Neo-Deism as a Religious Philosophy for the 21st century

[Gnomon]

I have repeatedly opined that rational pragmatic Deism doesn't have the right stuff to become a religion. But I can't deny that the boiling stew of humanity is in desperate need of an over-arching unifying force or symbol of some kind. Most traditional religions have provided some kind of collective meaning -- in the form of legends, myths, & scriptures -- for distinctly defined communities of people. But now may be the time for a "new world order", not in the form of an authoritarian political system, but of an ecumenical religious order.

Religious heritages with deep roots, cannot be just ripped-up, but must inter-twine somehow with all other threads of human yearning. Likewise, the ancient intuition of super-nature cannot be suppressed by a rational focus on mundane nature. Which is why the Deist respect for both the practical values of Science and the idealistic values of Religion may be the tie that binds us all into a single rope, pulling in the same direction. From a broad perspective, we may see the various streams of religion throughout history eventually converging into a mighty river of human endeavor -- pardon the melodrama. But that utopian dream won't come to pass without some channeling force to offset the contingencies of fate & fortune.

Therefore, the burden may fall upon the diaspora of Deists to write a new Story of Us. That 21st century Bible will have to develop a history of all people from all times & places, showing how we are inter-related and inter-dependent. It will have to include input, not only from religious traditions, but also from all scientific disciplines. Each of the world's nations, races, and religions will have to play a significant part in the complex chronicle of emerging Earthlings, and the dramatic saga of hubristic Humanity. Where cultural values conflict though, some over-arching principle, such as a universal deity, will be needed to resolve the issue.

Hence, the Book of Deus will have to assert or imply a transcendental purpose that can be seen in the overall direction of evolution, within which the frustrating zig-zags, revolutions, and paradigm shifts of Hegelian history are merely the meandering path of a people wandering in the wilderness, while searching for some teleological "promised land". That journey must teach us that we are one with the wider world. Moreover, the "spiritual structure" of particular societies must be interwoven with those of all other cultures.

The Judeo-Christian Bible is an on-going argument based on appeal to authority. Likewise, the Book of Deus will have to look-up to some transcendent universal power, even though it may be abstract and symbolic. But that loosely-defined iconic symbol must appeal to human emotions in some sincere manner, without being so anthro-morphic as to be ridiculous in our sophisticated cynical modern age. If not sensitively handled, such a pop-scripture would sound like pulp-science-fiction.

To suit 21st century knowledge and sentiments, this Neo Testament will have to cleverly interlace the language of Science and Religion, appealing to both Reason and Feelings. Perhaps the infinities and paradoxes that bedevil post-quantum Science, as it explores the ragged edges of reality, may be inspirational hints of transcendence. This might add an air of delicious mystery to the historical myth of human striving for something unseen, yet deeply desired. But it must also show why there is no need to dread the unknown.

There, that's a diagram of a desideratum for Deism in the 21st century. It will be a monumental task to attempt to change the course of history from impending self-imposed disaster. All I'm saying though is let's get the ball rolling, and see where it goes. But who will be the Messiah, and who will be the Prophet of the harmonious kingdom to come? Who will write a compelling Story of Us, that will move the hearts of humanity to coalesce into a Utopian community of people, united by faith in a fanciful dream of self-directed symphony? Just as Moses shrugged-off the Lord's command to lead his people, I say "Not me, Lord!" But if not me, then who will be the Aaron of eloquence to interpret this impossible vision into a practical mission of Deistic destiny? Applications for that role are hereby solicited.

[Gnomon]

Excerpt from private communication with Dave Gaddis :
<< I am not certain Deism is the right one to build a religion around. Both the terms and Deism and religion have negative connotation. I also agree that Deism, in its current form, is not sustainable. People need fellowship in person.>>

I understand both your time constraints, and your disappointment in the waning "Deist movement", despite your personal efforts to revive it. In fact, I continue to use the term "Deism", not in the original sense of a continuation of the Protestant reformation of Christianity, but in the modern sense of a religious worldview based on scientific rather than prophetic revelations, and validated by real-time reasoning instead of appeals to ancient authorities. From here onward, I'll use the coinage "Neo-Deism" when I want to specify the 21st century version of the 17th century "movement".

