The Design Argument

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The Design Argument

Also known as the Teleological Argument

Need to Know

The Teleological Argument from;

Aquinas

Paley

The Aesthetic Argument (Swinburne)

The Anthropic Principle (F.R Tennant)

The challenges to it from;

Hume (other explanations for order)

Mill (the world reveals a cruel and incompetent designer)

Darwin (evolution and natural selection)

Teleological Argument- The basics

'Telos' is the Greek word for end or result of some course of action

The phrase 'Teleological Argument' is used to refer to arguments for God's existence which work by looking at they have been designed for some reason or purpose

The argument is backward looking, it starts with the result and try's to work out a cause

a-posteriori argument which is based on our observation of order, purpose and regularity

Argument is divided into two parts; Design qua regularity and Design qua Purpose

Aquinas

St. Thomas Aquinas

Born c1225- Died c1274

Italian Catholic Priest

Best known for his book 'Summa Theologica'

The Design argument is the 5th of his five ways

Aquinas himself read and used Aristotle's philosophy

Aquinas states that when you look at the world you can see that everything in it follows natural laws, even things that aren't conscious thinking beings. If things follow natural laws they tend to do well and have some sort of goal and purpose. However if a thing has a purpose and does well and yet it cannot think then it must have something that thinks and directs it.

"Take an arrow as example. It can only be directed to its goal and used for its purpose by someone, such as an archer."

The arrow and the archer analogy describes a natural body such as a bee as the arrow, and God as the archer. Without the archer the arrow cant be aimed, and has no goal much like a bee without God.

CONCLUSION: Everything in the natural world that does not think for itself heads towards its goal or purpose because it is directed by something which does think. That something we call God.

Aquinas argues in favor of regularity of succession. --> he bases his argument on the fact things in nature follow laws that lead to certain results