Four causes

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See also: Potentiality and actuality

 

This article uses the word 'cause' in its traditional scholarly philosophical sense, not to be confused with the word's main usage in current ordinary language.

Aristotle's Four Causes illustrated for a table: material (wood), formal (structure), efficient (carpentry), final (dining).

The four causes or four explanations are, in Aristotelian thought, four fundamental types of answer to the question "why?" in analysis of change or movement in nature: the material, the formal, the efficient, and the final. Aristotle wrote that "we do not have knowledge of a thing until we have grasped its why, that is to say, its cause." While there are cases in which classifying a "cause" is difficult, or in which "causes" might merge, Aristotle held that his four "causes" provided an analytical scheme of general applicability.

Aristotle's word aitia (Greek: αἰτία) has, in philosophical scholarly tradition, been translated as 'cause'. This peculiar, specialized, technical, usage of the word 'cause' is not that of everyday English language. Rather, the translation of Aristotle's αἰτία that is nearest to current ordinary language is "explanation."

In Physics II.3 and Metaphysics V.2, Aristotle holds that there are four kinds of answers to "why" questions:

Matter

The material cause of a change or movement. This is the aspect of the change or movement that is determined by the material that composes the moving or changing things. For a table, this might be wood; for a statue, it might be bronze or marble.

Form

The formal cause of a change or movement. This is a change or movement caused by the arrangement, shape, or appearance of the thing changing or moving. Aristotle says, for example, that the ratio 2:1, and number in general, is the formal cause of the octave.

Efficient, or agent

The efficient or moving cause of a change or movement. This consists of things apart from the thing being changed or moved, which interact so as to be an agency of the change or movement. For example, the efficient cause of a table is a carpenter, or a person working as one, and according to Aristotle the efficient cause of a child is a parent.

Final, end, or purpose

The final cause of a change or movement. This is a change or movement for the sake of a thing to be what it is. For a seed, it might be an adult plant; for a sailboat, it might be sailing; for a ball at the top of a ramp, it might be coming to rest at the bottom.

The four "causes" are not mutually exclusive. For Aristotle, several, preferably four, answers to the question "why" have to be given to explain a phenomenon and especially the actual configuration of an object.^[7] For example, if asking why a table is such and such, an explanation in terms of the four causes would sound like this: This table is solid and brown because it is made of wood (matter); it does not collapse because it has four legs of equal length (form); it is as it is because a carpenter made it, starting from a tree (agent); it has these dimensions because it is to be used by humans (end).

Aristotle distinguished between intrinsic and extrinsic causes. Matter and form are intrinsic causes because they deal directly with the object, whereas efficient and finality causes are said to be extrinsic because they are external.

Thomas Aquinas demonstrated that only those four types of causes can exist and no others. He also introduced a priority order according to which "matter is made perfect by the form, form is made perfect by the agent, and agent is made perfect by the finality." Hence, the finality is the cause of causes or, equivalently, the queen of causes.

Definition of "cause"

Main article: Aristotelianism

In his philosophical writings, Aristotle used the Greek word αἴτιον (aition), a neuter singular form of an adjective. The Greek word had meant, perhaps originally in a "legal" context, what or who is "responsible," mostly but not always in a bad sense of "guilt" or "blame." Alternatively, it could mean "to the credit of" someone or something. The appropriation of this word by Aristotle and other philosophers reflects how the Greek experience of legal practice influenced the concern in Greek thought to determine what is responsible. The word developed other meanings, including its use in philosophy in a more abstract sense.

About a century before Aristotle, the anonymous author of the Hippocratic text On Ancient Medicine had described the essential characteristics of a cause as it is considered in medicine:

We must, therefore, consider the causes of each [medical] condition to be those things which are such that, when they are present, the condition necessarily occurs, but when they change to another combination, it ceases.

Aristotle's "four causes"

Aristotle used the four causes to provide different answers to the question, "because of what?" The four answers to this question illuminate different aspects of how a thing comes into being or of how an event takes place.

Material

Aristotle considers the material "cause" (ὕλη, hū́lē) of an object as equivalent to the nature of the raw material out of which the object is composed. (The word "nature" for Aristotle applies to both its potential in the raw material and its ultimate finished form. In a sense this form already existed in the material: see potentiality and actuality.)

Whereas modern physics looks to simple bodies, Aristotle's physics took a more general viewpoint, and treated living things as exemplary. Nevertheless, he felt that simple natural bodies such as earth, fire, air, and water also showed signs of having their own innate sources of motion, change, and rest. Fire, for example, carries things upwards, unless stopped from doing so. Things formed by human artifice, such as beds and cloaks, have no innate tendency to become beds or cloaks.

In traditional Aristotelian philosophical terminology, material is not the same as substance. Matter has parallels with substance in so far as primary matter serves as the substratum for simple bodies which are not substance: sand and rock (mostly earth), rivers and seas (mostly water), atmosphere and wind (mostly air and then mostly fire below the moon). In this traditional terminology, 'substance' is a term of ontology, referring to really existing things; only individuals are said to be substances (subjects) in the primary sense. Secondary substance, in a different sense, also applies to man-made artifacts.

Formal

Further information: Platonic realism

Aristotle considers the formal "cause" (εἶδος, eîdos) as describing the pattern or form which when present makes matter into a particular type of thing, which we recognize as being of that particular type.

By Aristotle's own account, this is a difficult and controversial concept. It links with theories of forms such as those of Aristotle's teacher, Plato, but in Aristotle's own account (see his Metaphysics), he takes into account many previous writers who had expressed opinions about forms and ideas, but he shows how his own views differ from them.

Efficient

Aristotle defines the agent or efficient "cause" (κινοῦν, kinoûn) of an object as that which causes change and drives transient motion (such as a painter painting a house) (see Aristotle, Physics II 3, 194b29). In many cases, this is simply the thing that brings something about. For example, in the case of a statue, it is the person chiseling away which transforms a block of marble into a statue. According to Lloyd, of the four causes, only this one is what is meant by the modern English word "cause" in ordinary speech.

Final

Main articles: Teleology and Teleology in biology

Aristotle defines the end, purpose, or final "cause" (τέλος, télos) as that for the sake of which a thing is done. Like the form, this is a controversial type of explanation in science; some have argued for its survival in evolutionary biology, while Ernst Mayr denied that it continued to play a role. It is commonly recognised that Aristotle's conception of nature is teleological in the sense that Nature exhibits functionality in a more general sense than is exemplified in the purposes that humans have. Aristotle observed that a telos does not necessarily involve deliberation, intention, consciousness, or intelligence:

This is most obvious in the animals other than man: they make things neither by art nor after inquiry or deliberation. That is why people wonder whether it is by intelligence or by some other faculty that these creatures work, – spiders, ants, and the like... It is absurd to suppose that purpose is not present because we do not observe the agent deliberating. Art does not deliberate. If the ship-building art were in the wood, it would produce the same results by nature. If, therefore, purpose is present in art, it is present also in nature.

