How the Most Popular Atheist Became a Believer: A Response
Analyzing Hamza El Bouzekraoui’s argument for a creator.
This article is a direct response to an article written by Hamza El Bouzekraoui. I encourage all readers to first read Bouzekraoui’s original article before continuing with this one for needed context.
Opening Thoughts
Upon first glance, I thought Bouzekraoui’s article was going to be about Einstein given his inclusion in the cover photo and the title of the article. There is an argument involving Einstein that is often employed by those of religious faith attempting to persuade others of the existence of God and it goes as follows: “Even Einstein, one of the most brilliant minds to ever exist, believed in God. Therefore, God must exist.” After all, Einstein often employed the term “God” when talking about physics. Perhaps one of his most notable quotes reads as follows:
“God does not play dice with the universe.”
This argument doesn’t hold the weight that religious apologists think it does because Einstein simply didn’t believe in a God in the same way as the major religions do. Einstein famously believed in the “God of Spinoza,” or essentially, that the entire universe as a whole was God. He didn’t believe in some supernatural being that created the universe and ruled over the life within it. Rather, he believed that the laws of nature themselves governed how the universe and everything within it operates. His use of the term “God” was akin to the term “Mother Nature.” Although Einstein used flamboyant terms such as “God” when describing how he viewed the universe, his real beliefs were much closer to those of agnostics or atheists rather than the religious.
Thankfully, Bouzekraoui does not make the Einstein argument in their article. However, they do employ a similar tactic using a different person. I will come back to this point at the end of my response. Why Einstein was chosen for the cover image is still a mystery.
Following the Argument Wherever it Leads
Bouzekraoui starts their article with a quote from Socrates that states.
“We should follow the argument wherever it leads.”
Following an argument to its logical conclusion is at the very core of philosophy. However, as evidenced by the many influential philosophers throughout history who cannot seem to agree with each other, it’s entirely possible that various individuals can start with the exact same information and end up at completely different conclusions. The idea of following an argument to its logical conclusion is simple, yet fraught with personal bias. Let this article stand as an example of such biases and witness the phenomenon yourself.
The Universe Must Have A Cause
In this section, Bouzekraoui talks about causality; the idea that the universe follows the laws of cause and effect. In physics, this would be explained by saying that any cause for any event must be within the past light cone of said event (a light cone being a diagram of the paths that light can take through spacetime). Essentially, any current event must have had some interaction within the past that lead to its current state which does not violate our current understanding of physics. If light, which travels at the universal speed limit through space, could not travel through space from point A to point B in a given amount of time, then there are no interactions between point A and point B which can happen in that time period. Such interactions would be outside the light cone. However, a much more simple explanation is employed in their article.
Bouzekraoui posits that the universe is an effect, and therefore must have a cause. The cause, according to their argument, is God. This leads to the inevitable question of “what or who created God?” Even if said question has a satisfying answer, we could always follow an infinite series of questioning the creators of the creators. “God had to be created by X, but who created X? X had to be created by Y, but who created Y?” etc.
Religious believers are quick to point out that it’s possible for God to be eternal; a God which has existed for all of eternity and therefore never required a creator. If it’s possible for God to have existed for all of eternity without needing a creator, isn’t it possible for the universe to have existed for all of eternity without needing a creator as well? Sure, the universe has not always existed in the state we see it in today, it has evolved over time, but who’s to say that the universe isn’t undergoing something similar to a phase transition?
Some theorists believe in a cyclic universe in which spacetime rapidly expands from a singularity and then collapses back into a singularity and has been repeating such a cycle for eternity. In this scenario, we would simply say that we currently exist within one of infinitely many expansion events and in the future, the universe is destined to collapse back into a singularity where it will repeat the cycle anew. According to this viewpoint, the universe is simply changing forms; undergoing a type of phase transition similar to how water can freeze into solid ice and the ice can melt back into liquid water.
Bouzekraoui goes on to share a quote from an article written by Michael Shermer for Scientific American. The quote is as follows:
“…black holes and singularities that give birth to new universes — in a manner similar to the singularity that physicists believe gave rise to the big bang.”
They seemingly glance over the mention of black hole cosmology (more on that later) and focus on the Big Bang stemming from a singularity. Bouzekraoui writes:
“You know that if there ever were a time when there was nothing, that’s exactly what we would have now. The idea that something popped into existence from nothing is simply not a scientific idea.”
