The design argument was formulated by Paley. His watch analogy is an a posteriori argument which gives empirical evidence the structure is that it explains that the existence of God is the best explanation for the evidence available. His argument says that the world and everything in it are so intricate and complex that they must have been designed. He goes on the mention that if he found a watch lying on the ground he would take from it that there must have been a designer due to the organisation of parts put together for a purpose so even if we had no previous knowledge of watchers or makers we would look at all of the small pieces that make up a watch, arranged in a specific way meaning they fulfil the purpose of telling the time and all of those pieces could not have fallen together so therefore must have been designed. This is an analogy of things in the natural world for example, the human eye is made of small parts working together to create the purpose of sight, we infer this must be the result of design not chance.
The teleological argument offers a way we can explain God’s existence in terms of design and nature. It explains that the world is too complex and diverse for there not to be a designer, such as God, at work. This argument derives from Thomas Aquinas’ work from his Summa Theologiae. His fifth way suggests that inanimate objects cannot have ordered themselves since they lack intelligence. For example, planets could not have put themselves into orbit, yet they are in perfect order and placement so therefore there must be a designer, an intelligent being, that did so.
Explain what is meant by intelligent design Intelligent design comes from the creationist teachings who's belief is that science is unconstitutional however even though it is believed the universe is created through a higher intelligent design, it does not necessarily have to be God. Creationists also believe that the story of creation from the bible is literally true and actually occurred. According to them the creation of the universe was designed through a higher being, that being God. Intelligent design is split into three smaller subsets, the first being irreducible complexity of which all objects and organisms in the universe have. Meaning they are very complex and are not able to be explained through the 'simplistic' means of natural selection and evolution theories.
Stacey Snyder Professor McMichael Introduction to Philosophy April 08, 2014 Paley’s Teleological Argument In this paper, I will be discussing Paley’s teleological argument for the existence of God. This is a valid argument but in my opinion it is not enough to prove the existence of God. I believe that even if all the premises are true and they relate to the conclusion, which they do, that the argument can still be proven wrong by other theories. Paley’s teleological arguments, also called the design argument, attempts to prove that God exists by proving that God created the earth and created humans. Paley’s version of the argument is commonly recognized by the “watchmaker” analogy which is as follows.
Explain the main challenges of the teleological argument for the existence of God The word ‘telos’ derives from the Greek meaning end, goal or purpose. The teleological argument is the argument that the world was designed by a designer and this designer is God. Throughout history there have been many points to support the teleological argument however there have also been many that challenge it. In “dialogues concerning natural religion” David Hume offers three key criticisms of the teleological argument. His first point was that the universe is bound to look designed because it has to be this way for us to be here to observe it, any solar system or planet which provided the conditions for conscious life to exist will seem to have been designed for our purposes.
According to Paley the analogy of the watch links to the universe because, Paley argued that just as the watch being designed necessitates a designer to explain why it exists, so all of nature requires a much greater designer. Paley pointed out that the complexity of nature is far greater than any machine human beings can make. Therefore the whole of nature requires a grand designer. That grand designer can only be God. In other words this is trying to say that, the ability to create the universe is complex therefore something beyond human knowledge something that is transcendent can only create the universe and that something is
If we didn’t have intuitions of space and time there would be no experience at all so we must possess some innate knowledge in order for us to live within it. Kant says that we have a conceptual scheme because senses alone are not enough to make sense of the phenomenal world. He believes that a conceptual scheme is made up of 12 innate concepts (which he called categories) e.g. causality, unity and substance. He argued that they were part of the structure of the mind and that we would have no experience without them.
It has also sought to explain a modern formulation of the argument as put forward by Richard Swinburne. In both of these versions of the argument, the key idea is that the order and purpose which we all experience through our senses, a posteriori, requires an explanation. For believers like Paley and Swinburne, the most likely explanation is that there is a designer God who created the world lovingly and for a purpose. Hume presents a fictitious dialogue between three characters: Cleanthes, Philo, and Demea. Although Hume focuses primarily on the global design argument, it should be clear that his objections to the global argument can be applied to the local design argument presented by Paley.
Descartes declares he has to determine if there is a God and if he does exist, whether he can be a deceiver. The reason he has to determine the existence of God and what he is, rests in his theories of ideas. This is because we do not know if there is an outside world and we can almost imagine everything, so all depends on God’s existence and if he is a deceiver. “To prove that this non-deceiving God exists, Descartes finds in his mind a few principles he regards as necessary truths which are evident by the “natural light” which is the power or cognitive faculty for clear and distinct perception.” If arguments is presented in logical trains of thought, people could not help but to be swayed and to understand those arguments. Natural light
Existence is a part of perfection. While the ontological argument can be approached without the use of consciousness or awareness, cosmological and teleological arguments require a closer focus on the cause and the design of the universe. In earlier years Plato, then Aristotle stressed the cosmological argument as cause and motion, whereas Thomas Aquinas’ concept focused on life having a cause or a starting point. According to his premise the universe is a series of causes and the first cause would be what everyone understands to be God. This concept leads to other debates that mock the well-known adage “Which comes first, the chicken or the egg”.