— Aristotle, Physics, II.8

According to Aristotle, a seed has the eventual adult plant as its end (i.e., as its telos) if and only if the seed would become the adult plant under normal circumstances. In Physics II.9, Aristotle hazards a few arguments that a determination of the end (i.e., final cause) of a phenomenon is more important than the others. He argues that the end is that which brings it about, so for example "if one defines the operation of sawing as being a certain kind of dividing, then this cannot come about unless the saw has teeth of a certain kind; and these cannot be unless it is of iron." According to Aristotle, once a final "cause" is in place, the material, efficient and formal "causes" follow by necessity. However, he recommends that the student of nature determine the other "causes" as well, and notes that not all phenomena have an end, e.g., chance events.

Aristotle saw that his biological investigations provided insights into the causes of things, especially into the final cause:

We should approach the investigation of every kind of animal without being ashamed, since in each one of them there is something natural and something beautiful. The absence of chance and the serving of ends are found in the works of nature especially. And the end, for the sake of which a thing has been constructed or has come to be, belongs to what is beautiful.

— Aristotle, On the Parts of Animals 645^{a 21–26}, Book I, Part 5.

George Holmes Howison highlights "final causation" in presenting his theory of metaphysics, which he terms "personal idealism", and to which he invites not only man, but all (ideal) life:

Here, in seeing that Final Cause – causation at the call of self-posited aim or end – is the only full and genuine cause, we further see that Nature, the cosmic aggregate of phenomena and the cosmic bond of their law which in the mood of vague and inaccurate abstraction we call Force, is after all only an effect... Thus teleology, or the Reign of Final Cause, the reign of ideality, is not only an element in the notion of Evolution, but is the very vital cord in the notion. The conception of evolution is founded at last and essentially in the conception of Progress: but this conception has no meaning at all except in the light of a goal; there can be no goal unless there is a Beyond for everything actual; and there is no such Beyond except through a spontaneous ideal. The presupposition of Nature, as a system undergoing evolution, is therefore the causal activity of our Pure Ideals. These are our three organic and organizing conceptions called the True, the Beautiful, and the Good.

— George Holmes Howison, The Limits of Evolution (1901)

However, Edward Feser argues, in line with the Aristotelian and Thomistic tradition, that finality has been greatly misunderstood. Indeed, without finality, efficient causality becomes inexplicable. Finality thus understood is not purpose but that end towards which a thing is ordered. When a match is rubbed against the side of a matchbox, the effect is not the appearance of an elephant or the sounding of a drum, but fire. The effect is not arbitrary because the match is ordered towards the end of fire which is realized through efficient causes.

In their biosemiotic study, Stuart Kauffman, Robert K. Logan et al. (2007) remark:

Our language is teleological. We believe that autonomous agents constitute the minimal physical system to which teleological language rightly applies.

— Biology and Philosophy

Scholasticism

In the Scholasticism, the efficient causality was governed by two principles:

• omne agens agit simile sibi (every agent produces something similar to itself): stated frequently in the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, the principle establishes a relationship of similarity and analogy between cause and effect;
• nemo dat quod non habet (no one gives what he does not possess): partially similar to the legal principle of the same name, in Metaphysics it establishes that the cause cannot bestow on the effect the quantity of being (and thus of unity, truth, goodness, reality and perfection) that it does not already possess within itself. Otherwise, there would be creation out of nothingness of self and other-from-self In other words, the cause must possess a degree of reality greater than or equal to that of the effect. If it is greater, we speak of equivocal causation, in analogy to the three types of logical predication (univocal, equivocal, analogical); if it is equal, we speak of univocal predication.

Thomas in this regard distinguished between causa fiendi (cause of occurring, of only beginning to be) and causa essendi (cause of being and also of beginning to be) When the being of the agent cause is in the effect in a lesser or equal degree, this is a causa fiendi. Furthermore, the second principle also establishes a qualitative link: the cause can only transmit its own essence to the effect. For example, a dog cannot transmit the essence of a feline to its young, but only that of a dog. The principle is equivalent to that of Causa aequat effectum (cause equals effect) in both a quantitative and qualitative sense.

Modern science

See also: Teleology § Teleology and science

In his Advancement of Learning (1605), Francis Bacon wrote that natural science "doth make inquiry, and take consideration of the same natures : but how? Only as to the material and efficient causes of them, and not as to the forms." Using the terminology of Aristotle, Bacon demands that, apart from the "laws of nature" themselves, the causes relevant to natural science are only efficient causes and material causes, or, to use the formulation which became famous later, natural phenomena require scientific explanation in terms of matter and motion.

In The New Organon, Bacon divides knowledge into physics and metaphysics:

From the two kinds of axioms which have been spoken of arises a just division of philosophy and the sciences, taking the received terms (which come nearest to express the thing) in a sense agreeable to my own views. Thus, let the investigation of forms, which are (in the eye of reason at least, and in their essential law) eternal and immutable, constitute Metaphysics; and let the investigation of the efficient cause, and of matter, and of the latent process, and the latent configuration (all of which have reference to the common and ordinary course of nature, not to her eternal and fundamental laws) constitute Physics. And to these let there be subordinate two practical divisions: to Physics, Mechanics; to Metaphysics, what (in a purer sense of the word) I call Magic, on account of the broadness of the ways it moves in, and its greater command over nature.

Biology

Explanations in terms of final causes remain common in evolutionary biology. Francisco J. Ayala has claimed that teleology is indispensable to biology since the concept of adaptation is inherently teleological. In an appreciation of Charles Darwin published in Nature in 1874, Asa Gray noted "Darwin's great service to Natural Science" lies in bringing back teleology "so that, instead of Morphology versus Teleology, we shall have Morphology wedded to Teleology." Darwin quickly responded, "What you say about Teleology pleases me especially and I do not think anyone else has ever noticed the point." Francis Darwin and T. H. Huxley reiterate this sentiment. The latter wrote that "the most remarkable service to the philosophy of Biology rendered by Mr. Darwin is the reconciliation of Teleology and Morphology, and the explanation of the facts of both, which his view offers." James G. Lennox states that Darwin uses the term 'Final Cause' consistently in his Species Notebook, On the Origin of Species, and after.

Contrary to the position described by Francisco J. Ayala, Ernst Mayr states that "adaptedness... is a posteriori result rather than an a priori goal-seeking." Various commentators view the teleological phrases used in modern evolutionary biology as a type of shorthand. For example, S. H. P. Madrell writes that "the proper but cumbersome way of describing change by evolutionary adaptation [may be] substituted by shorter overtly teleological statements" for the sake of saving space, but that this "should not be taken to imply that evolution proceeds by anything other than from mutations arising by chance, with those that impart an advantage being retained by natural selection." However, Lennox states that in evolution as conceived by Darwin, it is true both that evolution is the result of mutations arising by chance and that evolution is teleological in nature.