All I'm proposing at the moment, is that a group of Deists begin to work on a long-term project, with the goal in mind of creating from scratch a combined religious Myth and scientific Paradigm for the 21st century. I have been working on my personal version for several years. But I'm aware that it is skewed by my own idiosyncrasies and prejudices. So at first, the project would be a continuation of previous attempts to reach a consensus on the key features of the Deist worldview. Then that basic outline could be translated into a storyline (myth) that explains our current understanding of God, the Universe, and Us.

That document, The Story of Us, could then serve as the foundation upon which to build a non-sectarian religion with early-adopter apostles, who could then go-forth and preach the good news of religious, political, and personal reconciliation, not to divine domination, but to harmony with the real world. I know that sounds naively utopian, but is it worth a try? Jesus didn't even write a book, but his simple message of reconciliation between God & Man, Jews & Gentiles, resonated so strongly with non-Jews that it soon became the default religion of the gentile world.

So my question to you is this : is the idea of an updated trans-cultural Myth reasonable enough to warrant further discussion? The project might span several years, and it might fall-apart into bickering spats. Besides, any actual religious consequences in the wider world would probably be out of our hands anyway. But it might also stimulate some beneficial changes in the deteriorating state of world religions.

[Gnomon]

Continuation of reply to Dave Gaddis :

If not Deism, what core philosophical worldview would be appropriate to build a religion upon? I agree that the very terms "religion" & "God" would have negative connotations for Atheists and Agnostics. But most Deists seem to be able to reconcile those meta-physical concepts with their physical understanding of how the world works.

I also agree that most people are "social animals", who need inter-personal fellowship. But that aspect of humanity has little to do with reasoning. And in fact, many of those seeking religious fellowship might have a negative connotation of "reason" in a religious context. That's why I was focusing on self-labelled Deists, who are already inclined to combine Reason and Intuition in their religious worldview.

I still don't think that abstract philosophical Deism per se will ever become a popular religion. It would need to be combined with specific social & cultural beliefs & practices. And it would need a shared myth to explain in simple terms who we are as a people, where we are going, and why. That's why my forum post proposed that someone needs to create a religious myth for the meaning-starved science-suffused 21st century. And I think Deism, with its naturalistic notion of deity, could provide a kernel of philosophical science to the project.

That seed of reasonableness might serve as the basic BothAnd attitude necessary to bring the whole concept of religion into the multicultural post-modern world. And who better to do that than those who are already inclined to doubt the plethora of outdated pre-scientific myths, and to accept the self-updating worldview presented by modern science. Even some prominent agnostic physicists (e.g. Max Tegmark) have come to think of the universe in vaguely deistic terms, such as "Panpsychism".

So, I think it would be possible to take that notion one step further, and to postulate the existence of a universal Mind, that not only is the universe (PanDeism), but which creates the physical world as an evolving concept in the eternal Mind (PanEnDeism, Idealism). That would explain the origin of the mental Information which is the essence of physical Energy and Matter. It would fit Tegmark's model of the universe as a program of data running on a system of rules (physical laws), and processors (energy), and storage (matter). Hence, Information could update the ancient notion of Spirit as the divine "force" causing the world to work as it does, and explaining the mysteries of Life & Death. Metaphorically and Mythically, Information (EnFormAction) is the spirit of God moving through the world, causing change, animating bodies, and becoming conscious.

No one needs to accept our fabricated Myth as absolute truth. They only need to accept that it's a more believable story than the old fairy tales and fables of ancient cultures that are so remote from our inter-connected wired-world of technology indistinguishable from magic. But the modern Story of Us will have to compete with the common romantic inclination to view the past through rose-colored glasses, to look back to Golden Ages, and to fear the unknowns of a fast-approaching future.


