Teleological argument.

What is a posteriori reasoning?

-Using observation/experience to reach conclusions.

What is teleological?

-To do with something’s purpose/end point.

What is a posteriori reasoning?

-Using observation/experience to reach conclusions.

What is teleological?

-To do with something’s purpose/end point.

What are teleological arguments?

-Try to prove God exists by looking at the design/order in the world.

-Posteriori argument, based on the order & purpose in the universe, to conclude it is the result of design, not chance.

-The evidence from design points to a designer & concludes it’s God.

-Aquinas’ 5th way & Paley.

Why does Aquinas believe God helps us achieve our purpose?

-Things that lack knowledge act for a purpose/end & acting for a purpose/end always lead to the best result.

-This doesn’t happen undeliberately.

-Anything that lacks knowledge needs something with knowledge to guide it.

-Therefore there is an intelligent being that guides all natural things to their end.

-This is God. - he is the guiding force that makes all things achieve their purpose deliberately.

What is Aquinas’ archer & arrow analogy? & the weakness?

-The same way an archer guides an arrow is the same way as God guides natural bodies to their purpose.

-This only helps understand his view, it doesn’t prove his argument.

Aquinas’ argument for the existence of God.

-From governance of the World.

-Posteriori argument - the observations of the universe show regularity & order.

-There is beneficial order & purpose in the universe, it couldn’t have happened by chance. Many objects don’t have the intelligence to work towards a goal themselves. Anything that lacks knowledge needs smt with knowledge to guide it - arrow & archer analogy.

-Ockams razor supports Aquinas’ theory - God guides all non-intelligent things to complete their purpose.

What are the weaknesses of Aquinas’ view?

-Aquinas’ argument could be considered unsound bc the premise it’s based on that there is beneficial order in the universe may not be true. Mill argued the world reveals cruelty, violence & unnecessary suffering which aren’t the characteristics of an ordered world.

-Hume argued just bc we see order in the world doesn’t mean we can leap to the idea of a Divine Orderer. It’s a great leap in logic.

-Hume recognised the problems with viewing the world was ordered. He maintained we don’t have other worlds to compare it to, there isn’t any way of knowing whether this world is truly ordered.

-Hume argues any world would look designed bc if it was chaotic, it wouldn’t survive.

-Just bc Aquinas uses the arrow & archer analogy, doesn’t mean he has proved his argument, only illustrated his complex argument.

What are william paley’s two teleological arguments?

-Design qua regularity= complex objects work with regularity. The seasons of the year work with order, gravity works with order. This order is the result of the work of a designer.

-Design qua purpose= things have been put together deliberately with a purpose. Eyes have been constructed for a purpose to see.

What is Paley’s watch analogy?

-If you came across a rock, it can be explained by natural causes. If you came across a watch there isn’t a natural explaination. Its made up of clogs & springs so this design couldn’t have come about by chance and there must be a watchmaker designing it with the purpose of telling the time.

-The world is more complex than a watch so there must be a creator God.

-Even if the watch is broken, there is enough design to suggest a watchmaker.

What are Humes criticisms of the watch analogy?

-It isn’t necessarily true the world is like a watch, it might be true a watch looks as if it’s designed but it is harder to say the world has these characteristics. The world instead is like a vegetable that has characteristics of intricacy.

What are Hume’s criticisms of the teleological/Paley’s argument?

-While we can observe order/purpose in the world, we cannot apply the same criteria to the whole world. (fallacy of composition).

-We have observed the design of machinery but have no witness of universes being designed so we should not assume a God-like designer.

What are Tennants arguments based on design?

-Tennants anthropic principle, argues against the origins of the universe being by chance. He concluded science has now discovered if the laws of nature or gravity were even slightly different, human life couldn’t have happened.

-Argued for the existence of an intelligent God who designed the universe on the basis of beauty. For Tenant, the beauty of the natural world is evidence for the existence of God bc there isn’t any scientific explaination to account for beauty. It doesn’t have a function.

What are the criticisms of Tennant’s view?

-The anthropic principle argument gives special status to humans. E.G if the universe was structured another way, dung beetles wouldn’t exist, yet we don’t argue the universe was designed for the existence of dung beetles or the universe designed for the existence of cancer.

-Others suggest coincidence is a part of reality of the world, so why not for the universe as a whole.

-Beauty may have a scientific explaination to improve survival. Research shows animals percieved as beautiful are more tolerated than those aren’t.

-Some argue beauty is a matter of opinion, so beauty doesn’t exist in the same sense as Plato’s Form of beauty. It’s subjective.

What is Swinburne’s teleological argument?

