Are Deists more like theists or Atheist?

[Twisted]

was Einstein a deist or an Atheist? what's the point of believing in a deist God?

[robvalue]

I'll leave others to say exactly what Einstein was as I'm not totally sure.

I too have no idea what the actual point of a deist belief is, it's something that baffles me. But then, belief is not a choice. I'd certainly say deism is generally much closer to atheism than religious theism. It generally supposes a model where things are exactly like an atheist would expect, except "a god" got things rolling before the Big Bang, instead of "we don't know what happened". So it's kind of just relabelling "We don't know" for personal preference, I think. Maybe for emotional reasons, maybe philosophical reasons, maybe logical reasons that I can't fathom. As Deist Paladin has shown, it can be pragmatic to put forward this belief as a way of cutting through bullshit arguments about whether there is a god and get straight to "What makes you think God happens to be exactly like a character in your favourite story book?"

I mean no disrespect to deists. It's just my own incredulity, and I totally respect their belief that there was "some big force" behind everything. And if that's what they believe, then they are only being honest in saying so, whether or not they feel they can rationalise it.

[Saxmoof]

It basically comes down to whether you define an atheist as someone who just isn't religious or as someone who doesn't believe there's a god. I go with the former personally, I class agnostics and deists as atheists due to them not being part of a religion

As for the point of believing in a deist god, I think deists have the same want to believe in an all powerful governing force in the universe, which is an understandable thing to want to believe, but they find the idea of people knowing what god thinks, looks like, wants us to do with our genitals etc. ridiculous

[ignoramus]

So a deist is only half full of it?
They believe in a more realistic approach to the "fucking impossible!"

[Pyrrho]

[robvalue]

My impression is that he had some sort of "the universe/nature is God" kind of belief.

[Jenny A]

Deist appears to be a rather broad umbrella. My husband calls himself a deist. He means that he believes that there is higher power of some kind "out there." He doesn't think it has any interest people or that it is necessarily omnipotent or aware of everything. It's a disinterested higher power. Also he doesn't claim to be able to prove it or that it is provable. If you claimed to have evidence of such a being he'd be highly skeptical. He does not consider our lack of knowledge proof of such a being. It's a gut feeling not a rationally held belief and he knows it.

Practically speaking though, he's just a hair's breadth from atheist. He belief does not affect his behavior, or his skepticism about woo generally.

[Pyrrho]

[DeistPaladin]

was Einstein a deist or an Atheist? what's the point of believing in a deist God?

As I've said elsewhere, deism is mostly atheism with poetic flourishes. 

Certainly as far as practical application goes (how we live, how we learn, where we gain our sense of morality and purpose, etc) there isn't any difference I can see. I don't even believe in an afterlife. 

The point of believing in a deist God is I get to identify with great thinkers from history who had fantastic hair. 

[Secular Elf]