A Deist answers typical inversions of Naturalism

And when the atheist descanted on the unceasing motion and circulation of matter thro' the animal vegetable and mineral kingdoms, never resting, never annihilated, always changing form, and under all forms gifted with the power of reproduction; the Theist pointing `to the heavens above, and to the earth beneath, and to the waters under the earth,'asked if these did not proclaim a first cause, possessing intelligence and power; power in the production, and intelligence in the design and constant preservation of the system; urged the palpable existence of final causes, that the eye was made to see, and the ear to hear, and not that we see because we have eyes, and hear because we have ears; an answer obvious to the senses, as that of walking across the room was to the philosopher demonstrating the nonexistence of motion.

Thomas Jefferson
(The Faiths of Our Fathers: What America's
Founders Really Believed
By Alf J. Mapp :14)


The typical atheist argues that no matter the improbability (actually mythologically narratives of Naturalism can be defined as an impossiblity according to probability analysis) we happen to have "won the particular lottery favorable to life" because otherwise we wouldn't be here and living to see we had won. As Jefferson notes, that is an inversion of causes with respect to seeing. The fact that we are living and seeing currently did not cause anything to happen back in the time of origins. Seeing now has no causative force and there is no reason to argue that anything was "because" we are here to see it now. It's rather like arguing after you win the lottery that "because" you won the lottery, you didn't need the winning ticket. (Another way of noting this inversion is the story of the Nazi sharpshooters.)

I understand perfectly well that the Naturalist, atheist, agnostic or what have you is trying to say, "Look, if it all hadn't been just so and favorable to life then we wouldn't even be here! So it all seems to be set just so, because if it was not we would not be here."

This, "...we would not be here." lacks force and any real explanatory power. Soon enough, most of us will not be here to observe anything as we will be dead, yet the numerous conditions favorable to life that are physically impossible to account for in Naturalism will most likely remain, regardless. Observation by sentient beings of the numerous conditions apparently set very specifically to favor the existence of intelligent life in Nature has nil to do with their cause or their continued preservation in the system and laws of Nature.