There are only two possible theories for life’s origin: blind chance or intentional design.
The problem for naturalists is that the more we learn about life, the more impossible their theory becomes.
But just how unlikely is it?
Here’s why life is 100% designed🧵
How Simple Can a Cell Be?
To determine how unlikely life is to arise without a mind, we must first ask “how simple can a cell be and still survive?”
In 2016, scientists at the J. Craig Venter Institute created JCVI-syn3.0, the simplest self-replicating cell ever made. They stripped away every gene that wasn’t absolutely necessary for survival.
Here’s what they found:
•The cell still needed 473 genes in total.
•438 of those genes coded for 438 distinct, functional proteins, each one a precision molecular engine built from amino acids.
•Every one of those proteins was essential for the cell to live, metabolize, and reproduce. Remove any of them, and the cell would die.
From this study we can safely say that 400 distinct functional proteins is the bare minimum for life.
So how easy is it to get these proteins?
Not easy at all.
Proteins are chains of amino acids that must fold into precise 3D shapes to work. If the fold is wrong, then the amino acids fall apart and the protein is useless.
Studies show that the odds of getting a single functional protein fold from random amino acids are about 1 in 10⁷⁷ (Axe, Journal of Molecular Biology, 2004).
To help you understand how large this number is, the number of particles in our observable universe is about 10^80.
That means the odds of mindlessly assembling just one functional protein is almost as small as the odds of a blind man picking out the one marked atom from the entire observable universe.
But it’s even worse than that, because we don’t just need one protein… we need at least 400.
And it’s even worse than that, because just finding a protein isn’t enough, it has to be a protein that has the correct function for that cell, otherwise it’s junk or it can even damage the system.
If the odds of finding even one functional protein are 1 in 10^77, what do you think the odds are of mindlessly finding 400 correct functional proteins all at the same time and in the same place?
But it’s even worse than that.
Even if you have 400 proteins that all happened to fold together in the exact right ways to allow the cell to function… you still need DNA to make more of these proteins.
Before we talk about the information stored in DNA, just getting the raw molecule “DNA” to form on its own—in nature and with no help—is basically impossible. This is because DNA is made of special building blocks called nucleotides, and they have to link up in exactly the right way, like snapping together thousands of Lego pieces without a guide, instructions, or even a flat surface.
These building blocks don’t naturally form in the right shape and the pieces have to line up perfectly, all in the same “handedness,” or it falls apart.
So how likely is it for the DNA molecule to form naturally?
Imagine you dumped out a box of puzzle pieces—not just one puzzle, but 500,000 pieces from 10,000 puzzles all mixed together. Then you waited for the wind to blow them all correctly into place. That’s about how likely it is for a single strand of DNA to form by chance.
And this is JUST to get the DNA to form correctly.
But we don’t JUST need the DNA to form… we also need it to be correctly sequenced so it can create more proteins. Without DNA correctly sequenced, the already existing 400 proteins can’t be renewed or replicated and the cell will die.
The sequence of bases in DNA (A, T, C, G) must be arranged just right to code for functional proteins.
If even a single codon (3-base sequence) is incorrect in the wrong place, it can render the resulting protein nonfunctional or even toxic. This means only a tiny fraction of all possible DNA sequences will produce anything remotely useful.
Imagine tossing half a million Scrabble tiles out of an airplane and expecting them to land on the ground spelling the entire instruction manual for a self-replicating robot. No typos, all the grammar correct, and every page in order… it’s like that.
But it’s still even worse…
In order to make proteins, you need DNA, but in order to use the DNA to make the proteins… you need dozens of already existing proteins.
This means—like a mouse trap—life is irreducibly complex. You need proteins and DNA to both form correctly, in the same place and at the same time, independently… the chances of this happening without a mind are unfathomably remote.
And it’s even worse than this…
You also need this to happen within a cell membrane.
Even if you had all the pieces of life, like DNA and proteins, they would be completely useless without something to hold them together and protect them. That “something” is called a cell membrane.
A cell membrane is like the skin of a water balloon. It keeps all the important stuff inside and keeps the bad stuff out. Without it, everything would just float away or fall apart.
