Deism

[SLD]

Reading a new book on the American Revolution that challenges our traditional notion of Deism. We think of it as belief in a watchmaker god, but that’s more of a 19th century view of Deism. For an 18th century educated man, Deism was equivalent to Pantheism. Thus the reference to "Nature and Nature’s God" in the DoI is more a call to freedom from god for the political body. Deism for an 18th century philosopher was not really different than atheism.

Thoughts?

SLD

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

The clock maker God comes straight from Descartes, who most certainly was no Deist. According to Descartes, God created the laws of nature and set them into motion. Life itself was created by the laws acting on matter such as movement of hands of a clock were caused by laws acting on matter designed by a clock maker. And this in and of itself was not new, medieval thinkers like William of Okham accepted that God created nature, secondary causes, and did not act by an unending series of miracles to create the Universe we see around us.

 

[ideologyhunter]

How was deism "not really different than atheism"? Spell that out a bit.
Here's a representative quote from Voltaire: 'It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason.'
It seems to me that what Voltaire intuited from the perceived order in the universe is the opposite of atheism. What he said in the quote could be said on the 700 Club today. Had Voltaire's life span occurred at a forward jump of 80 years, he would have read Darwin and, very likely, abandoned the idea of a necessary deity.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Voltaire's quote, and indeed Deism and Pantheism as a whole, is really nothing more than a God of the Gaps argument. They're essentially saying "The universe is a complex place and I can't imagine it all just happening on its own - therefore God".

They spice the terms up with some philosophical sounding bullshit, but the core of them don't change from that.

 

[bilby]

How was deism "not really different than atheism"? Spell that out a bit.
Here's a representative quote from Voltaire: 'It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason.'
It seems to me that what Voltaire intuited from the perceived order in the universe is the opposite of atheism. What he said in the quote could be said on the 700 Club today. Had Voltaire's life span occurred at a forward jump of 80 years, he would have read Darwin and, very likely, abandoned the idea of a necessary deity.

Deism is not importantly different from atheism, if you are part of an organised church that considers having power and authority as important.

Churches hate both; they don't really care about the details.

 

[Jobar]

Deism is, I think, a dualistic idea; God is totally apart from the universe, indeed has no connection with it apart from creating it, then setting it to run untouched.

Pantheism, OTOH, is monistic; God is totally synonymous with universe. Merely different sides of the same coin.

I'd have to do some googling to find it, but Dawkins once wrote an article where he said something like "deism is watered-down theism; pantheism is sexed-up atheism." While I wouldn't state it that way, IMO his point seems valid. (It was also in The God Delusion.)

 

[Bomb#20]

Reading a new book on the American Revolution that challenges our traditional notion of Deism. We think of it as belief in a watchmaker god, but that’s more of a 19th century view of Deism. For an 18th century educated man, Deism was equivalent to Pantheism. Thus the reference to "Nature and Nature’s God" in the DoI is more a call to freedom from god for the political body. Deism for an 18th century philosopher was not really different than atheism.

Thoughts?

SLD

I don't think you can generalize that way -- there were a lot of 18th century philosophers. Certainly deism and atheism were very different things for Thomas Paine. You should read "The Age of Reason". Not just for clarifying what Deism was to one specific 18th century philosopher -- it's quite a good book in its own right.

 

[SLD]

How was deism "not really different than atheism"? Spell that out a bit.
Here's a representative quote from Voltaire: 'It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason.'
It seems to me that what Voltaire intuited from the perceived order in the universe is the opposite of atheism. What he said in the quote could be said on the 700 Club today. Had Voltaire's life span occurred at a forward jump of 80 years, he would have read Darwin and, very likely, abandoned the idea of a necessary deity.

Well, what did Voltaire mean by God? If it was Spinoza's god, then it’s pantheism, which really isn’t different than atheism. This is the point of the book I’m reading which is about the American Revolution which he argues was not merely a revolution against Britain but also against religion itself. We freed ourselves from God he argues. He starts by discussing Ethan Allen's book, The Oracles of Reason, and how he noted that it mirrors Spinoza. So to do many other founders views of god. And there are others who are largely forgotten who shaped the revolution in that fashion. See, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Young_(American_revolutionary). Young influenced Allen and Adams directly.

It was also common for ministers to accuse Deists of atheism. And yet these people embraced the label, privately if not publicly. Franklin especially said that he was convinced of Deism reading religious tracts opposing it.

SLD

- - - Updated - - -

Reading a new book on the American Revolution that challenges our traditional notion of Deism. We think of it as belief in a watchmaker god, but that’s more of a 19th century view of Deism. For an 18th century educated man, Deism was equivalent to Pantheism. Thus the reference to "Nature and Nature’s God" in the DoI is more a call to freedom from god for the political body. Deism for an 18th century philosopher was not really different than atheism.

Thoughts?

SLD

I don't think you can generalize that way -- there were a lot of 18th century philosophers. Certainly deism and atheism were very different things for Thomas Paine. You should read "The Age of Reason". Not just for clarifying what Deism was to one specific 18th century philosopher -- it's quite a good book in its own right.

True. Thomas Jefferson pointed out that he was a sect unto himself and what he believed was known but to him and god alone.

SLD

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

Deism at it's core is the idea that God exists and can be proven by logic, and one need not rely on revelation for knowledge of God.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deism
For deists, human beings can know God only via reason and the observation of nature, but not by revelation or by supernatural manifestations (such as miracles) – phenomena which deists regard with caution if not skepticism. Deism is related to naturalism because it credits the formation of life and the universe to a higher power, using only natural processes. Deism may also include a spiritual element, involving experiences of God and nature.^[13]
...
Too many men of letters of the time agree about the essential nature of English deism for modern scholars to ignore the simple fact that what sets the Deists apart from even their most latitudinarian Christian contemporaries is their desire to lay aside scriptural revelation as rationally incomprehensible, and thus useless, or even detrimental, to human society and to religion. While there may possibly be exceptions, ... most Deists, especially as the eighteenth century wears on, agree that revealed Scripture is nothing but a joke or "well-invented flam."

 

[SLD]

Deism at it's core is the idea that God exists and can be proven by logic, and one need not rely on revelation for knowledge of God.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deism
For deists, human beings can know God only via reason and the observation of nature, but not by revelation or by supernatural manifestations (such as miracles) – phenomena which deists regard with caution if not skepticism. Deism is related to naturalism because it credits the formation of life and the universe to a higher power, using only natural processes. Deism may also include a spiritual element, involving experiences of God and nature.^[13]
...
Too many men of letters of the time agree about the essential nature of English deism for modern scholars to ignore the simple fact that what sets the Deists apart from even their most latitudinarian Christian contemporaries is their desire to lay aside scriptural revelation as rationally incomprehensible, and thus useless, or even detrimental, to human society and to religion. While there may possibly be exceptions, ... most Deists, especially as the eighteenth century wears on, agree that revealed Scripture is nothing but a joke or "well-invented flam."

Deism means different things to different people. To many of our founders, particularly Franklin and Jefferson their understanding of God was essentially Spinoza's, which today we call pantheism. It wasn’t a standard understanding of Deism that we have today. Their contemporaries viewed such beliefs to be atheism. Franklin famously said he was converted by a sermon opposing deism. That sermon also accused deists of atheism. It didn’t stop Franklin's conversion. His view of god was no different than our view of nature.

SLD