Paley’s watch analogy...

Paley’s watch analogy, and the evidence of fine-tuning, are not intended to demonstrate that the design in the universe is the work of an intelligent agent, but rather are intended to demonstrate that the order in the universe is indeed design. Flew therefore suggests that we speak not of “arguments from design” but of “arguments to design”. The Argument from Analogy The classical statement of the teleological argument is that of William Paley in his Natural Theology.

Paley likened the universe to a watch. Like a watch, he said, the universe consists of many complex parts functioning in harmony to some useful end. In a watch the various parts are ordered such that they measure time; in the universe, such that they support life. The two are, in this respect, similar. In the case of a watch we take these properties to constitute evidence of design.

If we were to stumble across a watch in a natural environment, lying on a heath, for example, then we would instantly know that it was designed because of its order and complexity. If order and complexity constitute evidence of design in the case of a watch, though, then they must also constitute evidence of design in the case of the universe. The case of the watch therefore illustrates the fact that the order and complexity of the universe is evidence that the universe was designed.

The inference from the order and complexity of a watch to its being designed is not dependent on knowledge of how watches are made. If we were to stumble across a watch in a natural environment, then we would instantly know that it was designed even without any knowledge of how watches are made or where watches come from. It is therefore no objection to Paley’s argument that we know how watches are made but do not know how universes are made.

Order and complexity are together sufficient to support the inference to a designer even without any knowledge at all of the origins of universes. Not only can we infer from the analogy between the order and complexity of a watch and the order and complexity of the universe that the universe has a designer, we can also infer something about what this designer is like. For the universe is not only ordered and complex in the same way as a watch, but it is so on a much grander scale.

The order and complexity of the universe far exceeds that of a watch, and we may therefore infer that the designer of the universe is correspondingly greater than designers of watches.