But here’s the problem: making a working membrane without help is really hard. The special fats that make it are complex and don’t form easily in nature. And real membranes also need tiny machines built into them to let food in and waste out. Those machines are proteins. But remember, proteins can’t be made unless you already have DNA and other proteins working together inside the membrane.
So you need the membrane to hold the proteins and DNA, but you also need the proteins and DNA to make the membrane. It’s like needing the lid of a jar to store the pieces that make the lid. It doesn’t work unless it’s all there at once.
This video explains how difficult it is to make a cell membrane
This is why evolutionists (people that claim life is not the product of design) are now arguing that evolution and abiogenesis are two completely different and unrelated theories… because the more we learn about life the more impossible their naturalist theory becomes.
So, if the odds that life is the product of mindless unintentional processes are functionally 0%, how likely is it that life is the product of an intelligent, intentional cause?
100%
The case against naturalism is overwhelmingly strong.
If you want to help more people see why, please retweet this thread
One of the most popular moral beliefs in the modern world, especially among atheists, is that morality is subjective.
What’s right or wrong, they say, isn’t written into the fabric of the universe.
There’s no objective standard, no divine law, no transcendent good.
Morality, in this view, is just a human invention, shaped by culture, emotion, and social contract.
What’s “right” in one culture might be “wrong” in another.
There are no objective moral truths, only preferences and local agreements between people.
That’s it.
This view is often called moral relativism or cultural relativism, and it’s easy to see why it appeals to people today.
It sounds tolerant. It avoids uncomfortable judgments.
It tells us we can all live our truth without forcing it on others.
But is that really what we believe?
Does this theory really capture our moral experience?
This question was formally asked and answered 80 years ago…
After the Second World War, the world was horrified by the crimes committed by the Nazis. The systematic slaughter of six million Jews, the execution of political prisoners, the abuse of civilians, the inhumane experiments, they waged a total war waged on conscience itself. When the Allies won, they put the leaders of Nazi Germany on trial for crimes against humanity. These became known as the Nuremberg Trials.
Surprisingly, the Nazi leaders didn’t deny that they had done these things. In fact, many of them openly admitted to it. What they denied was that they had done anything wrong.
“We were only following orders.”
“We were acting according to the laws of our country.”
“You have your laws, and we have ours. Who are you to judge us?”
That was their defense.
In other words, they made the same argument that today’s moral subjectivists and relativists make. They claimed that morality is just a construct of society and law. And since Nazi Germany made these actions legal under their own system, they were not morally culpable. They weren’t “murderers.” They were patriots. Bureaucrats. Soldiers. Loyal Germans doing what was considered right in their culture.
And if morality is subjective and relative, they were right.
If morality really is subjective or culturally relative, then there is no ultimate moral standard we can appeal to. We can’t condemn the Holocaust. It might be emotionally offensive to us. It might be unpopular. But “wrong”?
No.
That’s why Chief U.S. Prosecutor Robert H. Jackson delivered one of the most important statements in legal and moral history. He said:
“The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their being repeated. They are wrong whether or not the particular nation which committed them is in the dock.”
He went on to declare that there exists a law above the law, a moral standard that transcends all national laws, all cultural customs, all societal norms. This moral law is not made by man and cannot be undone by man. It is higher than Hitler, higher than America, higher than every government and every opinion. And it is only on that transcendent moral ground that the Nuremberg trials could stand.
Because if there is no such law, if there is no God and no transcendent moral standard, then the Nazi defense stands.
Ben argues that because every brain state has a complete physical cause, there’s no need for the mind. But this assumes that the brain is a closed system governed solely by physical causes… which is materialism.
But “materialism is true” is the very thing Ben needs to demonstrate.
Right now he’s not arguing for materialism. He’s assuming it.
That’s textbook question begging.
2. Ben Conflates Necessity with Sufficiency.
Ben argues:
“The mind, if it moves the brain, must act through matter, for each neural state proceeds from one complete and physical cause, with no redundant force in parallel.”
