Honestly, it’s all quite confusing. Deism seems like a form of agnosticism. They ,I’m told, believe in a god /creator of everything, but not that the god /creator would be something we have a relationship with.

With atheists there are different types, I most recently learned.

To me, an atheist doesn’t believe in any creator or observer ‘god.’ And certainly don’t worship any diety. Most have a sort of code of ethics that they follow, mixed out of what they personally percieve is the ‘right’ thing to do.

I don’t think I know any deists. At least none that ‘know’ who or what created this universe. So I’m not sure how they calibrate their moral compass.

To me atheisim makes more logical sense.

If something did create what we know of as the universe, I think it would have been intelligent aliens. For what purpose? No idea.

The problem with any creator theory, to me, is Who created the creator. And who created them etc. No matter what created us, it had to simply materialize out of nothing. That’s the biggest hole in deism or any creator beliefs.

Deism sounds ok to me until it gets to the “there must be one creator” part, supposedly as evidenced by the universe… how?

Atheism often means actively sure there is nothing like spirituality, and seems to manifest in devout pseudo-scientific skepticism, which to me is fairly annoying.

I think you might want to describe what your views are before asking us to label you. ;-)

This whole thing gives me A.- D.- D.- ism.

I don’t see why it’s a big deal to find a “group” to someone who basically doesn’t pray to God, and who doesn’t like organized religion. If you do believe in God then ok, you believe in God, but don’t care about organized religion. Why do you need some label to fit into? do you believe in God or not?

I think you should be a Reform Jew. You don’t have to be religious at all, you can believe in God or not, you can go to synagogue or not, and your basic schtick is hoping for peace in your family, community, and the world. You do good on earth to help those on earth. No obsession with doing good to get into heaven. No worry about the afterlife, just a concern for our fellow man and society at large. A Reform Jew can change their mind about being an atheist or a theist and it doesn’t matter. Theism is not a requirement to be part of the group.

Of course, we Jews aren’t supposed to convince anyone Judaism is the right path. I’m only explaining something you might be interested in even from just a learning perspective about what’s out there, not even necessarily what you should do, or identify as.

If I had to choose from your list I would side on deism but I’m agnostic. As far as where the universe came from the only thing I’m reasonably certain of is it did not happen the way religion says it did. There is just too much gray area to be able to come to the conclusion that there is no creator or creators of some type either. That said being atheist or deist means different things to people. To some it refers to the god of religion. I don’t see it that way, I see it as encompassing possibilities of creation outside of religious doctrine also. I think agnosticism is the only honest stance and the most scientific one.

atheism, of course
no evidence for a god ->no justification to assert that there is one.
it does not matter whether you ascribe specific actions, names, or characteristics to this god or not.

To me, deism.

I like the concept. It stands right in the middle. It refuses organized religions, but it doesn’t dismiss God. I wouldn’t call myself a deist, though, I don’t know about deism in details. I just have this opinion that science and religion are not opposed, but can be combined. That’s how I came up with an idea that there is a god who created this world in the ways we now know through science (like, causing the Big Bang, for example) and not as any religion says. When I voiced my opinion, I was told it was a deistic view.

So I “chose” it as my religious stance. It is right in the middle. That is why I like it. To me, it was a new, fresh option, that gave me a chance to avoid choosing between two evils. (arrogant, hateful internet atheists and fatalistic and willfully blind religious fanatics. Also, I don’t like churches, except as buildings, but I do like religions, even though I am aware they are man made and not the real truth).

I probably chose to like it more because of it’s “why not both?” nature. My motto is, if you have to choose between the two, look for the third. (it leaves more space for imagination. And it makes me feel rebellious.)

Is it an idiotic reason to choose an religious stance? Probably. I never said I was smart. I don’t preach it either, so in my mind it gives me right to believe whatever the hell I want.

Have a nice day!

Deism is sexed up atheism.

It’s the “I’m not religious but I’m spiritual” version of atheism.

