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    The objection from the absence of an efficient cause does... — Carmelics
    Home/Natural Theology
    HistoryEditSee Inverse

    The objection from the absence of an efficient cause does not conclusively defeat the argument from design.

    Natural Theology
    ?Rate how convincing each reason is below to see the overall strength.
    1 reason for
    2 reasons against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
    ?
    • 1.Rejecting the argument from design requires holding both that no efficient cause exists for complex natural order and that no one planned that order.
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    • 2.The hand-in-hand attribution of wisdom and power means that conceding a planner sufficient in wisdom entails conceding a planner sufficient in power.
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    • 3.These two commitments together undercut the force of the objection against the argument from design.
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    Reasons Against

    2 perspectives
    Reason against 1 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Hume's Philo demonstrates that complex order can arise from principles of generation intrinsic to matter itself, requiring no external efficient cause.
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    • 2.If natural order admits of immanent causal explanation (e.g., Spinoza's natura naturans), the inference from design to a transcendent planner is logically blocked before power becomes relevant.
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    • 3.The supporting argument's premise P1 thus begs the question by treating the absence of an efficient cause as conceded rather than as the very point under dispute.
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    Reason against 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Kant's Critique of Pure Reason establishes that efficient causation is a category applicable only within possible experience, not to a supposed cause of the empirical world as a whole.
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    • 2.Because the argument from design requires projecting the wisdom-power nexus onto a being outside the causal order, the supporting argument's P2 illegitimately extends an intra-experiential concept beyond its constitutive limits.
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    • 3.The inseparability of wisdom and power cannot rescue the design argument if the very application of causal categories to a transcendent designer is epistemically impermissible.
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    Topics

    Natural Theology

    Connections

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    Divine Attributes1 linked

    Related

    Because the argument from design requires projecting the wisdom-power nexus onto...Hume's Philo demonstrates that complex order can arise from principles of genera...If natural order admits of immanent causal explanation (e.g., Spinoza's natura n...Kant's Critique of Pure Reason establishes that efficient causation is a categor...
    +5 moreShow less
    Rejecting the argument from design requires holding both that no efficient cause...The hand-in-hand attribution of wisdom and power means that conceding a planner ...The inseparability of wisdom and power cannot rescue the design argument if the ...The supporting argument's premise P1 thus begs the question by treating the abse...These two commitments together undercut the force of the objection against the a...

    Similar

    Rejecting the argument from design requires holding both that no effic...84%The design argument falls well short of what it claims to prove80%These two commitments together undercut the force of the objection aga...77%Having a final cause does not require being designed by an intentional...76%

    Source

    AI-extracted1/3 agreementValid
    SEP: reid
    View source passageHide passage
    This is a powerful objection, but it is not the end of the debate. Notice that someone who rejects the argument from design is likely to think both that there is no efficient cause of the complex order which we encounter in nature, and that nobody planned the order that we find. But there is no doubt that when a person, say, builds a house that there was somebody who formed the plan to build the house. The question is whether or not that person must have had the power to build it in order to bri
    Extraction notes

    Validity: Extracted via Max plan + API grounding/validity checks

    Details

    Type
    claim
    Perspectives
    3 (1 for, 2 against)
    Edits
    1 edit