-Argues scientific knowledge shows God doesn’t only exist, but cares for us. E.G we can observe objects fall when dropped & this helps us avoid accidents.

-Main force of Swinburne’s argument is it’s good scientific practice to look for the simplest explaination when trying to solve a problem & God is the most simple explaination for the existence of the universe.

-Ockams razor.

What is Dawkin’s criticism of Swinburne’s view?

-Dawkins argues Swinburne as a Christian has been encouraged by his faith to attribute the lack of any explaination to God & therefore not have to think.

What is the theory of evolution?

-Evidence/observation shows through natural selection creatures most suited to their environment would survive & pass their characteristics to the next generation.

-Creatures with successful mutations are more likely to reproduce & less successful mutations means the creature is less likely to survive & so these species die out.

What is Darwin’s evidence for evolution?

-Found a species of finch on each island with a different-shaped beak depending on the food source of the island.

-EG longer beaks for extracting insects from trees, shorter beaks for cracking seeds.

-Darwin suggested this design was due to natural selection where finches with less successful beaks for food died out. Leaving the successful ones to reproduce.

How does evolution challenge the teleological argument?

-If species have survived due to adaptation to the environment there is no need for a designer/God.

-If evolution is a random process, there is no purpose/planned design given by God.

-Challenges the dignity of humankind bc humans evolved in the same way as animals. Where is the uniqueness of humankind?

What are the arguments for evolution explaining change in the world?

-Challenges the design argument bc it explains regularity/purpose as a result of chance. Advantaged mutations allows creatures to reproduce more making it look like they are designed to fit their environment.

-The world appears to be designed only bc humans have minds that design things with purpose/order. Evolution uses evidence from observation to show there is a natural explaination & no designer/God.

-Evolution is a natural process with no plan/purpose so we don’t need to infer a designing mind who planned the world.

-Natural selection is a wasteful process. It’s cruel creatures not adapted to their environment die out or random mutations having negative effects. This wastefulness/bad design supports the idea there is no design/designer.

What are the teleological arguments that explain design better than evolution?

-Seems unlikely the order/regularity/purpose in the world came about by chance. Paley argues if u came across a watch on a heath, u wouldn’t think it appeared by chance but that it must’ve had a designer. Similarly things in the world seem to be designed, eg eyes for seeing which looks like design not chance.

-Tennant’s anthropic principle argues God set up laws of physics that allowed the process of evolution, with the purpose of allowing human life to evolve. There is a designing mind behind the natural processes.'

-Paley uses the example of a broken watch - even if its broken & doesn’t fulfil its purpose of telling the time perfectly, we can still tell it was designed. Like in the world, we might see bad design but it doesn’t rule out there is design.

-Tennant’s aesthetic principle says the appreciation of beauty in the world seems unnecessary for survival. This indicates a omnibenevolent designer God who designed us & things in the world to give pleasure.

What are the strengths of the Teleological arguments?

-Easy to understand.

-Appeals to our sense of wonder & awe at the beauty of the world.

-Comforting to think a higher power has designed the world for us bc he loves us.

-Comforting to think a higher power is in charge.

What are Humes criticisms of the teleological argument?

-Given an infinite amount of time, all particles in the universe would be able to combine in every possible combination. Eventually a stable environment would be created & that would be the world we live in. Thus randomness explains the universe, not a designer.

-Our world is finite/imperfect why should God be infinite & perfect?

-Just because we see evidence of a designer we don’t know anything about the nature of the designer.

-The designer could’ve created this world through a series of trial & error experiments.

-There could be a number of designers - after all a house is created by a number of people.

-The designer could be immoral, just because a watch is perfect, doesn’t mean the watchmaker is a good person.

What are the arguments for Hume’s view about teleological arguments.

-We cannot assume just because a human-made machine has a designer that the world needs a designer too.

-The design argument assumes the designer is the monotheistic God when it could be several gods or a malevolent one. Due to the flaws in design.

-The design argument assumes there was intentional design rather than the product of a random chance.

-The fallacy of compostion= just because eyes have purpose to allow creatures to see, it doesn’t mean the world as a whole has a purpose & therefore a designer.

What are the arguments against Hume’s view about teleological arguments.

-Paley argues even if we haven’t seen the watch being made, we still would assume design & a designer. So we haven’t seen the world being made but we learn from the effects there is a designer.

-Hume takes the analogy too far, many agree there is a designer of the world but don’t hold religious beliefs.

-Paley argues you cannot throw all parts of a watch in the air & expect them to fall so the watch worked & told the time. So chance is not enough to explain the world.