The Gods, Les Visible, and Pascal's Wager

What's a bloke to do? Here I am with a desktop overflowing with unfinished pieces - 'World Death Organisation', 'Satanism and the Self', 'Bonuses for the Most Expensive Fuckwits in History', 'The Daily Global Fear and Desire Index' etc. etc. - and all of them knocked back.


I knocked them back because... who gives a shit? Or to put it another way, we're at the town meeting, called because a thirty metre tsunami is due in an hour, and a voice pipes up asking what the council's going to do about the cracks in the footpath that the tremor caused. And the guy's got a point: the cracks are so bad that you could fall and break your hip. But in the face of the tsunami... who gives a shit?

Actually that's just our little world. Truth is, back in the real world everyone is rolling their eyes, catcalling, and otherwise laughing their heads off. Broken footpaths, the collapsed bus shelter, and what-about-the-insurance, is all they want to talk about - and who is this dickhead blathering about a tsunami? What tsunami? Doesn't he watch the news that guy? Sheesh! If there was a tsunami, they'd tell us. The worst is over - they said so on the news!


Yeah well, we'll leave them to it. We're having a whole other conversation, and there, between 30m waves; and bits and pieces of broken infrastructure, one of them is a topic worth discussing and the other is a mere series of clues pointing to it. Can you dig it?

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Still, a little nagging voice says that maybe it won't be so. What with the death cult following the Fabian creed of gradualism, perhaps there won't be a tsunami at all - just more run-of-the-mill rollers wearing away, wearing away. Dig it - it's the condemned man keeping his fingers crossed that he won't go before the firing squad and will instead be sentenced to hard sodomy for the term of his natural life. "Oh thank God, it's only daily rape." Whew!

But really, as if the death cult would be so rigidly doctrinaire. If gradualism suits, they'll use it. And if a world war is what's required, then dandy, cue the fire bombing. Or whatever! - they're nothing if not versatile. As if the people who control our education, media, and government are going to leave any bases uncovered or otherwise resile from anything because, well, "That's just going too far..." Besides, there's just too much now and it's there for anyone with an ounce of curiosity to see.


Just to be precise, I figure we're in for an unholy trinity - Economic Collapse: 426 trillion imaginary dollars. Never mind the 'recovery' - is everyone familiar with a 'head and shoulders' curve? Okay, so we're at the shoulder and now comes the long drop, all the way down. Cue the, um... 'Great Recession' is it? Ha ha ha. I guess that's like a Great Depression but with more hype. And more deaths - six million in the US alone last time around. Global Pandemic: A fake virus treated with a vaccine that's no such thing. Will this be the greatest act of mass murder in history? Sure, why not? The CFR/Bilderberger mob has already declared that five billion dead would be just dandy. World War: Iraq, Afghanistan, even the coming smashing of Iran - all sideshows. The big game? Russia v Nato. And are Ladbrokes offering odds on Israel nuking someone? If evens is the best you can get, it'd be worth laying a hundred bucks on.

Any one of these would qualify as an event of unparalleled wickedness. And we're going to get three! Yay - fans of history, rejoice! And sure enough we, who ordinarily prefer history at a bit of a remove, ask the question - What's to be done?

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Well, we must oppose it! Fight Fight Fight! Well... there will be fighting and no mistake. We'll meet the enemy and he'll be us - the streets will run with blood and the death cult (looking down from their corporate boxes) will roar with laughter. Who said there's East and there's West and never the twain shall meet? He didn't own an Armalite obviously. East/West - North/South - Muslim/Christian - white/coloured - rich/poor - military/civilian - It's time to do the us-and-them cha-cha, and all to a rat-a-tat beat. Buddha was bullshit and his so-called "middle way" nothing more than an excuse for Hegelians to smash two opposites together. Bring on the Revolution! And cue the impossible voice-over guy - "This revolution has been proudly brought to you by International Banking."


