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Dilbert creator Scott Adams dies aged 68 after prostate cancer diagnosis
(www.independent.co.uk)
this post was submitted on 13 Jan 2026
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“Next, many of my Christian friends have asked me to find Jesus before I go. I’m not a believer, but I have to admit the risk-reward calculation for doing so looks so attractive to me, so here I go. I accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and look forward to spending an eternity with Him. The part of me not being a believer should be quickly resolved if I wake up in heaven. I won’t need any more convincing than that. I hope I’m still qualified for entry.”
What an absolute fucking goober. Good luck with that one, chief.
That's Pascal's wager, and it's nothing new.
There's plenty more about him that can be criticized.
Pascal's Wager is hilarious because it implies that their "omniscient" God is so stupid he can be tricked into thinking you sincerely believe. Sounds blasphemous to me!
I thank god everyday that I was made to be an atheist.
That's why this guy is better known for his contributions to computer science
writeln readln
I suppose it depends on if you think faith is inherently important or it's just the behavior.
I mean his paragraph is pretty much outright silly, but broadly you can decide that acting "right" might happen to help you in an afterlife scenario. Some specifics prescribed by religion are kind of arbitrary, but there's some common things about trying to be good to others.v Going MAGA like he did would seem to be a perilous move in that context.
How about the fact he used his status as a conservative voice to skip the line and get priority experimental cancer treatments? Not only did he die, but somewhere out there there is another person dead or dying because they got bumped from the treatment
I prefer the one where he was such a shitty father that he mused about not having to murder his own teenaged son after he ODed
Things are "experimental" because we don't know if they work, not because they are better.
Yeah, it could be that his final, worthwhile contribution to humanity was to be a line on a spreadsheet.
I refuse to believe the pantheons of gods didn't predict pascal's wager and hide an antipascal clause similar to Matthew 25:31 where not being an asshole will send you to heaven and being an asshole sends you to hell.
Don't believe in God, until you're standing at the pearly gates. St Peter hates this one weird trick
To be fair, that's a very Southern Baptist way to look at it. If you've ever read a Chick Tract (I'm so sorry), you'll know that many end with someone who lived mired in sin earnestly repenting and believing in God right before they die, and it's shown to work. Some other branches of Christianity, notably Catholicism, relax the emphasis on belief and put more stock into your actions while you lived – although they also believe most but not all sins can be pardoned if you confess and perform penance.
However, I would suggest that believing in God because of Pascal's wager is:
Obviously idiotic (this part we all know). There are an infinite amount of gods you could believe in that would have the belief requirement. Even if you assert that it's a belief in "a" god, how are we supposed to know it wouldn't be some god who values empirical reason and would look down on this belief? These infinitesimal odds you're wasting your only known life on aren't even strictly positive.
Something the God of the Bible probably wouldn't appreciate? Within the shared fiction of Christianity, he knows exactly what's in your heart, and I'm sure "I'm cooperating just so you give me the goods" doesn't play well. Granted that's kind of on God for being an abusive parent and threatening eternal damnation to anyone who doesn't, but I'm still sure he doesn't like people who game his abusive system for selfish ends.
I fucking love Chick Tracts and collect them. They are so wildly unhinged it's great
Seconding that Chick Tracts are comedy gold (Exhibit A). They're so feverishly deranged that they become an unintentional parody of evangelical Christianity. Solidly "so bad it's good".
They used to get left in the bathrooms on Washington State Ferries pretty reliably and I got together a pretty good collection. The first one I read was the classic Dungeons and Dragons one, this would have been pretty close to its first publication too. I wish I had kept those.
I used to get them as a kid, trick or treating. I kind of miss them in a messed-up nostalgia way.
There was a table in the NYC subway many years ago that had thousands of them and they were handing them out. I definitely took a couple, knowing full well what they are, for the sheer novelty.
Also to give them a few less to hand out to someone who might be susceptible because fuck em
I was hoping to find and share an image macro of Leela and Nibbler discussing the meaning of life, with Leela remarking, "So every religion is wrong!"
Unfortunately, all I could find is Leela/Nibbler porn. Lots and lots of it. Goddamn, humans. We should be lucky there's no judgemental god watching us all.
The Bible says that's ok so why not?
https://biblehub.com/topical/t/the_parable_of_the_workers.htm
"The vilest offender who truly believes, that moment from Jesus a pardon receives," so goes the old hymn.
You know that Jesus allegedly has said many times that not believing in God is the sinnest of sins? Down to hell with you, then.
Supply-side Jesus
That’s Pascal’s Wager, taken to the logical conclusion. Pascal’s Wager is basically the idea that debating whether or not God exists is meaningless; If you simply live life as if God does exist, then there are no downsides. Just be someone who God would want in heaven, and the actual belief doesn’t really matter.
But then when you take that to a logical conclusion, it basically turns into “there’s no downside if I’m wrong, and repenting on my deathbed means all my previous sins are forgiven. So why not repent right before dying, so my previous sins are forgiven and I’m dying with a clean slate?”
Different denominations have different opinions on it. Baptists tend to take the “fire and brimstone unless you repent, but you’re all golden after repentance” stance. So they would tend to agree with this scenario. This is also why southern baptists tend to be such cunts, because they tell themselves that their actions are righteous and backed by God, because they have repented. Basically, justifying evil is easy when you change the question from “is this morally evil” to “is this backed by my god?”
Catholics used to have a very hard “baptism washes away (almost) all sins” stance, but have recently adopted a more fluid “how you act in life is just as important as what you believe” stance. So older Catholics would have likely agreed, but modern Catholics would tend to disagree.
The more liberal denominations (like United Methodists) would scoff and say that faith without works is dead.
If he's a pascal's wager guy, I hope he died in battle just in case the Norse are correct. And his deeds in life kept his heart lighter than a feather, in case the Egyptians got it right. Etc.
He did, he died battling cancer.
Well, the cancer died, too. So technically it was a tie.
RIP Norm.
pascals wager is incredibly stupid and illogical. What about other 10 billion religions? What if accepting jesus now puts you down with 9,999,999,999 other religions?
Not what Pascal's wager is, afaik.
Jesus says many times that not believing in God is the ultimate sin. Thus, if you don't sincerely believe that God exists, you're fucked. Ergo, Pascal's wager is believing that God exists regardless of your actual attitude toward religion.
Which is why I said it is taken to the extreme logical conclusion. Many denominations believe that baptism and/or repentance is enough to wash away and forgive previous sins. After all, that was Jesus’ whole thing. So why bother believing for the majority of your life, when you can simply accept God on your deathbed? No need to believe your entire life, when believing right at the end is enough.
Adams had many detestable views, but I interpreted this as a sarcastic quip, mocking those who seriously think that way.
This is the guy that literally begged Donald Trump to cure his cancer.
No he begged Trump to strong-arm KP into giving him special treatment. That's just nepotism, not magical thinking.
Yeah he was obsessed with his own intelligence and loved mocking those who disagreed with him
Les paris stupides...
Gods hate him!
See how he faked his way into heaven using this one weird trick!