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It should be by a sculptor with a terrible eyesight! The sculptor analogy predates the watchmaker one by like 2200 years and for some reasons is much less known
by _0w8t 4y ago
It should be by a sculptor with a terrible eyesight! The sculptor analogy predates the watchmaker one by like 2200 years and for some reasons is much less known these days than watchmaker one.
From THE MEMORABILIA by By Xenophon, https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1177/1177-h/1177-h.htm https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1177/1177-h/1177-h.htm
“Socrates. But now if you had two sorts of things, the one of which presents no clue as to what it is for, and the other is obviously for some useful purpose—which would you judge to be the result of chance, which of design?
Ar. Clearly that which is produced for some useful end is the work of design.
Soc. Does it not strike you then that he who made man from the beginning (5) did for some useful end furnish him with his several senses—giving him eyes to behold the visible word, and ears to catch the intonations of sound? Or again, what good would there be in odours if nostrils had not been bestowed upon us? what perception of sweet things and pungent, and of all the pleasures of the palate, had not a tongue been fashioned in us as an interpreter of the same? And besides all this, do you not think this looks like a matter of foresight, this closing of the delicate orbs of sight with eyelids as with folding doors, which, when there is need to use them for any purpose, can be thrown wide open and firmly closed again in sleep? and, that even the winds of heaven may not visit them too roughly, this planting of the eyelashes as a protecting screen? (6) this coping of the region above the eyes with cornice-work of eyebrow so that no drop of sweat fall from the head and injure them? again this readiness of the ear to catch all sounds and yet not to be surcharged? this capacity of the front teeth of all animals to cut and of the "grinders" to receive the food and reduce it to pulp? the position of the mouth again, close to the eyes and nostrils as a portal of ingress for all the creature's supplies? and lastly, seeing that matter passing out (7) of the body is unpleasant, this hindward direction of the passages, and their removal to a distance from the avenues of sense? I ask you, when you see all these things constructed with such show of foresight can you doubt whether they are products of chance or intelligence?”
Then in «Against Physicists” by Sextus Empiricus this was cited as:
“Tell me, Aristodemus, are there some people you have admired for their wisdom? Yes, there are, he said. Who are they, then? Well, I have admired Homer for his poetry, Polyclitus for his sculpture, and Zeuxis of course for his painting. [93] And is it not because of the exceptional craftsmanship of their works that you approve of them? Yes, it is, he said. If Polyclitus’ statue, then, also took on life, would you not approve of the artist much more? Definitely. Well, given that when you saw a statue you said that it had been crafted by some skilled person, when you see a human being whose soul’s activity and whose body’s design are good, do you not think that he was crafted by some exceptional mind?”
- tinco 4y agoIf you don't know why we prefer the analogy of the blind watchmaker over the idle chats of some ancient Greeks then maybe it would be good to give the good book another read.
- _0w8t 4y agoIt will be better if the modern debunking of the design arguments refered to Socrates as the originator of the arguments, not rewording of the same arguments by a random guy from 200 years ago. And even as a debunking original Hume's one from 250 years ago about stupid mechanic that I sighted in another thread was more to the point than the modern talk about a blind watchmaker.
- tinco 4y agoNo, because Socrates was just a philosopher with no tools to justify his theories. And even is Humes' story is more elegant, it is also just a thought experiment. The blind watchmaker is a reference to an argument that is based in the knowledge of things that have been discovered, based purely in reality. The philosophers might come up with an argument that is sound, but they could not tell you if that argument is actually true.
- _0w8t 4y agoHume’s point was there was no intelligent design in things made by a skillful craftsman even with a good eyesight. It was not a thought experiment but simple observation of how things were made. It was all tinkering for a long time until something that worked appeared. That it is, it was not a design but evolution.