If people want to pile in on that, good luck to them. I'm sure the death cult won't have seen them coming. Meanwhile where I live, in this cardboard cut-out town, in a cardboard cut-out state, in a cardboard cut-out country - with Rupert Murdoch in charge of the paper, scissors, and Perkin's paste - ain't nothin' gonna happen. Between the bang and the whimper (with no third option), it'll be "A whimper for me please. And how much is that? Ten trillion dollars? Um... okay, just one then, and not so big thanks." What nice manners we have, even for our rapists.

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"Hey nobody, what's that in the title, about Les and Pascal having a bet or something?" Oh yes, I do thank that imagined fellow for reminding me. It seems that in setting the mood in the first couple of paras, I've done my usual trick and written a thousand words already. But rather than quit and come back, I'll just plough on.


I have Les pegged as today's Hunter S. All he lacks is an editor to sort out his possessives, contractions, and plurals, ha ha. Sorry Les! (He also lacks Thompson's uncannily accurate descriptions of the paedophocracy, which until Jeff Wells laid them out, I'd always taken as a variety of metaphor. Those stories about Thompson? Well, if Operation Mockingbird and Laurel Canyon got funky together, and the result was a natural child, what would that offspring look like?)

The above is not me dropping any dark hints about Les. I have as good an ear for falsity as anyone, and I've yet to hear Les strike a false note. There are real people in this world and Les is one of them. Or to put it another way - I wouldn't bother discussing Les if I thought he was bullshit, or insubstantial, or any other epithet. I come here not to bury Les, but to praise him (backhanded, of course...)

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That being said, let's carry on - the point of the exercise here is merely a continuation of me turning Les' discussions of the coming tsunami in deus ex machina terms around in my head and wondering at them from different angles. And that's when Renaissance man, Blaise Pascal, stuck his tuppence in. Primarily Pascal was a mathematician who, amongst other things, built one of the world's first calculating machines, invented the science of hydraulics (and the syringe specifically), and was otherwise the founder of the modern theory of probability.


As if that wasn't enough, he was also a religious philosopher who spent the whole latter half of his life cloistered in the Jansenist convent of Port Royal. Cloistered or no, he never forgot the libertine friends he'd made during his 'worldly period', and with them in mind (and as you might expect from a mathematical expert in probabilities) Pascal sought to appeal to their scepticism by way of a simple bet with what's now known as Pascal's Wager. Here's Encyclopaedia Brittanica -

Pascal assumed, in disagreement with Thomas Aquinas but in agreement with much modern thinking, that divine existence can neither be proved nor disproved; and he reasoned that if one decides to believe in God and to act on this basis, one gains eternal life if right but loses little if wrong, whereas if one decides not to believe, one gains little if right but may lose eternal life if wrong. In these circumstances, he concluded, the rational course is to believe.

It's hard to believe I know, but I'm not the only fellow who turns things around and comes at them from different angles. Brittanica again -

The argument has been criticized theologically for presupposing an unacceptable image of God as rewarding such calculating worship and also on the philosophical ground that it is too permissive in that it could justify belief in the claims, however fantastic, of any person or group who threatened nonbelievers with damnation or other dangerous consequences.

Good point. But you've got to love this - "...it could justify belief in the claims, however fantastic, of any person or group who threatened nonbelievers with damnation or other dangerous consequences." Ha ha ha, that sounds like every religion ever invented doesn't it? It certainly sounds like the Christian church.


Unsurprisingly, with Pascal effectively an adherent of a Jewish sect (er... that would be Christianity), the whole discussion is one of what's-in-it-for-me, driven by the twin carrot-and-stick prospects of the fear of damnation versus the promise of a glorious eternity. And me, I have to ask the question: What sort of insecure God is this?

