A scholar named Paul Tobin has written a book titled The Rejection of Pascal’s Wager.  Subtitled: A Skeptic’s Guide to Christianity. One can read it on the internet if one is so inclined.  Here is the link.

My question concerns why you would want to.  I have corresponded with Mr. Tobin about this and he assures me that he makes converts to the atheist cause.  I don’t believe him, even as I confessed to him that his book is excellent and thoroughly destroys Christian pretensions.   The book strikes me as a classic case of preaching to the converted.  Paul thinks (or says he thinks) otherwise.  He thinks he is as good at converting away from Christianity  as the original Paul of biblical fame was at converting in the other direction.

Hardly an atheist alive knows the terrain as well as Paul Tobin but what of it?   Unless one is preparing for a career as an anti-Christ crusader, why would you want to fill up your brain with so much lubricant?  And where will being an anti-Christ crusader get you?

If I am right to think that the book is superfluous for most atheists and would be dismissed by all theists despite their not having any good points of rebuttal, and if I am also right in believing Mr. Tobin knows this, then the reason for his writing the book is a mystery on a par with the doctrine of the holy Trinity.    It occurs to me that most books that have a “persuasion thesis” are like this one.     Has somebody you know changed his mind about the death penalty or abortion as the result of reading a book?   Most of the people I know can’t even be persuaded to see or refrain from seeing a movie because of movie reviews.  People are wise.  I happen to know that thinking causes indigestion and I recommend against it.  I know it never did anything good for me.    So, Paul, if you are out there and reading this, watch out for stomach aches.