11.24
Teleology is the philosophy of design or purpose in the natural world. It’s a belief that the natural order, and the individual organisms within it are designed for a certain purpose or use. Theists and atheists alike live according to an underlying assumption of teleology whether they acknowledge it or not. I talk a lot about the validity of intuitional truth on this blog, and teleology would generally fall into that category. To get a better understanding of what it’s all about, take this quote from The Pilgrim’s Regress:
Every day a jailor brought the prisoners their food, and as he laid down the dishes he would say a word to them. If their meal was flesh he would remind them that they were eating corpses, or give them some account of the slaughtering: or, if it was the inwards of some beast, he would read them a lecture in anatomy and show the likeness of the mess to the same parts in themselves -which was the more easily done because the giant’s eyes were always staring into the dungeon at dinner time. Or if the meal were eggs he would recall to them that they were eating the menstruum of a verminous fowl, and crack a few jokes with the female prisoner. So he went on day by day. Then I dreamed that one day there was nothing but milk for them, and the jailor said as he put down the pipkin:
’Our relations with the cow are not delicate -as you can easily see if you imagine eating any of her other secretions.’
Now John had been in the pit a shorter time than any of the others and at these words something seemed to snap in his head and he gave a great sigh and suddenly spoke out in a loud, clear voice:
’Thank heaven! Now at last I know that you are talking nonsense.’
’What do you mean?’ said the jailor, wheeling round upon him.
’You are trying to pretend that unlike things are like. You are trying to make us think that milk is the same sort of thing as sweat or dung.’
’And pray, what difference is there except by custom?’
’Are you a liar or only a fool, that you see no difference between that which Nature casts out as refuse and that which she stores up as food?’
’So Nature is a person, then, with purposes and consciousness,’ said the jailor with a sneer, ’In fact, a Landlady. No doubt it comforts you to imagine you can believe that sort of thing:’ and he turned to leave the prison with his nose in the air.
’I know nothing about that,’ shouted John after him. ’I am talking of what happens. Milk does feed calves and dung does not.’
–CS Lewis, The Pilgrim’s Regress
It’s readily obvious when we look at the natural world that it’s particulars are meant for certain applications or activities. Like the character John says, “Milk does feed calves and dung does not.” Now this concept is an important one that regresses to greater ideas like intelligent design. It’s also a crucial point of connecting the material world with religious ideas. Indeed, this might be the crux of where the physical meets the metaphysical in human understanding.
Take homosexuality for example. The reason for rejecting it amongst religious and non-religious alike is a belief that it is “against nature” in some way. That phrase is tossed out a lot, and it simply means that engaging in homosexual acts is an abuse of the way the body was designed to work. Sex is a proper use of the body as it’s designed, but homosexuality is a use of the body in a way that violates it’s obvious design. It’s akin to feeding your calves dung instead of milk. You can claim all day long that they are both just secretions of a cow, but in a few days you’ll have a dead calf on your hands.
In short, the anthropological application of teleology brings an undertone of morality with it. It’s inescapable. Any time you bring oughtness into the philosophical mix, it’s going to require a judgement of the violation of what ought to be. That’s why I said earlier that teleology is the crux where physics and metaphysics meet. It also marks a turning point in this series of posts where I am taking simply theistic arguments to something more concrete about who that theistic personality may be.
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