C - Hume's criticisms

Philosophical challenges

What is background info on Hume?

• He criticised the arguments for God in his book, ‘dialogues concerning natural religion.’

• Hume was an empiricist - he believed we can only rely on our own sensory experience when formulating arguments.

• Once you talk about a metaphysical God, you are going beyond your own experience, therefore cannot make any logical conclusions.

• Hume is not saying that God does not exist, he is simply arguing that inductive arguments do not prove God exists.

What are all 5 of his criticisms called?

1. Empirical objections.

2. Critique of causes.

3. Problems with analogies.

4. Rejection of traditional theistic claims and the designer is not necessarily the God of classical theism.

5. Apprentice, plurality and absent God.

What are the empirical objections?

• There is no reason or evidence based on observation that can establish whether or not the universe was caused - empirical objection.

• We can talk about things that we have experience of with some certainty - we have no experience of creating the universe, therefore cannot talk meaningfully about that.

• Hume argued that the universe is unique - we have nothing to compare it to, we cant say what it could have been like, or how it came to being because we haven’t experienced anything like it coming into being.

• We do not know how worlds are usually made so we cannot make any conclusions.

What are the critiques of causes?

• The cosmological argument is a fallacy of composition because it assumes that just because we can observe that each part of the universe is caused - does not mean that the universe as a whole was caused.

• Just because each element of a chain has a cause - it doesn’t mean the chain itself must have a singular cause.

• Russell gave an example that just because all humans have mothers, it doesn’t mean the human race has one.

What is the fallacy of composition? (critiques of causes)

• The fallacy of composition is to confuse the properties of a whole with the properties of the parts.

• E.g. this is a good college = every student in the college is good.

What does the critiques of causes say about similar effects?

• Similar effects do not necessarily imply similar causes.

• Although the outcomes may seem similar - the events leading to the outcomes may be very different.

• Just because the world seems to show order, it does not mean that the order is the result of the same sort of design we experience with man made objects.

What are the problems with analogies?

• Hume argued that the world is not like a machine - it is more organic than mechanical.

• Hume felt that the argument did not provide enough evidence to prove that intelligence explained the order and design of the world.

What other principles did he think could be governing the world? - problems with analogies

• There could be lots of different principles governing the world.

• Gravity, generation, vegetation.

• Why does the teleological argument assume there can only be one governance.

What did Hume say about house building/universe building? - problems with analogies

• Hume argued that if we see a house, we conclude that it must have had a builder - because we’ve experienced house building before.

• We can’t make the same conclusion about the universe because we’ve not experienced ‘universe building’

• Hume argues that if we were to compare the world to man-made designed things that could mean we conclude there is a plurality of Gods.

• Just like a house requires many people to build it - the world may have needed lots of Gods to create the different parts.

What did Hume think the world was more similar to? - problems with analogies

• Hume argued that the world was far more similar to a carrot than a watch

• This is because of principles vegetation and generation creating the carrot.

• The natural world may contain inner self-regulation and growth.

Why did Hume say the analogies are weak?

• Hume thought it was not right to draw comparisons between the world and machines and use them as analogies - as there is very little similarity.

What are Hume and Philo’s alternative arguments? - Rejection of traditional theistic claims

• Hume argues that animals, which are not well adapted to their surroundings will simply die and therefore the apparent ‘design’ in the animal kingdom exists due to the sheer need for survival.

• Since Darwin published his findings on evolution nearly 100 years later - the theory has been accepted as the most credible way to account for apparent design displayed by animals and plants.

• Another alternative that Philo says is that the universe is actually being spun from the abdomen of a gigantic spider.

• His point is that apparent order and design do not necessarily point to an intelligent brain.

• Webs are spun with order and design but they are not created with brain power, they are created with abdomen power.

What is the Epicurean Hypothesis according to Hume? - Rejection of traditional theistic claims

• At the time of creation the universe consisted of particles in random motion.

• The initial state of the forces were chaotic.

• However gradually overtime they became ordered.

• Hume believed it was inevitable that an ordered state would develop.

• So the stability and sense of order of the universe is due to random particles coming together overtime and not the work of a designer.

What does Hume say about evil and God? - Rejection of traditional theistic claims

• The existence of evil undermines the likelihood of a loving God.

• Therefore the deign argument does not necessarily point to the God of classical theism.

• Hume questioned how a world designed by a just, loving God could produce so much evil and suffering?

• He argued it was more likely that a God with no moral character produced the universe than a loving one.

• This opposes the idea of the God of classical theism designing the universe.

What did Hume say about God not needing to be a Christian God? - Rejection of traditional theistic claims

• Hume said that even if we can assume a creator, there is no reason why this must be the Christian God.

• We have an imperfect and finite world, so how can we assume the creator is a perfect and infinite being.

• We do not know, looking at the world if God is good or all loving or all knowing.

• He could have simply copied the idea from another God or accidentally created the world.

What did Hume say about an apprentice and absent God? - Apprentice, plurality and absent God

• Even if the design argument is valid the design could have been by lesser Gods or an apprentice God.

• This world might be the last of many failed experiments in ‘design’ by such an apprentice God.

• Or a God could have made the universe then abandoned it.

• We don’t know that our universe is well designed as we have nothing to compare it to.

What does Hume say about God being faulty? - Apprentice, plurality and absent God

• God is meant to be infinite but the analogical argument tells us that God could only design something finite.

• Gods design contains faults so does that mean God is ‘faulty’?

What is a key quote about the world being faulty, imperfect and abandoned?

‘‘The world is very faulty and imperfect and was only the first rude essay of some infant deity who afterwards abandoned it.’’ - Hume

What does Hume say about there not needing to be just one God? - Apprentice, plurality and absent God

• Hume said there is no reason to assume that the universe was made by just one God.

• Imagine a watch - there is no reason for us to believe it was made by just one person - and that all watches were made by the same person.

• There are all sorts of possibilities that are just as likely.

• The world could have been made by a committee of Gods, or demons or angels.