The Teleological Argument

• What does the design argument suggest God is like, in Hume's opinion?

  Immoral
• Hume quote on God


  'The world is very faulty and imperfect, and was only the first rude essay of some infant deity who abandoned it'
• Imperfect & immoral God


  One should judge the craftsman on the quality of the work they produce - earthquakes and illness do not imply a just God. There could be two gods or forces: a good and an evil. That would explain far better the state of the universe
• Problems with man made analogy

  The analogy of a man made thing is bound to lead to the conclusion that the universe was designed. But Hume points out that we already have experience of watches being made, and so this just begs the question when it comes to the universe. The analogy of a man-made thing also implies a human-like God (like effects imply like causes), but this causes problems as God is meant to be infinite in His qualities
• What counter-argument does Dawkins provide for the design argument?

  The female digger wasp lays her eggs in a caterpillar so that the larva can eat the insides as they grow. She also stings it to paralyse it so it is alive as they are eating it
• What is the theory that the world is the chance arrangements of atoms?

  Philo's Epicurean hypothesis
• Organisms challenging Aristotle

  Organisms adapt to their environments and pass on their genes more effectively than ones that can't. So there is no need to appeal to a divine intelligence to account for complexity and 'order' - they arise 'naturally' from the processes of evolution and natural selection
• No need for a goal

  Evolution challenges the Aristotelian account of causation which includes purpose as it shows that natural processes can be explained without the need to refer to a goal
• Who criticised Paley's design argument for comparing dissimilar things (the universe and a watch) in an analogy?

  Hume
• Philo's Epicurean hypothesis


  The world is the chance arrangements of atoms
• Many Desginers criticism

  The universe is not like all the other things we can experience. A watch has many designers usually why not the universe? The universe could have come about randomly and still look designed, given enough time. The presence of evil and suffering in the universe prompts us to ask what kind of design it has
• Hume on Design Argument


  Hume said that analogy can only compare similar things. The watch is not similar to the universe
• Paley's design argument


  The argument compares finding a rock and a watch on the ground. While the rock is assumed to have natural origins, the watch, due to its complexity and purpose, is attributed to a designer. The analogy is then applied to the universe, suggesting its complexity implies the existence of a designer.
• William Paley's Design Argument


  The analogy of the watch. Watch has so much design in it that you know it must be designed by an intelligent being
• Efficent Cause


  What brings something into existence
• Which philosopher originally proposed that the cosmos is directed by intelligence?

  Plato
• Summary of Aquinas' Fith Way

  • The natural world obeys natural laws
  • Natural things flourish as they obey these laws
  • Things without intelligence can't direct themselves
  • Therefore, things without intelligence require something with intelligence to direct them to their goals
  • This is God
• Archery example


  Aquinas gives the example of arrows fired by an archer to hit a target. Without the archer giving the purposive direction, the arrow would remain in the quiver
• Acting for goals & intelligence

  The fact that non-intelligent things (like acorns and plankton) always act in certain ways for certain goals implies that they were given those goals by intelligence because only intelligent beings can assign a purpose to things and move that thing towards its purpose
• Moon example

  The moon has a regular 29 and a half-day cycle
• Tree example

  Given the right conditions, acorns always grow into oak trees and not wombats
• Aquinas' fifth way non intelligent life

  Aquinas' fifth way uses the observation that non-intelligent organic life acts in certain ordered, cyclical and purposive ways
• What does the ancient Greek word

  telosmean?Goal or purpose
• Final Cause


  The purpose of a thing
• Efficient cause


  An agent that brings a thing into being or initiates a change
• Efficient & final causes

  Aristotelian-Thomistic scholars (working in the tradition of Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas) say that efficient causality is unthinkable without final causality
• Who was Aquinas influenced by?

  Aristotle
• Aquinas' five ways type of knowledge

  A posterori
• Design argument


  An argument for God's existence that begins with the premise that design requires an intelligent designer and ends with the conclusion that God is the best explanation for the observable design within the universe
• The Teleological Argument


  The word teleological comes from the Greek wordtelos, meaning goal or purpose. The world and things in it seem to move towards certain goals or ends