| The Argument From Design | |
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Recommended Reading |
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Cornman/Lehrer/Pappas (1992) Philosophical Problems and Arguments, Indianapolis:Hackett Hume, D. Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion in Cohen (ed.) (1965) Essential Works of David Hume, New York:Bantam; pp. 303-389.
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Introduction |
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The argument from design was put forward in modern times most influentially by William Paley, who gave the example of a person who discovers a watch. Suppose they have not seen a watch before; yet can there be any doubt that, as they inspect it closely and see that all the parts are perfectly fitted to operate together so as to perform a single function, they will recognise that this is a thing that has been constructed to a purpose, and that somewhere there is a designer from whose brain this derived? Of course we will not doubt it. Just so, how can anyone look at the world about us, including all the excellent animals in their beautiful ecologies and the wonderful mind of man and the starts and planets so perfect and so regular in the heavens, how can anyone study this creation and not see it as a creation? Plainly, it is impossible.
The argument
is an obvious one, and something similar was put forward by Cicero
2000-odd years ago:
"When you see
a sundial or a water-clock, you see that it tells the time by design and
not by chance. How then can you imagine that the universe as a whole is
devoid of purpose and intelligence, when it embraces everything, including
these artifacts themselves and their artificers[1]?
So t
[1]
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The Argument |
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Let’s start by putting the argument into a more organized form. 1. It is claimed that the World has the property that its parts are perfectly fitted to work together to perform a function
2.
A watch also
has the property that its parts are perfectly fitted to work together to
perform a function 3. A watch also has the property of being designed by an intelligence ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4.
Therefore the
World also has the property of being designed by an intelligence.
The argument is basically an argument from analogy and an argument from analogy generally looks like this:
1. It is claimed that an object has properties P1, P2, …, Pn. 2. analogues A1, A2, …, Am also have properties P1, P2, …, Pn. 3. The analogues have property P. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4. Therefore the object has property P.
The argument relies upon the suppressed intermediate conclusion that
[5. If an object has properties P1, P2, …, Pn, it will also have property P.]
In our case the
suppressed intermediate conclusion would be that [5. An object has the property that its parts are perfectly fitted to work together to perform a function it will also have the property of being designed by an intelligence. Note that
analogical arguments are a kind of inductive argument – you’ll recall that
we talked about inductive arguments previously and contrasted them with
deductive arguments. In a
deductive argument, if the premisses are true and the argument is
valid then the conclusion is true. Inductive arguments by contrast
are arguments where the truth of the premises is only supposed to make the
conclusion probably true, and a good inductive argument is called a
strong one. However, even in a
strong argument with true premises it is still possible for the conclusion
to be false. Arguments that go from particular facts to general facts – as
this one does – have to be inductive arguments, because no collection of
particular facts that is less than the collection of
all relevant facts can guarantee
the truth of a universal statement.
In this case it is the step of the argument that yields the suppressed imtermediate conclusion in which this inductive characteristic is displayed. If we show that step we can present the argument in two parts as:
2. The analogues have properties P1, P2, …, Pn. 3. The analogues also have property P. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5. If an object has properties P1, P2, …, Pn, it will also have property P.
5. If an object has properties P1, P2, …, Pn, it will also have property P. 1. The object has properties P1, P2, …, Pn. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4. Therefore the object has property P.
The second part
of the argument is deductive and is valid – so we can accept it and ignore
it for the moment. The first part is inductive: is it strong or weak? Is
it true that the premises make the conclusion probably true or not? We
can’t tell this from the mere form of the argument, but have to look at
the particular case. Arguments from analogy like this are weak if the suppressed intermediate conclusion is not true or if it is not obviously true and yet is not argued for. What would make it not obviously true would be things like the possible existence of significant differences between objects that possess properties P1, P2, …, Pn and objects that possess property P. Where significance is defined – possibly question-beggingly – as being plausibly related to the possession of those properties. There are various conditions that it is quite obvious would make the argument more likely to succeed. For example if the number of analogous objects was small then there is prima facie a lower probability for an inductive conclusion than if the number of analogues was greater. Think back to our swan example: if there are only two swans that we’ve seen we probably wouldn’t want to draw many conclusions about swans, but if there are a thousand swans we’re a lot more confident. Thus:
A: The more analogues the better.