Statements that a species does something "in order to" achieve survival are teleological. The validity or invalidity of such statements depends on the species and the intention of the writer as to the meaning of the phrase "in order to." Sometimes it is possible or useful to rewrite such sentences so as to avoid teleology. Some biology courses have incorporated exercises requiring students to rephrase such sentences so that they do not read teleologically. Nevertheless, biologists still frequently write in a way which can be read as implying teleology even if that is not the intention.

Animal behaviour (Tinbergen's four questions)

Main article: Tinbergen's four questions

Tinbergen's four questions, named after the ethologist Nikolaas Tinbergen and based on Aristotle's four causes, are complementary categories of explanations for animal behaviour. They are also commonly referred to as levels of analysis.

The four questions are on:

1. function, what an adaptation does that is selected for in evolution;
2. phylogeny, the evolutionary history of an organism, revealing its relationships to other species;
3. mechanism, namely the proximate cause of a behaviour, such as the role of testosterone in aggression; and
4. ontogeny, the development of an organism from egg to embryo to adult.

Technology (Heidegger's four causes)

In The Question Concerning Technology, echoing Aristotle, Martin Heidegger describes the four causes as follows:

1. causa materialis: the material or matter
2. causa formalis: the form or shape the material or matter enters
3. causa finalis: the end
4. causa efficiens: the effect that brings about the finished result.

Heidegger explains that "[w]hoever builds a house or a ship or forges a sacrificial chalice reveals what is to be brought forth, according to the terms of the four modes of occasioning."

The educationist David Waddington comments that although the efficient cause, which he identifies as "the craftsman," might be thought the most significant of the four, in his view each of Heidegger's four causes is "equally co-responsible" for producing a craft item, in Heidegger's terms "bringing forth" the thing into existence. Waddington cites Lovitt's description of this bringing forth as "a unified process."

Naturalism (philosophy)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naturalism_(philosophy)

Angel Falls in Venezuela: According to naturalism, the causes of all phenomena are to be found within the universe and not transcendental factors beyond it.

In philosophy, naturalism is the idea that only natural laws and forces (as opposed to supernatural ones) operate in the universe. In its primary sense it is also known as ontological naturalism, metaphysical naturalism, pure naturalism, philosophical naturalism and antisupernaturalism. "Ontological" refers to ontology, the philosophical study of what exists. Philosophers often treat naturalism as equivalent to materialism.

For example, philosopher Paul Kurtz argues that nature is best accounted for by reference to material principles. These principles include mass, energy, and other physical and chemical properties accepted by the scientific community. Further, this sense of naturalism holds that spirits, deities, and ghosts are not real and that there is no "purpose" in nature. This stronger formulation of naturalism is commonly referred to as metaphysical naturalism. On the other hand, the more moderate view that naturalism should be assumed in one's working methods as the current paradigm, without any further consideration of whether naturalism is true in the robust metaphysical sense, is called methodological naturalism.

With the exception of pantheists – who believe that Nature is identical with divinity while not recognizing a distinct personal anthropomorphic god – theists challenge the idea that nature contains all of reality. According to some theists, natural laws may be viewed as secondary causes of God(s).

In the 20th century, Willard Van Orman Quine, George Santayana, and other philosophers argued that the success of naturalism in science meant that scientific methods should also be used in philosophy. According to this view, science and philosophy are not always distinct from one another, but instead form a continuum.

"Naturalism is not so much a special system as a point of view or tendency common to a number of philosophical and religious systems; not so much a well-defined set of positive and negative doctrines as an attitude or spirit pervading and influencing many doctrines. As the name implies, this tendency consists essentially in looking upon nature as the one original and fundamental source of all that exists, and in attempting to explain everything in terms of nature. Either the limits of nature are also the limits of existing reality, or at least the first cause, if its existence is found necessary, has nothing to do with the working of natural agencies. All events, therefore, find their adequate explanation within nature itself. But, as the terms nature and natural are themselves used in more than one sense, the term naturalism is also far from having one fixed meaning".

— Dubray 1911

History of naturalism

See also: History of materialism and History of metaphysical realism

Ancient and medieval philosophy

Naturalism is most notably a Western phenomenon, but an equivalent idea has long existed in the East. Naturalism was the foundation of two out of six orthodox schools and one heterodox school of Hinduism. Samkhya, one of the oldest schools of Indian philosophy puts nature (Prakriti) as the primary cause of the universe, without assuming the existence of a personal God or Ishvara. The Carvaka, Nyaya, Vaisheshika schools originated in the 7th, 6th, and 2nd century BCE, respectively. Similarly, though unnamed and never articulated into a coherent system, one tradition within Confucian philosophy embraced a form of Naturalism dating to the Wang Chong in the 1st century, if not earlier, but it arose independently and had little influence on the development of modern naturalist philosophy or on Eastern or Western culture.

Ancient Roman mosaic showing Anaximander holding a sundial. One of the contributors to naturalism in ancient Greek philosophy

Western metaphysical naturalism originated in ancient Greek philosophy. The earliest pre-Socratic philosophers, especially the Milesians (Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes) and the atomists (Leucippus and Democritus), were labeled by their peers and successors "the physikoi" (from the Greek φυσικός or physikos, meaning "natural philosopher" borrowing on the word φύσις or physis, meaning "nature") because they investigated natural causes, often excluding any role for gods in the creation or operation of the world. This eventually led to fully developed systems such as Epicureanism, which sought to explain everything that exists as the product of atoms falling and swerving in a void.

Aristotle surveyed the thought of his predecessors and conceived of nature in a way that charted a middle course between their excesses.

Plato's world of eternal and unchanging Forms, imperfectly represented in matter by a divine Artisan, contrasts sharply with the various mechanistic Weltanschauungen, of which atomism was, by the fourth century at least, the most prominent ... This debate was to persist throughout the ancient world. Atomistic mechanism got a shot in the arm from Epicurus ... while the Stoics adopted a divine teleology ... The choice seems simple: either show how a structured, regular world could arise out of undirected processes, or inject intelligence into the system. This was how Aristotle… when still a young acolyte of Plato, saw matters. Cicero… preserves Aristotle's own cave-image: if troglodytes were brought on a sudden into the upper world, they would immediately suppose it to have been intelligently arranged. But Aristotle grew to abandon this view; although he believes in a divine being, the Prime Mover is not the efficient cause of action in the Universe, and plays no part in constructing or arranging it ... But, although he rejects the divine Artificer, Aristotle does not resort to a pure mechanism of random forces. Instead he seeks to find a middle way between the two positions, one which relies heavily on the notion of Nature, or phusis.

