Our Perfectly Placed Planet
There is an off shoot of the Argument by Design that a surprisingly large number of Christians still use. The claim is that the Earth is perfectly placed by God to support life. Those who espouse this argument state that if the Earth was just one degree closer to or further away from the Sun, all life as we know it would not exist. This is true. If the Earth was just one degree closer to or further away from the Sun than all life as we know it would not exxist. Does this fact prove that the Christian God put the Earth in exactly the right place for life? No.
I find this argument particularly interesting because it was refuted rather well and rather publicly two hundred and fifty years ago and yet Christians today are still using it. This argument doesn’t just show an ignorance of science and an ignorance of logic, but also shows an ignorance of literature.
In 1759, French satirist Voltaire published his masterpiece, Candide. This book is considered by most to be a classic. It is even on many High School reading lists. In the book, the master teacher of metaphysico-theologo-cosmolonigology, Pangloss, explains that:
“It is demonstrable,” said he, “that things cannot be otherwise than as they are; for as all things have been created for some end, they must necessarily be created for the best end. Observe, for instance, the nose is formed for spectacles, therefore we wear spectacles. The legs are visibly designed for stockings, accordingly we wear stockings. Stones were made to be hewn and to construct castles, therefore My Lord has a magnificent castle.”
Now obviously the nose was not formed for spectacles. Obviously people made spectacles to fit the nose, just as it is obvious that life on Earth arose because of our placement in the solar system and not the other way around. So while it is true that if the Earth was one degree closer to or further away from the Sun, all life as we know it wouldn’t exist, that isn’t to say that some other form of life (as we may not know it) couldn’t exist nor does it say that life must exist at all. If the Earth was in a different position, perhaps no life would exist on Earth just as no life exists on so many other planets. Voltaire understood this and joked about it with his over the top teacher who claimed that God made stones so that we can build castles. It seems rather obvious that if there were no stones, than we would have built a structure out of something else that was there. This claim that the Earth was put into the perfect position for life is just backwards thinking.
Filed under: Argument by Design, Religion
