What’s the best explanation for the origin of life for atheists?

I just ordered the newest edition of “The Mystery of Life’s Origin“, which is a classic book on the origin of life by pro-design authors. The new edition has several new chapters. It reminded me of my interest in the origin of life when I was a younger man, just starting full-time work with a hot Internet start-up in the big city.

Back then, I liked to listen to debates about the origin of life (e.g. – Walter Bradley versus Robert Shapiro, etc.), as well as lectures and interviews. I ordered tons of academic lectures and debates, especially from Access Research Network. Two of my favorite interviews from ARN featured Dr. Charles Thaxton and Dr. Dean Kenyon.

Let’s start with Charles Thaxton’s interview.

And here are the questions:

1. How did you first get interested in the origin of life?
2. How did you come to write The Mystery of Life’s Origin with Walter Bradley and Roger Olsen?
3. Was there an advantage to having the three of you collaborate on the project?
4. What is the primary argument of your book, The Mystery of Life’s Origin?
5. Have scientists come close to developing a plausible naturalistic explanation to the origin of life or do you still consider the origin of life to be a mystery?
6. Do you see a particular irony in the timing of Stanley Miller’s experiments and the discovery of DNA by Watson and Crick?
7. How does the emergence of modern genetics tie in with the Darwinian scenario of life going from simple to complex?
8. What are the major problems with origin of life simulation experiments?
9. Isn’t it rather impressive that amino acids were produced in the Miller experiments?
10. How close is the development of amino acids to the threshold of life?
11. What are the steps involved in producing proteins from amino acids?
12. Why are amino acids isolated during this process?
13. How can the investigator affect the outcome of a simulation experiment?
14. How did you evaluate the different chemical evolution experiments?
15. Are the initial conditions in the simulation experiments plausible?
16. What did the earth’s early atmosphere contain?
17. Will the simulation experiments work with this atmosphere?
18. There seems to be an underlying assumption that the origin of life resulted without any intelligent input whatsoever yet the simulation experiments appear to rely upon intelligent guidance. Could you comment on this irony?
19. Are there any natural processes that would have filtered out destructive ultraviolet light?
20. What additional steps beyond creating amino acids would be required to develop life?
21. What is so difficult about making proteins or nucleic acids?
22. In addition to the energy problem in protein synthesis isn’t there a sequencing problem?
23. Are DNA sequences analogous to a written language?
24. Has Hubert Yockey made similar claims?
25. In The Mystery of Life’s Origin you refer to order, randomness, and specified complexity. Could you give us an overview of these concepts?
26. What do you think the presence of specified complexity in a living system indicates about its origin?
27. In inferring the necessity of intelligence to produce life haven’t you ventured from the realm of science to religion?
28. Could you summarize the reasons why you believe intelligence was involved in the origin of life?
29. What are the major objections to your current point of view?
30. How was The Mystery of Life’s Origin received by the scientific community?
31. What was Dean Kenyon’s response to your critiques of his book, Biochemical Predestination?
32. What was Dean Kenyon’s response to The Mystery of Life’s Origin?
33. Were you a bit apprehensive about meeting Kenyon after writing a book which was quite critical of his views in Biochemical Predestination?
34. Are self-organizational theories plausible?
35. Would you comment on the work done by Prigogine and Eigen?
36. What is your assessment of RNA scenarios?
37. What other problems do you see with an RNA world?

You can learn more about Charles Thaxton here.