With the rise and dominance of Christianity in the West and the later spread of Islam, metaphysical naturalism was generally abandoned by intellectuals. Thus, there is little evidence for it in medieval philosophy.

Modern philosophy

It was not until the early modern era of philosophy and the Age of Enlightenment that naturalists like Benedict Spinoza (who put forward a theory of psychophysical parallelism), David Hume, and the proponents of French materialism (notably Denis Diderot, Julien La Mettrie, and Baron d'Holbach) started to emerge again in the 17th and 18th centuries. In this period, some metaphysical naturalists adhered to a distinct doctrine, materialism, which became the dominant category of metaphysical naturalism widely defended until the end of the 19th century.

Thomas Hobbes was a proponent of naturalism in ethics who acknowledged normative truths and properties. Immanuel Kant rejected (reductionist) materialist positions in metaphysics, but he was not hostile to naturalism. His transcendental philosophy is considered to be a form of liberal naturalism.

Hegel who together with Joseph von Schelling developed the form of natural philosophy recognised as Naturphilosophie

In late modern philosophy, Naturphilosophie, a form of natural philosophy, was developed by Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel as an attempt to comprehend nature in its totality and to outline its general theoretical structure.

A version of naturalism that arose after Hegel was Ludwig Feuerbach's anthropological materialism, which influenced Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels's historical materialism, Engels's "materialist dialectic" philosophy of nature (Dialectics of Nature), and their follower Georgi Plekhanov's dialectical materialism.

Another notable school of late modern philosophy advocating naturalism was German materialism: members included Ludwig Büchner, Jacob Moleschott, and Carl Vogt.

The current usage of the term naturalism "derives from debates in America in the first half of the 20th century. The self-proclaimed 'naturalists' from that period included John Dewey, Ernest Nagel, Sidney Hook, and Roy Wood Sellars."

Contemporary philosophy

A politicized version of naturalism that has arisen in contemporary philosophy is Ayn Rand's Objectivism. Objectivism is an expression of capitalist ethical idealism within a naturalistic framework. An example of a more progressive naturalistic philosophy is secular humanism.

The current usage of the term naturalism "derives from debates in America in the first half of the last century.

Currently, metaphysical naturalism is more widely embraced than in previous centuries, especially but not exclusively in the natural sciences and the Anglo-American, analytic philosophical communities. While the vast majority of the population of the world remains firmly committed to non-naturalistic worldviews, contemporary defenders of naturalism and/or naturalistic theses and doctrines today include Kai Nielsen, J. J. C. Smart, David Malet Armstrong, David Papineau, Paul Kurtz, Brian Leiter, Daniel Dennett, Michael Devitt, Fred Dretske, Paul and Patricia Churchland, Mario Bunge, Jonathan Schaffer, Hilary Kornblith, Leonard Olson, Quentin Smith, Paul Draper and Michael Martin, among many other academic philosophers.

According to David Papineau, contemporary naturalism is a consequence of the build-up of scientific evidence during the twentieth century for the "causal closure of the physical", the doctrine that all physical effects can be accounted for by physical causes.

By the middle of the twentieth century, the acceptance of the causal closure of the physical realm led to even stronger naturalist views. The causal closure thesis implies that any mental and biological causes must themselves be physically constituted, if they are to produce physical effects. It thus gives rise to a particularly strong form of ontological naturalism, namely the physicalist doctrine that any state that has physical effects must itself be physical. From the 1950s onwards, philosophers began to formulate arguments for ontological physicalism. Some of these arguments appealed explicitly to the causal closure of the physical realm (Feigl 1958, Oppenheim and Putnam 1958). In other cases, the reliance on causal closure lay below the surface. However, it is not hard to see that even in these latter cases the causal closure thesis played a crucial role.

— Papineau 2007

In contemporary continental philosophy, Quentin Meillassoux proposed speculative materialism, a post-Kantian return to David Hume which can strengthen classical materialist ideas.

Etymology

The term "methodological naturalism" is much more recent, though. According to Ronald Numbers, it was coined in 1983 by Paul de Vries, a Wheaton College philosopher. De Vries distinguished between what he called "methodological naturalism", a disciplinary method that says nothing about God's existence, and "metaphysical naturalism", which "denies the existence of a transcendent God". The term "methodological naturalism" had been used in 1937 by Edgar S. Brightman in an article in The Philosophical Review as a contrast to "naturalism" in general, but there the idea was not really developed to its more recent distinctions.

Description

Hubble Ultra-Deep Field

 

Flammarion engraving

A 21st century image of the universe and a 1888 illustration of the cosmos

According to Steven Schafersman, naturalism is a philosophy that maintains that;

1. "Nature encompasses all that exists throughout space and time;
2. Nature (the universe or cosmos) consists only of natural elements, that is, of spatio-temporal physical substance – mass –energy. Non-physical or quasi-physical substance, such as information, ideas, values, logic, mathematics, intellect, and other emergent phenomena, either supervene upon the physical or can be reduced to a physical account;
3. Nature operates by the laws of physics and in principle, can be explained and understood by science and philosophy;
4. The supernatural does not exist, i.e., only nature is real. Naturalism is therefore a metaphysical philosophy opposed primarily by supernaturalism".

Or, as Carl Sagan succinctly put it: "The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be."

In addition Arthur C. Danto states that Naturalism, in recent usage, is a species of philosophical monism according to which whatever exists or happens is natural in the sense of being susceptible to explanation through methods which, although paradigmatically exemplified in the natural sciences, are continuous from domain to domain of objects and events. Hence, naturalism is polemically defined as repudiating the view that there exists or could exist any entities which lie, in principle, beyond the scope of scientific explanation.

Arthur Newell Strahler states: "The naturalistic view is that the particular universe we observe came into existence and has operated through all time and in all its parts without the impetus or guidance of any supernatural agency." "The great majority of contemporary philosophers urge that that reality is exhausted by nature, containing nothing 'supernatural', and that the scientific method should be used to investigate all areas of reality, including the 'human spirit'." Philosophers widely regard naturalism as a "positive" term, and "few active philosophers nowadays are happy to announce themselves as 'non-naturalists'". "Philosophers concerned with religion tend to be less enthusiastic about 'naturalism'" and that despite an "inevitable" divergence due to its popularity, if more narrowly construed, (to the chagrin of John McDowell, David Chalmers and Jennifer Hornsby, for example), those not so disqualified remain nonetheless content "to set the bar for 'naturalism' higher."

Alvin Plantinga stated that Naturalism is presumed to not be a religion. However, in one very important respect it resembles religion by performing the cognitive function of a religion. There is a set of deep human questions to which a religion typically provides an answer. In like manner naturalism gives a set of answers to these questions".

