It is obvious for any Atheist and agnostic that there is an infinitesimal probability that a universe-altering God can exist. What about those who believe God does not interfere with human life and the laws of the universe? This describes the deist, contrary to a theist, they derive the existence of God through personal experience and reason. Like atheists and agnostics they reject supernatural events and that God does not interfere with humans.
In my opinion, the majority of atheists and agnostics have a problem arguing with deists. There are no apparent logical fallacies nor do they explicitly contradict science in their argument. It also seems impossible to logically argue against a God that is beyond logic.
The typical atheist versus deist dialogs goes something like this:
Atheist: “Do you believe in God? (while holding back smirk).”
Deist: “Yes I do.”
Atheist: “Lol! You think the world began 6,000 years ago!”
Deist: “Oh, I believe in evolution - I don’t actually believe in miracles or prophecies, I just think God is beyond our knowledge.”
Atheist: “Uh, but you do know it is statistically improbable for God to exist.”
Deist: “Lol! God is beyond statistics or any other science – I just think he is exists and I don’t let that fact change how I live. Do you find something wrong with that?”
Atheist: “Well, fuck, Dawkins didn’t prepare me for that.”
Well, is anything wrong with being a Deist? Yes there is, but it is a question of ethics like abortion and whenever we bump into a moral dilemma we turn towards philosophy.
Believing in a deist God is a meaningless belief. The word meaningless carries some emotional baggage to it, so allow me to clarify what I mean. When I use the word meaning, I am not referring to the meaning humans impose on objects or events. For example, some people find fishing symbolic of the time they spent with their father and is meaningful in that regard. In this example, the son or daughter imposes the meaning on fishing. The way I am regarding something as meaningful is whether it appeals to logic and reason. When I assert that a deist God is meaningless, I am implying that it doesn’t appeal to logic and reason. Logic cannot answer whether the deist God is true or not.
A good way to figure out if a given hypothesis is true or false is to insert it into the scientific method machine:
The hypothesis of Intelligent Design is easy to find false because when it’s inserted into the scientific method machine it comes out a falsity. This implies that intelligent design is ‘meaningfully’ false. However, when you insert God into the machine, it gives you no answer because you cannot prove God’s existence using logic. You cannot derive the God hypothesis as meaningfully true or false. Therefore the God hypothesis is a meaningless one and will forever be in hypothesis stage.
There are an infinite amount of meaningless hypotheses that you can come up with. Why should you believe in one meaningless hypothesis over the infinite amount you can think of? The fact is, you don’t, and there is a good reason for it. In your daily life you never allow meaningless hypotheses to affect your life in a meaningful way. You use logic in the choices you make. For example, you know the sun is going to come up the next day because it has been doing so for your whole life. Never do you allow a meaningless hypothesis affect your daily choices. Why should the deist believe in a meaningless God? He would only be contradicting the way he lives.
Assume the deist does allow a meaningless belief to affect his life meaningfully. Then what is stopping him from using other meaningless hypotheses? If this deist wanted his behaviors to be consistent, he would seriously consider that global warming is a result of a shortage of pirates. Having meaningless beliefs affect your life meaningfully is a detrimental behavior that should not be practiced.
In summary:
The Deist has two options.
1) Believe in a meaningless supernatural God, and have it affect his life in a meaningful way.
2) Believe in a meaningless supernatural God, and have it NOT affect his life in a meaningful way.
In the first case, the deist is committing an irrational act that is similar to that of a theist. Most likely if you believe in a meaningless God, I can assume you are extracting some meaning from it or else you wouldn't be believing. In this case, again, you are being irrational like a theist.
In the second case, the deist is similar to an atheist. Both understand that God is a meaningless hypothesis and both don't let it affect their life. There is something contradictory about this sort of deist. How can you believe in God and not extract meaning from it at the same time? There must be a reason for believing.
In other words, there is no such thing as a deist, only a theist or atheist in disguise and it is probably the former.
5 comments:
"Assume the deist does allow a meaningless belief to affect his life meaningfully. Then what is stopping him from using other meaningless hypotheses?"
This somehow presupposes that belief in something meaningless acts as a sort of "gateway drug" for other meaningless thoughts, which is fallacious.
Life on this mud ball we call home -- finite, mortal life -- is, itself, without substantial meaning, compared to even our galaxy. Our lives are brief, and their impact is minimal when seen over spans of time still short compared to the age of the universe.
Yet, we assign meaning to our lives. The assignment of meaning provides comfort and context, both of which we -- as social primates -- find satisfying.
Lack of belief in a deist or theist god is no guarantor of humane treatment, civility, or scientific achievement (the regimes of Stalin and Pol Pot both showed us that).
Humans are, by nature, irrational. When we have any power, we tend to abuse it. When we have any advantage, we tend to use it. We are cruel beasts. As predators, we like killing things. As primates, we like establishing a clear social hierarchy. We are cunning. We have culture, and we have language. We will use our signs and symbols to manipulate subjective experiences, using semiotic and linguistic tricks as a wedge to pry the still-budding rational mind away from the fertilizer we call a brain.
Regardless of what we will attempt, most of us will always believe something irrational, and others -- believers and disbelievers -- will always use that irrational belief to control others. That is the great bug in our programming. That is the sign that we are mere stewards, destined for a temporary reign upon this world, soon to be surpassed by a much less troublesome form of life.
So I believe. ;)
Deism was initially created as a mixture of belief and logic and it is irrational to assume that a deist believes in a God because of some moral conviction. A deist's belief, in the classic sense of the word, should be derived from the notion that at some point in time, before "mass" and "action" as the deists of the Enlightenment described mass and energy, began to exist or interact, that is, before the universe began to... be... there was some force which set these into action. Modern deism should not be in contrast to science, because modern deism is simply the acknowledgement that within the laws of physics, and within the known universe, there is no possible scientific explanation of "why" the laws of physics are the way they are... only how. Deism embraces this by pointing out that a force, which could be described as godly, had to have started the universe in motion, for you cannot have something out of nothing -- you can have a big bang, and a set of laws which allow the something to come about, but somehow those laws themselves exist.
Until science answers that question, it is not merely a matter of faith to assume that some force started it in motion, as long as we do not make the fallacy of giving this force additional importance.
Thraxamer,
The Deist has two options.
1) Believe in a meaningless supernatural God, and have it affect his life in a meaningful way.
2) Believe in a meaningless supernatural God, and have it NOT affect his life in a meaningful way.
In the first case, the deist is committing an irrational act that is similar to that of a theist. Most likely if you believe in a meaningless God, I can assume you are extracting some meaning from it or else you wouldn't be believing. In this case, again, you are being irrational like a theist.
In the second case, the deist is similar to an atheist. Both understand that God is a meaningless hypothesis and both don't let it affect their life. There is something contradictory about this sort of deist. How can you believe in God and not extract meaning from it at the same time? There must be a reason for believing.
In other words, there is no such thing as a deist, only a theist or atheist in disguise and it is probably the former.
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Humans are irrational, but it won't be that difficult for you to realize why that could cause trouble sometimes. You can't expect to sue somebody for not giving you a million dollars, no matter how much faith you have in him giving it to you. Being an irrational organism is not an excuse for being irrational.
Foresst,
If something is unknown, let it just be unknown. Why assert a supernatural God as the next best alternative?
impressive lecture but at the end u probably think tat god exists contradicting a deist... in that case i would expect u to be an atheist or an agnostic or at the least an apatheist but here u r a theist which is a worst case scenario after such a long description about the logical science and intelligence
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