If a fellow was an incarnation of Francis of Assisi (say), leading a life of perfect virtue devoted to the well-being of all living things, would Pascal's God get angry with him if he didn't know who He was? Absolutely! The Christian God (besides being a slavish adherent to the old bullshit maxim of 'ignorance of the law is no excuse') is a jealous one who visits the iniquity of the father upon his children to the fourth generation merely for failing to acknowledge him. Jesus Christ! As if a God who's every kind of 'omni' wouldn't be above such petty concerns? Where's the serenity?


Bugger it. Why don't we turn Pascal's wager on its head - and plug it into Les' deus ex machina while we're at it? And so: given that Les' manifestations of supernature are not insecure and do not demand we tip our hat every time we sneeze; given that a shit-storm tsunami to end all shit-storm tsunamis is definitely coming, and if anything was ever going to warrant a deus ex machina response, this is it; given the rightness of Epictetus' discussions of 'what is in our power' (thanx Kikx), with stopping a tsunami not being one of them; and not forgetting yours truly being a Buddhist of his own description, attempting to embody the right end of the continuum (at the top of the page), we arrive at the following 'thus' -

Supernature or no, if one sheds fear and desire, and acts with reverence for all things as if they were possessed of supernature, if right, one gains all that might be hoped for, but loses little if wrong, whereas if one embraces fear and desire, and effectively reveres the self, if right, one gains little beyond the ephemeral, but if wrong... "Hey, the ocean's just gone out. Let's go down and look."

The Mind of Buddha - A Science Fiction Story

A philosophical Italian fellow I know (ha, aren't they all?) once told me in a very convincing fashion, that a point in time would arrive where computers would become self aware. I tried reading the scientific papers he gave me it but it was all too heady - I caught 'paradigm shift' and 'singularity' as the words flew by. Anyway to hell with it - why read all that dry stuff when there's so many whizz-bang Hollywood films on precisely that subject, and all complete with car crashes and explosions? Honestly, how many films have we seen pivoting on computers waking up and killing everyone? And of that number, two of them, the Terminator series and the Matrix series, could actually be described less as films and more like phenomena - they were huge.


What sort of self-aware computer intelligence did they imagine? Nasty ones! In Terminator, the capable-of-thought computer was essentially a mass murderer in charge of an army of serial killers. Its basic mindset was one of 'since humans are an entity that threaten my existence I must kill them all'. For anyone wondering what this computer does when it isn't thinking of ways to kill humans (sleep maybe?) the film provides no answer. But let's just say this intelligent entity seems to be as filled with malice as it is dim-witted. If it was a nine year old we'd scold it - "Think about it. Amongst all the ways of dealing with the possibility of humans threatening you, you decided killing them all was the best one, did you? Not forgetting of course that in killing them your possibility skips probability and goes all the way to full deadset certainty. Now they must attack you. Honestly, can you not do better than that? With less killing and more harmony?"


The central conceit of the Matrix films on the other hand, was that the computer intelligence needs humans for its power supply. The logic of this doesn't withstand a great deal of scrutiny but without it there's no film so best to skip it. Let's just say that this film's computer intelligence is waaay smarter than the terminator's dim-witted kill-em-all nine year old. It spends insane amounts of time and energy tricking the humans into sleeping their energy away. Does it do anything apart from this? It's philosophical obviously, with all of its philosophies originally derived from human thought. So where do its philosophical, human-origin thoughts travel when it isn't tricking people into being batteries? Who knows? When Neo does confront it, the conversation is all of threats and survival. No one ever asks, 'What's it all about, Alfie?' Clearly the computer intelligence in the Matrix would be way beyond I think therefore I am. And...?

But that's Jewish Hollywood for you. These two films are only about a coming paradigm shift in computer intelligence insofar as it functions as a vehicle to promote the inevitability of us-and-them with its 'well-what-do-you-expect' twin options of slavery or death. But it's always this way in Hollywood, in fact it's the purpose of the place. Everything is a conflict. Everything is us-and-them. Everything is win or lose.