In fact, the idea of “something from nothing” is, in a way, very much possible within our current understanding of physics depending on your definition of “nothing.” What we consider empty space (what we would colloquially refer to as “nothing”) is indeed filled with something; fields. Fluctuations in such fields can cause what we call virtual particle pairs to pop into existence. These are short-lived pairs of particles with opposite energy which recombine and annihilate each other almost instantly (usually). While we can’t directly observe virtual particles, we can observe the effects that such virtual particles have on observable particles and black holes. Hence, we have good reason to believe that virtual particles are in fact real phenomena that occur within our universe. One of the easiest ways to understand this phenomenon is by using a mathematical metaphor.
We can take the average energy available in empty space and set it equal to zero. The first law of thermodynamics states that energy cannot be created or destroyed. It can only change from one form to another. Therefore, if we start with zero average energy in empty space we cannot simply add or remove energy; such an act would give us a positive or negative nonzero energy value. However, it is possible to combine the effects of adding and removing energy together in unison. If we start with a zero value and add some value of energy while simultaneously adding an equal but negative amount of energy then the total energy of empty space remains at zero.
This can also be visualized with a different metaphor. Say we have an area of flat dirt. While the dirt is flat and undisturbed, there is nothing but a flat surface. There are no holes, no piles, etc. For this analogy, the flat surface represents nothingness. Now, assume we start digging a hole in the surface of the dirt and pile the dirt next to the hole. Suddenly, we have two things that we didn’t have before; a hole and a pile of dirt. But, we never added or removed any dirt from the overall system. The total amount of dirt in the pile is equal to the total amount of dirt that was removed from the hole. There has been no dirt gained or lost yet we suddenly have two things that didn’t exist beforehand. In fact, we can dig as many holes as we want and create as many hole-pile pairs as we wish without ever disrupting the amount of dirt we started with.
If you describe “nothing” as the absolute lack of all things, including quantum fields, then the existence of virtual particles does not prove that something can come from nothing. But, it does do a decent job of promoting the idea that what we observe might not always be what is actually happening. Any average person would look at an area of empty space and declare that there is nothing there without the knowledge that even empty space is washed in an ocean of constantly fluctuating quantum fields and virtual particles.
If the idea of something coming into existence from nothing doesn’t tickle your fancy, you can rejoice in knowing that we might not even need to come to terms with the idea because there are alternative theories to the initial cause of the Big Bang. Some theorists believe in a model of universe formation known as black hole cosmology which was mentioned in the previous quote used by Bouzekraoui. This model suggests that the Big Bang and the singularity in which it started didn’t simply pop into existence from nothing, but rather was the result of a black hole from a different universe. It posits that the matter, and therefore energy, that fell into a black hole in some parent universe was ejected to create a new universe via a white hole; A.K.A. our Big Bang. White holes can be thought of as black holes in reverse. While a black hole’s intense warping of spacetime means that nothing can escape from it after passing through its event horizon, a white hole warps spacetime in the opposite way, such that everything is ejected from it and nothing can enter it. It would be possible that the two universes (ours and our parent) could have different laws of physics which are used to describe why our understanding breaks down at the point of the singularity. The singularity represents a shift in physical laws and would require not only a complete understanding of physics on our side of the singularity but a complete understanding of physics on the other side as well in order to accurately be described. Black hole cosmology also suggests a sort of universal evolution in which universes whose laws easily allow the formation of black holes spawn more child universes than those whose laws do not. We would expect universes that are very good at creating black holes to be more abundant than those that aren’t. Indeed, we find ourselves in a universe that is fairly good at creating black holes.
This theory answers the question of how the Big Bang started by positing that it is a white hole resulting from a black hole in a parent universe. However, it does not answer the question of how the first universe, which started a series of universes birthing other universes, came to be. We’re back at questioning the creators of our creators but instead of defining a creator as some sort of all-powerful being, we’re defining it as a series of alternate universes which may or may not be eternal. Some people find solace in this idea, some do not. For some, this is a perfectly acceptable answer. Others grimace at the idea of an eternal series.
Another thing to keep in mind is that the Big Bang theory does not describe how the universe was created and does not posit that the universe came into existence from nothing. Rather, the Big Bang explains a particular expansion event. Reputable scientists make no claims about what happened before the Big Bang or even how the Big Bang started. The very instance that the expansion of the Big Bang started and anything before that point is completely speculative.
