Theology - Arguments from Experience for God

Design Argument

The universe and everything in it has a design, order and purpose - this infers a designer (God)

Design

Anything that has parts organised to serve a purpose

Anthropic Principle

The universe is finely-tuned and uniquely suited for human life

Aesthetic Principle

‘Beauty beyond necessity’ - F.R Tennant

Leibniz’s Principle of Sufficient Reason

All synthetic truths require a complete explanation

Why does an ordered universe suggest a creator?

An ordered universe is a synthetic truth. All synthetic truths require an explanation. Therefore, the ordered universe requires an explanation

Key Features of the Teleological Argument

A posteriori evidence — beneficial order/purpose (Aquinas), complexity of design (Paley), accumulation of improbable elements (Swinburne)

The Analogical Argument (Aquinas/Paley/Dawah)

Draws an analogy between human behaviour and the natural world (e.g watch, socks etc) - because two things are similar in one way, they’re similar in other ways

The Argument to the Best Explanation (Swinburne)

P1: The universe operates by rules and laws

P2: Rules and laws are created or put in place

P3: It is reasonable to ask what put the universe’s laws into place

P4: Given the improbability of these occurrences all happening at once, chance isn’t a good solution

C1: Therefore, God is the most probable solution

Aquinas’ Fifth Way

P1: Things that lack intelligence, such as living organisms, have an end (a purpose)

P2: Things that lack intelligence cannot move towards their end unless directed by someone with knowledge and intelligence

P3: Example, an arrow doesn’t move by itself, requires an archer’s direction

C1: Therefore, there must be some intelligent being which directs all unintelligent natural things towards their end

C2: The intelligent being must be God

Flaws of Aquinas’ Fifth way

• Other explanations for ‘end’ ie chance/biology e.g seemingly random bird migrations don’t require director

• Inductive leap to GCT

What 3 phrases does Paley use when describing the eye/watch to prove God?

• “Several parts”

• “Framed and fitted together”

• “Produces regularity of function”

Paley’s Design Argument

P1: Anything that has parts organised to serve a purpose is designed

P2: Nature contains things which have parts that are organised to serve a purpose

P3: Therefore, nature contains things which are designed

P4: Design can only be explained in terms of a designer (presumed analytic truth)

P5: A designer must be or have a mind and be distinct from what is designed

C1: Therefore, nature was designed by a mind distinct from nature

C2: Such a mind must exist and must be God

Weak analogy response to D.A

• Hume

• ‘Great disproportion’ between parts and whole

• Humans are dissimilar to watches

• Law of analogy - ‘like effects infer like causes’

Insufficient evidence response to D.A

• Arrangement of parts for a purpose doesn’t infer that the cause is a designer on its own

• Requires prior evidence of designer

• We only have limited understanding of the universe, therefore limited evidence

Epicurean Hypothesis

With finite matter and infinite time, all arrangements of matter could occur by chance

Anthropomorphism response to D.A

• D.A risks anthropomorphising God, as it infers a designer that is like a human designer

• Flaws in design - problem of evil

• Possibility of multiple designers

Evolution response to D.A

• Darwin

• Appearance of design is possible without design

• Natural forces ensure survival of the fittest, alterations can happen naturally

• Swinburne’s Temporal Order

• The universe can’t fully be explained by science

• The laws of science presuppose laws of science

• Keeps going back and back and back

• Therefore an infinite entity (ie God) must have invented temporal order

What is a Cosmological Argument?

An argument which focuses on the question of cosmology: Why is there something rather than nothing?

Why wouldn’t the universe require an explanation?

The universe is a “brute fact” (Bertrand Russell)

Why does the universe require an explanation?

All chains of events/motion have a first cause; there must be a “sufficient reason” (Leibniz) for this

Aquinas’ First Way - The Argument from Motion (Kinetological Way)

P1: Some things in the world are in motion

P2: Nothing can move itself

P3: Everything in motion is moved by something else

— If A is put into motion by B, B must also have been in motion, which must have been put into motion by something else

P4: If this continues infinitely, then there is no first mover

P5: If there is no first mover, then there is no next mover, and so nothing would be in motion

C1: Therefore, there must be a first mover that causes motion in all things

C2: The first mover must be God

Motion

Moving from a potential state to an actual state

Aquinas’ Second Way - The Argument from Causation

P1: We find in the world causes and effects

P2: Nothing can be the cause of itself

— If something were causally responsible for itself, it would be prior to itself

P3: Causes follow in order: the first causes the second, which causes the third

P4: If you remove a cause, you remove its effect

P5: Therefore, if there is no first cause, there will be no later causes

P6: Therefore, given that there are causes, there cannot be an infinite regress of causes

C1: Therefore, there must be a first cause, which is not caused itself

C2: God must be the first cause

What are the three inferences about causation?

• Causation is transitive (if x leads to y and y leads to z, then x leads to z)

• Causation is irreflexive (x can’t cause x)

• Causation is universal (all things in the universe have causes)

Per accidens

Accidental causation, the effect is the result of the cause but does not depend on the cause for its continued existence, e.g farmer planting seed

Per se

Essential causation, the effect is directly and necessarily preceded by the cause; the effect cannot continue without the cause, e.g car on a flat plane, disabled child

Necessary existence

It must exist, it is impossible for it not to exist

Contingent existence

It is possible for it to exist and not to exist, often dependent on other factors

Aquinas’ Argument from Contingency

P1: Things in the universe exist contingently (ie it’s possible for them to exist and not to exist)

P2: If it is possible for something not to exist, then at some time, it did not exist

P3: Given this, it is possible where there is a time where there was nothing in existence

P4: If at some time nothing was in existence, nothing could begin to exist

P5: Therefore, there is something that must exist

C1: The necessary being must be God

Weaknesses of the argument from contingency

• Fallacy of composition - what’s true for the parts isn’t always true for the whole

• Not all possibilities are actualised

• Inductive leap to God