PS___The ongoing evolution of religions :

Over the millennia, world cultures have updated their inherited myths in the form of new spin-off religions. For example Hinduism became stagnated as an elite few Brahmins lorded over the masses of miserable peasants. Then prince Siddharta turned the focus of religion from public rituals & sacrifices toward inner personal psychological salvation via a path to Nirvana. The Buddha's teachings eventually became the holy scriptures mostly for non-Hindus.

On the other side of the world, the oral Hebrew myths were eventually recorded and redacted into holy scriptures for the Jewish remnant after the Babylonian exile. Then came Jesus with a message, not of outward rituals & sacrifices to ward-off divine wrath, but of inward salvation via faith in God's love. The teachings of the Christ eventually became the holy scriptures for non-Jews.

Now, almost all of the world's religions have outgrown their inspired founding myths, and have become mired in outward shows of piety & rituals, or of empty-minded rejection of the real world. So the time has come for a new Messiah, with a new myth, not of grovelling before tyrannical deities, or of passive waiting for escape from reality, but of a new, more realistic and humanistic view of reality.

Must we wait for a savior to appear amongst us, in the form of a reincarnated Krishna or Christ, or should we take the bit in our mouths, and create our own Myth without a Messiah? I'm willing to contribute my little piece of the puzzle, for what it's worth.

[Gnomon]

Random thoughts on a Deist-based religious practice.

Types of religions :
Philosophical religion : Stoicism, Buddhism, Taoism, Neo-Deism (control self)
Folk religion : Hunter-gatherer, Paganism, Polytheism (control nature spirits)
Formal religion : Judaism, Christianity, Islam (control universal God)

Note : I think any religion based on the Neo-Deist attitude would necessarily be a philosophical type, concerned more with personal development and social harmony than with manipulating nature spirits or pleasing a tyrannical lord.

Minimum Requirements for a Religion :
1. Moral rules to provide a sense of Justice & Ethics ( Golden Rule, Ten Commandments)
2. Myths to provide a sense of mystery, romance and belonging (legends, histories)
3. Rituals or practices to provide things for people to do (mass, festivals, meditation, prayer)
4. Knowledge claims to provide reliable truths to live by (prophets, enlightenment, science)

A. Morality would be common sense rules of thumb like the Golden Rule; more specific rules would be left to secular governments. I personally don't buy the notion of Karma, or divine Justice in an afterlife. Virtue is its own reward.

B. The Unifying myth would be the Story of Us, with a historical, philosophical, and scientific analysis of where we came from, how we got where we are, and what the future might hold for us. It should advise how to avoid the mistakes of previous religions. Of course, literature from world cultures, including scriptures, would be used where appropriate.

C. A wide variety of practical activities could be made available, to keep members occupied, entertained, and developed. But more like a secular social club than a church, with topical talks, Yoga classes, meditation, music, dinners, etc.

D. Doctrinal instruction would be more like TED talks than sermons on soul salvation or boring homilies. But each group would decide what their needs and wishes are. Basic facts would be taken from current science, with philosophical and historical analysis for local applications.

Note : I'm not proposing that we try to create a global religion from scratch. This project is intended only to produce a central Neo-Deist Myth upon which others could build a religion for an independent local group.

[Gnomon]

Here's another excerpt from communication with Dave Gaddis :

Thanks for the link to Dave Robertson. I'll try to contact him to see if there would be any problem using the pithy & recognizable term "Neo-Deism", for convenience, to describe the religious philosophy I talk about on the blog. However, I don't think that should necessarily be the name of a specific religion based on the Deist ideology. I envision many boutique religions springing up from that single root. But, as a loner introvert, I'm not likely to participate directly in any of them. If Dave doesn't go along, I could continue to use Enformationism, despite its lack of gist & brevity.

