Paley

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When analyzing William Paley’s “watchmaker” argument, it is difficult to avoid an initial reaction other than a befuddled and somewhat sarcastic really? The concept of his justification for an intelligent designer as the responsible entity for the creation and order of nature isn’t difficult to understand, it is simply conceptually and logically flawed. In other words, it does not make sense.
But what is the “watchmaker” argument? Paley wrote an anecdote whereby he sees a wristwatch on the ground and deduces the following about the origin of the complex and intricately-built piece of machinery:
1. it was designed and assembled intentionally by a watchmaker;
2. it was built for a purpose;
3. it did not simply appear via a random act;
Paley concluded that similar to a wristwatch (or any human-built artifact), a complex product of nature (e.g. an eye, bacterial flagellum, or the universe itself) must have been designed and assembled intentionally, and for an orderly purpose rather than by random act or evolutionary process. But who or what has the capability to design an eye, flagellum, or the universe? His only possibility is an intelligent designer, which is code for God.
In assessing the strengths and weaknesses of the Paley supposition (a theory implies observation and testing), any reasonable person without a pre-drawn a conclusion based on their own bias (e.g. Dover School District; Ken Ham) cannot possibly conclude Paley establishes the existence of God in any way. Like many in the modern creationist and intelligence design (ID) movements, Paley formed an opinion one can deduce was based on an obligation to faith, yet offers no evidence of support – pure conjecture. Furthermore, like modern day anti-evolutionists, P...

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... counter-argued, how does Paley account for the possibility of more than one designer/God, a disordered universe based on observed and disorderly geological or astronomical activity, and exactly which other universe is Paley using to make his comparison to ours?
Paley and modern day ID’ers have no evidence-based or tested answers to any of those questions, not to mention more complex inquiries such human chromosome number two or Tiktaalik. If believers like Paley, Ken Ham, and members of the Dover School District wish to change the hearts of their communities, they should do so honestly. Creating stories about watches or rebranded titles for creationism doesn’t permit the use of the word science, it does not prove there is a God, and it most certainly does not disprove 150 years of the application of the scientific method to show Darwin and his finches were right.

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