Providing assumptions required for science

According to Robert Priddy, all scientific study inescapably builds on at least some essential assumptions that cannot be tested by scientific processes; that is, that scientists must start with some assumptions as to the ultimate analysis of the facts with which it deals. These assumptions would then be justified partly by their adherence to the types of occurrence of which we are directly conscious, and partly by their success in representing the observed facts with a certain generality, devoid of ad hoc suppositions." Kuhn also claims that all science is based on assumptions about the character of the universe, rather than merely on empirical facts. These assumptions – a paradigm – comprise a collection of beliefs, values and techniques that are held by a given scientific community, which legitimize their systems and set the limitations to their investigation. For naturalists, nature is the only reality, the "correct" paradigm, and there is no such thing as supernatural, i.e. anything above, beyond, or outside of nature. The scientific method is to be used to investigate all reality, including the human spirit.

Some claim that naturalism is the implicit philosophy of working scientists, and that the following basic assumptions are needed to justify the scientific method:

1. That there is an objective reality shared by all rational observers.
   "The basis for rationality is acceptance of an external objective reality." "Objective reality is clearly an essential thing if we are to develop a meaningful perspective of the world. Nevertheless its very existence is assumed." "Our belief that objective reality exist is an assumption that it arises from a real world outside of ourselves. As infants we made this assumption unconsciously. People are happy to make this assumption that adds meaning to our sensations and feelings, than live with solipsism." "Without this assumption, there would be only the thoughts and images in our own mind (which would be the only existing mind) and there would be no need of science, or anything else.
2. That this objective reality is governed by natural laws;
   "Science, at least today, assumes that the universe obeys knowable principles that don't depend on time or place, nor on subjective parameters such as what we think, know or how we behave." Hugh Gauch argues that science presupposes that "the physical world is orderly and comprehensible."
3. That reality can be discovered by means of systematic observation and experimentation.
   Stanley Sobottka said: "The assumption of external reality is necessary for science to function and to flourish. For the most part, science is the discovering and explaining of the external world." "Science attempts to produce knowledge that is as universal and objective as possible within the realm of human understanding."
4. That Nature has uniformity of laws and most if not all things in nature must have at least a natural cause.
   Biologist Stephen Jay Gould referred to these two closely related propositions as the constancy of nature's laws and the operation of known processes. Simpson agrees that the axiom of uniformity of law, an unprovable postulate, is necessary in order for scientists to extrapolate inductive inference into the unobservable past in order to meaningfully study it. "The assumption of spatial and temporal invariance of natural laws is by no means unique to geology since it amounts to a warrant for inductive inference which, as Bacon showed nearly four hundred years ago, is the basic mode of reasoning in empirical science. Without assuming this spatial and temporal invariance, we have no basis for extrapolating from the known to the unknown and, therefore, no way of reaching general conclusions from a finite number of observations. (Since the assumption is itself vindicated by induction, it can in no way "prove" the validity of induction — an endeavor virtually abandoned after Hume demonstrated its futility two centuries ago)." Gould also notes that natural processes such as Lyell's "uniformity of process" are an assumption: "As such, it is another a priori assumption shared by all scientists and not a statement about the empirical world." According to R. Hooykaas: "The principle of uniformity is not a law, not a rule established after comparison of facts, but a principle, preceding the observation of facts ... It is the logical principle of parsimony of causes and of economy of scientific notions. By explaining past changes by analogy with present phenomena, a limit is set to conjecture, for there is only one way in which two things are equal, but there are an infinity of ways in which they could be supposed different."
5. That experimental procedures will be done satisfactorily without any deliberate or unintentional mistakes that will influence the results.
6. That experimenters won't be significantly biased by their presumptions.
7. That random sampling is representative of the entire population.
   A simple random sample (SRS) is the most basic probabilistic option used for creating a sample from a population. The benefit of SRS is that the investigator is guaranteed to choose a sample that represents the population that ensures statistically valid conclusions.

Methodological naturalism

Aristotle, one of the philosophers behind the modern day scientific method used as a central term in methodological naturalism

Methodological naturalism, the second sense of the term "naturalism",(see above) is "the adoption or assumption of philosophical naturalism … with or without fully accepting or believing it.” Robert T. Pennock used the term to clarify that the scientific method confines itself to natural explanations without assuming the existence or non-existence of the supernatural. “We may therefore be agnostic about the ultimate truth of [philosophical] naturalism, but nevertheless adopt it and investigate nature as if nature is all that there is."

According to Ronald Numbers, the term "methodological naturalism" was coined in 1983 by Paul de Vries, a Wheaton College philosopher.

Both Schafersman and Strahler assert that it is illogical to try to decouple the two senses of naturalism. "While science as a process only requires methodological naturalism, the practice or adoption of methodological naturalism entails a logical and moral belief in philosophical naturalism, so they are not logically decoupled." This “[philosophical] naturalistic view is espoused by science as its fundamental assumption."

But Eugenie Scott finds it imperative to do so for the expediency of deprogramming the religious. “Scientists can defuse some of the opposition to evolution by first recognizing that the vast majority of Americans are believers, and that most Americans want to retain their faith.” Scott apparently believes that “individuals can retain religious beliefs and still accept evolution through methodological naturalism. Scientists should therefore avoid mentioning metaphysical naturalism and use methodological naturalism instead.” “Even someone who may disagree with my logic … often understands the strategic reasons for separating methodological from philosophical naturalism—if we want more Americans to understand evolution.”

Scott’s approach has found success as illustrated in Ecklund’s study where some religious scientists reported that their religious beliefs affect the way they think about the implications – often moral – of their work, but not the way they practice science within methodological naturalism. Papineau notes that "Philosophers concerned with religion tend to be less enthusiastic about metaphysical naturalism and that those not so disqualified remain content "to set the bar for 'naturalism' higher."

In contrast to Schafersman, Strahler, and Scott, Robert T. Pennock, an expert witness at the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial and cited by the Judge in his Memorandum Opinion. described "methodological naturalism" stating that it is not based on dogmatic metaphysical naturalism.

Pennock further states that as supernatural agents and powers "are above and beyond the natural world and its agents and powers" and "are not constrained by natural laws", only logical impossibilities constrain what a supernatural agent cannot do. In addition he says: "If we could apply natural knowledge to understand supernatural powers, then, by definition, they would not be supernatural." "Because the supernatural is necessarily a mystery to us, it can provide no grounds on which one can judge scientific models." "Experimentation requires observation and control of the variables.... But by definition we have no control over supernatural entities or forces."

The position that the study of the function of nature is also the study of the origin of nature is in contrast with opponents who take the position that functioning of the cosmos is unrelated to how it originated. While they are open to supernatural fiat in its invention and coming into existence, during scientific study to explain the functioning of the cosmos, they do not appeal to the supernatural. They agree that allowing “science to appeal to untestable supernatural powers to explain how nature functions would make the scientist's task meaningless, undermine the discipline that allows science to make progress, and would be as profoundly unsatisfying as the ancient Greek playwright's reliance upon the deus ex machina to extract his hero from a difficult predicament."