Similarly if there are only a few similarities between analogous objects then, intuitively, our confidence in the analogy is going to be lower than if the number of similarities were greater. So:
B: The more common properties in the analogues the better.
Contrariwise, if we see one or two swans that are black that will lower the probability of our conclusion to some degree; but if we see thousands of them that will have a much greater effect. Therefore:
C: The more falsifying instances the less likely is the analogy.
Here’s a non-theological example of an analogical argument (Thomas Reid Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man Essay 1, Ch. 4):
We may observe a very great similitude between this earth which we inhabit, and the other planets, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, and Mercury. They all revolve around the sun, as the earth does, although at different distances and in different periods. They borrow all their light from the sun, as the earth does. Several of them are known to revolve round there axis like the earth, and by that means must have a like succession of day and night. Some of them have moons, that serve to give them light in the absence of the sun, as our moon does to us. They are all, in their motions, subject to the same law of gravitation, as the earth is. From all this similitude, it is not unreasonable to think that that those planets may, like our earth, be the habitation of various orders of living creatures. There is some probability in this conclusion from analogy.
We can see quite easily how this fits into our schema for analogical arguments, and we can see where the problems are which make this less than convincing.
Now look at the argument for God as presented by Cleanthes in the dialogue by Hume (pp. 316 f.).
Look around the world: Contemplate the whole and every part of it: You will find it to be nothing but one great machine, subdivided into an infinite number of lesser machines, which again admit of subdivisions, to a degree beyond what human senses and faculties can trace and explain. All these various machines, and even their most minute parts, are adjusted to each other with an acuracy, which ravishes into admiration all men, who have ever contemplated them. The curious adapting of means to ends, throughout all nature, resembles exactly, though it much exceeds, the production of human contrivance; of human design, thought, wisdom, and intelligence. Since therefore the effects resemble each other, we are led to infer, by all the rules of analogy, that the causes also resemble, and that the Author of nature is somewhat similar to the mind of man, though possessed of much larger faculties, proportioned to the grandeur of the work, which He has executed. By this argument a posteriori, and by this argument alone, do we prove at once the existence of a Deity and His similarity to human mind and intelligence.
A reconstruction of this argument in the form that we have suggested for arguments from analogy would yield something like this:
a. The parts of machines of human contrivance fit together wonderfully for their purposes. b. They do so because they are designed to do so by a mind. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- c. If parts work together for an end that is probably because they have been designed to do so by a mind.
c. If parts work together for an end that is probably because they have been designed to do so by a mind. d. The parts of the world fit together wonderfully for their purposes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- e. Therefore they have probably been designed to do so by a mind.
And there is left only the final step to say that this mind is God’s mind, which might appear obvious. But it isn’t. We’ll get to that.
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The Objections |
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Cleanthes’ partner in this discussion is a chap called Philo. It is more than likely that the criticisms that Philo puts forward against the argument from design are criticisms that Hume himself felt were convincing.
Doing Without Mind
Philo begins by attacking the inference to (c.) directly. He claims that just because there are certain properties in common between contrivances and the world, we are not justified in putting a high probability on their both being due to intelligent design. Recall condition C. above that tells us that one way to make the conclusion seem less probable is to come up with falsiffying instances. This is how Philo approaches the prioblem: he gives three examples of order that do not obviously involve design:
i. Vegetable Reproduction
Consider the growth of pants. They come from a seed, and with water and sunlight they grow from the earth, and they become flowers or oak trees or whatever. There is a wonderful order in their parts and yet we cannot see that there is any intelligence in any of the things that go to make them: neither in water and earth and sunlight, nor in the seed. Why don’t we conclude that the world is the outgrowth of a plant seed?
