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    <title property="dct:title">Pascal's Wager, After G&#xF6;del</title>
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    <p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_Wager" title="Pascal's Wager &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">The short answer</a>: it doesn't matter.</p>
    <p>The long answer is the universe (or <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiverse" title="Multiverse &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">multiverse</a>, or universe of multiverses, or whatever) is clearly a system that works <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle" title="Anthropic principle &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">because here we are</a> despite the spectacular (and not-so-spectacular) <a href="http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Constants/index.html" title="Fundamental Physical Constants from NIST" rel="dct:references">ways it could fail</a> at so many levels.</p>
    <p>If it's a system that works and we're in it, we're <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_incompleteness_theorems" title="G&#xF6;del's incompleteness theorems &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">never going to be able to model it completely</a> or perceive outside of it, because that would entail just a bigger system that we're also in. Moreover, there will <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heisenberg_Uncertainty_Principle" title="Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">always be a gap</a> between the actual universe and any model we can construct of it; there will always be a source of new phenomena to observe, so we shouldn't worry our pretty little heads about it.</p>
    <p>But if there is, say, an entity that can appear to intervene on physics in ways that are interesting to human beings, it is necessary that it be part of the same system we are, which is to say equivalent to a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke%27s_three_laws" title="Clarke's three laws &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">very technologically-advanced alien</a>. It is important, of course, to recognize that that is not the same thing as a deity. I'm sure there are <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation" title="Drake equation &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">plenty of entities</a> out there that might superficially qualify, but we have <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox" title="Fermi paradox &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">yet to produce a viable specimen</a>.</p>
    <p>Now, if there was an entity that <em>was</em> truly capable of intervening on the fundamental elements of our system, it would necessitate that it was on the <em>outside</em>, which would mean that all information moving across the system's boundary would be constrained to <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0133093/" title="The Matrix (1999) - IMDb" rel="dct:references">manipulating the rules of the system itself</a>. But in that event, how could anything within the system, that is how could <em>we</em>, perceive the difference between an intervention and any other natural phenomenon?</p>
    <p>Of course, if I'm wrong, then <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_G%C3%B6del" title="Kurt G&#xF6;del &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">G&#xF6;del</a> is wrong, which <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_paradox" title="Russell's paradox" rel="dct:references">compromises mathematics</a>, which compromises science, which compromises technology, which basically makes us all subject to the caprice of some big sadist in the sky. And that isn't a very fun existence in my opinion.</p>
    <p>Therefore: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mu_%28negative%29" title="Mu (negative) &#x2014; Wikipedia" rel="dct:references">it doesn't matter</a>.</p>
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