And here’s the interview with Dean Kenyon:

And here are the questions:

1. What first interested you in biology and the origin of life? What is your academic background in this area?
2. What was your viewpoint on the origin of life when you wrote Biochemical Predestination?
3. How have your views on the origin of life changed since you wrote Biochemical Predestination?
4. Do many of your colleagues support your new position? If not, why not?
5. What are the general presuppositions that scientists make who study the origin of life?
6. What is the Oparin-Haldane hypothesis, and what role does it play in current research and teaching on the origin of life?
7. What are the major underlying assumptions of the Oparin (chemical evolution) hypothesis?
8. Are there any other important assumptions in origin of life theories?
9. How well are these assumptions supported by currently available scientific data?
10. What is your evaluation of the Miller type of simulation experiment? What do these experiments tell us about possible chemical events on the prebiotic Earth?
11. Is it possible that interfering cross-reactions might prevent life from arising naturalistically?
12. Stanley Miller’s pioneering work in the origin of life assumed a reducing atmosphere of methane, ammonia, water vapor, and carbon dioxide? Is there sufficient empirical support for this assumption?
15. How large a gap is there between the most complex “protocell” model and the simplest living cell?
16. What is the biologically relevant information content of the simplest living organism known to exist? What are estimates for a theoretical minimum information content of the first living cell?
17. How probable is it that such complexity could arise by undirected chemical processes?
19. What are the major unsolved problems in research on the origin of life?
20. What is the relevance of the Second Law of Thermodynamics to the origin of life?
21. Is it plausible that an “RNA world” was the precursor of the first living cells?
25. If life did not originate by chemical evolution on the primitive Earth, what other possible scientific explanations exist?
26. What do you mean by your statement that “perhaps scientism is more widespread than we like to think”?
27. Is it possible that natural processes are insufficient to account for the origin of all biological information?
28. Can science rule out the possibility that most biological information had an intelligent cause?
29. What alternatives are there to pursuing purely naturalistic explanations for the origin of life?
30. What do you mean by “intelligent design” as it relates to the origin of life?
31. Why is an intelligent design or creationist interpretation of scientific data bearing on origins not acceptable to many scientists?
32. What criteria could be used to determine if the information content of living organisms had an intelligent or natural cause?
34. Does academic freedom allow you to discuss the difficulties of scientific naturalism and origin of life theories? If not, why are they protected from criticism?
35. How should the origin of life be taught in light of the California Science Framework policy which states that “nothing in science or in any other field of knowledge shall be taught dogmatically”?
36. How is scientific progress impacted when critiques of current theories are suppressed?

You can learn more about Dean Kenyon here.

The challenge for naturalists posed by the origin of life makes it well worth your time to learn and understand. I used to explain this argument to my entire IT department on white boards when I was a young man. It’s fascinating, and more convincing than personal testimonies or abstract philosophical arguments. Although I read books on the origin of life, I learned how to present the information as an argument by watching the interviews above over and over.

People sometimes ask me how I was able to survive 22 years in IT with my theism intact. It turns out that there are no shortcuts to a theistic worldview. You have to support it with evidence. You have to be able to show your work about how you reached your conclusions. I’m a theist today because I never found a single atheist in any software development job who could even begin to challenge the evidence that I collected from listening to all those lectures and debates that I started from in my early 20s. It was as easy to defeat them as taking candy from a baby.

If only Christian parents and Christian leaders understood the importance of scientific facts when they talk to young people about Christianity. We need to be less worried about hurting the feelings of young people by making them “feel dumb”. Christianity isn’t supposed to be easy. It’s not a bad thing to ask people to work hard at learning how to rationally ground it with evidence. If we want to stop our young people from being lazy, ignorant and cowardly, then the right way to do it is to make them work. Make them learn. Make them fight.

My reply to a Christian feminist’s view of marriage and parenting

I got a comment below on the post I wrote about Christian men preferring women with STEM degrees for marriage. I felt that I needed to say something strict about this woman’s comment, because I am seeing her attitude everywhere among Christian women. Although I am more forgiving about her views in private, I think it’s important to be hard on her in public.


Her comment (she’s “thoughtfullady”) is here:

This was an interest post to read. I am a christian woman myself in STEM. I understand the pros and cons, I agree with some of your views and disagree with some others.
In today’s world its hard to sustain a family with only one stream of income, plus, a woman’s life does not revolve around a man anymore, at least in the western and european countries, so if or when I get married, I do not think I would leave my job temporarily ( 3 years or so) or permanently to raise children and attend to my husband all the time, its not financially sustainable in the middle and long term for a household unless the man I marry is earning more than enough for all of us. Yes, I will do my very best to spend good quality time with my family. I believe also that most of the education load should not go into the woman, at least not in modern days, fathers play an equally important role as mothers in their children’s education and science has proved this.