In other words, he’s saying:
“If the mind is going to influence the brain, it must interact physically—but we already have a full physical explanation, so there’s no room (or need) for a non-physical cause.”
This line of reasoning completely misses the nature of what’s being claimed about the mind.
Here’s why:
Imagine someone says, “Every movement of the tongue and vocal cords has a physical cause, so we don’t need to posit a mind to explain speech.”
Would that follow? No. Tongues don’t compose sentences. Vocal cords don’t understand grammar. They are instruments, not origins. The movement of atoms and muscles is necessary* to get speech, but it is not sufficient* to get speech. Atoms and muscles alone would never cause a tongue to make meaningful speech.
Likewise, the fact that brain states involve electrochemical processes doesn’t mean those processes are self explanatory. A mind could very well use the brain, just like a speaker uses vocal cords. And yes, a speaking agent must interact with matter in order to speak, but that doesn’t mean the agent is reducible to matter.
The error here is assuming that if we can find a necessary condition for something to be the case, then that explanation is also sufficient to explain the phenomenon. Ben is conflating these two concepts.
That’s what he believed.
Until… his heart stopped.
That’s when he experienced something he never believed in: Hell
This is the story of Howard Storm 🧵
Like most college professors today, Howard was a convinced atheist.
“I was a professor at Northern Kentucky University. I was the chairman of the art department. I was a hardcore atheist. I believed the physical world was all that existed. There was no soul, no afterlife, no God. Religion was for weak people.”
But in 1985, during a trip to Paris, everything changed.
He suddenly collapsed from a perforated stomach and was rushed to the hospital. While waiting for surgery, he slipped out of consciousness to find himself outside of his body.
“I was standing next to the bed, watching my wife cry and seeing my body lying there. But I was very much alive. More alive than I’d ever felt before.”
Over the past century, serious philosophical arguments have exposed this view as incoherent.
These arguments are so strong that even many atheists have abandoned materialism.
Here are 𝐟𝐢𝐯𝐞 of the most powerful, starting with zombies 🧟 🧵
1. The Zombie Argument
Imagine there’s a person exactly like you in every conceivable way. They walk like you, talk like you, and have a brain identical to yours down to the last atom.
But they have no inner experience.
No feelings.
No awareness.
No qualia.
They say “I’m in pain,” but they don’t actually feel pain.
They describe the color red, but never experience redness.
They act conscious, but there’s nothing it’s like to be them.
This is the concept of the philosophical zombie, a being physically identical to a conscious human, but completely devoid of consciousness.
David Chalmers uses this thought experiment to challenge materialism. He writes:
“It is conceivable that there be a creature physically identical to me, but without conscious experience. If so, then consciousness is not physical.”
(The Conscious Mind, 1996)
If such a zombie is logically possible, then consciousness cannot be identical to physical brain states. You could recreate the entire brain and still leave out the mind.
The zombie argument doesn’t claim zombies exist, it just claims they are possible in principle. And that’s enough.
Because if the mind were nothing but the brain, then any physical duplicate would necessarily have consciousness. The very fact that we can coherently imagine a zombie shows that consciousness must be something more.
The brain can explain behavior, but it cannot explain experience. And unless materialism can account for what it’s like to be you, it leaves the most essential part of you out of the picture.
2. The Knowledge Argument (Frank Jackson)
Imagine a scientist named Mary who has lived her entire life in a black-and-white room. She’s never seen color, but she’s the world’s leading expert on color vision.
She knows every physical fact there is to know about wavelengths, neural firings, optics, brain chemistry. She even knows exactly what happens in the brain when someone sees red.
Then one day, Mary steps outside her black and white room and she sees a red rose for the first time.
And in that moment, she learns something new.
She learns what it’s like to see red.
This is Frank Jackson’s famous thought experiment, and it raises a simple but devastating question for materialism:
If Mary already knew ALL the physical facts, but still learned something new upon seeing red, then there must be more to consciousness than physical facts.
In Jackson’s words:
“It seems just obvious that she will learn something about the world and our visual experience of it. But then is it inescapable that her previous knowledge was incomplete. But she had all the physical information. Ergo, there is more to have than that, and Physicalism is false.”
