Design argument: Edexcel A* grade notes

Edexcel
Philosophy

AO1: Paley’s design qua purpose (watch)

Imagine walking on a heath and seeing a rock. The rock seems like it could have existed forever. Nothing about it suggests otherwise.
However Paley claims we would think differently if we found a watch, because it has complexity enabling purpose.
Its purpose depends on the exact individually intricate structure of its parts and their precise arrangement in relation to each other.
Complexity by itself is not enough, since it can occur by chance. E.g. if we come across sand on a beach, it forms a complex pattern but does not indicate design.
However if we came across a sand castle, that complex arrangement of the sand serves a purpose. It’s so unlikely to occur by chance that it’s more reasonable to infer design.
So we can infer design when a thing has the property of purpose enabled by complexity.
This property we observe in the watch, we also observe in nature.
E.g. the human eye, wings of a bird and fins of a fish are made of individually complex parts precisely arranged to enable the purpose of sight.
So, nature must have a designer.
Nature is much grander and greater than any human design, so the designer of the nature must be greater and more powerful than any human designer.
Furthermore, a designer is a mind which is distinct from what is designed.
So, a mind which designed the world and is distinct from it exists.
This argument is typically interpreted as inductive and a posteriori, because its premises involve observations of the world which are used as evidence for the conclusion that God exists.

AO1: Swinburne’s anthropic design argument

Paley’s argument is based on spatial order, the order of things in space, e.g. the parts of the watch and eye are arranged in a certain order in space.
Swinburne rejects this method as too weak, because there could be explanations for spatial order other than God, e.g. evolution.
Swinburne develops Aquinas and Tennant’s approach of turning to temporal order, the order of things over time.
E.g. a hydrogen atom behaves the same now as it did yesterday and a billion years ago.
The behaviour of objects remains the same over time, suggesting there are laws of physics which determine their behaviour.
Paley assumed science would be unable to explain the spatial order he identifies, whereas Swinburne provides reasons for thinking science cannot explain temporal order.
Science can tell us what the laws are, but not why they are that way – why do the laws of physics exist, and why do we have the laws we do? Science can tell us that E=MC2, but not why E=MC2.
So unlike with spatial order, Swinburne thinks that since science can’t explain this, it’s valid to turn to other explanations.
We know that human minds can create temporal order.
We impose all sorts of behavioural order on our lives, e.g. brushing our teeth in the morning.
So, we know that temporal order can be caused by minds.
So, a mind is the best explanation we have of the temporal order in the laws of physics.
Only a God would be capable of designing the laws of the universe.
So, God exists.

AO1: The status as a proof of the design argument

Design arguments are a posteriori, meaning based on experience.
E.g., Paley’s argument is based on our observation of purpose enabled complexity in the world.
Design arguments are typically inductive, meaning their premises could be true yet their conclusion false.
The truth of their premises provides evidence which supports the conclusion, but does not logically guarantee it.
Such arguments are typically made by empiricists, the epistemological theory that knowledge is gained from the evidence of experience.
Inductive proofs are therefore not logically certain.
If successful, they give us what we currently have most reason to believe based on the available evidence.
But, they cannot prove their conclusion for certain.
This is because they are ‘defeasible’, meaning in principle further evidence could be discovered which would either make them false, or just change the overall weight or balance of evidence towards a different conclusion.
So, such arguments can be contested by attacking the truth of the premises, or by denying that the conclusion follows from them.
Design arguments often employ analogical reasoning, which is a form of inductive reasoning.
Where we cannot directly experience the cause of X, we can use the evidence of its likeness toY whose cause we can observe, to draw a probabilistic inference about the nature of the cause of X.
A posteriori inductive arguments were used by Aquinas for theological reasons as part of his natural theology.
They cannot, and are not intended, to prove the Christian God in particular.
Their aim is to show that the evidence suggests there is a designer.
This is meant to support faith in the Christian God, since evidence for a generic God also increases the probability of a specific God.

AO2: The validity of analogy

Swinburne supports design arguments by arguing analogical argumentation is scientifically valid.
Imagine a scientist doesn’t know the cause of X, but they know X is similar to Y, which they do know the cause of.
It is rational to hypothesise that the cause of X is similar (analogous to) the cause of Y.
Design arguments employ exactly the same form of inductive reasoning:
Things in nature are like things humans create (Paley’s watch) or direct (Aquinas’ arrow).
So, the cause of those natural things is analogous, i.e., an intelligent mind.