There’s no material difference between the two.

I believe in God but I don’t argue about it and I don’t try to convince anybody about it. Never did, never will. Life is way too short to get into it over such a topic.

Since there is no way for me to know whether a personified God exists, I am sure that I am not an atheist. Being unable to accept the commonly held belief that a man sits on a throne in heaven deciding who will be allowed to join him and who will be condemned to perdition, I cannot be a theist. This seemingly leaves categorizing me as either agnostic or deistic. However, both require accepting the possibility that the universe or an entity that created it did not have a beginning or ending, neither of which is satisfactory.

Scientific evidence suggests that from the beginning of time, the universe has evolved from a form of pure energy into the present state of existence and that evolution is ongoing. I imagine the momentum of evolution is a creative force that individuals may take from or add to by choosing to be largely guided by their inherited animal instincts or by altruism rising from conscious awareness of their part in a greater whole. This makes more sense to me than atheism, agnosticism, theism or deism.

To answer your question, Which position makes more sense, atheism or deism?

Neither makes sense. It isn’t a logic problem. It isn’t something subject to the scientific method. Belief/faith arises from experiences and understanding and interaction with the world. Yet two people with similar thought processes, similar experiences and interactions, could arrive a deeply different conclusions.

I honestly don’t know. The idea of a personal God makes no sense to me but on the other hand the idea that the Universe just created itself out of random bits of nothingness doesn’t make much sense either.

@Seek that’s what Dawkins would say.

@ARE_you_kidding_me – I’m a big fan.

“Makes more sense?” Well, which makes more sense, hitting the brakes to stop at a stop light, or praying for God to stop the car at a stop light?

Atheism, hands down. Deism implies that there is a god of some sort.

If a god started the universe where did that god come from? To me deism raises as many questions as it answers.

@Dutchess_III most deists reject prayer and revelation. That’s what separates deism from theism.

Before the theory of evolution, there was one big question that atheism could not answer. How could life form out of randomness? Deism made sense then. Now that evolution has provided the answer to the question, there is no need to believe in God. As Richard Dawkins puts it, God is redundant.

Aren’t all those who believe in some super natural, omniscient being “deists” @NerdyKeith? they believe in a “deity,” right?

@Dutchess_III You might be thinking of the term “theist.” Deists specifically believe in a god who set everything in motion but doesn’t intervene in our day-to-day lives.

Why would a deity set everything in motion then just disappear?

One could imagine if I wrote a super complex computer program that simulated reproduction, evolution, laws of physics, etc, and then just let it run for awhile, it could grow into (not possible with current computing power, but feasibly imaginable in the future) a simulation of an entire society, with thousands of inhabitants, and I am still just one person and don’t have time to check up on all of my creations and make sure they’re all doing OK. I’m out living my own life. I might not even feel like the “lives” I’ve created in the machine are “real,” so I might not care.

I don’t necessarily believe in the hypothesis that the real world is all a computer simulation. But this is just an example.

There was this really unhappy dude in his 30s, hitting the bottle a little too much, hated his life. He would come home from his factory job every night to his dingy little apartment to play a Second Life/Farmville type game. In this game he could build a nation of people, an army to defend it, an economy, a government, etc But instead, he decided to take a shortcut and steal this ethnic group, a workforce that was enslaved in another player’s kingdom.

So, he opens discussions with the this one guy and cons him into leading his people out of slavery to a promised land. It was a good game and helped him get through the lonely nights until his shift started again the next day.

But he was such a drunk that he would lose patience, get pissed and threaten to kill these people off almost every other night. This went for a long time. He’d get all pissed off at his shitty life and take it out on his people. Sometimes he would get so drunk that he’d fuck with them just for kicks. But the dude who represented them in this internet world had to talk him down all the time, beg him not ot pull the plug. Then later, when the guy was hung over, he would be all contrite and nice to his people for a few days. But then something shitty would happen at work and it would start all over again.

