As most famously presented by William Paley in his theological work titled “Natural
Theology”, the Watchmaker Analogy is a recurring argument for a designer, which, by way of
analogy, asserts that complexity requires a designer.
The way Paley put it is essentially as follows: if you were walking across a field and saw
a watch lying upon the ground, you wouldn’t assume that it had come together by chance
because it’s too ordered and complicated.
Rather, you would assume that it had a conscious and intelligent designer.
By way of analogy, Paley then went on to argue that because life and indeed the universe
is ordered and complicated, it too must’ve had a conscious and intelligent designer.
While Paley’s presentation of this argument is the most famous, since his time many theists
and deists have developed versions of their own.
For example, Ray Comfort often uses the analogy of a painting and a painter, while Ian Juby
is fond of using the analogy of a building and a builder.
However, despite the many versions of this argument, they’re all fundamentally the
same… they assert that complexity requires a designer.
So what exactly is wrong with the Watchmaker Argument?
I mean, the title of this video promises to debunk it, and yet we’re a minute in and
we haven’t even started!
So, starting with the most critical flaws, let’s get on with it!
First and foremost, and what single-handedly debunks the Watchmaker Argument, is that it’s
a False Analogy.
An analogy is a comparison between things that have similar features for the purpose
of explaining a principle or an idea, and in this case, Paley insists that a comparison
can be made between the complexity of a watch and the complexity of the universe, which
both imply that they had a designer.
However, the last step is flawed because it concludes that because two things share one
quality in common – that being complexity, they must also share another quality in common
– a designer, when this simply cannot be logically concluded.
If it could, then by using the same faulty logic, countless other absurd qualities could
also be attributed to the universe.
For example; the watch is complex; the watch was invented in the 15th century; the universe
is complex; therefore, the universe was invented in the 15th century.
Just because two objects share one quality in common, this doesn’t mean that they necessarily
share another.
Hence, right from the get-go, the Watchmaker Argument is a False Analogy.
A second objection, and one very closely related to the first, is that it commits a False Cause
Fallacy.
It does this by asserting that complexity and order can only be caused a designer, when
not only has this never been proven to be true, it’s actually been proven to be completely
incorrect – but we’ll get to evolution in just a second.
Essentially, like all False Cause Fallacies, the Watchmaker Argument mistakenly confuses
correlation with causation.
It recognizes a relationship between complexity and designers, and then concludes that one
necessarily implies the other.
To once again demonstrate this flaw through an unrelated example, we can look at the following:
Temperatures have been rising over the past few centuries, whilst at the same time the
number of pirates have been decreasing; thus, pirates cool the world and global warming
is a hoax.
There may be a correlation between temperature and pirates, just as there is a correlation
between complexity and designers, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that one implies
the other.
And this brings us comfortably to yet another major problem with the Watchmaker Argument.
It completely ignores evolution by natural selection.
Without getting into it too deeply, natural selection has been completely and utterly
proven to be an unconscious process that has given rise to countless complex and purposed
organisms – which, without an understanding of natural selection, do indeed give the impression
that they were deliberately designed.
Or in other words, we know, for a fact, that nature can, does, and has produced remarkably
complex organisms without a conscious and intelligent hand behind it.
The truth of the matter is that the reason we recognize a watch as designed actually
has nothing to do with how complex and purposed it is, but rather it is because we already
know that the watch was designed.
We have literally millions of examples of watches being created by a designer, and zero
examples of watches being made without a designer.
However, and in contrast, we have zero examples of life being created by a designer and literally
millions of examples of natural selection producing complex life.
A fourth major flaw with the Watchmaker Argument is that either commits a Special Pleading
Fallacy, or it’s completely self-refuting.
Its core premise asserts that purpose and complexity requires a designer, and so if
we draw the Watchmaker Argument out to its logical conclusion – that there is a god
and that it created the universe and everything in it, then by applying the argument’s logic
to itself we must conclude that this god too had a designer, and so on and so forth for
infinity…
By definition, Special Pleading is an argument in which the speaker deliberately creates
an exception to their argument without justifying why, and that is precisely what one must do
to prevent the Watchmaker Argument from being completely self-refuting.
Hence, the Watchmaker Argument is either self-refuting or it commits a Special Pleading Fallacy.
Despite each of the previous four objections single-handedly defeating the Watchmaker Argument
on their own, here are just some additional issues that add insult to injury.
The Watchmaker Argument is self-contradicting.
The argument first assumes that a watch is different from nature, which it indirectly
claims is uncomplicated and random.
However, it then states that since the universe is so complicated and ordered it too must
have a creator.
Thus, it gives the universe two incompatible and contradicting qualities.
The Watchmaker Argument doesn’t imply a designer – it implies that there are many
designers.
After finding that watch upon the ground, imagine if you then saw beside it a shoe.
Would you assume that a watchmaker made that shoe?
Of course not – you would assume that a shoemaker made it.
Therefore, according to the analogy, life must have a lifemaker, suns must have a sunmaker,
and so on and so forth, implying that there are many creators rather than just one.
Of course, one creator could be responsible for creating more than just one creation,
but until demonstrated this is an assumption.
The Watchmaker Argument acts as if a watchmaker creates a watch from nothing, when this simply
isn’t true.
A watch, like all human creations, is a rearrangement of energy and mater that already existed.
A watchmaker can’t create a watch literally from nothing, and so the Watchmaker Argument
can actually only argue that the designer of the universe rearranged energy and matter
that already existed.
The Watchmaker Argument doesn’t support theism.
Even if it were accepted as a sound argument, it would only prove that a universe had a
universe designer – and that’s it.
It wouldn’t prove a particular religion to be true.
Or, as Hitchens put it, “Even if the watchmaker argument was valid, you, as a theist, still
have all of your work ahead of you”.
In addition to the Watchmaker Argument not supporting theism, its logic is also inconsistent
with the description of most monotheistic gods – and certainly the Abrahamic ones.
An all-powerful and all-loving god would not create organisms with the type of suboptimal
design that can be seen in nature.
From vestigial organs to birth defect to pregnancy complications, it cannot logical follow that
an all-powerful, all-loving god can be responsible for this.
Meaning that either that god isn’t omnipotent or that it isn’t omnibenevolent – or both!
So, to recap, the Watchmaker Argument is flawed because: It’s a False Analogy; It commits
a False Cause Fallacy; It completely ignores evolution by Natural Selection; It commits
a Special Pleading Fallacy or it’s completely Self-Refuting; It’s self-contradicting;
It doesn’t imply a designer, but rather many designers; It acts as if watches are
created from nothing; It doesn’t support theism; and, It doesn’t support the concept
of an omnipotent and omnibenevolent god.
It’s not a sound argument… in fact, it’s thoroughly debunked.
As you might have noticed, this video is quite a bit longer than many of my others, but to
be perfectly honest with you I think it needed to be.
While the Watchmaker Argument is thoroughly flawed, it is nevertheless what I personally
consider to be the best argument for a deity that there has ever been… and hence, it
deserved this royal kick-in!
Thanks for the view, and I’ll leave you with this overwhelmingly powerful argument
to consider: Armored Skeptic has a YouTube channel.
Armored Skeptic has three hundred thousand subscribers.
Rationality Rules has a YouTube channel.
Therefore, Rationality Rules has three hundred thousand subscribers.