ii. Animal Reproduction
Consider the growth of animals. They come from a seed, and with the right conditions they become adults of their species. Their organs are all well adapted for their purposes. Where was there intelligence or design in any element of their origin and growth. Not in the mating, nor in the feeding. Why don’t we conclude that the world is the offspring of some giant animal?
iii. Instinct
Consider the products of animal instinct. The termite and the honeybee dn the wasp and the beaver and the bower bird all build themselves homes of great complexity. But none of this building is driven by the designs of the builders. They operate according to blind reason and intelligence is quite absent. Why don’t we conclude that the world is the product of some purely instinctual creative force?
iv. Inanimate Powers
Consider the formation of snowflake crystals. They are the accidental product of cooling of water which happens to have a particular molecular structure that results in the crystal structure of its solid that we see in a snowflake. There is nothing of intelligence in its van der waals forces or s-orbitals or in the temperature changes. Why don’t we conclude that the world is the product of inorganic and inanimate forces acting out their determined destinies.
There are thus many different ways in which our experience tells us that order can be created. It might be possible to argue that these alternatives are all to be explained as also due to intelligent design and that therefore they don’t count as falsifying instances for the design argument. But to make this argument is to assume what is to be proved – which we might call begging the question. And, moreover, if we consider the range of experiences that we call upon in forming a posteriori judgements, the experiences of order that we have that are of the kinds listed above far outnumber those that we have with machinery. So if anything we should prefer one or more of those alternatives to the mechanisms analogy.
Doing Without God
Suppose, however, that we are prepared to accept the conclusion of the argument from analogy that the world has probably been designed by a mind. Even so, says Philo, we are not forced to conclude that this mind belongs to anything that we would call God.
i. The God of Trial and Error
Suppose that the world had all the wonderful features that the argument claims for it, even so the perfection of the production may not be attributable to the perfection of the producer. Consider what we would think on this analogy if we went to see a shipbuilder at his work. The ship that he has built is perfectly functional and has many parts all of which act together to make the boat work as well as it does. But there is no evidence that the boatbuilder is a paragon of design skill or intelligence. The success of his boatbuilding is due to his following in a tradition of shipbuilding that has developed these techniques over many years. But those techniques aren’t the result of a single mind’s brilliance: in most respects they are the result of a process of trial and error in which different things were tried, and some failed and were not tried again, but some succeeded and were incorporated into the tradition.
But would we think that that is an appropriate story to tell about a God? Would it still be God if we were talking about a creator or designer who followed a trial and error methodology to create his worlds? Would we accept that God follows in a tradition established by trying many different ways of making worlds. Some of those worlds will be failures – and what would that mean – and so those ways of making worlds are dropped, but some are successful and so those ways are preserved by the creator. This sort of bungling God would be no sort of God at all.
ii. Santa’s Elves
Let’s continue with the analogy of the shipwright. When we look at what goes on in the boatyard we do not find a single workman/designer, we find a large number of workers, many of them working under the direction of the shop owner, but largely independent. We see the same sort of thing on any construction site; there are crane operators, concreters, cabinetmakers, and so on. We see it in factories. In fact we see it wherever man is determined to build something large and complex. Isn’t that more applicable as a model of building the world than the building of a watch? Therefore the appropriate analogy is not to the watchmaker but to Santa’s workshop.
But, again, we’re not going to think that this is going to be a story about God. God, after all, is one – that’s one of his most widely agreed upon characteristics.
iii. God as Man
Finally there is the objection that if the argument from design relies upon a similarity between the world and the products of man to claim that it has to have some sort of producer, then we can claim that the producer has more of the properties of man than would be acceptable in a God. For example, hands, eyes, sex, bad motives, and so on.
With these criticisms Philo finishes by saying that:
This world, for aught he knows, is very faulty and imperfect, compared to a superior standard; and was only the first rude essay of some infant Deity, who afterwards abandoned it, ashamed of his lame performance; it is the work only of some dependent inferior Deity; and it is the object of derision to his superiors; it is the production of old age and dotage in some super-annuated Deity; and ever since his death, has run on at adventures, from the first impulse and active force which it received from him…
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