How Successful Is the Design Argument??
How successful is the Design Argument?
The argument from design, otherwise known as the teleological argument, is an argument for the existence of God based upon the empirical evidence of the design of nature. The argument form design is considered as part of Natural theology. Defined Natural theology is a set of arguments that argue for the existence, in which their aim is not presuppose a belief in God, but rather have their starting point with the existence of the world, the order and purpose in the world and the concept of God. Respectively, the names of these arguments are the Cosmological argument, the design argument and the Ontological Argument. The aim of this essay shall be to assess the successfulness of the design argument. In order to this successfully, the arguments that strengthen and weaken the argument will need to be examined.
In general the argument from design is often divided into two forms. Design as purpose and design as regularity. The former states that anything that Exhibits some purpose, rather than accidental will more often than not point to an intelligent and purposive agency.  It then follows that we can see that the world exhibits a lot of purpose as a whole and with everything that is in it. It can then be concluded that since being purposeful points to an intelligent agency that is outside of this world, and the world can be perceived as being purposeful; then the only agency that is able to do this is God. The latter, has a similar format to the former, in the sense anything that displays certain regularity points to an intelligent and personal agency; and it is clear that the world and the totality of things that exist displays this regularity as whole and with all things that are in it. The conclusion from this is that God is an intelligent and personal agency that is outside the world. Therefore this agency must be God.
When examining the successfulness of the argument from design, we are also able to look at the problem of evil in conjunction as this also provides challenges to accepting the argument as being successful. John Stuart Mill, does this in “Nature and the utility of Religion. He does this by ascribing the designer to human characteristics. He argues that events that occur that out of human control or prevention, nature is guilty in which no one is held accountable for. However, the actions in which humans and animals undergo, would never go unpunished if there was a human agency involved. On the topic of the argument from design, Mill strongly believes that there is no intelligent agency in the universe, and if the argument was to succeed one would be forced to conclude that ” Either there is no God or there exists and incompetent or immoral God”, as this would not fit in with the God of Classical Theism.