Voltaire and God

[Cypress]

Throughout his intellectual life, Voltaire wrestled with the problem of knowledge of God. A convinced deist, he believed with certainty that the design of the universe announced an intelligent Supreme Being who was the world’s author. Beyond that, however, his works on the issue reveal that Voltaire was tentative and uncertain about what we knew of this God, and he could not reconcile to his own satisfaction God’s existence, of which he was certain, with God’s providence. He found atheism a wholly untenable position, and when such ultimate disbelief began to be expressed by Parisian philosophes from 1770 on, Voltaire actively defended belief in God and assailed the atheists for both their errors and the danger they posed to the Enlightenment and its acceptance.

Voltaire was convinced that whatever we know about God, we know from nature alone, and he warred ceaselessly⎯if sometimes indirectly⎯against the claims of supernatural knowledge, including both scriptural revelation and private inspiration. Voltaire found self-contradiction in the belief that a universal God had revealed himself in particular fashion to this or that time and place. He saw all sectarian religions as a combination of corrupted natural knowledge and as human fabrication, serving, above all in his view, the interests of the world’s various clergy. His deism and anticlericalism were among the most fervent aspects of his work.



Source: Alan Charles Kors, University of Pennsylvania

 

[Hume]

Throughout his intellectual life, Voltaire wrestled with the problem of knowledge of God. A convinced deist, he believed with certainty that the design of the universe announced an intelligent Supreme Being who was the world’s author. Beyond that, however, his works on the issue reveal that Voltaire was tentative and uncertain about what we knew of this God, and he could not reconcile to his own satisfaction God’s existence, of which he was certain, with God’s providence. He found atheism a wholly untenable position, and when such ultimate disbelief began to be expressed by Parisian philosophes from 1770 on, Voltaire actively defended belief in God and assailed the atheists for both their errors and the danger they posed to the Enlightenment and its acceptance.

Voltaire was convinced that whatever we know about God, we know from nature alone, and he warred ceaselessly⎯if sometimes indirectly⎯against the claims of supernatural knowledge, including both scriptural revelation and private inspiration. Voltaire found self-contradiction in the belief that a universal God had revealed himself in particular fashion to this or that time and place. He saw all sectarian religions as a combination of corrupted natural knowledge and as human fabrication, serving, above all in his view, the interests of the world’s various clergy. His deism and anticlericalism were among the most fervent aspects of his work.



Source: Alan Charles Kors, University of Pennsylvania

Seems like a mush of nothing. God may exist, might not. Who's to say.

 

[Cypress]

Seems like a mush of nothing. God may exist, might not. Who's to say.

That's not what it says. It says it is self evident a supreme rational organizing principle authored the universe. But it is revealed through nature, not through divine revelation or scripture.

 

[Hume]

That's not what it says. It says it is self evident a supreme rational organizing principle authored the universe. But it is revealed through nature, not through divine revelation or scripture.

It is not self evident.

 

[Ross Dolan]

Throughout his intellectual life, Voltaire wrestled with the problem of knowledge of God. A convinced deist, he believed with certainty that the design of the universe announced an intelligent Supreme Being who was the world’s author. Beyond that, however, his works on the issue reveal that Voltaire was tentative and uncertain about what we knew of this God, and he could not reconcile to his own satisfaction God’s existence, of which he was certain, with God’s providence. He found atheism a wholly untenable position, and when such ultimate disbelief began to be expressed by Parisian philosophes from 1770 on, Voltaire actively defended belief in God and assailed the atheists for both their errors and the danger they posed to the Enlightenment and its acceptance.

Voltaire was convinced that whatever we know about God, we know from nature alone, and he warred ceaselessly⎯if sometimes indirectly⎯against the claims of supernatural knowledge, including both scriptural revelation and private inspiration. Voltaire found self-contradiction in the belief that a universal God had revealed himself in particular fashion to this or that time and place. He saw all sectarian religions as a combination of corrupted natural knowledge and as human fabrication, serving, above all in his view, the interests of the world’s various clergy. His deism and anticlericalism were among the most fervent aspects of his work.