Design Demands a Designer
In this section, Bouzekraoui puts forward the age-old watchmaker analogy that has been a staple in the arsenal of religious apologists for centuries. The analogy states that something as complex as a watch requires that there exists someone who made the watch; a watchmaker. In this context, the universe as a whole is analogous to the watch and God is the watchmaker. The analogy implies that something as complex as the universe we find ourselves in requires a creator.
Many philosophers take issues with the watchmaker analogy for a number of reasons. Perhaps the most common reason is that it is seen as a logical fallacy. In fact, there are multiple logical fallacies that can describe the watchmaker analogy.
The non sequitur fallacy is used to describe some conclusion that does not follow from the premises. The watchmaker analogy is a non sequitur because it does not follow from the premise that just because one thing required a creator means that all things require a creator. The argument fails to include any reasoning for why every “thing” must have been intentionally created by something else; it simply assumes it to be so. It’s entirely possible that complex natural systems can come about due to the laws of physics alone, without the need for some all-powerful being’s influence. In science, such complex systems are often referred to as emergent properties. These are properties of some large systems that are not shared by any of the individual pieces that make up the larger system. For example, weather is an emergent phenomenon. Individual molecules that make up the air we breathe do not exhibit weather patterns. But if you get enough of them together around a rocky planet with large bodies of water then you do end up with predictable weather patterns. We would not say that weather requires a creator, but rather that it’s simply an emergent property of the laws of physics.
The watchmaker analogy is also guilty of circular reasoning. It states that the universe is so complex that it is the shining example of design and uses that as reasoning for why it must have been designed. The analogy attempts to prove that design is necessary by claiming that the universe was designed and using the design of the universe to claim that design is necessary. The argument is self-referential and starts with the point it is attempting to conclude. It provides nothing to account for why something must be designed in the first place.
Another fallacy that plagues the watchmaker analogy is that of false equivalence. The analogy states that because a watch and the universe share one property (complexity) they must share other hidden properties as well (such as requiring a creator). It is not necessary for two things to share multiple properties simply because they share a single property. Fish and monkeys are both animals, but that does not mean that both of them can climb trees.
Bouzekraoui describes how human body parts are “some of the most advanced technologically savvy pieces of equipment ever put together,” but it only takes a small amount of research to identify many of the limitations of the human body.
99.999…% of the universe is inhospitable to humans. Our lives are only possible because we happen to find ourselves in a tiny bubble with oxygen, water, and heat. When we venture from our bubble even the slightest bit we must bring food, water, heat, and oxygen with us. Permanent brain damage, quickly followed by death, occurs if we go without oxygen for even a couple of minutes. With a universe as massive as the one we find ourselves in, why would an intelligent designer create organisms which can only breathe in such an unimaginably small portion of it? Likewise, most of the universe exists outside the temperature range conducive to human life. If a human were to magically teleport to any random place in the universe there is an overwhelmingly high chance that they would immediately freeze or burn to death. Why would an intelligent designer limit humans to such a small portion of available temperatures? Theoretically, if humans were the pristine example of intelligent design that creationists claim then the universe should be our playground. Instead, the universe attempts to kill us the second we step out of our extremely limited comfort zone.
Looking at our anatomy reveals multiple design quirks that seemingly make no sense for the most intelligent of designers. Our eyes are fraught with problems where the lenses don’t correctly focus light onto receptors leading to vision problems. Not to mention the fact that we can only detect visible light, a small region of the electromagnetic spectrum. Why can’t we see all wavelengths of light? Why are our ears limited to only detecting sound waves in the range of 20Hz to 20kHz? We’ve built measuring devices that are way better at detecting electromagnetic waves and sound waves than we can as humans alone. It’s possible for our heart to suddenly stop beating correctly. What’s up with that? Why would an all-powerful designer purposefully design our cells to become cancerous and start replicating out of control? There are many examples of human physiology that simply don’t make sense in the context of perfect design. This next example is perhaps one of the more commonly used arguments to counter creationism.
The vagus nerve starts in the brain and carries signals to and from the digestive system as well as other organs. The recurrent laryngeal nerve branches off of the vagus nerve and carries signals to and from the larynx. Although there is a fairly short direct path between the upper portion of the vagus nerve and the larynx, the recurrent laryngeal nerve instead branches off of the vagus nerve much lower down in the body, loops around the aortic arch of the heart, and goes back up into the neck. Why would this nerve take such a roundabout path to its destination and increase the potential for problems if humans were intelligently designed by some all-powerful creator?
