Philosophy- Is nature designed?
Are there any reasons for supposing that nature is designed?
I will argue that although it may sometimes appear to us that there are good reasons for supposing that nature is designed, that they are not as strong as some ‘intelligent design’ theologians suggest. There has been a long line of ancient thought that supposed this due the complexity of humans ourselves but once Darwin had popularized the ideas of evolution we had to look further for this supposition. The strongest of these is called the ‘Anthropic Principle’ that points to the delicate balance of natural laws and suggests that this points towards design. I personally think that there are good common-sense arguments to refute this, one of which I call the certain coincidence argument. There are also a great many ‘Multiverse’ or ‘Parallel Universe’ theories that it has been suggested are nothing more that scientific speculation but for me speculation that is grounded in science is better that that which is grounded in mysticism. I will also look at ideas around how our current biological form is resultant of evolutionary fluke and that if this world was designed, the designer created something rather nonsensical and inhumane. I finally look at the idea that if we suppose some sort of design that still leaves us with the question of who designed the designer?
One of the earlier arguments for supposing that nature is designed was the pre-Darwinian idea that man is such a complex being with such amazing capabilities that we must have some purpose and direction so therefore be designed by some greater being, in almost all cases, a God. We now know that, evolutionary forces have slowly created complex entities like ourselves over many, many millennia in a series of mutations but before the recognition of the theory of evolution this could be seen as a suggestion of design. One of St Thomas Aquinas ‘Five ways’ of proving the existence of God was a form of Teleological argument that suggests that we must have some purpose. He says: “Some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God. ”
The ‘Anthropic Principle’ is a name given for a more recent argument for the supposition that nature is designed and is related the scientific observation that the ‘fundamental constants’ of nature appear to be ‘fine-tuned’ in such a way as to suggest design. Some Cosmologists have pointed to things like the mass-to-charge ratio, the strength of the force which binds nuclear particles together, or even the laws of gravity to argue that these are so finely balanced that it could not be by chance. This has been warmly greeted by what I will call the ‘Intelligent Design’ wing of modern Christianity. I will admit that the odds of such a universe coming together in one attempt are extraordinary but if we look into this a little further there are a few possible explanations.
The first explanation I will classify as the certain chance/coincidence argument. This goes that it might be only possible for the universe to support life with a particular set of ‘finely-tuned’ fundamental constants but we would not be here to report them otherwise. This argument is articulated very well by Roger Penrose in the ‘Emporor’s New Mind’: “The argument can be used to explain why the conditions happen to be just right for the existence of (intelligent) life on the earth at the present time. For if they were not just right, then we should not have found ourselves to be here now, but somewhere else, at some other appropriate time. This principle was used very effectively by Brandon Carter and Robert Dicke to resolve an issue that had puzzled physicists for a good many years. The issue concerned various striking numerical relations that are observed to hold between the physical constants (the gravitational constant, the mass of the proton, the age of the universe, etc.). A puzzling aspect of this was that some of the relations hold only at the present epoch in the earth's history, so we appear, coincidentally, to be living at a very special time (give or take a few million years!). This was later explained, by Carter and Dicke, by the fact that this epoch coincided with the lifetime of what are called main-sequence stars, such as the sun. At any other epoch, so the argument ran, there would be no intelligent life around in order to measure the physical constants in question-so the coincidence had to hold, simply because there would be intelligent life around only at the particular time that the coincidence did hold!” Chapter 10
Then I personally feel slightly drawn (somewhat irrationally I must admit) to what has become known as ‘Multiverse’ theories. This explains the ‘Anthropic Principle’ by speculating that our Universe is only one of many, greatly reducing the necessity for any apparent ‘design.’ With the myriad of different ideas there is a constant that our Universe is only one of a great number of parallel Universes, but the relationships between the constituent Universes depends on which theory you subscribe to. There are a great many to consider such as; the Bubble theory, open Multiverses, Big Bounce, M-theory but I will not go into each one. It has been said that these theories themselves are not science because they are impossible to test empirically or to scientifically disprove. Some of these theories are though based on complex quantum physics like Hugh Everetts ‘Many Worlds Interpretation’ but not being particularly knowledgeable in quantum mechanics I cannot say anything about it strengths or weaknesses.
