Teleological Arguments for the Existence of G-d

Teleological arguments demonstrate the existence of G-d using the order and purpose of the universe around us as evidence.

"Telos" is a Greek word literally meaning "tail" but often referring to "end goals", "purposes" or "outcomes".

It is especially powerful in its use of commonly-shared experiences of awe and wonder at the natural world.

Kant, even though he did not agree the arguments actually worked, wrote: "The proof always deserves to be mentioned with respect. It is the oldest, the clearest, and the most accordant with the common reason of mankind."

They are inductive (reasoning which is based on evidence/probability rather than necissity) and a posteriori (knowledge gained from experience) arguments.

While they may not be convincing on their own, they often are with a cumulative effect alongside religious experience and cosmological arguments.

Aquinas' Fifth Way - design qua regularity

P - The world has order and purpose

P - Things that "lack intelligence" cannot act with regularity without a "guiding hand" or "governance of the world"

C - Everything in nature which has regularity but has not intelligence must be directed to its goal by G-d

Examples of order and purpose in the world include the sun rising and setting each day at a regular time, planets and stars orbiting one another, or the tides moving in and out.

He uses the example of an archer shooting an arrow at a target, in the sense that the arrow cannot reach the target without the external help of the archer, and the world could not perform its duties/regularities without the external help of G-d. 

Patterns, he argues, are followed "not fortuitously, but designedly." meaning it is a result of divine architecture, not accident.

William Paley - design qua purpose

Paley was an 18th/19th century English clergyman, mathematician, and slavery abolitionist. He lived in an era of scientific revolution, including advancements in Newtonian physics and the invention of the microscope. This furthering in ability to observe the natural world deepened the faith of many Christians and made the existence of an intelligent creator more obvious.

Paley uses an old analogy of a watch - previously written about by Hume etc - to make his argument for the existence of G-d. In the same way that if we were to stumble across a watch and examine the complex insides working perfectly in unison to fulfil their purpose, we would know that it had an intelligent creator. We would not have to watch it being made or have the watch need to be in perfect working order for us to know that.

He writes about this and other analogies in Natural Theology (1802), including the "contrivances" of animal reproductive systems, skin, feathers, and the human eye. Other evidence of the universe woking like cogs/machines, not mentioned, include fractals as well as laws of gravity, motion and thermodynamics. The natural world is far more sophisticated and complex than a watch.

P - The watch could not be explained by saying it had always existed

P - The watch has complex parts that fit together to achieve a specific function (telling the time)

P - Manufactured machines are the result of intelligent design

This is not just evidence, to Paley, of a Creator G-d, but of a benevolent one.

Frederick Robert Tennant - Anthropic and Aesthetic Principles

Tennant was a 19th/20th century scientist and theologian who lived during the dawn of Darwin's theories of evolution and natural selection. Darwin's theories seemed to argue that evidence of design is actually a matter of chance and simply a fluke of survival for a given environment.

Thomas Huxley was a friend and colleague of Darwin who would give lectures on the evidence supporting Darwin's theories. Tennant attended one of these lectures and was both impressed and convinced. He concluded that the design argument needed a new direction that could be coexistent with scientific consensus, if not supportive of it.

He argues in Philosophical Theology that because evolution moves towards a purpose/goal/telos, and yet does not have a mind, it must be guided by G-d (like Aquinas' arrow's "guiding hand.") 

The Anthropic Principle

Tennant was the first person to use the term "anthropic principle" with "anthropos" being a Greek word meaning "man" or "humanity." It shows evidence for the existence of G-d by demonstrating that the world has been designed in a way that is perfect for human life.

He argues that the laws of gravity or the gaseous balance of the atmosphere been different, human life would not have been able to survive for this long. This fine tuning could not have been by chance, and so must have been the result of divine creator.

The Aesthetic Principle

Tennant argued that because beauty is not a necessary part of survival/does not perform a utilitarian function, it cannot be explained by science, and so must be a result of G-d creatin git for human enjoyment.

This is not just evidence of a Creator G-d, but of a benevolent one. 

QUOTE BANK!!

Kant: "This proof always deserves to be mentioned with respect. It is the oldest, the clearest, and the most accordant with the common reason of mankind." HOWEVER did not actually think it worked.

Aquinas: "lack intelligence," "guiding hand," "governance of the world" "not fortuitously, but designedly."

Paley: "the contrivances of nature surpass the contrivances of art, in the complexity, subtlety, and curiosity of the mechanism."

Paley: "The hinges in the wings of an earwig, and the joints of its antennae, are as highly wrought, as if the Creator had nothing else to finish. We see no signs of diminution of care by multiplicity of objects, or of distraction of thought by variety. We have no reason to fear, therefore, our being forgotten, or overlooked, or neglected."

Tennant: beauty is "a biologically superfluous accompaniment of the cosmic process."

Psalms 19:1: "The heavens declare the glory of G-d; and the firmament showeth his handiwork."

Swinburne: "the subtle and coherent arrangement of their millions of parts."

Cole: "The universe is orderly when it could have been chaotic."

Swinburne: "so either the orderliness of nature is where all explanation stops, or we must postulate an agent of great power and knowledge, the simplest such agent is G-d."

Paley: "Every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater or more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation."

Tennant: "The multitude of interwoven adaptations by which the world is constituted a theatre of life, intelligence and morality, cannot reasonably be regarded as an outcome of mechanism, or of blind formative power, or aught but purposive intelligence."

Tennant: "The aesthetic argument for theism becomes more persuasive when it renounces all claims to proof and appeals to a logical probability." (argues the argument is more persuasive BECAUSE its inductive.