Source: Alan Charles Kors, University of Pennsylvania

Those are some very interesting guesses Voltaire made.

I wonder which, if any, are correct.

 

[Cypress]

It is not self evident.

It was to Voltaire as a Deist, according to Professor Kors.

 

[Hume]

It was to Voltaire as a Deist, according to Professor Kors.

Yes, and it is false.

 

[Cypress]

Those are some very interesting guesses Voltaire made.

I wonder which, if any, are correct.

I would say life is completely about making guesses - educated guesses, theoretical systems of thought, or otherwise.

The sense perception evolution gave us does not allow us to sense or perceive perhaps 98 percent of all reality.

 

[Ross Dolan]

I would say life is completely about making guesses - educated guesses, theoretical systems of thought, or otherwise.

The sense perception evolution gave us does not allow us to sense or perceive perhaps 98 percent of all reality.

I agree about the lots of guesses, Cypress, although not necessarily with the "completely about." But a huge amount.

And I agree that many of those guesses are educated.

But a lot are totally blind guesses...especially in the area of whether any gods exist...and the nature of any that do.

That was my point in what I wrote.

Everything I bolded in my reply...was a blind guess in my estimation.

 

[Hume]

One of Voltaire's favorite sayings was the aphorism, "If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent Him" ('Si Dieu n’existait pas, il faudrait l’inventer').

Voltaire and Religion. "If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent Him".

It makes no difference whether god exists or not. The concept fulfills a social function.

 

[Obtenebrator]

I would say life is completely about making guesses - educated guesses, theoretical systems of thought, or otherwise.

The sense perception evolution gave us does not allow us to sense or perceive perhaps 98 percent of all reality.

Yes humanity is limited. BUT here's the key point: there are those out there who CLAIM that they have reason to believe in God which means reasons which can be tested by other observers.

If God is, say, like a Neutrino and barely interacts with matter that's one thing, but that isn't the God of conjecture. The God of conjecture creates physical reality and interacts with it (to some greater or lesser extent) which means there is a COMPONENT or perhaps a TRANSLATION of God from His place outside of the physical which impinges on our lives. He presumably shows up as at least a shadow in the cave.

That's why we have the CONCEPT.

If one points to the mere "existence" of the universe as the "evidence" of God it presupposes that there is some way to compare a universe made with or without a God. This is the flaw of the Intelligent Design advocates...how does one detect "design"?

 

[Ross Dolan]

It makes no difference whether god exists or not. The concept fulfills a social function.

That's why we have the CONCEPT.

I agree with both these comments.

 

[Obtenebrator]

I agree with both these comments.

Oh, I definitely agree that God fulfills a social (and even for many, a "personal") need. In reality THAT is why we have the concept...which takes it out of the sphere of observation of nature.

Yes there are questions we can't answer. God is an excellent filler of gaps. And as many theologians note, the "God of the Gaps" is bad theology because God gets progressively smaller as we observe more of the natural world.

The only real big "wall" is the existence of the universe. That appears to be a truly unknowable and unanswerable question. It is one of the few things that I can truly agree with the agnostic position on. The universe is here, this is manifestly true, but whence did it come?

Invoking the God Hypothesis for this is exactly as valuable as invoking any other random string of words as an explanation.

 

[Ross Dolan]

Oh, I definitely agree that God fulfills a social (and even for many, a "personal") need. In reality THAT is why we have the concept...which takes it out of the sphere of observation of nature.

Yes there are questions we can't answer. God is an excellent filler of gaps. And as many theologians note, the "God of the Gaps" is bad theology because God gets progressively smaller as we observe more of the natural world.

The only real big "wall" is the existence of the universe. That appears to be a truly unknowable and unanswerable question. It is one of the few things that I can truly agree with the agnostic position on. The universe is here, this is manifestly true, but whence did it come?

Invoking the God Hypothesis for this is exactly as valuable as invoking any other random string of words as an explanation.

That is such a tough question for me, O, that I almost always use the term "what we humans call the physical universe."

Not only do we know whence it came...we do not really know what it is in its full extent.

