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ARGUMENTS BASED ON OBSERVATION (HUME'S CRITICISMS OF TELEOLOGICAL AND…
ARGUMENTS BASED ON OBSERVATION
Aquinas' teleological (design) argument
Aquinas (13th century) used
Aristotelian ideas
extensively in his Christian theology.
Aquinas thought God gave us our
reason
so we could learn more about Him.
In his Five Ways, Aquinas presents five ways in which we can use reason to conclude God exists.
The Fifth Way: Argument from Design
We see that natural bodies work toward some goal, and do not do so by chance.
Most natural things lack knowledge.
But as an arrow reaches its target because it is directed by an archer, what lacks intelligence achieves goals by being directed by something intelligence.
Therefore some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God.
He uses the example of an
arrow heading for a target
. If we saw the arrow in flight, we could conclude that it
must have been shot on purpose
because arrows cannot move on their own. When we see planets moving in an orderly way, we can therefore conclude that
a divine mind must have put them in motion on purpose
, because planets cannot move on their own.
Paley's teleological (design) argument
18th century
Sets out teleological argument in his works
Natural Theology
.
Paley uses the analogy of someone finding a
watch on a heath,
to show that when we see things working in an
orderly and purposeful manner, we know they must have been designed.
He said we see order and purpose in the world too, in the structure of
animals and plants
, and can conclude that they
must have been designed by God
.
We can tell from the care God put into creation that God must care for us.
Aquinas' cosmological argument
Cosmological arguments address the question of why the universe exists at all, and conclude it must be due to God.
The
first three
of Aquinas' Five Ways are variations of his cosmological argument:
The
First Way
is the
Unmoved Mover (Prime Mover)
– we observe motion and change in the world. There must be a reason for it, which must be God.
The First Way: Argument from Motion
Our senses prove that some things are in motion.
Things move when potential motion becomes actual motion.
Only an actual motion can convert a potential motion into an actual motion.
Nothing can be at once in both actuality and potentiality in the same respect (i.e., if both actual and potential, it is actual in one respect and potential in another).
Therefore nothing can move itself.
Therefore each thing in motion is moved by something else.
The sequence of motion cannot extend ad infinitum.
Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God.
The
Second Way
is the
Uncaused Causer
– we observe chains of
cause and effect
in the world. There must be a reason for it, which must be God.
The Second Way: Argument from Efficient Causes
We perceive a series of efficient causes of things in the world.
Nothing exists prior to itself.
Therefore nothing [in the world of things we perceive] is the efficient cause of itself.
If a previous efficient cause does not exist, neither does the thing that results (the effect).
Therefore if the first thing in a series does not exist, nothing in the series exists.
If the series of efficient causes extends ad infinitum into the past, for then there would be no things existing now.
That is plainly false (i.e., there are things existing now that came about through efficient causes).
Therefore efficient causes do not extend ad infinitum into the past.
Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God.
The
Third Way
is
Contingency
– we observe that
everything in the universe depends on something else
for its existence. There must be something that does not depend on anything else, otherwise nothing would ever have started, and this must be God.
The Third Way: Argument from Possibility and Necessity (Reductio argument)
We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, that come into being and go out of being i.e., contingent beings.
Assume that every being is a contingent being.
For each contingent being, there is a time it does not exist.
Therefore it is impossible for these always to exist.
Therefore there could have been a time when no things existed.
Therefore at that time there would have been nothing to bring the currently existing contingent beings into existence.
Therefore, nothing would be in existence now.
We have reached an absurd result from assuming that every being is a contingent being.
Therefore not every being is a contingent being.
Therefore some being exists of its own necessity, and does not receive its existence from another being, but rather causes them. This all men speak of as God.
Leibniz and the principle of sufficient reason
Gottfried Leibniz
argued that there must be
'sufficient reason'
or explanation for everything.
The universe requires a
sufficient reason
, and the only reason sufficient enough to explain the existence of the universe must be
God
.
The anthropic principle
F.R Tennant
The universe seems expertly fine-tuned to allow for human life to exist. It seems more likely that this fine-tuning is a result of
deliberate design
, than that it happened by chance against enormous odds.
HUME'S CRITICISMS OF TELEOLOGICAL AND COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENT
David Hume
was an 18th century sceptic philosopher
In
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion
,
Hume
criticised teleological and cosmological arguments for the existence of God.
Hume
argues that the analogy between the world and a watch is weak; the world is not very obviously like a watch in its mechanisms.
Order in the world does not necessarily mean that someone must have had the idea of the design - it is an
essential part of the world's existence
. It could have come about by chance.
The
universe is unique
, so we cannot know how universes are usually made or whether ours is unusually orderly.
Just because the things in the universe have
causes
, it does not follow that the universe as a whole must have some kind of
universal cause
.
Perhaps the universe is its
own
cause.
We cannot look at the effects (the world) and continually infer the cause (God):
it might not be the God Christians describe.
it might be a God who is stupid, arriving at this design only after countless mistakes or copying someone else's ideas.
it might be a
whole committee
of Gods, or angels, or even demons.
POSSIBLE CRITICISMS OF TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENTS
The argument might be considered to have strengths because we can all see the world around us and appreciate elements of
beauty, order and purpose
. Such beauty, order and purpose on a global scale could be best explained by the
existence of God
.
Darwin's theory of evolution through
natural selection
provides an
alternative explanation
for the characteristics of living things.
Chance
is another possibility. This might be considered a better fit than the God hypothesis.
Not everyone
sees the world as orderly and beautiful and purposive. Some see it as
chaotic and full of ugliness and pointlessness
.
As an a posteriori argument, it can only lead to a
probable conclusion
and does not prove anything.
POSSIBLE CRITICISMS OF A POSTERIORI ARGUMENTS
We do not always see the
same things
when we look at the world, and our experiences are not always the same as other people's, so a posteriori arguments do not appeal to everyone.
A posteriori arguments try to find the
'best fit'
explanation, but they can never be certain.
They cannot prove, they can only
suggest
strongly probable conclusions.
Some new evidence might come along which forces a need for a new explanation.
They need for constant review of a posteriori reasoning can be considered a strength as well as a weakness, as it
discourages arrogance and encourages questioning
.
POSSIBLE CRITICISMS OF COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENTS
Other theories suggest different explanations for the existence of the universe, such as the
Big Bang theory, or chance
. These might be considered a better fit than the God hypothesis.
Not everyone thinks the universe requires any explanation or reason.
As an a posteriori argument, it can only lead to a
probable conclusion
and does not prove anything.
A posteriori arguments
arguments which draw conclusions based on
observation
through
experience
.
A priori arguments
arguments which draw conclusions through the use of
reason
.
Principle of Sufficient Reason
the principle that
everything must have a reason
to explain it.
OTHER CRITICISMS
J.S. Mill
pointed to the amount of evil in the world as a fundamental objection to design.