There is also an argument that only refutes the Theological argument that nature and the natural world was designed for the development of us homo-sapien-sapiens. This is that our development into our current form is based on many many evolutionary flukes? This does not discount the creation of ‘intelligent’ life forms of some sort, but only that, as most theologians suggest, that it was ‘created/designed’ to facilitate life in our present form.
Another argument (that possibly has no place in Philosophy) is that if nature was designed by some super-natural entity then why is life so random and so horrible for some? Disease, Depravation, Acts of Nature, and many other things cause immeasurable discomfort and distress to us so why not design some type of Utopia? Or at least ‘create’ some sort of correlation between what I’ll loosely call ‘good behaviour’ and a ‘good life.’ Although we are encouraged by people of a theological disposition, to act in this way or that, there does not appear to be any tangible results in this life.
We can finally consider, when that when looking at the ideas of any supposed design to nature, who designed the designer? This is a question that I believe that science, theology, and philosophy will never be able to answer. Trying to speculate about ‘Multiverses’ or ideas of that ilk can at least be inferred from scientific enquiry, and people may believe that we are just waiting some great ‘theory of everything’ but to go back any further leads to a insolvable circular argument.
To conclude, I concede that before we became aware of the ‘Theory of Evolution’ it could be easy to think that complex beings like ourselves could not have fallen from the sky in our present form so accepting the idea of a designer was not totally irrational. I have never accepted the ‘Anthropic Principle’ but can see that the argument about the ‘fine-tuning’ of the laws of physics needs an answer. I personally accept the idea that the ‘chance’ came first and then we followed giving the world this appearance of design. There are many different ways that this could be possible but I would point towards ‘Multiverse’ or ‘Parallel Universe’ theory as the most likely explanation. I think it is quite easy to refute the suggestion that the world was particularly designed to result in humans in their present form and easy to ask why the world is so cruel and inhumane if it was designed. I must admit that I have nothing of note to say about the question of “Who designed the designer?” but instead leave it as a question that I believe can never be answered.
Sebastian O’Brien April 2007
I will argue that although it may sometimes appear to us that there are good reasons for supposing that nature is designed, that they are not as strong as some ‘intelligent design’ theologians suggest. There has been a long line of ancient thought that supposed this due the complexity of humans ourselves but once Darwin had popularized the ideas of evolution we had to look further for this supposition. The strongest of these is called the ‘Anthropic Principle’ that points to the delicate balance of natural laws and suggests that this points towards design. I personally think that there are good common-sense arguments to refute this, one of which I call the certain coincidence argument. There are also a great many ‘Multiverse’ or ‘Parallel Universe’ theories that it has been suggested are nothing more that scientific speculation but for me speculation that is grounded in science is better that that which is grounded in mysticism. I will also look at ideas around how our current biological form is resultant of evolutionary fluke and that if this world was designed, the designer created something rather nonsensical and inhumane. I finally look at the idea that if we suppose some sort of design that still leaves us with the question of who designed the designer?
One of the earlier arguments for supposing that nature is designed was the pre-Darwinian idea that man is such a complex being with such amazing capabilities that we must have some purpose and direction so therefore be designed by some greater being, in almost all cases, a God. We now know that, evolutionary forces have slowly created complex entities like ourselves over many, many millennia in a series of mutations but before the recognition of the theory of evolution this could be seen as a suggestion of design. One of St Thomas Aquinas ‘Five ways’ of proving the existence of God was a form of Teleological argument that suggests that we must have some purpose. He says: “Some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God. ”
The ‘Anthropic Principle’ is a name given for a more recent argument for the supposition that nature is designed and is related the scientific observation that the ‘fundamental constants’ of nature appear to be ‘fine-tuned’ in such a way as to suggest design. Some Cosmologists have pointed to things like the mass-to-charge ratio, the strength of the force which binds nuclear particles together, or even the laws of gravity to argue that these are so finely balanced that it could not be by chance. This has been warmly greeted by what I will call the ‘Intelligent Design’ wing of modern Christianity. I will admit that the odds of such a universe coming together in one attempt are extraordinary but if we look into this a little further there are a few possible explanations.
