Design Argument

Design Argument

Hume 3 ways against the design argument are;

Demea plays somewhat the role of Galileo's Simplicio. His main role is to pose arguments that the other two players can demolish, or to ask questions that give the other two characters opportunities to elaborate their positions. He believes God is so unknowable and inscrutable that any effort by humans to describe God borders on sacrilege by assigning to God the limited and corrupt attributes of human beings. He states his position pretty clearly in Part III by saying

The infirmities of our nature do not permit us to reach any ideas, which in the least correspond to the ineffable sublimity of the divine attributes.

Philo is the hard-headed skeptic who sees paradoxes and inconsistencies in every line of argument, sees alternate interpretations for every observation, and who thus essentially believes nothing can be known for certain. His arguments are most nearly those of the modern skeptic. Hume at times lets him go over the top and express extreme ideas, which are then tempered a bit for the sake of more sensitive readers. Cleanthes is the pragmatic skeptic, who is keenly aware of the limitations of logic and observation but who nevertheless believes our mental picture of sense impressions and logical inferences is too real to dismiss entirely. It is Cleanthes who articulates the Argument From Design. (Collins, 2009)

Hume certainly uses Philo as a vehicle to express some of his more abrasive views. On the other hand, Hume was never fully able to reconcile the results of complete skepticism with the reality that some things are known for certain even if the basis for the knowledge cannot be clearly articulated, and Cleanthes most clearly reflects that side of Hume.

Early on Hume has Demea speak so obviously inconsistently as to make the reader wonder whether ...