I agree that a combination of Eastern and Western religious ideas should be worked into those new religions. And the term "Deism" may be too closely associated with the Christian traditions. That's why I intuitively coined Neo-Deism to make a distinction. Whatever religions might emerge from the Story of Us project could choose names to suit their local customs and practices. For example, if I were to join a local group, it would most likely be much more influenced by Christian praxis than any other. Long ago I attended the Unity Church, which was essentially Christian, but used various other symbols (Egyptian),"scriptures" (New Age), and practices (meditation). At the time, it was too far out for me, and my fundamentalist Christian roots.

I also agree that the Buddha had the right idea : don't worry about pleasing the non-intervening gods, just get your own mind right, and treat your fellows morally. Unfortunately, the religions that sprang from that philosophical seed, have strayed from the Path. For example, the Dalai Lama has said, laudably, that where his religion is opposed to science, then it must change. Ironically, his Tibetan Buddhists still pray to ancestor gods, and use spinning prayer wheels to amplify their voices. Those practices, unchanged for millennia, have little to do with a scientific worldview, but I suppose do little harm, yet its not my kind of thing. Meditation has come to be accepted by most scientists, but the transmigration of souls is still beyond the scope of Science. And it doesn't fit my understanding of how the world works.

The bottom line, I suppose, is that Science will never be the final arbiter of Religious beliefs and practices. So, my intent in the Story of Us project, is merely to show how we all have the same essential needs, and that we can live together peacefully, if we can give up the notion that there's only one "Way".

[Gnomon]

The Story of Us should provide an overarching theme (meta-narrative) for the history of mankind in a mysterious & indifferent world. That story-behind-the-story would provide an overall structure for a belief system uniting isolated unrelated events into a narrative with a higher meaning & purpose. Even if we have to leave the ultimate destiny open to personal interpretation.

The various Sciences can provide mundane details & data upon which to construct the chronicle of human emergence from mere animated matter to dominant force on planet Earth. Then, various religious & philosophical doctrines can furnish a more holistic perspective of the significance of humanity's place in the cosmos. Hopefully, the narrative arts of story-telling can weave those disparate threads into an accessible graphic depiction of how we humans have learned, from millennia of trial & error, how we ought to behave, as we try to live peacefully with a motley crew of 7 billion strangers in the revved-up machine of our avant-garde world. Each of the world's religions is an artifact of historical Hegelian solutions that were eventually replaced by newer, sometimes better, solutions to the problem of how to live a good life.

Perhaps the story can even find some humor in the Cosmic Irony, that a long ago & far away explosion of raw energy, has somehow created inquisitive little minds that now look back to the dark skies for hints of meaning. In the inexorable upward progression from physical atoms & forces to meta-physical Life & Mind, we can infer the cosmic significance of seemingly random trivial events : that order is being created out of chaos; that organism emerges from disorganized stuff. Can we assume that the observed progress (Enformy) against all odds of Entropy, is evidence of original intent? Should we infer that a mysterious Mind of some kind created our frustrating world for some unknown ultimate purpose? If so, we would have the last laugh on snarky Atheists who seem to have missed the Socratic irony of a world created by a Darwinian process that automatically chooses the best of the lot, turned up by random trial & error tinkering. Almost like a computer program designed to answer some deep cosmic question.

The laid-back "philosophical" Neo-Deist worldview of our highly-evolved heroes might be portrayed as a modern version of ancient Stoicism or Taoism. Their message was that in order to live a life of peace & tranquility, we must learn to live within the constraints of that cosmic order. To face adversity with equanimity, we must understand the natural organization of the world system. Although we begin our lives as the apple of our parents eyes, we eventually learn that Mother Nature is not concerned with our personal welfare. So, our hard-won wisdom allows us to take life's lemons and make lemonade. Like Buddhists, they live in the moment, don't worry about the open-ended future, and don't lust after life's transient luxuries.

In the end of the Story of Us, they all live happily ever after.