 

[Cypress]

I agree about the lots of guesses, Cypress, although not necessarily with the "completely about." But a huge amount.

And I agree that many of those guesses are educated.

But a lot are totally blind guesses...especially in the area of whether any gods exist...and the nature of any that do.

That was my point in what I wrote.

Everything I bolded in my reply...was a blind guess in my estimation.

Yes, we have to make a lot of blind guesses, because we frequently lack tangible information

 

[Hume]

Yes, we have to make a lot of blind guesses, because we frequently lack tangible information

Only the profoundly ignorant think "blind guesses" are the basis of knowledge.
This is the stupidest thing I ever heard.

 

[Cypress]

Yes humanity is limited. BUT here's the key point: there are those out there who CLAIM that they have reason to believe in God which means reasons which can be tested by other observers.

If God is, say, like a Neutrino and barely interacts with matter that's one thing, but that isn't the God of conjecture. The God of conjecture creates physical reality and interacts with it (to some greater or lesser extent) which means there is a COMPONENT or perhaps a TRANSLATION of God from His place outside of the physical which impinges on our lives. He presumably shows up as at least a shadow in the cave.

That's why we have the CONCEPT.

If one points to the mere "existence" of the universe as the "evidence" of God it presupposes that there is some way to compare a universe made with or without a God. This is the flaw of the Intelligent Design advocates...how does one detect "design"?

Science has been widely successful as a method of inductive knowledge.

But because science is packed with dense technical language and mathematics, most laypersons are so overwhelmed and impressed by it they don't know how little science actually knows or can explain.

No one has ever seen a neutrino. We can measure certain properties of it. But don't even know what it actually is. Is it wave or particle? Is it not matter at all, but just a perturbation of a quantum field.? Why does it exist? Why does the Higgs field exist? Science, in principle, cannot make truth claims about any of this. Neutrinos are theoretical constructions which fit nicely within the standard model of particle physics.

What we call neutrinos and the Higgs field, and Indian mystic might call properties and facets of the universal spirit Brahman. We couldn't exist without the Higgs field, which is food for thought in itself.

I don't think it matters for scientists. What they are interested in is measuring the properties of the physical universe, and putting them in a self-consistent theoretical and mechanistic framework of motion and energy. Which is a lot of fun as an intellectual pursuit.

 

[domer76]

Throughout his intellectual life, Voltaire wrestled with the problem of knowledge of God. A convinced deist, he believed with certainty that the design of the universe announced an intelligent Supreme Being who was the world’s author. Beyond that, however, his works on the issue reveal that Voltaire was tentative and uncertain about what we knew of this God, and he could not reconcile to his own satisfaction God’s existence, of which he was certain, with God’s providence. He found atheism a wholly untenable position, and when such ultimate disbelief began to be expressed by Parisian philosophes from 1770 on, Voltaire actively defended belief in God and assailed the atheists for both their errors and the danger they posed to the Enlightenment and its acceptance.

Voltaire was convinced that whatever we know about God, we know from nature alone, and he warred ceaselessly⎯if sometimes indirectly⎯against the claims of supernatural knowledge, including both scriptural revelation and private inspiration. Voltaire found self-contradiction in the belief that a universal God had revealed himself in particular fashion to this or that time and place. He saw all sectarian religions as a combination of corrupted natural knowledge and as human fabrication, serving, above all in his view, the interests of the world’s various clergy. His deism and anticlericalism were among the most fervent aspects of his work.



Source: Alan Charles Kors, University of Pennsylvania

I know little of Voltaire and his philosophy, but your post seems to indicate he was a pantheist of sort.

 

[domer76]

I would say life is completely about making guesses - educated guesses, theoretical systems of thought, or otherwise.

The sense perception evolution gave us does not allow us to sense or perceive perhaps 98 percent of all reality.

Yes, so much is out of our perception. Thank goodness some of us can admit that without invoking the supernatural.

 

[Cypress]

I know little of Voltaire and his philosophy, but your post seems to indicate he was a pantheist of sort.

I think think most scholars call him a deist, but there is a lot of overlap between some of these words