Q&A: The Argument from Design and the Argument from Uniqueness
The Argument from Design and the Argument from Uniqueness
Question
With God’s help,
As I understand it, there are two arguments from design.
1) The argument from design: I assume the world is designed for some purpose, so there must be an entity with will, and therefore it makes no sense to claim regarding it that it too needs a designer.
The significant problem with this is: why assume the world is purposive? Does the Rabbi have an explanation? After all, there are so many “defects” in the world, stars that are empty of content. Why assume there is some ultimate purpose here, when in any case in another few hundred million years the sun will explode, and with it the earth, etc. etc.
2) The argument from uniqueness. I could imagine a world with different and simpler laws of nature. Why assume that specifically this world emerged from among all the possibilities of the laws of nature? After all, only less “probable” laws of nature would cause this. That is a sign that someone had to choose דווקא those from among the possibilities. If so, what about Him? He too needs a designer—why is He this way and not another way? Indeed, if it is forced upon Him to choose this, then the question applies to Him as well. But if He acts by will, then the question partly falls away and returns to the existence of will, which is itself unique. In my opinion, the answer to this question is that we have no hypotheses on which to posit other gods / other entities of will of which He is one part. Does the Rabbi agree with this answer? Did I understand it correctly?
Answer
I am now declaring a timeout on the topic of proofs for God. Almost all of the questions have already been answered, and I keep repeating the same things over and over. Please search the site in the questions and notebooks. From now until further notice I will not answer more questions on these topics.
I apologize—you are not to blame (except that apparently you did not read what has already been written here, or at least not carefully enough), but neither am I. I am simply exhausted. Just in the past few days there have, in my opinion, been hundreds of messages here on this topic, and I also have a few other things to do with my life. Sorry.
Maybe then the Rabbi would allow questions of clarification? For example, the second question I asked, without explanation, like in Rabbi Chaim’s question about “Rabbe”:
The argument from uniqueness claims that I could imagine a world with different and simpler laws of nature.
If so, why assume that specifically this world emerged from among all the possible laws of nature?
That indicates that someone had to “choose” precisely those from among the possibilities.
If so, what about Him—He too is unique? And also needs a designer: why is He this way and not another way?
Here the answer can be divided into two:
1) Insofar as He has will—it makes no sense to ask why He is this way and not another way. Will is purposive action, not causal/random action.
2) And insofar as He is not within our experience—we have no way to assume that God is unique. Unique relative to what options? Additional gods? We have no experience of Him on the basis of which to assume that He is unique.
Does the Rabbi agree with this answer? Did I understand it correctly?