Talk:Teleological argument

Voltaire photo

Hi, can someone move the Voltaire photo to Voltaire's paragraph pls? Thanks FatalSubjectivities (talk) 14:07, 12 July 2022 (UTC)

Done.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 21:18, 13 July 2022 (UTC)

Rephrase needed

for example, every two hydrogen atoms are ordered to form a compound with one oxygen atom. No, they're not: two atoms can bind to each other to form H₂, two pairs of atoms can bond with two carbon atoms to form ethane, etc. I don't know exactly what this sentence is saying, so I don't want to change it myself. 2001:BB6:4734:5658:5D1D:3796:2525:6D9B (talk) 15:11, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

I've changed it, since nobody else did. 2001:BB6:4734:5658:D21:6744:8DBD:A8B3 (talk) 11:07, 22 July 2022 (UTC)

Does anyone else think this whole article misses the point?

Upon cursory review of this article, it appears the teleological argument is being lumped in with the watchmaker analogy and intelligent design. The teleological argument deals with unintelligent objects or beings acting toward a certain end unthinkingly. But it seems like it is being confused with the idea that God intervened at times to change something or with the argument from complexity. I think this article misses the entire point, but I would like public comment before I go editing all willy-nilly. Kringga talk 16:48, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Over its history this article (and others related to it) have sometimes been difficult to edit because of the high political priority many Wikipedians give to making sure that Wikipedia makes all the definitions line up with the way they are recently used in specific American culture war debates which were hot when Wikipedia was young. That may be having an effect on whatever it is which is concerning you. But here are some questions:

• Do you have a good source for the idea that the teleological argument is specifically about unintelligent objects or beings acting toward a certain end unthinkingly? I can see how it might be argued, but I don't think I've ever seen the unintelligent aspect being emphasized and I am not sure why we would need to do that. For most readers it might become very confusing, without really changing the meaning?
• It is also not so clear how this would make it different from the watchmaker argument and "intelligent design" in the broad old sense? Can you explain the distinction(s) you are making?
• It does sound right to me that this article should not imply that the teleological argument is "the idea that God intervened at times to change something". (I guess that is a reference to Intelligent Design in those specific recent culture wars debates?) But does this article imply that definition? Can you explain where?
• What are you seeing in the article which confuses it with "argument from complexity"? Are you sure this is worth changing?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:58, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

ID movement and teleological-argument theistic apologetics are not synonymous but they overlap FatalSubjectivities (talk) 14:40, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree the article (starting with the first line) conflates an argument using teleology (the end) with one based on complexity or design which is deontology (the means) and not teleology. The article also narrows it as if such arguments are always about the existence of God.

But I’m also thinking such confusion of the means with the ends is so common as to be the norm, and that the existence of God association is so far the greatest WP:WEIGHT of coverage that arguments which actually use teleology would not get much space here. Perhaps it would better suit to have See Also links to such areas, e.g. Teleological behaviorism, Teleological ethics, Teleological language in biology, and Teleological interpretation (law). It might be nice to have an explanation for the abstract inductive vs deductive approach, but the WEIGHT just isn’t there.

Cheers Markbassett (talk) 21:33, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Whatever we do it will need to be based on a balancing of the different approaches found in reliable sources, and we also have to keep in mind that there is a quite different article called "Intelligent design" which focuses on the specific story of a version of this argument which we know from recent culture war debates. Currently this article is covering all the older variants. It is not really clear from your remarks what types of changes you would like to see, and how you would source them, but I take it you want the differences to be more clear. I have not looked at it for a while but I believe one problem is that reliable sources tend to use these terms in different ways. Currently the discussions of different approaches is split up chronologically, looking at specific proponents etc.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 17:27, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

User:Andrew Lancaster my comment said the only option I could see was adding some See Also to more technically correct uses of the term. Mistakenly saying teleology is design or that natural theology is it are so common as to be the WEIGHT here. It does not matter that academically the teleological argument is literally a phrase meaning talk about the end result. It does not matter that teleology is nothing about design nor about complexity. It does not matter that natural theology has many parts and only one is Aquinas use of a teleological argument as one of his proofs for the existence of God. It does not matter if Socrates use of it was about an unintelligent acorn. The association by many repetitions, however technically mistaken it may be for philosophy, is so dominant that I cannot see changing the body of this article and we just accept it does not match academic works. (e.g. here or here or others.) Cheers Markbassett (talk) 18:45, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