The first explanation I will classify as the certain chance/coincidence argument. This goes that it might be only possible for the universe to support life with a particular set of ‘finely-tuned’ fundamental constants but we would not be here to report them otherwise. This argument is articulated very well by Roger Penrose in the ‘Emporor’s New Mind’: “The argument can be used to explain why the conditions happen to be just right for the existence of (intelligent) life on the earth at the present time. For if they were not just right, then we should not have found ourselves to be here now, but somewhere else, at some other appropriate time. This principle was used very effectively by Brandon Carter and Robert Dicke to resolve an issue that had puzzled physicists for a good many years. The issue concerned various striking numerical relations that are observed to hold between the physical constants (the gravitational constant, the mass of the proton, the age of the universe, etc.). A puzzling aspect of this was that some of the relations hold only at the present epoch in the earth's history, so we appear, coincidentally, to be living at a very special time (give or take a few million years!). This was later explained, by Carter and Dicke, by the fact that this epoch coincided with the lifetime of what are called main-sequence stars, such as the sun. At any other epoch, so the argument ran, there would be no intelligent life around in order to measure the physical constants in question-so the coincidence had to hold, simply because there would be intelligent life around only at the particular time that the coincidence did hold!” Chapter 10
Then I personally feel slightly drawn (somewhat irrationally I must admit) to what has become known as ‘Multiverse’ theories. This explains the ‘Anthropic Principle’ by speculating that our Universe is only one of many, greatly reducing the necessity for any apparent ‘design.’ With the myriad of different ideas there is a constant that our Universe is only one of a great number of parallel Universes, but the relationships between the constituent Universes depends on which theory you subscribe to. There are a great many to consider such as; the Bubble theory, open Multiverses, Big Bounce, M-theory but I will not go into each one. It has been said that these theories themselves are not science because they are impossible to test empirically or to scientifically disprove. Some of these theories are though based on complex quantum physics like Hugh Everetts ‘Many Worlds Interpretation’ but not being particularly knowledgeable in quantum mechanics I cannot say anything about it strengths or weaknesses.
There is also an argument that only refutes the Theological argument that nature and the natural world was designed for the development of us homo-sapien-sapiens. This is that our development into our current form is based on many many evolutionary flukes? This does not discount the creation of ‘intelligent’ life forms of some sort, but only that, as most theologians suggest, that it was ‘created/designed’ to facilitate life in our present form.
Another argument (that possibly has no place in Philosophy) is that if nature was designed by some super-natural entity then why is life so random and so horrible for some? Disease, Depravation, Acts of Nature, and many other things cause immeasurable discomfort and distress to us so why not design some type of Utopia? Or at least ‘create’ some sort of correlation between what I’ll loosely call ‘good behaviour’ and a ‘good life.’ Although we are encouraged by people of a theological disposition, to act in this way or that, there does not appear to be any tangible results in this life.
We can finally consider, when that when looking at the ideas of any supposed design to nature, who designed the designer? This is a question that I believe that science, theology, and philosophy will never be able to answer. Trying to speculate about ‘Multiverses’ or ideas of that ilk can at least be inferred from scientific enquiry, and people may believe that we are just waiting some great ‘theory of everything’ but to go back any further leads to a insolvable circular argument.
To conclude, I concede that before we became aware of the ‘Theory of Evolution’ it could be easy to think that complex beings like ourselves could not have fallen from the sky in our present form so accepting the idea of a designer was not totally irrational. I have never accepted the ‘Anthropic Principle’ but can see that the argument about the ‘fine-tuning’ of the laws of physics needs an answer. I personally accept the idea that the ‘chance’ came first and then we followed giving the world this appearance of design. There are many different ways that this could be possible but I would point towards ‘Multiverse’ or ‘Parallel Universe’ theory as the most likely explanation. I think it is quite easy to refute the suggestion that the world was particularly designed to result in humans in their present form and easy to ask why the world is so cruel and inhumane if it was designed. I must admit that I have nothing of note to say about the question of “Who designed the designer?” but instead leave it as a question that I believe can never be answered.
Sebastian O’Brien April 2007
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