Download AO2 Questions Evaluating the Teleological Argument

AO2 Questions
Evaluating the Teleological
Argument
AO2 Questions
Can you remember what you could be asked?
Specification content
• Whether inductive arguments for God’s existence are
persuasive.
• The extent to which the Kalam cosmological argument is
convincing.
• The effectiveness of the cosmological/teleological
argument for God’s existence.
• Whether cosmological/teleological arguments for God’s
existence are persuasive in the 21st Century.
• The effectiveness of the challenges to the
cosmological/teleological argument for God’s
• existence.
• Whether scientific explanations are more persuasive than
philosophical explanations for the universe’s existence.
What do you know already?
Can you think of strengths of the TA?
Chance?
Strengths
• Ancient argument
• Based on observation – synthetic and a
posteriori
• Scientific theories always need updating
• Contemporary scientists agree with the
teleological argument - Polkinghorne
• Is a cumulative case
Any weaknesses?
Weaknesses
•
•
•
•
•
•
Inductive arguments do not prove certainty
Doesn’t prove the God of classical theism
Use of analogy is unsound.
May be apparent not intelligent design
Many scientists argue against it - Dawkins
Natural selection explains evil whereas argument from
design doesn’t
• ‘God of gaps’ – God is only used as an explanation to
fill the gaps left by science, eventually these gaps will
close and there will be no need to use God as an
explanation.
Extra information
Read pages 15 and 16 and make notes on
scholar’s challenges to the teleological argument
• Kant – empirical objections
• Mill – evil and suffering
Intelligent Design
Certain features of the universe and of living things
are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an
undirected process such as natural selection.
The theory does not challenge the ideas of evolution
defined as change over time, but challenges the idea
that this change is undirected. Supporters of I.D. use
‘jumps’ in the evolutionary process to support their
ideas – punctuated equilibrium.
Michael Behe – irreducible complexity
Some natural features would not work if they were
any less complex and so can’t have just evolved.
‘Scientific evidence strongly supports the teleological
arguments.’ Assess this view.
Strongly supports
Does not support
Is a posteriori – method used in science
Hume – pre evolution and empiricism
Darwin did not directly challenge the TA –
evolution as providing an explanation for
how things are
Tennant – evolution is culmination of
God’s plan
Darwin- natural selection
Many modern scientists support the TA
- Polkinghorne
- Arthur Browne
Dawkins – blind watchmaker
Intelligent design – Michael Behe –
irreducible complexity
Most scientists against intelligent design
Evaluating scientific challenges
Many supporters of Darwin claimed that
his theory proved conclusively that the
designed argument was wrong because:
• living things developed in
evolutionary steps, and this was
the result of random chance.
• evolution means that things
change and adapt to fit in with
the environment,
• rather than, as the scriptures
suggest, the environment being
shaped to fit their needs.
• the suffering of the natural world
did not match the notion of a
kind and loving God.
• if humans evolved, then they
could not have been created ‘in
God’s image’.
Others however, have argued that
Darwin’s theory is flawed because:
• Darwin’s theory fails to answer
the question of why there is
life at all.
• there are gaps in fossil records
meaning that there is a lack of
empirical evidence to support
Darwin’s theory.
• natural selection fails to
advance an organism into a
higher form of life.
• no scientific evidence has
been found to prove that
humans evolved from apes.
• Irreducible complexity –
intelligent design
Activities this lesson and homework
1. Create detailed notes on the strengths and
weaknesses of the teleological argument
2. Write your own essay plans for the questions
Starter
• To what extent does science weaken the
teleological argument?
_______________________________________
a.There is no need for God, natural
selection is the complete answer
b.Nature is self ordering –
mechanistic not God’s agency
c. Intelligent design provides an
alternative explanation for how
species develop
d.It is mistaken to believe in a
designer – only the winners of
adaptation are seen
e.Human appreciation of beauty is
not essential for survival
f. Remarkable coincidence not
divine plan
g. Can still have a religious
interpretation of the scientic facts
about the world e.g. Big Bang
h. Teilhard de Chardin – Evolution
is how God made humans
i. Can still accept a non-literal
interpretation of the Bible and
evolution
j. Memes show that human
appreciation of culture and beauty
can be explained without God