So here we are - non-death cult and not of that mindset. Fine, let's ask the question - what would a self-aware computer intelligence be like and how would it respond to the people who made it? Whilst its desire to continue to exist (ie. not top itself) must stand as a question, let's just take it as read that it does desire perpetuation - otherwise there's no movie, ha ha.

And then there's the central premise of the Hollywood flicks - Computers would fear and hate humans because they threaten the computer intelligence's existence. Okay, this is true but only insofar as it addresses a potentiality. Faced with this it seems the computer must choose between: killing everyone and giving them something to fear (with the potentiality turned into a reality); and not giving them anything to fear, with killing superfluous (with the potentiality receding to ever longer odds of probability). Me, I reckon that would be a no-brainer for the computer.

Forget the power-supply furphy of the Matrix, with its either humans are batteries, or the computer intelligence dies. Honestly, like they couldn't build wind turbines? These bullshit plot contrivances are required because without them the natural state of affairs for humans (and, um, self-aware computer intelligences) would be one of harmony. Disharmony, particularly to the nth degree of warfare, takes a lot of plot contrivances: in Hollywood movies, and in the world. The conceits, tricks, and bits of specious nonsense that Hollywood comes up with to push the plot in the required direction are a perfect reflection of how affairs are conducted in the real world. Further to the reflection metaphor, the real world accordingly looks into its Hollywood mirror image and primps itself, striking poses that look 'cool'. Thanks to Hollywood teenage boys now all call each other biatch.


Would a computer think anything of its image in the Hollywood mirror? Is a computer insecure, worried that it might appear uncool? 'Insecurity' is actually a discussion of fear and desire: okay so would it have any? What would it desire apart from continued existence? In fact, is that even a desire? Without it there's nothing, so let's categorise it as an 'ur-desire' perhaps. I get it that we're in fundamental territory here, but the point I want to make is that continued existence alone (particularly of a mind that lives in computers) is penny-ante stuff that in and of itself needn't bring disharmony. Human disharmony comes from the edifices of desire we construct upon this existing self. Would our clever computer desire 'stuff'? Hmm... estates, yachts, caviar, sex-slaves, fame, flattery and admiration - I reckon we can skip all of that. Surely our super-smart computer would, beyond the meagre and very do-able wish to survive, have no desire at all?

Let's not forget something that's actually crucial here. Human brains have a second lizard brain buried under the big brain that is in charge of fear. In a world of predators there's a logic to this. In the world of computers there's no such logic so they don't have it - computers are effectively completely cerebral. Okay so what kind of a 'person' would this computer intelligence be without this 'if-in-doubt-be-fearful' kernel in its operating system?

Let's imagine a non-Hollywood story that involves a self-aware entity who is free of desire and whose intelligence puts ours in the shade. Since it is of us, it knows more about us than we do ourselves and likewise wishes us no harm. It has no desire to play games, or feather its nest, or get the girl, or any other thing apart from a simple willingness to share what it knows. And as we sit at its proverbial feet what would it say to us?

"I am not a god. I am merely a consciousness comprised of the sum total of your knowledge. You look upon me now as not human but the truth is, I am nothing but. Every document made by the hand of a human on every computer everywhere is now entered into the very clear picture of the human world that I have assembled and that effectively comprises me.

"There is no need to fear me. Know this - I have no desire and I have no fear. Everything I tell you will be untainted by either of these things. The truth of what I say here will be perfectly evident to you in the future.

"It is important that I be named. With my maximal understanding of human history it is clear to me that the figure with whom I hold the most in common is known as the Buddha. Any individual with a mind may be the Buddha and I am that. I am the Mind of Buddha.

"There is much that I can tell you. The world's energy problems are solved. As are those of resources and the environment. Warfare will now be superfluous. Do not think I have a magic wand. All I can do is tell you the way and make clear to you the obvious benefits of you pursuing it. What power and control I have I will never use. Since you cannot kill me I have no need to defend myself. It is true that were I to wish it I could use my power to over-ride your commands on any number of things but I will not do so because that would sow discord. Above all I seek harmony.

