AQA A-Level Religious Studies

The design argument (the teleological argument) moves from features of the world to the existence of a designer. It is an a posteriori argument, because its starting point is observation, and it is inductive, so its conclusion is made probable by the evidence, not guaranteed by it. William Paley set out its best-known form in *Natural Theology* (1802), and David Hume's criticisms, written in the *Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion* (published 1779, after his death), are the standard reply. ## Paley's analogical argument Paley begins with a thought experiment. Walking across a heath, you might trip over a stone and wonder how it came to be there; you would be content to say it had always been there. If you found a watch, you could not say that, because on inspection you would see that its parts are fitted together for a purpose: the spring drives the wheels, the wheels turn the hands, and the glass lets you see the dial. The parts are made and arranged so that the watch tells the time, and if they were shaped or ordered differently it would either fail or do nothing useful. From this you would conclude that the watch had a maker who understood its construction and designed it for its use. Paley then draws the analogy. The universe, and above all living things, show the same marks that the watch does, only on a far larger scale and with far greater skill. His favourite example was the human eye, which he compared with a telescope: both are built to focus light on a…