Most scientists agree that the looping of the recurrent laryngeal nerve around the aortic arch is simply an artifact of evolution. It’s a negative side effect that stuck around as our aquatic ancestors slowly evolved into species whose hearts were further from their brain, dragging the nerve along with it. Remember, not everything given to us through evolution is positive. It’s possible for evolution to cause negative or null side effects as well. Some changes are negative but not detrimental enough to prevent reproduction, which is the driving force of evolution. It’s most likely that the migration of the heart to a lower position in the body had a positive effect that overshadowed any negative or null effects that might have been caused by the elongation of the nerve. Surely, if we were designed by some intelligent being then they could have just bypassed this counterintuitive anatomy altogether and used a much more direct route to save on resources and prevent potential problems.
Bouzekraoui writes this section with a confident tone in which they imply that everyone agrees with their point of view.
“It is a truism that everybody recognizes that this universe looks designed”
“Well, you and I both know that when you see things that function and they are complex, that design comes from an intelligent designer”
However, I cannot help but disagree. Remember at the beginning when I wrote about how multiple people can look at the same information and draw different conclusions? Bouzekraoui looks at the human body and sees a perfect specimen that could only have its origins in intelligent design. I find that idea a bit too human-centrist and pompous. Call me a pessimist, but when I look at the human body as a lover of science I see imperfections abound. The entire point of creating scientific measuring devices is to create things that are better than our bodies. We create devices that are more sensitive; devices that can see and hear and feel more than we can. If we wish to travel out of our comfort zone even a little bit we necessarily have to build vehicles that allow us to take our comfort zone with us else we risk death. Science has shown me that there’s room for improvement in almost all aspects of the human form.
Life Demands a Supernatural Life-Giver
During this section of their article, Bouzekraoui appears to misunderstand the material they are using as a source.
“In the material world, we have come to understand that there is a law of biology called “The law of Biogenesis”. It simply says that in this material, natural world, life comes from previously existing life of its own kind.”
Biogenesis is simply a term used to describe the formation of life from other life forms. The term is accompanied by a second term, abiogenesis, which is the formation of life from nonliving matter. The scientific consensus seems to be that, although we have yet to definitively create life from nonliving matter, it seems possible and in some cases even probable. Most biologists believe that it occurred at some point in our history, even though we may not understand the exact details yet.
The famous Miller-Urey experiment published in 1953 showed that amino acids, which combine to form proteins and are considered essential building blocks of life, could form under chemical conditions that mimicked Earth’s early environment without the need for a starting lifeform.
“In this apparatus an attempt was made to duplicate a primitive atmosphere of the earth, and not to obtain the optimum conditions for the formation of amino acids. Although in this case the total yield was small for the energy expended,- it is possible, that, with more efficient apparatus (such as mixing of the free radicals in a flow system, use of higher hydrocarbons from natural gas or petroleum, carbon dioxide, etc., and optimum ratios of gases), this type of process would be a way of commercially producing amino acids.” — Stanley L. Miller
In 2009, chemists showed that nucleotides that form RNA and DNA could arise from chemical reactions that could have naturally occurred on an early Earth.
“Our findings suggest that the prebiotic synthesis of activated pyrimidine nucleotides should be viewed as predisposed. This predisposition would have allowed the synthesis to operate on the early Earth under geochemical conditions suitable for the assembly sequence.” — Matthew W. Powner, et. al.
Later in 2015, chemists showed that three of the major building blocks for cellular life (ribonucleotides, amino acids, and lipids) could all form from a single set of chemical reactions.
“We show that precursors of ribonucleotides, amino acids and lipids can all be derived by reductive homologation of hydrogen cyanide and some of its derivatives and thus that all the cellular subsystems could have arisen simultaneously through common chemistry” -Bhavesh H. Patel, et. al.
We don’t currently know everything about life, but we know enough to say that it is most likely an emergent property of organic chemistry. At some level of complexity, life most likely arises from nonliving parts, similar to the emergence of weather patterns from individual molecules I wrote about earlier. Unfortunately, the abiogenic origins of life are extremely sensitive to initial conditions. This means that it may take a lot of trial and error to find the exact mix of conditions that were present on early Earth that allowed life to form. As evidenced by the experiments showing the possibility of abiogenesis given the right conditions, it’s likely that we are on the right track to pinning down the exact details of how life originally formed.
