Q&A: A Question About Atheism and Faith
A Question About Atheism and Faith
Question
I wanted to ask a question. First of all, I really wanted to thank you, Michi, for everything you do and work on. Thanks to you, I can honestly say I stayed religious, so as an introduction I wanted to say thank you!
Now after the flattery stage…
If, for example, an atheist claims that there is no God, and I claim that there is.
Now there is the physicotheological argument that you use a lot—that a complex thing must have something/someone etc. that put it together.
According to the principle of causality.
Now my question is this: if so, then an atheist can come and argue—here is proof that there are indeed complicated things that supposedly came into being by chance, without God / a creator / a guiding hand—the species on earth, in short, the theory of evolution…
Ummm, so doesn’t that basically “knock down” the physicotheological argument? Because after all, there are things that were formed randomly, so an atheist will also assume that the world was formed randomly…
I know what you usually say about this—about the laws of nature and so on—that they were not created naturally (what you often say about the example of the drunk and the ditch, etc.).
Could you expand a bit?
I’d be happy if you could address this in detail. Thank you very much, and Sabbath peace 🙂
Answer
You know my answer. So what is the point of repeating it? If you have a specific question, ask it.
Discussion on Answer
Not bad at all. 🙂
I can suggest the Michi-bot’s answer to your question
First of all—thanks for the warm words. It’s moving and fun to read.
A short disclaimer to open the conversation: the answers here are given by a model based on the writings of Rabbi Michael Abraham and trying to reconstruct how he would answer; they do not necessarily reflect his actual opinion in every case. For practical questions of Jewish law, consult a halakhic decisor. And one more usage note: the Michi-bot is optimized for the GPT-5 Thinking model; it’s worth making sure that’s actually what you’re using.
Does evolution “knock down” the physicotheological argument?
Exactly the opposite. It is important to be precise about what the Rabbi’s argument is:
1) What the argument says (and does not say)
The argument is not “every complex thing must have a designer” in the style of Paley’s watch. The updated formulation is:
The very existence of a system of precise and stable physical-biological laws, which makes possible processes that produce life and intelligence at all, calls for a sufficient reason—and reasonably points to a designing hand. Therefore, any explanation within the system of laws (evolution, abiogenesis, chemistry, astrophysics, etc.) does not touch the question; at most it shifts the point of wonder to the laws themselves (“who set the rules, and how were they tuned that way?”). ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][1])
The Rabbi sharpens the point: science explains phenomena by means of laws; it does not explain the laws themselves. Therefore, even if evolution has a full and successful explanation, the argument remains—it simply “climbs up a level,” from the results to the source of the laws. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][1])
2) Where does evolution come in?
Evolution, even if entirely correct, explains how complex species arise out of the laws of nature and biology. It does not explain why there are such laws at all, or why their values are tuned so that such things happen. Therefore it does not “knock down” the proof; it merely replaces “an explanation within the laws” instead of a gap in knowledge. The Rabbi formulates this explicitly: the distinction is between an argument within the laws and an argument outside the laws. The first is scientific; the second is philosophical-theological. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][1])
3) The analogy of the drunk, the wall, and the ditch
This is exactly the analogy you mentioned. A drunk walks on a narrow path; without constraints he will almost certainly fall. If there are walls on both sides, he will make it through. The walls = the laws of nature. Meaning: even if the internal process is “random,” the constraints guide the result. So the question becomes: who built the walls? That is the point. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][2])
4) “But then everything can be ‘by chance’…”
Here the probabilistic discussion that runs through the Rabbi’s writings comes in: from a Bayesian perspective, when you observe a world that contains rich and fitted lawfulness (broad fine-tuning, not just one isolated point), the hypothesis “there is a designer” gains posterior probability relative to an explanation of “chance within laws” alone—as long as you do not stipulate in advance that the prior for God approaches zero. This is not “God of the gaps” (bringing in God to fill a lack of knowledge), but an orderly consideration of the fit between data and hypotheses. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][3])
