Q&A: Neo-Darwinism
Neo-Darwinism
Question
If it turns out that the human species really came into the world by chance, thanks to random mutations, and given a different course of history and biology human beings might not have existed at all—and therefore there also would have been no one to receive the Torah—would that contradict Judaism? Is it possible that God gave the Torah only after the fact, once humanity happened to arrive in our world by chance, rather than as the result of divine choice?
Answer
Anything is possible. But it is not likely that this happened by chance. That is precisely the physico-theological argument.
Discussion on Answer
It’s a hypothetical question with no real meaning. It’s like asking what I would say if the sum of the angles in a triangle were 217. But why can’t one be religious for other reasons? Exactly as you wrote.
I accept that it probably wasn’t by chance.
I’m asking about a scenario in which it turns out that it really was by chance. Does that contradict Judaism? Can one hold the view common in academia (apparently “based” only on a materialist philosophical outlook) and still be religious? (I’m not talking about God, since as you’ve said on various occasions there are still quite a few proofs for God’s existence besides the argument from biological complexity.) A person who doesn’t believe in God obviously can’t be religious, so is the same true of someone who thinks that humanity’s arrival in the world was accidental? Can anything be reconciled with a religious worldview?