You have individuals who are driven by self-interest who focus on their own things, who end up believing that their ideology will automatically win in life, and we will do great.  Such individuals believe that you ignore everything going about, just do one's business, maybe give some marginal support to the ideology, and somehow it will work out in the end.  In short, their ideology is like that of the deist's God.  The deist God wound things up and is nowhere involved now.  Just what was created is so wonderful, it will work out.  You see people have such devotion in the following areas:

* Capitalists: The market will magically work things out and things will be provided.  All you need is to is make sure private property rights are secure, and blammo, everyone gets what they need.  But heck, if they don't, it is because they are losers.  By having winners and losers, it insures that the losers can die off, and the right way to do things manifests.

* Marxism: The workers will eventually rise up, and the class structure will be broken, and we will all be one class.  It is destined to happen.  Just get the ownership of the means of production in the workers hands and it will happen.

* Democratic statists: The state will end up taking care of everything, if we all vote.  Just add more laws on the books, and these laws will save us. 

* Techological progressive secular humanists: Science is an awesome thing.  Look at all the progress we have made.  The scientific method is awesome and leads to things getting better and better.  All you have to do is wait and see, and we will evolve a utopian horn of plenty that will end all poverty and disease.   Look at Star Trek and see the wonderous future we will have.

* Traditionalists: See the progress we made?  Well, it is because we have found traditional values that work.  All we need to do is end up following these traditions and the progress will continue.  We will do better and better and better.  All we need is the right set of laws in place and we will do better.

One can list other ones I may of missed, or find them in what was written above.  The point is here, in none of this deist approach do people stop to think about the impact of what they do in their own lives would have on others and the big picture.  It is just, play within the framework of the system, and it will work out.  Does anyone bother to ask about where things are really going, or how they will turn out, or side effects that might be preventable if people would just maybe adjust accordingly.  It ends up ultimately being a cop out to justify one's own behaviors which may not be best.  Conversely, it causes people also to be compartamentalized with their lives believing that they can just do their own little thing, as the dictates of their ideology states, and it will be fine.  Nothing in this challenges anyone to look outside themselves, just operate in their framework of their own limited beliefs.

You know, i don't really get your argument or what Deism has to do with it.

I will say though my own libertarian leaning beliefs don't really jive with what's convenient for me. I have no interest in actually trying to be super rich or successful.

I essentially want just enough money to live a fairly poor (by western standards) life where ism just assured to have enough money to buy food, video-games every once in a while and a standard computer every 4-5 years or so. With minor other expenses.

In most europeon countries I could have all my needs, and quite honestly, all my wants met... by doing pretty much nothing.


Nor do I particularly think everything works out under the free market. I just think more things tend to work out under a free market then other systems, because if you take selfishness as the biggest problem of the free market. Such a thing only gets magnified in government, because now instead of the selfishness of millions, it's the selfishness of hundreds... in government. It's easier for a single politician to lie then an entire business... and money, unlike votes are a continual thing.

Businesses and private employees have to worry about perception every day. Politicians, every 2-4 years. (note, this is a quasi-free market i'm talking about with evenhanded clear rules and regulations.)

Deist devotion is what I was using to describe how a deist would view things.  Ok, maybe not all deist, but the jist of how deism works.  Such an individual believes the system is now set, there is nothing hands on by God, but the system will work automatically forward and continue to improve, because it was designed as such by the master watchmaker.  It is a detached reverence towards things, that doesn't feel that personal action is needed or matters, because the ideology is marching on to some sort of ideal state.  

I guess that depends on your meaning of deist.  You mean in the case of "Doesn't believe in a specific religion but believes there was a god?"

Either way such a viewpoint seems silly considering that people are part of the universe... therefore there actions would be included, making nonaction silly.

I think the basic gist is that the problem with a lot of ideologies is that they claim to offer a magic pill to the world's solutions. And these sorts of movements almost always go pretty wrong.

Compare the American Revolution with the French Revolution.

The American revolution is more conservative. It uses the old British system as a starting point and adjustments are made. The founders were very cautious (pragmatic is a bit too positive), and were almost anti-democratic in a way when they set up our government. But I think the key is that they knew the system was imperfect, and made it so that the constitution and nation would be able to change and adjust as time went on.

French revolution was more liberal. It completely undid all the traditions and promised huge changes. The result is chaos, and eventual order by force.

I can try to go on with this theme by pointing out others who made big promises and ended up being disasters. But my point is: There is no magical pill. The best option is to have conservatives (in the true sense of the word) who are willing to enact some rational changes in order to preserve the rest of the system.

This is how I characterized the leaders of WWII and the post-war era. Now, just turn on the TV and it's almost like a dark comedy. Absolutely disgusting filth. Tea party, occupy wall streets. It's extremism, and the media is acting like fucking clowns (CNN), or trying to monetize it (FNC/MSNBC).

Deism believes in the watchmaker God, where the God did everything at the start and is no longer involved.  Someone who holds a belief in a deterministic ideology would hold that their ideology is going to triumph in the end, and what they do doesn't really matter, or is part of what will make their ideology win in the end.  It does seem silly, but for the person who subscribes to such, it seems natural.  Statistically though, what one person does is usually irrelevant anyhow.

I would say it is more like the ideology claims it IS the magic pill, and not just that it offers it.  It, itself, is the answer.  It will end up whitewashing the flaws and so on that happened.

You see this happen in the case of people who claim to be of the Christian faith and then equate western civilization with the Christian faith.  End result is every single thing in western civilization has to be shown as the best possible light, and the best possible outcome, or else Jesus ends up not being Jesus.  It leds to other things also, like those who are on the short end get set up as being the problem.  Are you poor?  Obviously it is your fault you are.  You see, if you were in the right, then everything would work out, because the religion of Jesus (aka "Western Civilization") shows that this is so.

So, whether it be technological utopia, triumph of markets, or triumph of the working class, it is all just do whatever you want, remain moderately faithful to your belief system (saying your ideology is glorous scores bonus points) and everything will work out in the end.  It is bound to happen after all.  Religiously, it is a nice what to have God, without really having God.  It is like the George Carlin religion, where you end up worshipping the sun and praying to Joe Pesci.  Biblically, a form of Godliness, without really any power. 

Such individuals, when in revolutionary mode will do real horrible evils also, thinking if they can just tip things the right way, it will make a different.  Marxists in the 20th century did this.  In this century, you have religious fundamentalists who end up doing this.  I believe some people involved in Occupy had this in mind, and probably some Tea Party folks.  Well, at least Ron Paul troopers don't go too far.  Signs on telephone poles are relatively harmless.

I don't really get the point. It's not like marxists or capitalists don't see any problems...