I understand that like me you aren't making any big proposals at the moment, but I was wondering if I could tease a more detailed explanation out of you of what your comments really mean in detail. Maybe it is relevant to other articles in the long term. I realize that Aquinas distinguished several different arguments but some of them seem to be equivalent. (Or that is a frequent reading.) Interesting that you cite Sedley. I've also tended to see him as a good source here. Can you point to a line or passage which explains your point?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 22:35, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

User:Andrew Lancaster I had no particular line in mind. In general, my point is that the literal meaning of “teleological argument” is just an argument based on teleology, and I offered some candidates of such for See Also links that are not about proving God exists. The most famous teleological argument is the Quinta Via of Aquinas in Five Ways (Aquinas), which is about proving God exist and became known as “the” teleological argument, perhaps confused as if that’s the only one. As said at Five Ways (Aquinas) even that one has nothing to do with design or complexity. Hopefully this helps. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 07:16, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Just my thoughts. No response necessary unless you think I am totally misunderstanding. Design means "intention" in these discussions, or in other words it means there is not only intelligence but also that the intelligences has ends (teloi). Complexity comes into the discussion because when complexity is observed which is not just a random mess, but something which looks organized and systematic, this supposedly implies that intelligence with ends. So no matter what we think of them, it is hard to handle these arguments separately because they are so commonly linked in such ways.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:50, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Mmm, think design or intelligence may or may not be present in individual cases of teleological arguments, but to be clear these are not the teleology part and a teleological argument may exist with one or both or neither. The acorn or other Teleological language in biology has no intelligence nor design, but looks at a final end (telos) anyway. The Teleological behaviorism and Teleological ethics has an intelligence looking at that final ends (result), but without a specific design of a mechanism. And of course one can have a design or intent without complexity. I don’t think these are inherently linked, but that since they are commonly confused and mistakenly said to be the same that the article cannot ignore that de facto they are taken as synonyms. cheers Cheers Markbassett (talk) 05:59, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

Minor description.

@Andrew Lancaster, The body does not necessarily have to state it. It's common sense, really, regarding how teleology works.(WP:CSIOR) It relies on reason rather than revelation. Whether the reasoning is convincing or unconvincing is another matter entirely, but the inherent nature of the argument is obvious.

The lead already has this line "While the concept of an intelligence behind the natural order is ancient, a rational argument that concludes that we can know that the natural world has a designer, or a creating intelligence which has human-like purposes, appears to have begun with classical philosophy."

Nonetheless, here are few sources: Though, I would argue, we don't need to put the sources on the lead.(MOS:LEAD) 182.183.53.142 (talk) 12:40, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

RationalISM is clearly more than just anything involving a rational argument. It also can't be defined as an opposite of "revelation". For a start you can read the article about it on WP which you link to. Using an -ISM means we connect this argument to a specific movement within philosophy, which would I think confuse and mislead. None of the sources you cite mention the word "Rationalism", and two of them are not valid sources according to WP norms.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:44, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

In that case perhaps, we could use "is a rational argument for". And instead of linking to the movement, we could simply link rationality as a quality of the argument. That could work. 182.183.6.255 (talk) 23:08, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

That is a step in the right direction. But are there such things as deliberately irrational arguments? I mean when we say that an argument is irrational, we mean it was done wrongly, don't we? Invalid? So what is the word "rational" adding here? Do we think our readers will be confused and think that an "argument for X" might actually be an argument which deliberately aims to work in an irrational way?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 23:29, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

It's true that most arguments aim to be rational. But, I think that since we are talking about a religious argument, it underscores the argument's intention to appeal to reason and logic rather than emotion or faith alone, which is important in distinguishing it from other types of arguments for God's existence, such as fideistic or purely theological arguments. I think it clarifies this aspect for the readers early on. 182.183.6.255 (talk) 00:02, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

References