How plausible is this story? What makes it plausible or implausible? This is the question that William Paley famously asks us to consider.
Paley offers the example of an individual going for a walk and potentially stumbling across two things (1) a watch, or (2) a stone.
(2) Suppose you are walking along a path and stumble across a stone. What questions would this raise? Would you be especially troubled or curious to find a stone across your path? Would it be difficult to explain how that stone came to be where it is and what it is?
(1) Now, suppose instead of stumbling across a stone you stumble across a watch. Ask yourself the same questions. Would the existence of a watch in your path have as easy an explanation as a stone?
Paley argues no. Instead, to explain the existence of a watch in all its complexity and 'design' requires us to posit the existence of a watchmaker. While a stone might be easily explained, a watch is not so easily explained because of all it's parts and the way they fit perfectly together.
The main question Paley is asking is one about design (or his word, contrivance). Can something designed exist without a designer? Can we identify a designer for every instance of design (maybe we can identify a designer of this object, but what designed that. Who designed the watchmaker?). Just as a watch has design and purpose, so it appears does everything in the universe and perhaps the universe itself. But this just raises the question of where that purpose comes from.
In the recommended reading, Davies suggests there are two different ways to understand divine. The first says the universe displays design in the sense of
purpose. The second argument is that it (being the universe) displays design in
the sense of regularity. Paley’s example of finding the stone and watch is the
example of the universe displaying design as a purpose since the universe resembles a watch and must therefore be
accounted for in terms of intelligent and purposive agency. Davies suggests perhaps the idea of regularity might be a better route to go. What are the differences in each view and what are the advantages of each? We will see that William Lane Craig incorporates aspects of each as he develops his own argument for God's existence for next class.
But there is a long tradition (going back to our good friend David Hume and even before) that this line of reasoning is faulty: Another idea about the design argument. Ultimately, there are several important questions to ask to understand and evaluate this claim: Why is the explanation of a watch in this situation different than that of a stone?
Why is this called a teological argument? What does that mean?
Does Paley give the best (or only) explanation for the existence of design/contrivance and complexity? What other competing explanations are available? Which explanation is best and why?
How do we begin to assess whether Paley's argument works?
How many of you have heard of Intelligent Design? Is Paley's argument just a version of Intelligent Design? Why or Why not?
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