Now, as I'm sure many people are aware of, logic and religion don't often meet, which is why this particular article stuck out to me. As many of you, my loyal readers, are aware, I am an atheist and firmly believe that mathematics is one of the most important subjects we cover in our lives. So, reading someone mathematically prove that we should all be devout christians was quite surprising to me.
the proof went like this:
Let's suppose we flip a perfect coin, with a perfectly random result. If it lands on heads, we will win $50, but if it lands on tails we win nothing. Our expected winnings, if we play the game a large number of times, according to the law of large numbers, is $25, because:
.5 (the proportion of results that yield us money) times $50 = $25 and:
.5 (the proportion of results that yield us no money) times $0 = $0
Add the two of these together and we get $25, our expected winnings.
Now, let's apply this to the christian faith. Suppose we lead devout christian lives and God rewards us for this by admitting us in to heaven where we live in paradise for eternity, since it is forever, the reward is 
(infinity, sorry it didn't come out as well as I would have liked). Suppose, now, that there is no God, and we live our lives accordingly and die at the end of it, here our reward is Zero. Now let's assume that, after our life is spent ignoring the presence of God, we are sent to Hell for our sin, for we have broken the first commandment, and done so most of our lives, our gain here is eternal suffering, hence we win - (negative infinity). So, if we write everything up, we get:
(infinity, sorry it didn't come out as well as I would have liked). Suppose, now, that there is no God, and we live our lives accordingly and die at the end of it, here our reward is Zero. Now let's assume that, after our life is spent ignoring the presence of God, we are sent to Hell for our sin, for we have broken the first commandment, and done so most of our lives, our gain here is eternal suffering, hence we win - (negative infinity). So, if we write everything up, we get: X (the chance there is a God) times (the reward for believing in him) =
(the reward for believing in him) = (1-X) (which is the chance there is not a God) times 0 (the reward for believing in him) = 0
Expected reward:
Sounds pretty good, now if we don't believe in God:
X (the chance there is a God) times - (the reward for not believing in him) = -
(the reward for not believing in him) = - (1-X) (the chance there is not a God) times 0 (the reward for not believing in him) = 0
Expected reward: -
Hold on, this can't be good. Assuming we don't believe in God, our expected reward is -, the worst possible loss imaginable. This means that, for anybody familiar with gambling, it makes more sense to worship God than to not worship him, as it has the greatest likelihood of yielding an appealing reward.
, the worst possible loss imaginable. This means that, for anybody familiar with gambling, it makes more sense to worship God than to not worship him, as it has the greatest likelihood of yielding an appealing reward. So, christians, statistically speaking, y'all aren't as crazy as I originally took you to be, I apologize.
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