[Gnomon]

The Story of Us will have to narrate from some perspective. So here's an idea : a time-lord alien from another universe visits our little corner of the master-verse. Seeing planets & stars emerging from the Big Bang is not too surprising, given the random collisions of charged particles. But living matter is a whole nother level of aggregation. And thinking matter seems so astronomically unlikely, that he must begin to look back at the origin for signs of tampering with the mechanical nature of Nature. Who put the zip in the Singularity, and who put the Bang in the Big Beginning? What is it that causes mindless particles to add-up to pipe-smoking philosophers?

[Gnomon]

Deists on Death

Deists may be generally classified into A> those who believe that God requires worship, and provides an afterlife for his worshipers, or B> those who make no assumptions about God's stipulations, other than physical laws, nor about the unknowable aspects of non-life. The former I would call Gnostics (special knowledge), and the latter are Agnostics (only common knowledge). For the purposes of this thread, Neo-Deists would be agnostic believers, who don't know anything for sure about supernatural subjects, and refrain from basing important decisions on dubious beliefs.

Classical Deists and Modern Neo-Deists may also differ in their attitude toward death. Classicals assume -- based on traditional Christian doctrine, plus recent anecdotes of afterlife experiences* -- that death is but a transition from corporeal to spiritual existence. Yet, the Moderns are more likely to take a Stoic stance toward dissolution of the body. According to Lucretius, "death is nothing to us". So why fear death, since there is no-one to experience it? ** But, what if the disembodied soul is also the seat of immaterial consciousness? Why couldn't human feelings continue to exist as ghosts beyond this vale of tears? On the other hand, why not make practical plans based on known-knowns, making allowances for known-unknowns, and leave unknown-unknowns for open-ended what-if conjectures in idle moments?

Objectively, death is simply nothingness (zero), but subjectively & emotionally, death is privation (less than zero). And humans fear anything that can take away what we now have. To lose one's life may be like having a fish on the line, that gets off the hook just before being reeled-in. We still have our line, but it's no longer connected to anything. Does death sever the connection between body and mind? Enformationism says that Life & Mind are not spiritual substances, but practical functions of the Body & Brain as integrated systems. So when the engine stops, forward motion grinds to a halt; when the system breaks down, it ceases to function.

For practical purposes, Physics is forever, in the sense of cycling energy, and where there is energy there is the potential for life. But individual lives are closed cycles that come & go like fleeting flames, and when it's gone it's gone forever ***. However, the Mind is the observer of these comings & goings, and subjectively views them as sproutings and uprootings. To be ripped-up from our very being is therefore something to be dreaded. But Neo-Deists will again profess ignorance about both the pre-life state, and any after-life existence. In any case though, it would be tough for flesh & blood humans, in a ghostly afterlife, to get used to being out-of-touch with reality.

Our emotional entanglements, that make life worth living, may live-on in a sense, in the hearts of survivors. But as Woody Allen once complained, "I don't want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying. I don't want to live on in the hearts of my countrymen; I want to live on in my apartment." So the question arises, can ghosts feel emotions or sensations without neural networks and neurotransmitters? What would it feel like to be a ghost, who can't touch her loved ones?

Life is a brief interlude between pre-life and post-life, of which we know nothing. So, the wise course would be to focus our attention on what we do know, and not to worry about the vast universe of our ignorance. Life is characterized by consciousness, but non-life has no known characteristics. However, Classical Deists may think of Consciousness as another name for the Soul, and assume that it will survive death. but Neo-Deists have become used to the idea of Life & Consciousness as biological functions, dependent on viable physical systems to generate and support them. Anything more than the life on the plate would be dessert, and it takes mature self-discipline to wait for the sweets.

I doubt that agnostic Neo-Deism will appeal to those of a Classical Deism persuasion. So these moot points will require a lot of BothAnd compromise, in order to work together under one umbrella. :?


* Those subjective reports, of glimpses of afterlife on the operating table, are difficult to distinguish from descriptions of dreams, or side-effects of anesthesia. And besides, most of the afterlife reporters were never completely dead, merely in cardiac arrest. Arguments can be made for both interpretations, and personal inclinations may sway Classical & Modern Deists one way or the other.

