Teleology
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Teleology is a philosophical system which explains natural things in terms of formal and final ends.[1] Within this system, it is observed that phenomena in nature fulfill functions, attain goals, and achieve purposes. Organelles, cells, organisms, and the harmonious coinciding of the natural constants, all indicate purpose and design in nature.

The roots of teleology stretch back to the foundations of philosophy itself. Pre-Socratic philosophers, and all great thinkers, have addressed the teleological school of thought, whether to espouse it or to dismiss it.

Nature

Aristotle, like many of his contemporaries, was preoccupied with the notion of change. He observed change in first, the behavior of living organisms, and second, purposeful human action in that they both move towards achieving ends. Living organisms, through reproduction and growth, always exhibit a striving towards predetermined functions such as an acorn (potentiality) developing into a mature oak tree (actuality). An organism inherently achieves these ends in order to fulfill its function. For Aristotle, organisms neither have “purposes” in the traditional sense nor attain ends by choice but instead have built-in goal-directed behavior, which he called entelechy. This innate quality of attaining ends is the organism fulfilling its function all for the sake of surviving in its particular environment. Plato, the teacher of Aristotle, also criticized other philosophers for denying or failing to discern final ends.

Further, an organelle, organism, person or thing is true to its nature (Good) when it fulfills its function; as when a shipbuilder correctly builds a ship, a bacterium's flagellar motor provides propulsion, a physician heals the injured, an otter successfully catches its prey, or a man contemplates the consequences of alternative actions prior to taking action. Thus he (man) is true to his nature if he fulfills the function of using his intelligence to attain desired ends. This notion of living things effectively fulfilling function ontologically affects how ID theorists and Darwinists think and argue about man's role in the cosmos.

Metaphysics for Aristotle is being and causation. Observable natural phenomenon has being, the fact “that” it exists, and a prior material and efficient cause that explains its existence. Science, thought Aristotle, is going beyond sense-data derived from experience to learn the material cause of things, what he called first principles(e.g.,explanations, laws, theories). For instance, when we observe steam rising from a pot of boiling water, we see that the steam exists. Upon closer investigation, we understand that heat from fire is the explanation for why the steam exists. Furthermore, heat is present in all cases where there is boiling water. Therefore, in order to attain the goal of cooking food with steam, heat must be applied to liquid water.

Immediate Cause <---------Why something exists---------> Final Cause

Mechanistic--------------------------------------------------End, purpose

Heat------------------------------Steam-----------------------To cook food

Switch--------------------------Porchlight----------------------Safety

Means <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Intended goal/desire

Human Art

Rational human action is goal-directed activity, based on choice and reason, that moves toward a desired end, an intended object of desire, which is explained as the final cause. Goal-directed action always begins with intention; satisfying logical preconditions to achieve the desired end by using or doing something for the sake of attaining something else. Say, for example your wife, unknowing to you, invited her classmate Lucy over to discuss their philosophy professor's militaristic requirements on their latest essays. Shortly, you ask your wife why the porch light is on and she replies, “So Lucy can see the front walk.” Your wife intends to provide safety for Lucy, and turns the porch light on to achieve this end. "All human action", says Aristotle, " aims at some end." While the means we use or perform are instrumental ends, the goals one intends to achieve are final ends. Many final ends are instrumental ends for other things desired. Intending to achieve some goal or end is, in problem analysis, the distance between your present actual state of affairs and your intended state of affairs wherein one's intended state of affairs, the object of desire, can be achieved only by satisfying the ontologic precondition of the material, immediate cause. In his work entitled Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle says that instrumental ends, such as an army training troops, building barracks, healing the injured, are done for the sake of attaining the final end of victory. His doctrine of four causes, the first three, formal, material, efficient are explanations for why something exists and produce or bring about the final cause, a desired end which is an effect. Such as a bicycle or automobile which in and of themselves are not transportation yet when used produce the effect of transportation. Aristotle holds that these four causes are also present in nature--living organisms (Stumpf).

Formal: idea of what is to be made (e.g. a statue of Aphrodite)

Material: what is it made of (marble)

Efficient: how it is made (by a sculptor who applies skill using tools)

Final: produced effect, purpose, function achieved (decoration, idea of love)

Before one can attain a goal, he or she must first satisfy the sufficient or necessary causative preconditions. Ontologically, specific preconditions must exist prior to effectuating one's desired ends. A precondition is the antecedent in a conditional statement-- 'if, then' propositions or premises in deductive argumentation. As the Pragmatist says--If you want X, do Y.

Teleology and Modern Science

Routinely mischaracterized by journalists and cynics, intelligent design is a cooperation of teleological reasoning and the widely accepted foundations of modern science. In addition to making a positive case based on logical and empirical means, ID simultaneously mounts criticisms for atelic ontologies like philosophical materialism and Darwinism.

In formulating the case for realism, ID actually begins, advances, and concludes with logical propositions and physical, scientific evidence. Intelligent design is the study of things in the universe that are best explained by way of a teleological and directive intelligence. ID is based on the empirical practice of observation, and the scientific principles of causality (cause and effect) and uniformity.

When applying ID to biology, it is observed that all living cells necessarily utilize the functional information found in DNA.

Considering the principle of causality ID asks, “What is the cause of functional information?” In all cases where we know the source of functional information, it always originates from an intelligent and teleological cause. Additionally, there are no verified cases of functional information arising by chance, by atelic processes, or by non-intelligent causes, nor by their cooperation. Complex specified information, the functional information content, is best explained by intelligence. Contrarily, philosophical materialism argues that a directive intelligent cause does not exist; complex living organisms are brought about by unintelligent, purposeless causes alone.

Employing the principle of uniformity, ID proposes that all functional information uniformly originates from teleological intelligence, even the functional information of DNA. Like any other truly scientific endeavor, ID proceeds from current verified knowledge into new knowledge. To accept a non-intelligent source for the functional information of DNA is to deny the verified scientific evidence. Intelligent design then asks what types of new data, concepts, and experiments result from proposing that functional information is teleological.

ID claims: Unintelligent events do not cause complex living structures.

Darwinism claims: Some unintelligent events, like RM&NS, are the causes of all complex living structures.

For more than a century, whenever the debate was between teleology and Darwinism, Darwinism usually won, yet intelligent design presents a new playing field of science vs. science. Two chief design-theoretic concepts are based on the mathematical and informational concepts of Specified Complexity and CSI formulated by William Dembski and Irreducible Complexity formulated by Michael Behe.

ID is exceedingly more advanced than other teleological concepts throughout history. The Formator argument of Plato, the Prime Mover argument of Aristotle, St. Anselm's Ontological Argument, or William Paley's Watchmaker analogy all lack the precision and scientific applicability of intelligent design. Through the utility of scientific, informational, and mathematical principles, ID stakes a new claim for teleology in nature.

Endnotes

^ Mod.L. teleologia meaning the study of ends or goals, teleo- from Gk. telos meaning "end", -logy from Gk. logos meaning "word" or as a suffix "the study of."

See also...

Holism
Teleomatic and teleonomic

Bibliography

Online
Charles Thaxton, DNA, Design and the Origin of Life
William Dembski, Intelligent Design as a Theory of Information
IDEA Club @ UCSanDiego, Information Theory: Finding the Immaterial Properties of Life
Information Theory

Print
Samuel Stumpf, Socrates to Sartre: A History of Philosophy, 1975, ISBN 0070623260
Michael Behe, Darwin's Black Box, 1998, ISBN 0684834936
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, ISBN 0872204642

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