Paley gives a version of the
Teleological Argument. He gives the argument by setting out an analogy with
finding a watch on a heath. We would know that there must have been a
watchmaker that made the watch. Paley only briefly, at the end of the piece,
sets out the corresponding argument concerning the world and God, but it is
pretty obvious how the two arguments are connected. What he is mainly aiming to
do is reply to eight possible objections to the Teleological Argument by
applying them to the case of the watch, to show that they are not convincing
objections.
Paley
contrasts finding a stone and finding a watch. There are particular features of
the watch which distinguish it from the stone, which make him conclude that the
watch was constructed by someone. It is clear the construction of the watch is
"complex and subtle," that "its several parts are framed and put
together for a purpose". He gives a careful description of the watch to
show this. He has no doubt that it was made by a watchmaker. Note that here
that the word "end" means purpose of function. The different parts of
the watch mechanism have different functions, or ends, and they all fit
together with the end of telling the time. What "does "subtle"
mean here, and in what ways is the construction of the watch subtle?
Some
philosophers might object to his argument in any of the following eight
different ways.
I.
You have never seen a watch made, and know no one capable of making a watch
like the one you have found, so you have no right to conclude that there is a watchmaker.
II.
The watch sometimes goes wrong. Why would a watchmaker have made an imperfect
watch? It does not make sense to suppose that the watch was constructed.
III.
The function of some parts of the watch is beyond our understanding. Some other
parts of the watch seem to perform no function whatever, and are
useless, since the watch works just as well without them. No watchmaker would
make such a watch.
IV.
The object had to have some internal structure. Some piece of matter had
to occupy the space where we found the watch. It is just an accident that the
arrangement of matter in that space was the one it happened to be, and we can't
conclude that someone made it.
V.
We don't need to suppose that a watchmaker made the watch. A better explanation
is that a 'principle of order,' or cause of nature, led to the existence of the
watch.
VI.
The fact that the watch is so intricate is no proof that it was constructed. It
just shows that we are inclined to think it was constructed.
VII.
The watch is just a result of the laws of mechanics and the property of the
materials inside it. We can't conclude that it was constructed by some
watchmaker. .
VIII.
We don't know anything about the matter, and can't draw any conclusions from
the existence of the watch.
Paley
replies to each objection, showing how it does not work. He leaves the reader
to consider how each of these objections is analogous to objections to the
Teleological Argument for the Existence of God, and how his replies would apply
to those objections as well.
We
can write out analogous objections to the Teleological Argument and replies to
those objections.
Objection
I. We have never directly experienced God creating the wonderful
complexity of nature, and we have no idea how God might go about creating the
world, so we cannot conclude from the complexity of nature that God created the
world.
Reply
I. Our lack of knowledge of how God performed his work makes no
difference. All the argument relies on is the complexity of the world, not
knowing precisely how it came about. We know enough to know that it is absurd
to suppose that a world like this just came about by accident. Some
all-powerful, vastly intelligent being must have arranged the world to be as it
is.
Objection
II. The world is very imperfect: our frail bodies go wrong often,
and disease and accidents kill people. If God had created the world, he would
have made us much stronger and more able to deal with the world, so our lives
were not so difficult.
Reply
II. The fact that an object is imperfect does not show that it was
not created. God may have made the world perfect, but afterwards humans,
through their free will and bad choices, made it less perfect. Whatever the
reason for the imperfection of the world, we can still be sure that some
intelligent being created it.
Objection
III. There are many things in this world which are very mysterious to
us. For instance, we do not understand much about human biology, the human
soul, the fundamental nature of matter, and why the universe is physically
arranged as it is. There are other parts of the world that seem to be
pointless. For instance, a human body does not need its appendix or tonsils.
God would not make the world like that.
Reply
III. First, as far as mysterious aspects of the universe goes, the
limits of our knowledge don't make any difference. Even if we don't understand
various parts of the human body, for instance the brain, we can still know that
it performs an essential function, because people who have damaged brains don't
do as well. In fact, we should expect a wonderfully complex world as made by
God to be beyond our understanding. Second, concerning parts of nature which
seem to perform no useful function, the existence of such parts does not affect
the reasoning from the parts of nature which do serve a useful function.
Even if having an appendix is of no benefit, we can still know that some form
of intelligence must have designed the human body, because it works so well.
Objection
IV. The universe had to have some arrangement of matter, and
it is just a matter of coincidence that it has the one it does. Like in a
lottery, someone has to win. Even if there are millions of tickets, one
of them will be the one that gets picked, and it is just a matter of randomness
which one it is. The universe could have been an infinite number of different
ways, and it just happened to be this one. There is no reason to think that
some intelligent being designed it this way.
Reply
IV. (Paley does not actually give a reply to this in the case of the
watch, presumably because he thinks that it is so obvious that the objection is
silly when seen how it applies to the case of the watch. We can set out what
kind of objection he would give, if he was asked.) It is vastly improbable that
some random collection of matter would form itself into a sophisticated working
universe. Consider an analogy. If you get a monkey typing letters at random, on
a typewriter or computer, it is true that it will type some assortment
of alphabetic characters. However, if the monkey typed a book of perfectly
grammatical English sentences which formed together to make an exciting work of
detective fiction, you would find it impossible to believe that it was purely
random, because that particular collection of letters requires so much thought
and intelligence to form. You would have to conclude that the monkey was
intelligent and understood English, and had a good understanding of the genre
of detective novels. Similarly, when we look at the world, with the vast
complexity of biology, for instance, it is impossible to believe that it just
happened at random, and was not the work of intelligence.