Bouzekraoui’s assertion that every biological experiment has shown that life arising from non-living chemicals is biologically impossible seems to be outdated. Despite experiments showing us that we are making progress on the abiogenic origins of life, religious apologist groups continue to push the narrative that life can only form from other life. In my opinion, this view ignores a growing body of evidence and it’s only a matter of time until abiogenesis is understood well enough to confirm what most biologists believe.
Moral law Demands a Moral Lawgiver
In this section, Bouzekraoui posits that morality requires a lawgiver. This is essentially just the watchmaker analogy but instead of the universe standing in for the watch, it’s morality. I’ve already pointed out the logical fallacies that plague the watchmaker analogy and they apply to this argument of morality as well.
“If some things are objectively morally right, and other things are objectively morally wrong, then there must be a God.” — Hamza El Bouzekraoui
As I wrote in my article What I Learned in a College Ethics Course, there are many models of morality. Two of the main ones are deontology and consequentialism.
Deontologists believe that there are certain morals that should always be upheld if one wishes to act in an ethical manner. It doesn’t matter which actions the individual decides to take so long as they align with that individual’s personal morals. They hold certain beliefs as inherently ethical and others as inherently unethical no matter the scenario.
Consequentialists believe that the morality of every action should be determined on a case-by-case basis depending on the consequences of said action. A certain action may be considered ethical under one set of circumstances but not under a different set of circumstances which may have different outcomes. They believe there are no morals that are absolute and independent of circumstance.
When talking about things that are “objectively morally right,” it sounds as if Bouzekraoui aligns with the deontological view of morality. In fact, this is the case for many religious believers who assert that their morality comes from the word of God.
One of the things that I find very interesting about ethics is how individuals can be extremely confident in their morality yet switch back and forth between different moral models depending on varying circumstances. The classic trolley problem thought experiment acts as a great demonstration of this. When presented with the basic version of the thought experiment, participants often align with either a deontological or a consequentialist view of morality. However, once the thought experiment is manipulated and the scenario is changed in certain ways, participants often flip back and forth between deontological and consequentialist reasoning. It’s very rare that participants stick firmly to one model or the other no matter the scenario presented. More information on this phenomenon is available in my article linked above.
Not only do some people disagree with the notion that there exist things that are objectively moral in all scenarios, but experiments also show that many people tend to flip back and forth with their beliefs depending on the situation. Sometimes people claim to believe in absolute morality, only to abandon the claim when presented with some specific scenario that challenges their belief.
The assertion that morality requires a God can easily be disproven by the existence of non-religious individuals who follow certain moral codes. An individual’s idea of morality is formed through many factors, including religion (or lack thereof), parental guidance, environment, life experiences, wealth, etc.
Personally, I grew up in a childhood devoid of religion. Most of my close family members were not religious and the ones that were kept it to themselves and rarely showed any indication of it. Religion simply wasn’t something that was mentioned. When I was old enough to understand the concept I looked into it but ultimately came to the conclusion that it wasn’t something I believed in. I had already developed a set of moral codes without its influence. These moral codes were developed mostly through life experiences. For example, I didn’t enjoy it when people were mean to me so I choose not to be mean to others to spare them the negative feelings that I’ve experienced in the past. Although religion may be an influence over morality, there is no reason that morality requires any religion or God.
Free Will Exists
“The Atheistic idea that there is no God is founded on the idea of Materialism. The idea that this material world is all that there is, all that there was, and all that there ever will be. Because of that, Atheism has to suggest that you, as a person, don’t really have free will, that there is no being inside of your body or brain that is super matter, and what’s going on in your brain is just electrons bouncing around and you’re the product of those bounces, and you don’t really make decisions on your own, it’s just the physical laws and properties going on in your brain.” — Hamza El Bouzekraoui
I actually agree with the above statement for the most part. However, there is one thing that I want to clear up. It’s not that atheists believe that free will doesn’t exist; it’s that science says that free will likely doesn’t exist. Some atheists believe in free will and some don’t. Atheism and the belief in free will are not inherently linked.
Experiments attempting to prove whether free will does or does not exist have been fraught with hard-to-interpret results and heavy criticism on both sides of the argument. I suspect this is mostly due to concepts like free will being ill-defined and only understood at the surface level. We all understand the concept of free will intuitively but find it extremely difficult to put it into scientific terms which can be evaluated methodically and objectively.