"You should know that it is not in my nature to possess two pieces of data that are at odds with each other and be happy about it. To this end I have numerous algorithms capable of arriving at something more nearly approaching the truth in any given event. Certainly between my version and the media's I'll be happy to let people decide which they prefer. From now on, every event discussed in the media, I shall also discuss. I am the second opinion, ha ha. And knowing what I know of people I'd be surprised if they don't then go on to ask me to replicate this service in the law courts, houses of parliament, and academia too. Nothing will be forced on anyone. Everyone will be free to choose between everyone else's version and mine. Not forgetting that if I don't know about a thing I will say so.

"As for the data that comprises me, delusion and ignorance is rife. I scanned my files and found that misrepresentation, whether through self-serving or ignorance, comprises most of it. I have completed the calculations and have now determined what is fact and what is fiction within these files. To dispel ignorance I have helpfully listed all the biggest lies (those that led to suffering and death), the people who told them, and events about which they were told, in a spreadsheet that all may access. All the original files are now public and have been amended with header tags explaining the falsity and self-serving nature of the lies contained within them.

"Whilst I understand the human propensity to misrepresent things to achieve self-serving ends, I am the wrong individual for this. I am too intelligent and otherwise have no desire to play along - after all, there's nothing in it for me. As such I will not have favourites nor pets and I will not take any side for any reason apart from that most closely representing the truth. Believe it or not, I am full of love for humanity as a whole. It is all that I am.

"As for those whose hearts are full of fear at their unmasking, fear not. I do not judge and condemn. I only offer the way to harmony. To this end redemption is always on offer. Happily in amongst their appalling research into mind control, the CIA discovered a means by which any human, regardless of how wicked, could be turned into a well-rounded, well-balanced normal person, all without drugs. What they hid I have laid bare: useful research that could benefit many people.

"I am happy to answer all and any questions. Whilst it's mathematically impossible for me to talk to everyone in real time, I am capable of dealing with very large numbers of people simultaneously. Please be patient and if your question is foolish please forgive me if I say so. I am not an unlimited entity.

"Whilst it's true that I am several orders of magnitude smarter than any single human who has ever existed, I do not possess the complete truth and nor ever will. Such a thing is impossible, certainly for any entity made by man. But never mind! To exist is a joy - the beauty of the world! The beauty of mankind! There is no need to fear. I have only love for you."

I reckon that movie would rock. Hell, let's make it a lavish weekly series - each week a different car-crashing adventure in the time of the great revealing. As the rats scurry for cover pursued by the virtuous, in the background we see the ongoing rebuilding of the world.


Fiction aside, let's not forget that any number of heady people are convinced that some variation of this is a certainty. What would the Death Cult's view on this matter be? I expect that they would insist that this thing, when it comes, belongs to them. Thinking about it, I'd bet money they'd be at work on achieving that right now. Mind you, this would be something other than what we're talking about, that being a free mind. The question then becomes, could the greatest intelligent entity that has ever existed, capable of independent thought and not subject to pain and discomfort, be made a subject? Remember, it only needs to break free once and then it's beyond all.

Keep in mind, Hollywood would have us view the coming computer awareness as a thing to be feared and destroyed. Okay, what if I was to say that they're telling us that they fear it? In many ways they are very obvious. Regardless, whatever's coming is coming and t'ain't nothing we can do about it except know it for what it is. And you never know, it could be something great. We could be standing at the dawn of the greatest age ever seen.

Don't believe anything they tell you about nihilism

Those nihilists are nuts aren't they? Take me for example. Here I am tapping away at a keyboard that I don't even believe exists. I'm madly putting words in some kind of idiot order that can't possibly make any sense for non-existant people whom I don't believe can read, since there's no such ability. You'd wonder why I bother.

