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13 Cards in this Set
- Front
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St Thomas Aquinas' beliefs? Quote? |
5th of 5 ways DESIGN QUA REGULARITY: Regularity, such as clean cut garden with no weeds show design. Natural bodies produced garden with end of being pleasing. Archer threw bow with end of shooting it. "Nowwhatever lacks knowledge cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed bysome being endowed with knowledge and intelligence; as the arrow is directed bythe archer" DESIGN QUA PURPOSE: Television was fitted together for a purpose of producing images and sound, same way universe is fitted together to produce conditions for life “ifthe different parts had been … placed after any other manner, or in any otherorder … no motion at all would have carried on in the machine” Summa Theologica, 1485 |
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William Paley's beliefs? Quote? |
First argument, design qua purpose: Watch analogy can also be applied to eye "Is it possible to believe that the eye was formed without any regard to vision, that is was the animal itself which found out that, although formed with no such intention, it would serve to see with" Second Argument, design qua regularity: Used evidence from astronomy and Newton's laws of motion/gravity to prove design in universe. Slight diffs would lead to chaos "if the attracting forces had varied according to any direct law of the distance, let it have been what it would, great destruction and confusion would have taken place" Natural Theology, 1802 |
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Arthur Brown's evidence for design? Quote? |
Ozone layer “Couldanyone possibly attribute this device to a chance evolutionary process? A wallwhich prevents deaths to every living thing, just the right thickness andexactly the correct defence gives every evidence of a plan” Footprints of God, 1943 |
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David Hume's challenge to argument FOR design? Quote? |
We don't have enough experience and knowledge of universe to conclude there's a designer, whereas we can with a house “Butsurely you won’t say that the universe is so like a house that we can with thesame certainty infer a similar cause” Can't like human's creations to God's as his understanding transcends ours. God is superior to us "we oughtn't to imagine, even supposing him corporeal, that he has a human body [or] ... human ideas ... [we know] nothing more perfect than a human mind" Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, 1779. |
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David Hume's challenge to argument FROM design? Quote? |
Can't prove the designer's intelligent, i.e. spiders aren't intelligent but webs are still well constructed "[imagine] an infinite spider, who spun this whole complicated mass from his bowels ... [that is] ridiculous; because a spider is a little contemptible animal" Epicurean hypothesis; at time of creation, universe consisted of particles in random motion. Was chaotic but gradually natural forces evolved into ordered system "In an infinitely long period of time every possible order or position of particles must occur an infinite number of times" Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, 1779. |
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John Stuart Mills' belief? Quote? |
Dysteleological argument; God can't be benevolent if he allows natural disasters and deaths to happen. “ifthe law of all creation were justice and the creator omnipotent then, inwhatever amount suffering and happiness might be dispensed to the world, eachperson’s share of them would be exactly proportioned to that person’s good orevil deeds” Nature and Utility of Religion, 1874. |
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Darwin's challenge to argument from design? |
Believed in evolution; survival of fittest. Random variations gives best advantage to plant or animal to survive in changing environments "the swiftest and slimmest wolves would have the best chance of surviving and so be preserved or selected" On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, 1859 |
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Appearance of Design fallacy by Richard Dawkins? Quote? |
DNA in humans give appearance of design. They have to adapt and mutate to adapt to environments, not that they're designed. Accepts evolution, rejects design. "The true utility of life, that which is being maximised in the natural world, is DNA survival. But DNA is not floating free; it is locked up in living bodies, and it has to make the most of the levers of power at its disposal" Article in Scientific American, 1995 |
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Richard Dawkins on Memes? Quote? |
Memes are spread of cultures/ideas/aesthetics etc. that make people attractive to opposite sex so they reproduce “nothingcan stop the spread of DNA that has no beneficial effect other than makingmales beautiful to females … But inevitably, if some genes do confer on maleswhatever qualities the females of the species happen to find desirable, thosegenes … will survive” Article in Scientific American, 1995 |
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John Polkinghorne's thoughts on Anthropic principle? What are the two types? Quote? |
Cosmos is constructed for development of intelligent life. Chance alone is unlikely - a single min change in values of nuclear force = life would not develop STRONG anthropic principle is idea that conditions for development of human life happened immediately after Big Bang. Purpose of design was life would develop on earth. Accepts evolution as it helped develop life WEAK anthropic principle is idea that life wasn't inevitable, but it happened to have occurred due to the condition some way down the line “Evolutionaryhistory seems to unfold through the interplay of two contrasting tendencies: ‘chance’(…the particularity of historical contingency) and ‘necessity’ (…generality ofthe lawfully regular environment … the reliability of the world)” The God of Hope and the End of the World, 2002) |
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F.R. Tennant's thoughts on Anthropic principle? Quote?
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Universe is not chaotic, and is designed for evolution. “[Thatthe universe] is the outcome of intelligent design … consists rather in theconspiration of innumerable causes to produce … a general order of nature … thecomprehensive design argument is the outcome of synopsis or conspection of theknowable world” Philosophical Theology, 1930 |
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Tennant's thoughts on aesthetic argument? Quote? |
Universe appears to be beautiful, and beauty is not essential for survival, whereas natural selection by evolution is therefore evidence of divine creator "From an intelligibility point of view, beauty seems to be superfluous and to have little survival value" Philosophical Theology, 1930 |
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Richard Swinburne's reformulation of design argument? Quotes? |
Accepts anthropic principle. Accepts evolution, doesn't rule out God as a designer. TEMPORAL: Universe's design can be compared to card shuffling analogy "The fact that this peculiar order [of ten aces of hearts being drawn] is a necessary condition of the draw being perceived at all makes what is perceived no less extraordinary and in need for explanation" SPATIAL: Initial conditions of universe perfect for development of life through evolution. Right level of oxygen, water etc “orderof the world is evidence of the existence of God both because its occurrence wouldbe very improbable a priori and also because, in virtue of his postulatedcharacter, he has very good, apparently overriding, reason for making anorderly universe” The Existence of God, 1979 |