Counter:

Hume objects that like effects do not imply like causes.
E.g. Dry ice and fire are not alike as causes, but their effect (smoke) is alike.
So,things in nature being like a watch or an arrow doesn’t prove their causes are alike (i.e., an intelligent mind).
Hume further argues it doesn’t even provide probabilistic evidence, as Swinburne claimed.
He attacks the analogy between artefacts and natural beings as weak, because of their significant disanalogies.
Artefacts are mechanical, mathematically precisely constructed.
Whereas the universe is more like an organic thing, more messy, less precise.
So, the analogy between watches and eyes, or between arrows and the behaviour of birds/flowers is weak.

Evaluation:

However, Hume’s critique of analogy doesn’t work against versions of the design argument which avoid analogical reasoning in favor of standard inductive probability and/or abductive inference to the best explanation.
Paley is often interpreted as taking one of those forms today.
On this reading, design arguments identify a property which is so unlikely to have come about by chance that design is a better explanation.
The universe is like the watch (or the arrow), but that’s not what makes it designed.
It’s designed because it has the property of complexity and purpose, or goal-directedness (or fine-tuning etc).
The watch & arrows are just illustrations of how we infer design from that property.
So, Hume’s critique of analogy fails.

AO2: Hume’s critique: God not the only explanation

Hume argues that even if the design argument succeeded, it cannot prove the Christian God in particular.
Just as possible is a committee of Gods (polytheism), a junior God, or even a God who then died.
There is no basis for preferring the Christian God as an explanation of the design in the universe, compared to those other options.
So, the design argument could be inductively cogent, meaning its premises are well-supported and it provides strong probabilistic support for its conclusion.
And yet, it would still be limited in scope, as it cannot justify belief in any particular God.

Counter:

Swinburne counters Hume, using the abductive reasoning of Ockham’s razor, since one God is simpler than multiple.
However the main problem for Hume is that Aquinas, Paley and Swinburne aren’t trying to prove the Christian God in particular.
They know the design argument is limited to proving some generic designer.
They all broadly follow the approach laid out by Aquinas’ Natural theology.
This involves inductive a posteriori argument aimed at supporting faith.
Belief in a particular God is still made more reasonable by an argument that only shows there is some kind of God.

Evaluation

So, sophisticated proponents of design arguments are appropriately careful about the scope of their conclusion.
Hume overreached with this critique and risks committing a straw man fallacy.
As Aquinas says in the end of all his 5 ways, ‘that thing we call God’.
This indicates awareness that the argument doesn’t prove exactly what that designer is.
That’s where the proper role of faith comes in, that the designer he’s found evidence for is the Christian God.
This minimal support for faith through evidence of some higher power is the sole purpose of the argument.
Hume incorrectly assumed it aimed to do more.

AO2: The epicurean hypothesis & the multiverse

Hume’s epicurean hypothesis claims an eternal universe made of atoms is guaranteed to sometimes assemble into orderliness by chance.
In infinite time, every possibility becomes certain to occur at some point.
Hume’s not claiming this is true, just that it is possible.
It’s an abductive counter-example which breaks the necessity of inferring from order to God.

Of course, the current evidence for the big bang suggests the universe isn’t eternal.
Nonetheless, we can use the multiverse in the same way.
Rather than infinite time, it involves infinite space (universes).
Some versions claim all metaphysically possible permutations of beings (spatial order) and physical laws (temporal order) exist.
This attacks all possible versions of the design argument.
Whatever they could point to (organisms, natural laws or fine-tuning) can be explained by the hypothesis that every possible state or thing exists somewhere in the multiverse.

Counter

Defenders of fine-tuning argue that the multiverse relies on very speculative physics, has no evidence for it, and seems potentially unfalsifiable.
Swinburne argues a scientific explanation is impossible, since science can only discover which laws exist, not explain why there are such laws.

Evaluation

However, the multiverse hypothesis is taken seriously by physicists.
It’s not incoherent, so Swinburne can’t dismiss scientific explanation as impossible.
Regarding its lack of evidence, we can follow Hume’s method and deploy it as an abductive counter-example which breaks the inference to God.
This treats the multiverse as a competing hypothesis to God.
Both are equal in explanatory power regarding the world.
This is not a stalemate, since it shows design is not the only reasonable explanation of our universe.
So, the teleological argument loses its persuasive force.
It cannot give us a reason to believe that a God is the explanation of the way the universe is.