(Epiphenomenal Qualia, 1982)
The conclusion is unavoidable: physical science can describe the mechanics of vision, but it cannot capture the experience of seeing.
Mary’s story shows that subjective consciousness, aka qualia, is a kind of knowledge irreducible to brain states. You can know all the objective data about what’s happening in someone’s brain, and still not know what they’re experiencing.
If experience goes beyond the physical, then so does the mind.
The second law of thermodynamics states that in any natural process, the total entropy of a system tends to increase over time. In simpler terms, things fall apart. Systems move from order to disorder unless there is something actively working against that tendency. Usable energy is lost, and complexity breaks down. This is why living things die, machines rust, and buildings decay. The observation describes what appears to be an unavoidable reality of physical systems.
This presents a serious challenge for any worldview that seeks to explain the origin of life and complexity using only time, chance, and natural processes. If all matter tends toward disorder, how did something as orderly and complex as life arise from non-life? How did blind physical forces, without intention or intelligence, generate the astonishing information systems found in even the simplest cell?
When confronted with this, many atheists offer a quick reply: “The Earth is not a closed system. It gets energy from the sun. The second law doesn’t apply here.”
At first glance, that seems like a good answer. It’s true that Earth receives a massive amount of energy from the sun. But this response does not solve the problem. It actually misses the entire point.
The second law does not require that a system be perfectly closed in order to observe entropy increase. What it says is that, without a mechanism to harness and direct energy toward a goal, systems will naturally degrade over time. The availability of energy does not stop the law from applying. In fact, when that energy is undirected, it often accelerates disorder.
Energy alone is not the same as order. To make that distinction clear, consider a simple analogy.
Imagine a room filled with Lego bricks. Some are scattered randomly, and a few are arranged in a basic structure. Now imagine we turn on a bright light in the room so that it receives a steady supply of energy. We then leave the room sealed for 10 billion years.
What should we expect to find when we return?
Would we expect the Legos to have gradually assembled themselves into an enormous mansion? Would the energy from the light have created greater structure and complexity?
Of course not. We would expect the opposite. The orderly structures would collapse, the plastic would degrade, and everything would move toward greater disorder. The light adds energy, but it does not arrange the bricks. It doesn’t create information or impose structure. Without a mechanism to guide that energy toward an organized result, the natural outcome is decay.
In fact, what if we reversed the experiment and froze the Legos for 10 billion years? Would we expect more or less disorder, compared to the room receiving energy from the light source? Clearly, we would expect to see less entropy. The absence of energy actually helps preserve the current structure. This shows that adding energy often increases entropy, not the other way around. Raw energy without direction tends to accelerate disorder.
The same is true on Earth. Yes, the sun gives us energy. But that energy is not structured, intelligent, or purposeful. It does not contain instructions. Without a system already in place to receive, process, and direct that energy, the sun should be speeding up entropy, not reversing it.
To put the absurdity of the atheist response in perspective: it would be like walking along a beach, seeing a detailed sandcastle, and saying, “Well, the sun has been shining here for four billion years. That must be how the sandcastle formed.”
No one would believe that. We all intuitively know that structure and design require more than energy, they require intention, arrangement, and information. Energy might dry the sand, harden the surface, or create random movement, but it does not stack grains of sand into turrets and moats.
This is the core problem with the atheist response. Saying “the Earth gets energy from the sun” does not explain how life arose. It merely restates that energy is available. But the second law is not about whether energy exists. It’s about what happens to systems over time without direction. Without guidance, energy disperses. Order breaks down. Complexity erodes. A dirty room will happen on its own. A clean room requires a cleaner. It requires a mind.
Life is not a chaotic pile of energized matter. Life is made of functional, information-based systems, molecular machines, DNA instructions, cellular networks, and self-repairing processes. These are precisely the things the second law says should not arise spontaneously. They require organization, planning, and coding. And they decay over time without input. The claim that they emerged naturally because the Earth “gets energy from the sun” is not an explanation. It is a deflection.