CHAPTER VI.
The Argument from Design.
Kant called the argument from design "the oldest, the clearest, and the most adapted to the ordinary human reason," of all the arguments advanced on behalf of the belief in God. Kant's dictum, it will be observed, omits all opinion as to its quality, and his own criticism of it left it a sorry wreck. John Stuart Mill treated it far more respectfully, and commenced his examination of it with the flattering introduction, "We now at last reach an argument of a really scientific character," and, although he did not find the argument convincing, gave it a most respectful dismissal. The purpose of the present chapter is to show that the argument from design in nature is in the last degree unscientific, that the analogy it seeks to establish is a false one, that it is completely and hopelessly irrelevant to the point at issue, and that one might grant nearly all it asks for, and even then show that it does not prove what it sets out to prove. That such an argument should have, and for so long, exerted so much influence over the human mind, gives one anything but a flattering impression of the power of reason in human affairs.
True it is that of late years the argument from design has felt the influence of the growth of the idea of evolution, and the champions of theism have used it with much greater caution, and under an obvious sense that it no longer wielded its old authority. The fact that this is so forms a commentary on the statement so often made that man's craving for an ultimate cause leads to the belief in God. The truth being that man—the average man—only seeks for an explanation of immediate happenings. Once the immediate thing before him is explained his curiosity is allayed. The average man lives mentally from hand to mouth, and troubles as little about ultimate explanations as he does about the exhaustion of the coal supply.
It is a point of some significance that the perception of design in nature, as with the belief in deity, is, if one may use the expression, pre-scientific in point of origin. What I mean by that is that it originates at a time when no other explanation of the origin of natural adaptations existed. It did not establish itself as one of several rival explanations and in virtue of its own strength. It was established simply because no other explanation was at the time conceivable. And so soon as another explanation, such as that of natural selection, was placed before the world, the origin of adaptations as a product of an extra-natural designing intelligence became to most educated minds simply impossible. The perception of design in nature was, as a matter of fact, no more than a special illustration of the animistic frame of mind which reads vitality into all natural happenings. It is impossible to find in the statement that particular adaptations in nature are designed anything more scientific than one can find in the belief that rain is the product of a heavenly rain-cow, or that flashes of lightning are spears thrown by competing heavenly warriors. It is the language only that differs in the two cases. The frame of mind indicated in the two cases are identical.
The attractiveness of the argument from design lies in its nearness to hand and in its appeal to facts, combined with the impossibility of verification. That nature is full of strange and curious examples of adaptation is clear to all, although the significance of these adaptations are by no means so clear. Moreover, a very casual study of these cases show that they are better calculated to dazzle than to convince. The presentation of a number of more or less elaborate facts of adaptation, followed with the remark that we are unable to see how such cases could have been brought about in the absence of a designing intelligence, is, at best, an appeal to human weakness and ignorance. The reverse of such a position is that if we had complete knowledge of the causes at work, the assumption of design might be found to be quite unnecessary. "We cannot see" is only the equivalent of we do not know, and that is a shockingly bad basis on which to build an argument.
When, therefore, an eminent electrician like Professor Fleming says, "We have overwhelming proof that in the manufacture of the infinite number of substances made in Nature's laboratory there must be at all stages some directivity," this can only mean that Professor Fleming cannot see the way in which these substances are made. It does not mean that he sees how they are made. And in saying this he is in no better position than was Kepler, who after describing the true laws of planetary motion, when he came to the question of why the planets should describe these motions fell back on the theory of "Angelic intelligences" as the cause. The true explanation came with the physics of Galileo and Newton, and with that, farewell to the angelic "directivity." The only reason for Kepler's angels was his ignorance of the causes of planetary motion. The only reason why Professor Fleming says that the atoms "have to be guided into certain positions to build up the complex molecules" is that he is unable to isolate this assumed directive force and to show it in operation; he is like a modern Kepler faced with something the cause of which he doesn't know, and lugging in "God" to save further trouble. It is an assumption of knowledge where no knowledge exists. "God" is always what Spinoza called it, the asylum of ignorance. When causes are unknown "God" is brought forward. When causes are known "God" retires into the background. "God" is not an explanation, it is a narcotic.
The argument from design rests upon the existence in nature of adaptations either general or special. And quite obviously the value of evidence derived from adaptations will be determined by the existence of non-adaptations. If, that is, it can be shown that a certain assemblage of forces produce adaptation, while in another instance they fail to produce it, it would then be logical to argue that the difference was due to the directive power being withdrawn in the latter case. But that as we know is never the case. What we see is always the same conditions producing the same effects. We are never able to say, "Here are natural forces working minus a directing intelligence, and here is an assemblage of the same forces working plus the addition of a directing intelligence." If we could do that we should be able to attribute the difference to the new factor. But this we are never able to do. And it is an elementary principle of scientific method that before we can assert the existence of a distinct force or factor, the possibility of isolation must be shown. Adaptation can, then, only be demonstrated by non-adaptation. And non-adaptation in nature simply does not exist, except in relation to an ideal end created by ourselves.