Objection
V. The explanation of the nature of the world is not that it was
created by a form of intelligence, but rather that a 'principle of order'
exists which has caused the world to be as it is. (This objection is similar to
VII, except that the term 'principle of order' here refers to some more
mysterious organizing force for the universe than simply ordinary scientific
explanations.)
Reply
V. First, whatever a 'principle of order' might be, we have never
seen it create anything, let alone the world, so why should we think that it
did. Second, the phrase 'principle of order,' if it means anything, can only
mean the same as an intelligent creative force, and the objector is implicitly
conceding that the world was made by an intelligent powerful being.
Objection
VI. All the wonderful complexity of the world shows is that we
are inclined to suppose that it was created by a God. It does not show that
it was in fact created by a God. That is to say, we have a natural inclination
to try to explain complex things, that we can't in fact explain, by saying that
God made them. This is a fact about humans, and our innate irrationality. We
are not actually justified in coming to the conclusion that there is a God.
This objection becomes clearer if you consider the way that primitive humans
think that natural phenomena like earthquakes and solar eclipses must be
expressions of the anger of gods, since they have no other explanation for the
occurrence of the frightening events they experience. The idea behind the
objection is that we are really no different from such primitive people,
because we bring in God to explain those things that we don't understand.
Reply
VI. (Again, Paley does not bother to reply to this, except to say
that someone finding a watch would be "surprised" to be told such a
view.) This objection does not say why the inference to the existence of
God is irrational. It is certainly true that humans tend to come to the
conclusion that God exists after seeing the wonders of the world, but this by
itself does not show it is irrational. We tend to come to the conclusion that
2+2=4, and this is perfectly rational. The objection provides no alternative
explanation for the wonderful complexity and design of the world, so still the
most rational explanation we have is that God made it that way.
Objection
VII. The existence and nature of the universe are simply a result of
the laws of physics, and other laws of nature. We can find a
perfectly scientific explanation of the existence and nature of the universe
through science, without ever having to bring God into the story. For instance,
the existence of the universe is explained through the Big Bang theory. The
wonderful complexity of nature is explained by the Theory of Evolution, where,
through genetic variation and natural selection, biological organisms become
more sophisticated and capable of surviving through thousands and thousands of successive
generations.
Reply
VII. A scientific law cannot be the cause of anything. To
think so is to be confused about the nature of explanation. A law is simply a
generalization describing how an intelligent force behaves. "A law
presupposes an agent." Something must keep the parts of the world going.
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What exactly Paley is suggesting here
is not clear. One possibility is that he is saying that while the
properties of metal may explain the interaction of the pieces of metal in the
watch, they does not explain how the watch came to have the particular
internal structure that it does. Someone had to design the watch to
give it that internal structure. Similarly, he is denying that the
"scientific explanations" we have of the nature of the world are
really explanations, because someone had to design the laws of nature and the
arrangement of physical matter that the laws of nature were going to govern.
This interpretation does not fit well with some parts of what Paley writes
here though, in particular, his claim that a law of nature is only the mode
according to which (i.e., the way in which) an agent proceeds. Alternatively,
he may be saying that while the laws of mechanics and metallic nature explain
why the watch works as it does, in its clockwork mechanism, it does not
explain what is making the watch parts move in the first place. However, the
obvious objection to this is that it is the tightly coiled metal spring in
the watch that keeps it going, and not a watchmaker. He might be saying that someone
had to wind the watch up in the first place, but, if so, then all his
argument here shows, at best, is the existence of a watch winder, not
a watchmaker. In the case of the world, this would amount to a "First
Cause" argument, rather than an argument from design. A third
possible interpretation of Paley, which would make more sense in the case
of his argument in the context of proving the existence of God, is that
someone needs to keep the parts of the watch moving all the time. We cannot
just suppose that they interact on their own, because something needs to make
them interact as they do. The laws of metallic nature describe how the
parts of the metal interact, but do not explain what force keeps the
interaction going from one moment to the next. But if this is what he is
saying, then this does not prove the existence of a watchmaker, for he
certainly is not there to prod the metal cogs and wheels into motion at every
moment. Rather, it would have to be God whose invisible hand keeps every bit
of matter behaving according the laws of nature at every moment.. Some force
is needed to keep the parts of the whole universe moving at any given moment,
so God's intervention is needed at every interaction of matter, and for the
movement of every single piece of matter, for every second of time. (This
third view was advocated by the philosopher Malebranche, and is called
"Occasionalism.") None of these three interpretations is entirely
satisfactory. It is tempting to conclude that Paley was mixing up different ideas
here, and got confused. |
Objection VIII. We don't know
anything about anything, especially about God.
Reply
VIII. This lame objection begs the question, and provides no argument.
We may not know much, but we know enough to see the how well the different
parts of nature fit together in an incredibly well-designed way. This is all we
need to be sure that some powerful intelligent being must have made the world.
© 2003 Christian Perring.