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.
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.
The design argument (DA) starts from the observations about the world from there towards the conclusion that God exists. This argument appeals to the world as proof of Gods existence and therefore relies on our experiences. The DA is a posteriori argument for the existence of God; it seeks to prove that there is evidence for a designer in the world and used external imperial evidence as its proof. It is an inductive argument, which means it’s based on experience and the most probable explanation. William Paley is a classical contributor to the DA and like St. Aquinas he believed that the world is too complex and well ordered to have happened by chance therefore it must have designed by a greater being, ‘God’.
The fundamental premise behind any teleological argument is that everything has a design and purpose which has been constructed by a higher intellectual being (in many cases this refers to God). There are many questions in life that have been left unanswered or addressed with unproven theories and the only plausible explanation is God. This essay will be examining Paley’s teleological argument in support of God’s existence and the Darwinian reply to it. The beginning of the essay will be about Paley and the design hypothesis followed up with what Darwin had proposed. By presenting both arguments from the different sides, this essay will examine and question the Darwinian reply as well as Paley’s teleological argument and based
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.
PART A: Explain Mill’s challenge to the teleological argument. (25marks) The teleological argument claims that God designed the world with a purpose. God is often described to be omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent. Mill criticises the idea of the teleological argument, he doesn’t believe that the world is designed by a God because within nature there are cruelty and crimes that are unpunished. Mill argues that if God designed the universe he wouldn’t have created something containing any evil at all it wouldn’t fit in with his description.
McCloskey attempts to make an argument for the non-existence of God and to give reasons why atheism is more comforting than theism. This paper is a response to that article which will address certain ideas raised by Mr. McCloskey. This author is a theist and will present arguments to show the reasoning for the existence and necessity of God. To begin with, McCloskey suggests in his article that the theist’s arguments are “proofs” which do not provide definitive evidence for the existence of God, so therefore, they should be discarded. This is not a justified argument due to the fact that theists do not try to definitely prove the existence of God.
All Gods are thus externalized forms, magnified projections of the true nature of their creators, personifying aspects of the universe or personal temperaments which many of their followers find to be troubling. Worshipping any God is thus worshipping by proxy those who invented that God.”
My first exposure to the dyadic/triadic distinction was in reading this essay. Turns out dyadic events are what we used to call physical and triadic are what we used to call mental. And since triadic events can't be reduced to dyadic events this eliminates the possibility that mere physical science will ever explain the unique mental qualities of man and God is restored to his rightful place in the universe or something of the sort. As it turns out there are quite a lot of physical triads out there in nature. Since triads correspond to physical structures and a logical system has been invented to deal with them, I conclude that a properly scientific account can be given of triadic phenomena.
Catholic people think that if you believe in God miracles seem more obvious to you and if you deny and test the existence of God then it will be harder to see the miracles happen. If God really is behind all of the natural laws, he is not restricted by them therefore He is allowed to violate them from time to time. This also contradicts the fact that God is omnibenevolant and defeats the saying that ‘all humans are equal’. There are a lot of problems with using miracles to prove Gods existence, some say that one person’s miracle is not one to another person, we have some sort of scientific explanations to miracles that happened in the bible, so in the future we could have explanations to miracles that