Views on methodological naturalism

W. V. O. Quine

Main article: Naturalized epistemology

W. V. O. Quine describes naturalism as the position that there is no higher tribunal for truth than natural science itself. In his view, there is no better method than the scientific method for judging the claims of science, and there is neither any need nor any place for a "first philosophy", such as (abstract) metaphysics or epistemology, that could stand behind and justify science or the scientific method.

Therefore, philosophy should feel free to make use of the findings of scientists in its own pursuit, while also feeling free to offer criticism when those claims are ungrounded, confused, or inconsistent. In Quine's view, philosophy is "continuous with" science, and both are empirical. Naturalism is not a dogmatic belief that the modern view of science is entirely correct. Instead, it simply holds that science is the best way to explore the processes of the universe and that those processes are what modern science is striving to understand.

Karl Popper

Karl Popper equated naturalism with inductive theory of science. He rejected it based on his general critique of induction (see problem of induction), yet acknowledged its utility as means for inventing conjectures.

A naturalistic methodology (sometimes called an "inductive theory of science") has its value, no doubt. ... I reject the naturalistic view: It is uncritical. Its upholders fail to notice that whenever they believe to have discovered a fact, they have only proposed a convention. Hence the convention is liable to turn into a dogma. This criticism of the naturalistic view applies not only to its criterion of meaning, but also to its idea of science, and consequently to its idea of empirical method.

— Karl R. Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery, (Routledge, 2002), pp. 52–53, ISBN 0-415-27844-9.

Popper instead proposed that science should adopt a methodology based on falsifiability for demarcation, because no number of experiments can ever prove a theory, but a single experiment can contradict one. Popper holds that scientific theories are characterized by falsifiability.

Alvin Plantinga

Alvin Plantinga, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Notre Dame, and a Christian, has become a well-known critic of naturalism. He suggests, in his evolutionary argument against naturalism, that the probability that evolution has produced humans with reliable true beliefs, is low or inscrutable, unless the evolution of humans was guided (for example, by God). According to David Kahan of the University of Glasgow, in order to understand how beliefs are warranted, a justification must be found in the context of supernatural theism, as in Plantinga's epistemology. (See also supernormal stimuli).

Plantinga argues that together, naturalism and evolution provide an insurmountable "defeater for the belief that our cognitive faculties are reliable", i.e., a skeptical argument along the lines of Descartes' evil demon or brain in a vat.

Take philosophical naturalism to be the belief that there aren't any supernatural entities – no such person as God, for example, but also no other supernatural entities, and nothing at all like God. My claim was that naturalism and contemporary evolutionary theory are at serious odds with one another – and this despite the fact that the latter is ordinarily thought to be one of the main pillars supporting the edifice of the former. (Of course I am not attacking the theory of evolution, or anything in that neighborhood; I am instead attacking the conjunction of naturalism with the view that human beings have evolved in that way. I see no similar problems with the conjunction of theism and the idea that human beings have evolved in the way contemporary evolutionary science suggests.) More particularly, I argued that the conjunction of naturalism with the belief that we human beings have evolved in conformity with current evolutionary doctrine ... is in a certain interesting way self-defeating or self-referentially incoherent.

— Alvin Plantinga, Naturalism Defeated?: Essays on Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism, "Introduction"

The argument is controversial and has been criticized as seriously flawed, for example, by Elliott Sober.

Robert T. Pennock

Robert T. Pennock states that as supernatural agents and powers "are above and beyond the natural world and its agents and powers" and "are not constrained by natural laws", only logical impossibilities constrain what a supernatural agent cannot do. He says: "If we could apply natural knowledge to understand supernatural powers, then, by definition, they would not be supernatural." As the supernatural is necessarily a mystery to us, it can provide no grounds on which one can judge scientific models. "Experimentation requires observation and control of the variables.... But by definition we have no control over supernatural entities or forces." Science does not deal with meanings; the closed system of scientific reasoning cannot be used to define itself. Allowing science to appeal to untestable supernatural powers would make the scientist's task meaningless, undermine the discipline that allows science to make progress, and "would be as profoundly unsatisfying as the ancient Greek playwright's reliance upon the deus ex machina to extract his hero from a difficult predicament."

Naturalism of this sort says nothing about the existence or nonexistence of the supernatural, which by this definition is beyond natural testing. As a practical consideration, the rejection of supernatural explanations would merely be pragmatic, thus it would nonetheless be possible for an ontological supernaturalist to espouse and practice methodological naturalism. For example, scientists may believe in God while practicing methodological naturalism in their scientific work. This position does not preclude knowledge that is somehow connected to the supernatural. Generally however, anything that one can examine and explain scientifically would not be supernatural, simply by definition.

Criticism

Colin Murray Turbayne

The Australian philosopher Colin Murray Turbayne puts forth an objection to naturalism which is based upon linguistic grounds. His objections refer to several of the concepts which form the a priori foundation for naturalism in general. In particular, Turbayne calls attention to the concepts of "substance" and "substratum" which in his view convey little if any meaning at best. He asserts that along with several "physicalist" constructs, these concepts have been mistakenly incorporated through the use of deductive reasoning into the hypotheses underlying materialism in the modern world. In addition, he argues further that they are more properly characterized as being purely metaphorical in nature rather than literal descriptions of an independent objective truth. Specifically, he identifies the "mechanistic" metaphors utilized by Isaac Newton and the mind-body dualism which was embraced by René Descartes as being particularly problematic. Turbayne argues that over time humanity has become victimized by mistaking such metaphorical constructs for literal truths, which now form the basis for considerable obfuscation and confusion within the realms of metaphysics and epistemology. He concludes by observing that humanity can readily adopt more useful models of the natural world only after first acknowledging the manner in which such purely metaphorical constructs have taken on the guise of literal truth within much of the modern world.

Applicability of mathematics to the material universe

The late philosopher of mathematics Mark Steiner has written extensively on this matter and acknowledges that the applicability of mathematics constitutes "a challenge to the entrenched dogma of naturalism."

Teleology

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology 

Plato and Aristotle, depicted here in The School of Athens, both developed philosophical arguments addressing the universe's apparent order (logos)

Teleology (from τέλος, telos, 'end', 'aim', or 'goal', and λόγος, logos, 'explanation' or 'reason') or finality is a branch of causality giving the reason or an explanation for something as a function of its end, its purpose, or its goal, as opposed to as a function of its cause.

A purpose that is imposed by human use, such as the purpose of a fork to hold food, is called extrinsic. Natural teleology, common in classical philosophy, though controversial today, contends that natural entities also have intrinsic purposes, regardless of human use or opinion. For instance, Aristotle claimed that an acorn's intrinsic telos is to become a fully grown oak tree. Though ancient atomists rejected the notion of natural teleology, teleological accounts of non-personal or non-human nature were explored and often endorsed in ancient and medieval philosophies, but fell into disfavor during the modern era (1600–1900).