** Philosopher Raymond Tallis observes, "A world in which none of us cared about death would be one in which none of us cared about each other."

*** Note : our general metaphors for potential Life & Consciousness are easy to confuse with specific instances of actual lives and minds. Perennial debates are fueled by loose terminology. Like Heraclitus' river metaphor, you can't step into the same life twice.

FWIW :
Ecclesiastes 9:5
"For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten."

[Gnomon]

Excerpt from an email to David Robertson on this topic :

I must clarify that I am using the name "NeoDeism" only to indicate that the modern understanding of what Deism "means" is quite different from the original or Classical Deism. For example, Scientific exploration of the world has pushed the activities of the deity farther-out toward infinity, and away from daily life in reality. As I see it, G*D has intervened only once in this world : in programming the Big Bang. Any subsequent miracles are fictional stories. Consequently, I don't have faith in God, but I assume that some kind of deity is logically required in order to explain, not just the technical operations of the material world, but also the meaningful functions of the mental/metaphysical world. Those two sides of the same coin are merely conceptual sub-categories of the whole world, not separate Magisteria.

Furthermore, I am not personally on a quest to create a new religion based on the Neo-Deist god-model. I'm merely trying to see if a group of freethinking internet Deists could work together to develop a consistent worldview, The Story of Us, that could eventually become the seed creed of future religious or secular organizations. Without such a set of core beliefs, a religion cannot cohere long enough to make a real difference in the world. So far, I've had no response. For me though, it's simply an intellectual exercise, not a religious mission. Someone more motivated than me will have to take the lead, or it won't get done. Meanwhile, I'll probably continue to play around with the idea on my blog or forum.

[Gnomon]

Excerpt from reply to SpiritSeeker in the "Hi, from Australia" thread :


Neo-Deism is nothing more than a general idea at the moment. There is no actual church or even a face-to-face community of believers (in the abstract Creator of an autonomous evolving world). So, in this forum I have been proposing a way to take it to the next level, by mutually developing a "creation Myth", and a "Deist Creed", neither to be taken literally. With those key features, abstract philosophical Deism might begin to appeal to those more interested in concrete religious functions, such as local meetings and social services. As a practical communal religion, Neo-Deism would be essentially the same as Secular Humanism, with none of the supernatural features of traditional religions. Can you handle that? [Note : Neo-D won't provide any divine assurances to assuage existential fears & anxieties, other than the hard-hearted advice to "stop worrying about the next life, and enjoy this one while you can".]

For all practical purposes, the G*D of Neo-Deism is equivalent to capricious implacable Nature, because we have no knowledge of anything outside the natural world. That is, unless you accept the inspiration of scripture writers, or the mystical-ways-of-knowing claimed by Gnostics & Psychics. Only for philosophical purposes -- such as justification for ideal principles of physics and morality -- would the notion of a reality-creating super-natural deity apply. If we assume that the Creator designed our world according to He/r own non-human purposes, with no devil-god to spoil paradise, then what-is-is-what-ought-to-be. [Note : "create", "design",and "purpose" are metaphors for concepts beyond our understanding]

Therefore, Neo-D won't be much consolation to those who expect answered prayers, a guaranteed afterlife, or a way to communicate with the dearly departed. Those beliefs are not supported by empirical evidence, so as emotional-need-fillers they must be accepted on faith in questionable anecdotes, by those who are predisposed toward a mystical-magical side to mundane reality. For non-mystics, their Maslow needs must be met in ordinary ways by ordinary humans, with no divine dispensation of love from above. [Note : as I envision it, Neo-D is essentially Atheism with a reasonable explanation for the existence of Reality]

Neo-Deism though, as I envision it, is essentially a return to the "Enlightenment Values" that gave birth to the original Deist movement. It is also a rejection of the extreme liberal/leftist worldview of the "Postmodern Movement". Both of those topics are discussed in the blog. So, what do you think? Is Neo-Deism too far removed from Western & Eastern religious traditions to serve your human needs, and to satisfy your longing for spiritual connection?