Regarding literacy, I liked the comment above relating to how the disciples were fishermen and I agree. Jesus picked some illiterate men to follow him just as the word says in 1 Corinthians 1:28, and I paraphrase, that from the ‘weak, base and despised, God chose people to bring shame to the wise’. The disciples, the educated ones and the not so educated ones, stood up to the Pharisees with knowledge of spiritual revelation not their background careers.
No matter how much worldly preparation you or your spouse have in science, children must be trained in the word of God, remember that most of the ideologies that we have are ‘based in science’ (erratically obviously) but NO matter how much scientific evidence on the knowledge of God we have, these people will not accept it because of their hardened hearts. Instead we’ve got to teach children to stay strong in their faith so they don’t fall into the mainstream movements while standing their ground in their convictions.

On the other hand, something that sticks to my mind is how you mentioned that most likely women in STEM would probably not finish college as virgins due to the environment that is found there. I would like to give you some advice in that: virginity is not a virtue in women, nor will make a woman a better or a worse wife, it only shows that either she made the decision/commitment (religion related or not) to remain that way or didn’t have the opportunity to engage in that activity, and yes, it happens. Remember sexual sin is as every other sin that anyone can fall into and forgiveness is available, the Bible puts it in par it with the liars and witchcraft in Revelations. Remember we are in front of a Holy God and even for the little everyday lies that we tell, Jesus had to die on the cross. Something I learned was not to categorise sin because all of them are equal in the eyes of God even if they bring different human or spiritual consequences to us. If you meet a woman who ticks all your wifey prospect boxes that previously felt into that trap and she asked for forgiveness and is walking on a new journey of sanctification, it would be very unwise of you to say no to her just because she didn’t remain a virgin.

Otherwise kudos to you for wanting to have a family that is Christ-centerd, very important specially now in the times we live, drowned in confusion and self absorbency! God bless you!

And here is my harsh response to her.


Thank you for this thoughtful comment, thoughtful lady.

In today’s world its hard to sustain a family with only one stream of income, plus, a woman’s life does not revolve around a man anymore, at least in the western and european countries, so if or when I get married, I do not think I would leave my job temporarily ( 3 years or so) or permanently to raise children and attend to my husband all the time, its not financially sustainable in the middle and long term for a household unless the man I marry is earning more than enough for all of us.

So, the first thing to say is that the reason that it is hard to sustain a family on one income is because we have a massive welfare state that has been put in place to support women making decisions according to the Sexual Revolution worldview, as opposed to the Judeo-Christian worldview. Many of the social programs now in effect, e.g. – taxpayer-funded contraceptives, taxpayer-funded abortions, taxpayer-funded daycare, taxpayer-funded public schools, anti-male divorce courts, taxpayer-funded health care, etc. were put in place in order to make choosing a good man “optional” for a woman. Basically, following the introduction of birth control and abortion, feminists decided to embark on a course of pursuing hot bad boys – even if those hot bad boys would not commit to them before sex. They focused entirely on the man’s appearance, and spurned men with exclusive convictions on religion and morality. These feminists delayed marriage, because they wanted validation from the bad boys. They wanted to pursue careers and buy shiny junk, rather than to build up a husband and produce influential children. That’s why we have a hook-up culture today. Feminists wanted to be free to pursue men based on their appearance, in order to get validation through sex. The welfare state – along with affirmative action, no-fault divorce, etc. – are just what feminists vote for in order to make their plan “work out”.

A good paper on how women’s suffrage led to a massive expansion in government:

Here is a good example of an ex-Christian woman following the sex with bad boys validation plan:

Yes, I will do my very best to spend good quality time with my family.