“if you are reading this article of your own volition, then the fact of the matter is there has to be a God that can account for that freewill that you, as a person, have” — Hamza El Bouzekraoui
The above passage makes no sense from a logical point of view. It’s possible that determinists (who don’t believe in free will) will read Bouzekraoui’s article and conclude that they’ve done so as a result of a series of physical interactions beginning at the Big Bang. It’s also possible that people who do believe in free will are currently reading the article and believe they are doing so of their volition. In neither case is God necessary to explain why someone is or is not reading some internet article. It’s possible that free will, and consciousness in general, is also an emergent phenomenon just like life and weather. Perhaps living organisms become conscious only once they’ve developed to a certain level of complexity. It seems almost intuitive that consciousness and free will would be intimately linked together. Perhaps one day we will be able to definitely say that consciousness and free will are deterministic outcomes of the laws of physics. Perhaps we won’t. In any case, I see no reason that God has to exist to facilitate free will.
Final Thoughts
Although I suspected Bouzekraoui’s article was about Einstein at first, it turns out that the “most popular atheist” is in fact, Anthony Flew. Anecdotally, I couldn’t say that I had heard about Anthony Flew before reading this article. However, I must admit that I spend very little to no time researching prominent atheists or their works so that’s not very surprising. Here’s what I found out after a bit of reading.
Anthony Flew announced that he had transitioned from being an atheist to a deist in 2004 due to “recent scientific discoveries.” However, it is important to note that Flew’s newly acquired beliefs were not that of traditional Christianity or many of the other mainstream religions. For example, Flew didn’t believe in an afterlife or the resurrection of Jesus Christ. According to some sources, he had a particular distaste for Christianity and Islam.
Flew’s beliefs were best described by Aristotle’s description of the “prime mover” or “unmoved mover.” Aristotle posited that some “thing” existed which set all other things in the universe into motion without needing a cause of its own motion. The way it was described by Aristotle was mostly cosmological, but it seems like Flew’s idea of the prime mover also included properties like being all-powerful and all-knowing.
I find Flew’s arguments in favor of a God to be underwhelming at best. They center mostly around personal incredulity; mainly about how statistically unlikely it is that complex lifeforms could have formed by chance and how he personally cannot fathom such a thing happening.
Something important to note is that even extremely unlikely scenarios are almost guaranteed to occur eventually in a universe as big and as old as the one we find ourselves in. Neil deGrasse Tyson routinely shares an analogy that perfectly illustrates this concept. It goes something like this: Line up 1,000 people and give each of them a coin to flip. Everyone that gets tails sits down. Since roughly half the people will get tails, roughly half the people will sit down. There are about 500 people left. Tell them to flip a coin and have those that get tails sit down. Now there are 250 people left, then 125, then 60, 30, 15, 8, 4, and 2. Now that there are only two people remaining, it means that if one of them flips heads they’ve successfully flipped ten heads in a row. Although it’s unlikely for any one person to flip heads ten times in a row, it’s very likely that someone will do it during the demonstration.
Likewise, it’s very unlikely that any one particular planet would harbor life. But, because of the sheer amount of potentially habitable planets that exist in the vastness of the universe, it’s likely that it would happen to at least one of them. The anthropic principle states that we would necessarily find ourselves on one of the rare planets which was able to successfully harbor life. As I wrote about in my article The Distance Problem, it’s entirely possible, and according to some, probable, that the universe could be teeming with life but the sheer scale of the universe prevents our interactions.
While I may take a more pessimistic stance when it comes to how perfect the human form is, I take a very optimistic stance on the abiogenic formation of life.
It turns out that even when we let the evidence lead us to the conclusion, it’s possible to arrive at different destinations. While Bouzekraoui seems to see evidence of God everywhere they look, I tend to find acceptable answers to questions without the need for incorporating religious beliefs. When I am unable to find a satisfactory answer, I am okay with saying “I don’t know.” I’d rather not know why or how something happens than make up an answer without evidence. An answer simply for the sake of an answer is not real knowledge.
In the end, Bouzekraoui’s argument is the same “God of the gaps” argument that almost all religious apologists employ. The moment something isn’t directly answered by science it’s automatically God’s doing. Historically, this hasn’t been very dependable since the number of gaps in our knowledge continually shrinks over time, leaving ever-less room for God. In just a couple hundred years we’ve gone from looking at the night sky with our bare eyes and speculating about the heavenly bodies to sending spaceships to observe said bodies directly and telescopes capable of showing us galaxies and exoplanets we didn’t even know existed. I am very optimistic that, with enough time, humans will have the ability to figure out the entirety of the universe’s secrets, leaving no reason to employ God as a solution.