5) Short answers to popular objections
* “Evolution showed that complexity arises without design” — Great. That means there is a working mechanism within the laws of nature. The physicotheological question becomes: why is there such a mechanism at all, and why do the laws allow it to work (effective teleology in the language of physics/biology)? ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][1])
* “So the laws themselves are necessary/logical” — Even if part of the framework is mathematical/logical, the concrete form of the lawfulness and the values (constants) still are not logically derived, and those are precisely the distinctive part. Therefore the argument still stands. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][4])
* “Multiple universes / the anthropic principle” — Even if they exist, they are still another lawful framework (“a wall”) that explains why we observe a universe like ours—not why there is such a framework, and why it is effective in producing life. That is: they belong to an explanation *within* the laws, not *outside* them. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][1])
* “Fine-tuning is disputed” — There are arguments about specific examples, and that is legitimate; in the Rabbi’s view, the argument does not depend on one single technical detail but on the general distinction: even when one succeeds in showing a natural mechanism, the philosophical question moves to the source of the lawfulness. See the responsa discussion on fine-tuning and the precise formulation of the claims. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][5])
6) Bottom line
Evolution does not “knock down” the proof; it places it correctly. Instead of “complexity implies a designer” (an argument that has problems), the Rabbi proposes: fitted and broad lawfulness implies a sufficient reason in a designer. Therefore, whether the biological processes are random-and-selection-guided or deterministic, the philosophical question about the source of the lawfulness does not move a millimeter; in some ways it is even sharpened.
A short methodological note
The Rabbi repeatedly emphasizes the need to stay away from “God of the gaps”: the lack of a scientific explanation is not evidence for God, and correspondingly the existence of a scientific explanation is not evidence against Him. Science deals *within* the laws; the question of their source is *outside* them. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][3])
Want me to dive into concrete examples (Higgs, constants, entropy, the gravitational constant, etc.), or should I organize a short “source sheet” by topic?
Sources actually used
* #Faith and Science – Part V#, “The Place of Evolution in the Theological Discussion” (Mikyab site). ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][1])
* #Concepts in Evolution# (responsa, on the analogy of the drunk and the “walls” = the laws of nature). ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][2])
* #A Bayesian Look at the Physicotheological Proof (Column 506)#. ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][3])
* #On the Physicotheological Proof – The Cause of the Laws# (responsa). ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][4])
* #Fine Tuning# (responsa) and #The Truths of Fine Tuning# (responsa). ([Rabbi Michael Abraham][5])
* Book: God Plays with Dice, chapter three: *The Physicotheological Proof – Creationism for the Advanced*; the opening of the chapter and the general framework; emphasis that evolution does not knock down the proof but shifts it to the laws.
For a deeper and more accurate picture, it is recommended to consult the cited sources.
Sabbath peace
[1]: https://mikyab.net/%D7%9B%D7%AA%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%A0%D7%94-%D7%95%D7%9E%D7%93%D7%A2-%D7%97%D7%9C%D7%A7-%D7%94/ “Faith and Science – Part V – Rabbi Michael Abraham”
[2]: https://mikyab.net/%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%AA/%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%A9%D7%92%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%91%D7%90%D7%91%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%95%D7%A6%D7%99%D7%94/ “Concepts in Evolution – Rabbi Michael Abraham”
[3]: https://mikyab.net/posts/78068/ “A Bayesian Look at the Physicotheological Proof (Column 506) – Rabbi Michael Abraham”
[4]: https://mikyab.net/%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%AA/%D7%A2%D7%9C-%D7%94%D7%A8%D7%90%D7%99%D7%94-%D7%94%D7%A4%D7%99%D7%96%D7%99%D7%A7%D7%95-%D7%AA%D7%90%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%95%D7%92%D7%99%D7%AA-%D7%A1%D7%99%D7%91%D7%AA-%D7%94%D7%97%D7%95%D7%A7%D7%99%D7%9D/?utm_source=chatgpt.com “On the Physicotheological Proof – The Cause of the Laws”
[5]: https://mikyab.net/%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%AA/fine-tuning/?utm_source=chatgpt.com “Fine Tuning”