Well, if a woman outsources the raising of her children to daycares, public schools, etc. then family isn’t a priority for her. And men know that. Men who are interested in having children raised with a Christian worldview will pass career women by, since this is important to us. I’m not interested in what a woman says about things. Her actions tell me what her priorities are. If a woman values career, then secular leftists will be raising her kids. Expressing hopes and desires and wishes won’t save her children from apostasy. I am seeing children getting sexually assaulted, indoctrinated, bullied, transed, etc. in the facilities provided by the secular left welfare state. If a woman goes to work, then she is leaving her kids to that.

I believe also that most of the education load should not go into the woman, at least not in modern days, fathers play an equally important role as mothers in their children’s education and science has proved this.

My job is to earn the money so that my wife can stay home and teach the children. I cannot teach the children while I am working full time. And neither can the woman. What men understand from women who want full-time careers after having children is that the children will be raised by people in daycares and schools who don’t have the worldview of the parents. I’m not marrying anyone to let someone else raise my kids. Raising children is an important part of marriage plan, and I want someone competent to do it. If I could do it, I would. That’s one reason why I need a wife – to do this important job.

No matter how much worldly preparation you or your spouse have in science, children must be trained in the word of God, remember that most of the ideologies that we have are ‘based in science’ (erratically obviously) but NO matter how much scientific evidence on the knowledge of God we have, these people will not accept it because of their hardened hearts.

Today, effective defending of the faith begins with evidence: science and history. The first question that comes up when discussing Christianity with a non-Christian is “how do you know that God even exists?” If the woman’s answer is “the word of God”, just know that this is not going to work on an atheist. There is no word of God without God, and she cannot derive God from appealing to the word of God, since God must exist before communicating through the Bible. I want my children to be the ones who make advances in philosophy, science and history, so people learn from them how to defend God’s existence and character. Illiterate fishermen who saw Jesus were good enough witnesses 2000 years ago. There are no people today who saw Jesus. Illiterate fishermen will not be able to have an influence in the university or the workplace or the public square. When feminists elevate illiterate fishermen over children who are educated and trained in logic and scientific evidence, it just means that her children will have no influence for Christ. And no Christian man takes on the costs and risks of marriage for that outcome. We are interested in serving God, and if we can’t have a marriage and children that serve God effectively, we will settle for less influence for God as single men.

See this recent study:

I would like to give you some advice in that: virginity is not a virtue in women, nor will make a woman a better or a worse wife…

I think most women who accept feminism and the Sexual Revolution denigrate virginity, even though the Bible says that sex before marriage is morally wrong. Christian men infer from this denigration of virginity that the woman doesn’t accept the Bible. We understand that she forms her beliefs about relationships, marriage, and parenting from feelings and peer approval – from the secular left culture. Men understand that she does not read any scientific papers about sex, marriage, parenting and divorce to confirm what the Bible teaches. Men like me know the effect that premarital sex has on the future stability of a marriage. We read books and scientific papers about what children need from mothers and fathers in order to develop properly. And we know how that the instability caused by promiscuity costs us (in divorce courts) and costs the children (effects of divorce on children). It is extremely inadvisable for a Christian man to make a legal commitment of his time and resources to a non-virgin. We have to make sure that our choice of mate is suitable for the plan to make the marriage serve God. It’s called “equal yoking”.

See these recent studies:

Remember sexual sin is as every other sin that anyone can fall into and forgiveness is available, the Bible puts it in par it with the liars and witchcraft in Revelations.