One night when he was in an especially bad humor, he tells his head dude in the game that he nor the whole original generation will never get to the promised land as punishment for some minor infraction, something that was programmed in the game that the drunk didn’t like. But the truth is, he didn’t really know where the promised land was. It was all just something for him to do at night while he knocked off another bottle of Jack D and pass out at the keyboard.

Eventually the drunk guy somehow was able to attract a girl who he really liked, but she insisted he quit drinking. So, he goes to AA and straightens up. Now that he is sober, he realizes what an ass he’s been So, he admits his mistakes and apologizes to them for being an asshole because this is one of the things AA people have to do in order to get straight with the world.

He tells his people that he’s got to go and that they really don’t need him to be harassing them anymore and making their life hell. He says that things have changed, that there is a new deal for them now, a better deal. He tells them that the the new deal is that they must take care of each other, share, love and protect each other and if they do that, everything will be OK. All they have to do is treat everybody else they way they themselves wish to be treated.

He is really disgusted by how he treated these people. So, the day he moves out, he unplugs his computer and leaves it there in the apartment to gather dust. He no longer has any interest in playing games, he just wants to live a real life and spend all the time that he spent on the computer with his girl.

So, they get married, have kids and live happily ever after. And the people in the program are still standing around praying that he will return to show them how to take care of each other and live the new deal.

But others simply went off to live the new deal and enjoy their independence and the responsibility and rewards thereof, because they understood what he said the first time and didn’t need him anymore.

@Dutchess_III I once entertained the thought that “God”, if he existed, set up the universe like a terrarium and he would look in every so often to see what the heck was going on. He wouldn’t do anything, just look in. For entertainment, maybe. That’s what a deist god might do.

@Dutchess_III
The joy of creation, I guess. Or simple boredom. You know how you make doodles in your notebook during a boring class? There isn’t any specific reason behind it, but it is a creation on it’s own.
I like to think God created the world in that way, being some super genius bored in his own cosmic version of a math class.

Not all Deists assume that the source of creation is a He, She or They, has emotions, an intended purpose for, are concern with or even consciousness of what has been/is being created. It seems to me that the prevalent concept expressed in number of responses to the question of a deity responsible for creating the universe is anthropomorphic. That is, “God” is conceived as being an image of man.

I envision the force driving the evolution of the universe transcends the limitations of space, time and human qualities. Perhaps this notion is outside of a definition of deism; I expressed this possibility in my previous response. However, this does not preclude a belief in spirituality. Human motivation can have a detrimental or beneficial effect upon creation, albeit within a very narrow time frame, as one chooses to satisfy desires at the expense of others or seek to recognize and respond to their needs.

I basically agree with @Bill1939.

For all I know, the Dark Energy driving the accelerated expansion of the known universe or some other undiscovered force, could be a “deity”.

Whatever it might be, I’m sure It’s devoid of and has no need for breasts or genitalia.

Yeah, when I was struggling, as a Christian, under pressure to just accept all of the things, without question, that seemed to be at odds with what I was taught about a “loving God,” I came up with that “He set it all in motion, then walked away,” idea. That didn’t sit well with my fellow Christians. Plus plus that didn’t really make any sense either.

I wonder if my last hypothesis is as disrespectful as calling “Rocky” Obama a eunuch. ;-o

Obama’s not an eunuch!

you seem awfully certain of that

I’m thinking the Deist God, let’s called him Larry, is just sitting around in his underwear drinking beer, scratching his balls and burping. Just like many other deadbeat dads. He doesn’t give two sh*ts about his kids.

@Kardamom Haha that’s hilarious. The deist God is basically a lazy slacker? Reminds me of the lazy hick character from Futurama.

@NerdyKeith Ha ha, yes, or Al Bundy from Married with Children

What makes the most perfect sense
is to experience the Truth
which is within yourself.

^Is that from a fortune cookie? ~

Sounds like it, doesn’t it!

Yes. No disrespect intended. I liked it.