Friday, September 02, 2005

The Deist Creed

TJIC, over in TJICistan seems to be on the threshold of becoming a functioning Deist. This is a good thing all in all and, in my opinion, the more deists, the better.

Pretty much the only thing that separates atheists and deists is the need to account for where the universe came from. Deists tend to believe god made the universe for some purpose, wound it up, then let it go to see what happens. I've played enough SimCity to understand the appeal to both the god and the deist. Atheists, OTOH, tend not to worry about the purpose of the universe and either don't care about it or are comfortable not knowing. I'm in that last category. I don't think the universe has a purpose, and I can live with that knowledge. I may be wrong but, frankly, the rules have been set up in such a way that I'll never know the purpose if there is one because it's not discoverable from the inside (there's a whole, very cool branch of set theory to deal with math like this). Instead of worrying or lamenting this, I just use the time I would have wasted on something constructive. Or I waste it blogging.

And, I always keep in mind the Deist's Creed (by the philosopher Homer),

“Alone! I’m alone! I’m a lonely insignificant speck on a has-been planet, orbited by a cold indifferent sun!”

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