The Watchmaker

One of the most famous arguments the religious have used to support their claims concerning a designer is that of The Watchmaker analogy. As a quick refresher, imagine you’re walking along in nature and you come across a finely crafted pocket watch. The watch couldn’t have come about by chance, but rather must have been designed by a Watchmaker. The argument continues to assert that since the universe and life is complex, there must be a designer. And therefore God.

Growing up I was convinced by this logic and even more recently I was stumped. At first glance, The Watchmaker argument seems to be sound and logical reasoning, but as you read on I hope to explain its faults and embarrassing contradictions. The attached video link does a fantastic job of deconstructing and disproving The Watchmaker argument and I strongly encourage you to give it a view. I want to emphasis a few of my favorite points.

The Watchmaker uses a false analogy fallacy. It compares a watch to the universe and assumes that since they are similar in one aspect they are also similar in other ways. They are both complex and they both have a designer. To explain the error, I will compare an alligator and an octopus. An alligator is an animal and it has four legs. An octopus is also an animal and therefore it also has four legs. Doesn’t work. Just because two things have something in common doesn’t mean we can logically assume that a comparison can rightly predict other qualities. A watch and the universe are both complex, however that doesn't prove they both must have a designer.

Another exceptionally weak aspect of the argument is committing the Special Pleading Fallacy. This is when an exception to the rules is used without justification. According to the argument, the watch is complex and was designed by a Watchmaker. The Watchmaker is also complex and was designed by a God. The God is complex and was designed by God’s God. God’s God is complex and… you get the point. An infinite eternal regression of designers designing designs. The special pleading happens when the apologist argues that God does NOT have a designer despite also being complex. God is the special exception to the rule.

It’s tricky to pick up on, but The Watchmaker argument uses an immediate contradiction to try and prove its own point. We start off walking in nature and notice a complex designed watch. Wow! But we don’t consider the grass, flowers, trees, rocks, and rest of nature as complex designs. The very next part of the argument states that nature is now considered a complex design. Wow! Imagine if the argument started out like this - You’re walking in nature and spot a flower. There is no possible way this flower could come about by chance because it’s complex and therefore must have been designed by The Flower-maker. Therefore the complex universe was created by The Universe-maker. If the argument started without a contradiction by asserting that nature is also complex, there would be nothing unusual about finding a complex design among other complex designs. Not to mention flowers come about by natural processes unaided by intelligent design.

There is much more to say about the argument, but for now I will conclude with this concept. Even if we pretend that The Watchmaker is a valid argument, it only proves there is a designer of the universe. Could be aliens or a computer simulation. Maybe it’s the Flying Spaghetti Monster or Allah. The argument would only prove agnosticism of an unknowable creator… IF it were a sound and logical argument. Nothing to be said about the thousands of different religions who all think they are worshiping the right supernatural deity without a shred of any evidence. Which god is the correct “Watchmaker”?