History

In Western philosophy, the term and concept of teleology originated in the writings of Plato and Aristotle. Aristotle's 'four causes' give special place to the telos or "final cause" of each thing. In this, he followed Plato in seeing purpose in both human and nonhuman nature.

Etymology

The word teleology combines Greek telos (τέλος, from τελε-, 'end' or 'purpose') and logia (-λογία, 'speak of', 'study of', or 'a branch of learning'). German philosopher Christian Wolff would coin the term, as teleologia (Latin), in his work Philosophia rationalis, sive logica (1728).

Platonic

In Plato's dialogue Phaedo, Socrates argues that true explanations for any given physical phenomenon must be teleological. He bemoans those who fail to distinguish between a thing's necessary and sufficient causes, which he identifies respectively as material and final causes:

Imagine not being able to distinguish the real cause, from that without which the cause would not be able to act, as a cause. It is what the majority appear to do, like people groping in the dark; they call it a cause, thus giving it a name that does not belong to it. That is why one man surrounds the earth with a vortex to make the heavens keep it in place, another makes the air support it like a wide lid. As for their capacity of being in the best place they could be at this very time, this they do not look for, nor do they believe it to have any divine force, but they believe that they will sometime discover a stronger and more immortal Atlas to hold everything together more, and they do not believe that the truly good and 'binding' binds and holds them together.

— Plato, Phaedo, 99

Socrates here argues that while the materials that compose a body are necessary conditions for its moving or acting in a certain way, they nevertheless cannot be the sufficient condition for its moving or acting as it does. For example, if Socrates is sitting in an Athenian prison, the elasticity of his tendons is what allows him to be sitting, and so a physical description of his tendons can be listed as necessary conditions or auxiliary causes of his act of sitting. However, these are only necessary conditions of Socrates' sitting. To give a physical description of Socrates' body is to say that Socrates is sitting, but it does not give any idea why it came to be that he was sitting in the first place. To say why he was sitting and not not sitting, it is necessary to explain what it is about his sitting that is good, for all things brought about (i.e., all products of actions) are brought about because the actor saw some good in them. Thus, to give an explanation of something is to determine what about it is good. Its goodness is its actual cause—its purpose, telos or 'reason for which'.

Aristotelian

Aristotle argued that Democritus was wrong to attempt to reduce all things to mere necessity, because doing so neglects the aim, order, and "final cause", which brings about these necessary conditions:

Democritus, however, neglecting the final cause, reduces to necessity all the operations of nature. Now, they are necessary, it is true, but yet they are for a final cause and for the sake of what is best in each case. Thus nothing prevents the teeth from being formed and being shed in this way; but it is not on account of these causes but on account of the end. ...

— Aristotle, Generation of Animals 5.8, 789a8–b15

In Physics, using the hylomorphic theory, (using eternal forms as his model), Aristotle rejects Plato's assumption that the universe was created by an intelligent designer. For Aristotle, natural ends are produced by "natures" (principles of change internal to living things), and natures, Aristotle argued, do not deliberate:

It is absurd to suppose that ends are not present [in nature] because we do not see an agent deliberating.

— Aristotle, Physics, 2.8, 199b27-9

These Platonic and Aristotelian arguments ran counter to those presented earlier by Democritus and later by Lucretius, both of whom were supporters of what is now often called accidentalism:

Nothing in the body is made in order that we may use it. What happens to exist is the cause of its use.

— Lucretius, De rerum natura [On the Nature of Things] 4, 833^[ii]

Modern philosophy

Main articles: Teleological argument, Intelligent design, and Intelligent design movement

The chief instance, and the largest polemic morass, of teleological viewpoint in modern cosmology and ontology is the teleological argument that posits an intelligent designer as a god.

Economics

A teleology of human aims played a crucial role in the work of economist Ludwig von Mises, especially in the development of his science of praxeology. Mises believed that an individual's action is teleological because it is governed by the existence of their chosen ends. In other words, individuals select what they believe to be the most appropriate means to achieve a sought after goal or end. Mises also stressed that, with respect to human action, teleology is not independent of causality: "No action can be devised and ventured upon without definite ideas about the relation of cause and effect, teleology presupposes causality."

Assuming reason and action to be predominantly influenced by ideological credence, Mises derived his portrayal of human motivation from Epicurean teachings, insofar as he assumes "atomistic individualism, teleology, and libertarianism, and defines man as an egoist who seeks a maximum of happiness" (i.e. the ultimate pursuit of pleasure over pain). "Man strives for," Mises remarks, "but never attains the perfect state of happiness described by Epicurus." Furthermore, expanding upon the Epicurean groundwork, Mises formalized his conception of pleasure and pain by assigning each specific meaning, allowing him to extrapolate his conception of attainable happiness to a critique of liberal versus socialist ideological societies. It is there, in his application of Epicurean belief to political theory, that Mises flouts Marxist theory, considering labor to be one of many of man's 'pains', a consideration which positioned labor as a violation of his original Epicurean assumption of man's manifest hedonistic pursuit. From here he further postulates a critical distinction between introversive labor and extroversive labor, further divaricating from basic Marxist theory, in which Marx hails labor as man's "species-essence", or his "species-activity".

Postmodern philosophy

Teleological-based "grand narratives" are renounced by the postmodern tradition, where teleology may be viewed as reductive, exclusionary, and harmful to those whose stories are diminished or overlooked.

Against this postmodern position, Alasdair MacIntyre has argued that a narrative understanding of oneself, of one's capacity as an independent reasoner, one's dependence on others and on the social practices and traditions in which one participates, all tend towards an ultimate good of liberation. Social practices may themselves be understood as teleologically oriented to internal goods, for example, practices of philosophical and scientific inquiry are teleologically ordered to the elaboration of a true understanding of their objects. MacIntyre's After Virtue (1981) famously dismissed the naturalistic teleology of Aristotle's "metaphysical biology", but he has cautiously moved from that book's account of a sociological teleology toward an exploration of what remains valid in a more traditional teleological naturalism.

Ethics

Teleology significantly informs the study of ethics, such as in:

• Business ethics: People in business commonly think in terms of purposeful action, as in, for example, management by objectives. Teleological analysis of business ethics leads to consideration of the full range of stakeholders in any business decision, including the management, the staff, the customers, the shareholders, the country, humanity and the environment.
• Medical ethics: Teleology provides a moral basis for the professional ethics of medicine, as physicians are generally concerned with outcomes and must therefore know the telos of a given treatment paradigm.

Consequentialism

Main article: Consequentialism

The broad spectrum of consequentialist ethics—of which utilitarianism is a well-known example—focuses on the result or consequences, with such principles as John Stuart Mill's 'principle of utility': "the greatest good for the greatest number". This principle is thus teleological, though in a broader sense than is elsewhere understood in philosophy.