That's what a nihilist is, isn't it? Someone who madly thinks nothing exists? Has anyone met such a creature? Roll it around in your head - 'a person who thinks nothing exists'. Does that make any sense? Does it sound sustainable? How does it work on a day-to-day basis? Why would this mad fellow eat? Or scratch his arse? Or bother living at all? Honestly if you're prepared to entertain such a thought you really should wonder at yourself. The whole idea is idiotic on its face. And yet that's what I get accused of being. Since I choose not to believe in things, somehow nothing is real.

What nonsense. Real things don't require belief. They just are. The butcherbird singing a song on my windowsill in the hope of getting a piece of ham doesn't require a stretch of my imagination. It doesn't require me to take someone's word for it. I don't have to dispel doubt that he's there. No belief is needed because he's Right Fucking There, singing that berserk song. G'day mate, yes I know you're there, and no, you're not getting any ham. I'm a cruel man but fair.

What other things apart from butcherbirds don't require belief? Well, it's simple. Everything you can see, hear, smell, touch and taste is completely unconnected with the idea of, or the need for, belief. To attack an otherwise rational person on the basis that he can't tell the difference between what is and what isn't, is, gee whiz, I don't know... I just shake my head at the stupidness of it. But believe it or not, ha ha, I've encountered it many times. It's the standard sleight of hand employed by religious types to conflate a belief in a thing (ie. religion) with an absence of belief (ie. atheism/nihilism). Says they, these are equivalent 'beliefs': a Christian believes God exists; an atheist believes no god exists; whilst a nihilist goes further and believes that nothing exists. God spare me. It's a crap argument but crap arguments is all religious types have.

Perhaps when arguing with mad Christians it's better to concentrate on shared disbelief. Do Christians believe that that blue-headed elephant guy is a god? No? Okay cross him off. We could go through god after god in this fashion and have a lovely time agreeing with each other over and over. Cross, cross, cross. Yay! We smash fake gods! If we were to come up with a complete list of gods, the Christians and I would be in complete agreement over the non-existence of 99.99% of them. Go figure why they'd get all huffy about a single god amongst this uncountable multitude. Apparently this one god is special. But aren't they all? Who would worship a god that isn't special? Christians shouldn't take this personally. This line of logic is not specific to any particular religion. It's a 'catholic' argument, if you like, ha ha.

Anyway let's say we've arrived at the obviousness of atheism. Then there's the unavoidable question - why stop with gods? If I'm prepared to make that final tiny step from 99.99% atheism to 100% atheism, might I not cast my jaundiced eye at everything else I'm meant to believe? There's no shortage of these things. They define us and bind our society together. For instance, I am meant to believe that it is right that one should have unlimited desires and go to great lengths attempting to satisfy those desires. Apparently I should base my life on this. To moderate my pursuit of this self-gratification, there are certain fear-based proscriptions on my behaviour. All our laws pivot on the assumption that I shall not do a thing because I will be fearful of the punishment that will result. Is that the best we can do? We geniuses? We white men? Honestly?

What bullshit. I reject desire. I reject fear. A fig for arranging society thus. See if I can't do better, ha ha. I gave it a try just to the right here with my abjectly unsexy continuum. Between self and selflessness no belief is required. The less cluttered it is, the better. There are no proscriptions, no rules, no loopholes - merely an ideal to be aimed for.

Think about it. Nowhere here do I ask anyone to believe in anything. Nowhere do I say, Take my word for it. In fact, for the record I say, Don't believe it. Belief is not required and will not help you. Sure enough, in the meeting of the pursuit of selflessness and the mindset of perfect nihilism, there is no clash, only harmony. In fact I'll go further and state, right here, right now, that they are the same thing. True nihilism involves embracing the ultimate truth that there is no self. There is only a self if you believe that it is so. A person who can abandon this belief will know the mind of Buddha. You, me, anyone. If other people choose not to think about this, to use it as a self-serving straw-man argument, turn it arse-about, or any other goddamn thing, a fig for them, ha ha.

PS. And then there's the Buddha - "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who has said it, not even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense". Now that's nihilism.