TELEOLOGY (from Gk. /47km tc/os, end, completion + -Xoyta, -logia, account, from legcin, to say). A term used in philos ophy to denote any theory which explains the world as in some way controlled by intelligent purpose. The question teleology answers in the affirmative is whether in the universe as a whole, or even in the phenomena of terrestrial organic life, there is some actually conscious being con trolling the cause of events and shaping it to the realization of preconceived ends. It is certain that the tendency to interpret actions teleologi cally appears in very early childhood. But as the child grows older he has a right to criticise the interpretation he previously gave to these ac tions. The mere fact that it is natural for him in early childhood to do a thing. is no proof that in mature life he is justified in continuing to do that thing. The criticism he gives to his early personifications results in the confirmation of sonic. lie is confirmed, for example, in his con viction that all normal human beings have much the same mental constitution and much the same conscious control over their actions as lie. But the increase in knowledge, which bears out his early interpretation of the actions of human be ings, tends to discredit much of his interpreta tion of other phenomena. Fetishes tend to dis appear with mental culture, while, in regard to the animal world, the child-fashioned, rough and-ready explanation of instinctive action as consciously purposed has become obsolete in scientific circles. But tne depersonifying ten dency of scientific knowledge has been generally offset by the attempt to attribute to the universe at large a pin-pose which many individual parts of the universe are no longer alleged severally to show.
In fact, in its metaphysical aspect the question is removed to a plane where science and scientific considerations are only of secondary importance. In the old argument that the natural world re veals adjustments which could only have been provided for by the foreseeing wisdom of God, the teleological hypothesis was a form of scientific theory—that is, it was as much a description of the course of events as an interpretation of their causes. As treated in its broadest scope. how
ever, teleology becomes an interpretation of the facts which it is the business of science to de scribe. Teleology is an interpretation of a par ticular kind; it argues that the facts which science describes can be adequately accounted for, causally, only by the assumption of an intelligent purpose of which human purpose furnishes the only analogy which we can understand. This does not mean that the purpose of the universe must be like human purpose, but that a purpose re sembling human purpose is all that can make it intelligible to us.
Teleology, in this sense, and scientific theory in no way conflict. As a matter of fact, they are based upon very different rational principles. Science proceeds in its explanations upon the law of parsimony (q.v.) , assuming the fewest pos sible hypotheses for the maintenance of its struc tures; teleology, on the other hand, proceeds on the principle of sufficient reason, which requires the fullest and most satisfactory explanation of phenomena as the probable truth. Again. science is primarily concerned only with the delineation of phenomena, with description of fact ; teleology strives to discover a significance in these phe nomena and facts which shall satisfy all the needs of the human mind. The same facts are dealt with in each ease, but the form of their consideration is entirely different. This may be illustrated in the case of the doctrine of evolu tion, which, for science, is simply the specific statement of certain hypotheses—as, for ex ample, the struggle for existence, the law of the survival of the fittest, etc.—which are supposed to describe the actual descent of animals; teleo logically, however, evolution is viewed as a proc ess planned and controlled by a foreordained intelligence analogous to ours. Frequently sci entific theory, as in this case, contains ele ments of teleology, but this is due rather to the failure of exact description than to the proper character of scientific treatment. There is no logical interconnection of science and teleology and no possibility of any real contradiction be tween them. See MATERIALISM; I\1ECHANISM.