Concept
Teleology
Overview
Teleology (from τέλος, telos, 'end', 'aim', or 'goal', and λόγος, logos, 'explanation' or 'reason') or finality is a philosophical approach to discussing causality that explains causes in terms of ends, purposes, or goals.
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 materialists 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).
Much of the discussion on teleology revolves around religion and the belief in a godly, purposeful existence for the world and for humans. See Teleological argument for an in-depth discussion on teleology and religion.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Teleology is discussed.
To entitle them to do this, a complete doctrine of Teleology is indispensable. A scientific theory, however perfect, of the subject-matter, considered merely as part of the order of nature, can in no degree serve as a substitute.
John Stuart Mill, A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive
states what it is; names the idea; author linked in the graph
to a determinate _concept_ of the supreme Cause, as Cause of the world according to moral laws, and, consequently, to the concept of such a cause as satisfies our moral final purpose. For this are required, as natural properties belonging to it, nothing less than Omniscience, Omnipotence, Omnipresence, and the like, which must be thought as bound up with the moral final purpose which is infinite and thus as adequate…
Immanuel Kant, Kant's Critique of Judgement
names the idea; author linked in the graph; opens on it
But radical finalism is quite as unacceptable, and for the same reason. The doctrine of teleology, in its extreme form, as we find it in Leibniz for example, implies that things and beings merely realize a programme previously arranged. But if there is nothing unforeseen, no invention or creation in the universe, time is useless again. As in the mechanistic hypothesis, here again it is supposed that _all is given_…
Henri Bergson, Creative Evolution
a chapter is titled for it; author linked in the graph; names the idea
But the word co-ordination implies somewhat more than this; it implies a teleological harmony in ideas, and in the case of personality this teleology is more than a mere purposive pursuit of a predeterminate end; it is a developmental teleology. This is personal character. A general idea, living and conscious now, it is already determinative of acts in the future to an extent to which it is not now conscious.
Charles S. Peirce, Chance, Love, and Logic
states what it is; names the idea; opens on it
58.] Such an Idea evidently radically transforms the relation which the understanding institutes between means and ends, between subjectivity and objectivity. And yet in the face of this unification, the End or design is subsequently explained to be a cause which exists and acts subjectively, _i.e._ as our idea only: and teleology is accordingly explained to be only a principle of criticism, purely personal to _our_…
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, The Logic of Hegel
states what it is; author linked in the graph; names the idea
Philosophers who discussed Teleology
- John Scotus Eriugena
- Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
- Friedrich Adolf Trendelenburg
- Henri Bergson
- Ludwig Büchner
- Julian Huxley
- Immanuel Kant
- Simone Weil
- Seyyed Hossein Nasr
- Hermann Lotze
- Thomas Nagel
- Christian Wolff (philosopher)
- Ernest Gellner
- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
- Socrates
- Michel Weber
- Aristotle
- Baruch Spinoza
- Wilhelm Wundt
- Lucretius
- Young Marx
- T. M. Scanlon
- Alfred North Whitehead
- Peter Hacker
Related ideas
- Epicurus
- Cognition
- Telos
- Francis Bacon
- Ancient philosophy
- Harvard University Press
- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
- Phaedo
- Western philosophy
- Immanuel Kant
- Ancient Greek
- John Stuart Mill
- Novum Organum
- Hylomorphism
- Karl Marx
- Physics (Aristotle)
- German philosophy
- Internet Archive
- Learning
- Cosmology
- Leviathan (Hobbes book)
- Autonomy
- Thomas Nagel
- Watchmaker analogy
Opposing perspectives
Place in the tradition
Part of Authoritarianism.