In the classical notion, teleology is grounded in the inherent nature of things themselves, whereas in consequentialism, teleology is imposed on nature from outside by the human will. Consequentialist theories justify inherently what most people would call evil acts by their desirable outcomes, if the good of the outcome outweighs the bad of the act. So, for example, a consequentialist theory would say it was acceptable to kill one person in order to save two or more other people. These theories may be summarized by the maxim "the end justifies the means."

Deontology

Main article: Deontological ethics

Consequentialism stands in contrast to the more classical notions of deontological ethics, of which examples include Immanuel Kant's categorical imperative, and Aristotle's virtue ethics—although formulations of virtue ethics are also often consequentialist in derivation.

In deontological ethics, the goodness or badness of individual acts is primary and a larger, more desirable goal is insufficient to justify bad acts committed on the way to that goal, even if the bad acts are relatively minor and the goal is major (like telling a small lie to prevent a war and save millions of lives). In requiring all constituent acts to be good, deontological ethics is much more rigid than consequentialism, which varies by circumstance.

Practical ethics are usually a mix of the two. For example, Mill also relies on deontic maxims to guide practical behavior, but they must be justifiable by the principle of utility.

Science

See also: Four causes § The four causes in modern science

In modern science, explanations that rely on teleology are often, but not always, avoided, either because they are unnecessary or because whether they are true or false is thought to be beyond the ability of human perception and understanding to judge. But using teleology as an explanatory style, in particular within evolutionary biology, is still controversial.

Since the Novum Organum of Francis Bacon, teleological explanations in physical science tend to be deliberately avoided in favor of focus on material and efficient explanations, although some recent accounts of quantum phenomena make use of teleology. Final and formal causation came to be viewed as false or too subjective. Nonetheless, some disciplines, in particular within evolutionary biology, continue to use language that appears teleological in describing natural tendencies towards certain end conditions. Some suggest, however, that these arguments ought to be, and practicably can be, rephrased in non-teleological forms; others hold that teleological language cannot always be easily expunged from descriptions in the life sciences, at least within the bounds of practical pedagogy.

Contemporary philosophers and scientists still debate whether teleological axioms are useful or accurate in proposing modern philosophies and scientific theories. An example of the reintroduction of teleology into modern language is the notion of an attractor. Another instance is when Thomas Nagel (2012), though not a biologist, proposed a non-Darwinian account of evolution that incorporates impersonal and natural teleological laws to explain the existence of life, consciousness, rationality, and objective value. Regardless, the accuracy can also be considered independently from the usefulness: it is a common experience in pedagogy that a minimum of apparent teleology can be useful in thinking about and explaining Darwinian evolution even if there is no true teleology driving evolution. Thus it is easier to say that evolution "gave" wolves sharp canine teeth because those teeth "serve the purpose of" predation regardless of whether there is an underlying non-teleologic reality in which evolution is not an actor with intentions. In other words, because human cognition and learning often rely on the narrative structure of stories – with actors, goals, and immediate (proximate) rather than ultimate (distal) causation (see also proximate and ultimate causation) – some minimal level of teleology might be recognized as useful or at least tolerable for practical purposes even by people who reject its cosmologic accuracy. Its accuracy is upheld by Barrow and Tipler (1986), whose citations of such teleologists as Max Planck and Norbert Wiener are significant for scientific endeavor.

Biology

Main article: Teleology in biology

Apparent teleology is a recurring issue in evolutionary biology, much to the consternation of some writers.

Statements implying that nature has goals, for example where a species is said to do something "in order to" achieve survival appear teleological, and therefore invalid. Usually, it is possible to rewrite such sentences to avoid the apparent teleology. Some biology courses have incorporated exercises requiring students to rephrase such sentences so that they do not read teleologically. Nevertheless, biologists still frequently write in a way which can be read as implying teleology even if that is not the intention. John Reiss argues that evolutionary biology can be purged of such teleology by rejecting the analogy of natural selection as a watchmaker. Other arguments against this analogy have also been promoted by writers such as Richard Dawkins.

Some authors, like James Lennox, have argued that Darwin was a teleologist, while others, such as Michael Ghiselin, describe this claim as a myth promoted by misinterpretations of his discussions and emphasized the distinction between using teleological metaphors and being teleological.

Biologist philosopher Francisco Ayala has argued that all statements about processes can be trivially translated into teleological statements, and vice versa, but that teleological statements are more explanatory and cannot be disposed of. Karen Neander has argued that the modern concept of biological 'function' is dependent upon selection. So, for example, it is not possible to say that anything that simply winks into existence without going through a process of selection has functions. We decide whether an appendage has a function by analysing the process of selection that led to it. Therefore, any talk of functions must be posterior to natural selection and function cannot be defined in the manner advocated by Reiss and Dawkins.

Ernst Mayr states that "adaptedness ... is an a posteriori result rather than an a priori goal-seeking". Various commentators view the teleological phrases used in modern evolutionary biology as a type of shorthand. For example, Simon Hugh Piper Maddrell writes that "the proper but cumbersome way of describing change by evolutionary adaptation [may be] substituted by shorter overtly teleological statements" for the sake of saving space, but that this "should not be taken to imply that evolution proceeds by anything other than from mutations arising by chance, with those that impart an advantage being retained by natural selection". Likewise, J. B. S. Haldane says, "Teleology is like a mistress to a biologist: he cannot live without her but he's unwilling to be seen with her in public."

Selected-effects accounts, such as the one suggested by Neander, face objections due to their reliance on etiological accounts, which some fields lack the resources to accommodate. Many such sciences, which study the same traits and behaviors regarded by evolutionary biology, still correctly attribute teleological functions without appeal to selection history. Corey J. Maley and Gualtiero Piccinini are proponents of one such account, which focuses instead on goal-contribution. With the objective goals of organisms being survival and inclusive fitness, Piccinini and Maley define teleological functions to be "a stable contribution by a trait (or component, activity, property) of organisms belonging to a biological population to an objective goal of those organisms".

Cybernetics

Main article: Cybernetics

Cybernetics is the study of the communication and control of regulatory feedback both in living beings and machines, and in combinations of the two.

Arturo Rosenblueth, Norbert Wiener, and Julian Bigelow had conceived of feedback mechanisms as lending a teleology to machinery. Wiener coined the term cybernetics to denote the study of "teleological mechanisms". In the cybernetic classification presented by Rosenblueth, Wiener, and Bigelow, teleology is feedback controlled purpose.

The classification system underlying cybernetics has been criticized by Frank Honywill George and Les Johnson, who cite the need for an external observability to the purposeful behavior in order to establish and validate the goal-seeking behavior. In this view, the purpose of observing and observed systems is respectively distinguished by the system's subjective autonomy and objective control.