It has practical significance for the physico-theological proof.
Because if they are embedded in matter, then they must have been created, since all matter is created.
And so whoever created matter was also compelled to create the laws.

But if they exist on top of some kind of “spirit,” then maybe they always existed, and they would not need a creator, only an emanator.
And here the principle of sufficient reason is already weaker than causality.

There is no practical difference at all. If they are inside matter, even then they were not created with it. Matter was created because laws are not entities. And even if they are not inside it, they still are not entities, so again they were not created.
As for the laws, if they are eternal then there is the principle of sufficient reason, and if they were enacted at some point in time then there is also the principle of causality. This is explained in the third notebook.

But if there is a theory explaining that the special universe had to emerge deterministically from conditions that were always here (Hawking, for example), then why is there a need for God? Where does He come in?
There are two theses that need to be decided between: 1) a scientific theory showing that the special universe could have formed by itself, and in fact had to happen. 2) God created the universe. Why choose 2 when 1 explains everything?
If we see a stone falling, are we surprised? Of course not, because it is necessary as a result of the data and the laws. So too with the universe.
If the laws are a result of the structure of primordial matter (or primordial laws), then it is a logical necessity that they be this way.
I would appreciate a detailed answer.

There is not and cannot be a theory explaining that the universe necessarily emerged from the conditions that prevailed before, unless those conditions were not a vacuum but had certain characteristics (and those are what dictated the special universe that emerged). And then the question returns to those very conditions: who created them?

1) In any case, I’d be glad if the Rabbi would say what the nature of the laws of physics is: a function of matter, or an external imposition.
2) So basically there are not really two theses here, one more reasonable than the other (unlike the Boeing or the watch argument, where one thesis is more plausible and probable than the other), right?
If I assume there was a primordial state that led to a complex result, there is nothing implausible in that view (like a plane created from a pile of scrap metal); everything here is reasonable and even completely necessary. Why does the Rabbi see this as irrational? Fine if the laws were created out of nothing, but if they are a necessary result of some primordial state, I don’t see any need to add God.

1) I don’t know. I’m not even completely sure these are really two different possibilities (because laws are not entities, so what exactly is the difference between the possibilities?).
2) I already wrote to you: the question is who created the primordial state? You gain nothing at all by inventing that primordial state.

1) Thanks. Do you know of materials that deal with the topic?
2) I didn’t understand. I’m arguing that the state was never created at all, but is entirely primordial—so it doesn’t need a creator (like God). What is implausible about that?

See the discussion of the principle of sufficient reason in the third notebook.

1) I meant materials dealing with the nature of the laws of nature.
2) What’s written there is really very brief and not so convincing in my opinion. So does the Rabbi agree that it makes no sense to say atheism is implausible—if some law or state is primordial?
By the way, does the Rabbi know of convincing sources that deal with the principle of sufficient reason?

The principle of sufficient reason is discussed in Richard Taylor’s book Metaphysics. There is a lot of material on this in English, and it’s worth searching online.
What is the question? I already explained that I absolutely do not agree. Atheism is plainly irrational.

Thanks.
1) What is the principle of sufficient reason called in English?
2) I’m simply claiming that the word “reasonable” doesn’t belong here, if the laws are primordial. It’s not like asking whether it’s reasonable that a watch created itself or not, because the watch is not primordial.
3) And what about materials on the nature of the laws?

1. Sufficient reason
2. And I claim that it does. The principle of causality also does not come from experience, and neither does the principle of sufficient reason. Therefore the distinction you drew (whether this is an ancient object or not) is, in my opinion, irrelevant.
3. I’m not familiar with any. As I said, I doubt whether the question even has any meaning at all.

Thanks for everything.
Just one last thing: are the constants that came into being at the time of the Big Bang a rigid and direct consequence of some component that existed before the Big Bang (like a stone falling as a direct result of attraction), or are they a combination of several factors (like rolling dice or the lottery), according to which they were determined in an acute way, so that this can be seen as a drawing of constants whose outcome is surprising?

As far as I know, nobody knows how the constants were formed. There are conjectures and proposals, but this will forever remain outside the domain of science. Even if they explain them, it will be on the basis of some other constant, and in the end we’ll remain without an explanation. Otherwise you have reduced physics to logic and mathematics, and it’s not likely that this will happen.