never sleeps. The reason the Church is secretive about their finances is not because it’s sacred, but because people would be furious to know how much is profit and how little is charity. Even Jesus would flip tables.

Time is Money and Mormons also commit their time, about 1/7th of their life. Spending 3 hours every week in church accumulates some 13,260 hours in an average life expectancy. To include the laws of keeping the sabbath day holy greatly restricts weekend options. As I’ve left the Church I’ve effectively doubled my weekend and I love it! Now, Sunday is just a bonus Saturday. Would you rather go to 3 hours of church every week or do absolutely anything else you want to do?

Mormonism uses emotional fear tactics of eternal consequences to enforce behavior. “You can live with you family for eternity in celestial paradise… as long as you strictly follow all these dogmatic commandments and if you mess up you’re screwed”. The teaching is that we are all sinners, born ill and commanded to become well. I think there can be value in feeling bad for doing things that are actually bad, but Mormonism claims a different moral structure. They define ‘sin’ and ‘righteousness’ unsupported by evidence and this leads to a cognitive dissonance of guilt for doing things that are not immoral. An omnipresent invisible God even condemns telepathic thought crimes. God is always watching and judging so be good for goodness sake.

The Church presents the ideal pattern of life to follow; school, mission, marriage, children, repeat. A long list of laws and guidelines have Mormons living all very similar lives. Without religion I have the ability to be an independent free thinking individual capable of making my own decisions. I eat and drink what see fit. I’m not limited to how I dress or my choice of underwear. I can choose which movies I watch and what music I listen to. I can pierce or tattoo my own personal body if I choose or color my mohawk blue. I can express sexual intimacy of informed consent with those whom I love. I can donate my money to a reputable charity if I feel like it. I can receive proven health care in place of faith healing.

An atheist has everything to live for during this one chance at life and nothing to die for with no fear of eternal punishment. What do the religious have to lose? An entire lifetime committed to a fiction when they could be making their own informed decisions and living how they choose. Basically everything. What do the atheists have to lose? A consoling fiction of a life after death. Atheist lose belief in non-scientific claims. That’s the Skeptic’s Wager.