AO1: Darwinian evolution vs design

Paley and Aquinas appealed to the complexity and purpose of organisms.
However, evolution by natural selection can also explain that.
There is variation in species. Members that are better adapted to their environment are more likely to survive and pass on the genes which code for that adaptation.
Over time, this causes a greater prevalence of those traits in the species as it becomes increasingly adapted to its environment.
This makes animals appear designed for survival. Really, those traits evolved over millions of years due to natural selection causing increasing adaptation.
This includes traits like instincts guiding animal behaviour, which explains Aquinas’ claim that they have a telos.
Dawkins wrote ‘the blind watchmaker’ referencing Paley. Taking Paley’s example of the eye, Dawkins explains how it could have evolved part by part over hundreds of millions of years.
So yes there is a watchmaker, but it is ‘blind’, meaning merely the blind mechanical force of natural selection.
Dawkins concludes complexity and purpose in organisms can be explained through simpler, more scientific means. This suggests belief in a designer is unnecessary.

AO2: Hume & Darwin on Design vs the problem of evil

Darwin noted how vicious natural selection is, concluding “I cannot see evidence of design”.
He illustrates with digger wasps which lay eggs inside caterpillars that are eaten from the inside when they hatch.
He concludes it’s not credible to think a perfect God designed this world.
Hume’s evidential problem of evil makes this point more philosophically.
Excessive and dysteleological suffering could have been avoided if nature were designed differently.
So, natural evil is evidence against a perfect creator and designer.
This is a stronger critique than Hume’s ‘committee of God’s’ objection.
It claims the world could not have been designed by the Christian God, not merely that it could have been another God.

Counter

Religious philosophers attempt to respond with theodicies.
These generally claim it is logically impossible for God to remove evil without also removing some greater good necessarily connected to evil.
E.g., our deserved punishment for Augustine, free will for Plantinga or soul-making for Hick.

Evaluation

However, natural evil kills innocent children and animals.
Free will or punishment cannot excuse such cases.
Hick would insist random evil is how a perfect God would design the world, to maintain the epistemic distance which enables soul-making.
However, by definition there can’t be evidence for that claim; it is unfalsifiable.
So all theodicies are vulnerable to Hume’s evidential argument.
God may be consistent with the evidence, but can’t be inferred from the evidence.
Design arguments are intended by natural theologians (Aquinas, Paley etc) to support faith in the Christian God, through providing evidence for a generic designer.
Hume’s critique undermines this aim.
It shows the only rational inference from observation of an imperfect world, would be to an imperfect designer.
When we make a full accounting of all the evidence, including evil, we see that inference from imperfection to perfection is empirically invalid.

AO2: Design arguments after Darwin

Tennant broadened the design argument to the overall structure, regularity and intelligibility of the universe.
Swinburne developed this, arguing Aquinas’ focus on temporal order was ‘wiser’ than Paley’s focus on spatial order..
Evolution can explain spatial order (e.g., the eye), but not the laws of nature.
Physical constants like the charge of the electron must be extremely precise for our universe to be life-permitting..
A tiny degree different and there would be chaos.
So, fine-tuning by a God is more reasonable than chance.

Counter

However, anthropic fine tuning relies on the assumption that the constants of nature are contingent.
The assumption is that while laws of logic are necessary, there’s no contradiction in a universe with different laws.
This overlooks that the laws of nature could be a metaphysical necessity.
There could be a deeper reason why our constants just are what reality must be.
Physicists seek a Grand Unified Theory of Everything, which could show that our physical laws arise from mathematical necessity.
So, just because we can mathematically conceive of different laws, doesn’t mean different laws are metaphysically possible.

Evaluation

Evolution demonstrates a broader critique of the bad design of design arguments, which modern ideas of necessary laws and multiverses merely extends.
Design arguments point to current scientific ignorance and claim God must explain it.
Despite their best efforts to avoid being a God-of-the-gaps style argument, they do fall into that fallacy.
Advances in biology undermined Paley’s argument.
But crucially, Paley’s argument was never justified to begin with.
A lack of scientific explanation doesn’t justify inferring God.
So, lacking explanation for the intelligibility or laws of nature doesn’t justify inferring God.
It’s not justified to believe God explains X, just because we can’t think how else X could be explained.

AO1: Strength & weakness of design arguments

The validity of analogy
Strength: Analogical reasoning is valid as it’s used by scientists all the time, e.g., to understand an unknown disease from the analogy of its symptoms to a known one.
Weakness: Analogical reasoning in design arguments is weak, as similarities in effects do not always imply similar causes.
Darwinian evolution
Weakness: Darwinian evolution explains the appearance of design in organisms through natural selection, making a designer unnecessary.
Strength: Modern developments like fine-tuning shift the focus from animal biology to the order and purpose in the laws of the universe, which evolution cannot explain away.
Whether God is the only explanation
Weakness: The design argument cannot establish the Christian God, as multiple or limited designers remain equally possible explanations.
Strength: Natural theology underpins the design argument, which intentionally limits its conclusion to a generic designer, making belief in God more reasonable without overreaching its evidence.