William Paley

Natural Theology

1. Paley contends that the design evident in living organisms proves that God exists.
a. He uses the example of finding a watch lying on the ground while walking across a heath
(an uncultivated tract of land).
i. We notice that all its parts work together for the purpose of measuring time.
1. Paley admits on page 39 that we might need “some previous knowledge
of the subject, to perceive and understand it.”
ii. Once we perceive and understand the watch, “the inference, we think, is
inevitable—that the watch must have had a maker…” And not just any maker,
but an intelligent maker (i.e. a watchmaker).
1. We think that this must be the case since we cannot think of any other
possible or probably means of such a thing coming into existence
without being designed and made by an intelligent maker.
2. Paley then goes on to challenge some possible objections to his view.
a. It does not weaken his conclusion that the finder of the watch:
i. Has never seen a watch made
ii. Cannot make a watch
1. Do we know exactly how the Egyptian Pyramids were created?
b. It doesn’t weaken the conclusion that the watch may not work properly
c. Finally, “The consciousness of knowing little need not beget a distrust of that which he
does know” (p. 40).
i. Points 4 thru 7 concern the relative ignorance of the watch-finder.
ii. In point 8 we see what the watch-finder does know: “He knows the utility of the
end [purpose]; he knows the subservience and adaptation of the means to the
end” (p. 40).
1. The latter part of the above sentence merely means that the method(s)
used to create the watch are not directly important to knowing the
purpose which the watch serves.
3. Now Paley considers the possibility of the watch replicating itself.
a. Self-replication of the watch would add to the conclusion that an initial watch-maker
must exist (p. 41).
b. The self-replicating watch would further point to a designer or watch-maker
i. The first watch is not the cause (the ultimate cause) of the second watch
1. Instead, a watch-maker must have designed (caused) the watch to have
self-replicating abilities.
2. The first watch is the most proximate or most directly linked cause of
the second watch, but the first watch is not the ultimate cause.
c. So, the self-replicating watch does nothing to undermine the argument from design.
 d. Even if we say that the watch before us was created by a pre-existing watch, and that
one made by the one pre-existing it, etc., does not disprove that “contrivance must have
had a contriver” (p. 42).
4. Paley then moves to argue that the watch is only an analogue of nature.
a. “Every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design which existed in the
watch, exists in the works of nature—with the difference, on the side of nature, of being
greater and more, and that in a degree which exceeds all comparison” (p. 43).
b. Using such analogies is one of the best ways to support Paley’s arguments: “I know no
better method of introducing so large a subject, than that of comparing a single thing
with a single thing—an eye, for example, with a telescope” (p. 43).

Paley uses what Philosophers call an Argument by Analogy

The strength of Arguments by Analogy depend (primarily if not solely) upon the close and relevant
similarities between the analogues.
Are there close and relevant similarities between a watch and nature?

On page 44, Paley moves from the conclusion that a Creator exists to arguing for the existence of the
Creator’s attributes.
Do you find those similarities between the Creator and humans close and relevant enough to
support the conclusion that we share with the Creator certain attributes?