Most women today who follow the Sexual Revolution instead of the Bible say that all sins are equal. They say “if God forgives me for this minor, minor sin, then what right does a man have to withhold marriage from me?”. Here is how marriage-minded men like me respond to this. First, most women who ask for forgiveness do it to feel good and to escape judgment by their peers. They don’t believe any harm has been done to the husband, despite the studies falsifying that. There is no genuine forgiveness for someone who thinks they have done nothing wrong. The goal of women mentioning forgiveness is to avoid being judged, and avoid missing out on marriage because men hold them accountable for their past actions. A woman’s past actions define her present character. She cannot make a new character in a split second, without having read anything to change her mind about her past views, and put her new views on display in new actions that honor chastity and marriage. Second, even if she sincerely repents, and God forgives her, that means nothing to a man with respect to marriage. Suppose a woman wastes all of her 20s and 30s partying and having recreational sex with hot, no-commitment bad boys. Suppose she sincerely repents of that, and ask God for forgiveness, and she gets forgiven by him. That does not make her attractive to a man who is looking for a helper to support him in his marriage plan. Marriage plans start at age 20, not age 40. Her repentance at age 40 does not help him in any way, since she was not there during those early years of his life to support him and raise his children and impact the world for Christ. He will also have to deal with the effects of her promiscuity even if God forgives her. The damage from promiscuity can be fixed, but not without a lot of time and effort on books and studies. Time and effort he could be putting into more important Kingdom work. In my experience, most women today have no interest in reforming their minds about their previous mistakes using books and studies. Their idea of forgiveness is just demanding it in order to escape judgment, and to avoid being held accountable for their actions. They hate the idea that they are losing out on something now, because of selfish, irresponsible behavior in the past. That has to be worked through or she’s not safe to marry.

For more on the motivation to call all sins equal:

For more on how men are right to reject non-virgins for marriage:

I hope this comment is helpful for you, and I really hope that the next generation of women rejects feminism, careerism, and sexual promiscuity so that men will be interested in marrying them.


Here’s a good video that is representative of what Christian women are like, these days, when men present them with a marriage plan and expectations about how they should prepare for marriage:

No good man who has a plan for marriage that does damage to secularism, feminism, socialism, etc. is going to marry a woman like this, who just sees relationships as a tool for making herself feel good, and who is entirely beholden to the culture. Men want their marriage and children to count for God. We don’t marry women who are obsessed with feeling good and being liked.

I feel I need to set them straight about their suitability and entitlement with respect to the marriage enterprise, and I hope my reply does that. These women can marry all the weak low-value non-Christian soy boys who will take them. They aren’t ever going to get a serious Christian man to sign them up for marriage.

LGBT fascism: father imprisoned for calling his biological child “daughter”

I have a lot to say about this story, so I’ll be brief in re-capping the facts.

The back story from Post Millennial:

H00g1and discovered that the school had been showing his daughter SOGI 123, the going sexual and gend3r identity education materials in British Columbia which amounts to tr4nsgend3r ideology “propaganda videos.” In the grade 7 yearbook, the child was referred to by a different name. The school counsellor changed the child’s name without telling her parents. The school “socially tr4nsitioned” the biologically female child on its own initiative, with the input of a gend3r ideologue psychologist, Dr. Wa11ace W0ng.

When H00g1and accompanied his child to a consultation with W0ng, the psychologist advised the pubescent child to take testosterone. W0ng referred the child to the endocrinology unit at the local hospital. Meanwhile, H00g1and was looking for mental health solutions to help the child without drugs.

On the child’s first visits to the hospital, a treatment plan was put into action. Both the child, and her mother—H00gland’s ex-wife—signed a consent form which explicitly stated that the “treatment” was experimental, meaning that the endocrinologists recommending the treatment didn’t know the long-term health impact.

A gend3r identity activist lawyer, B4rb4r4 Find1ey, represented the child in court. Justice B0den decided that the child’s best interests lay in destroying her long-term health to make her body appear more like that of a male.

H00gland, in contrast, thinks his daughter’s best interests lie in preserving his child’s health, in case his child ends up among the estimated 85 percent of children who desist in their belief that they are the opposite sex once puberty ends.

You can read more about W0ng here.

And here is the latest:

[A] warrant was issued by a judge for the arrest of a father after calling his biological female child his “daughter,” and referring to her with the pronouns “she” and “her.” H00g1and was found to be in contempt of court.

H00g1and is a father to a gend3r non-conforming biological female 14-year-old who identifies as tr4nsgend3r and prefers the use of male pronouns. H00g1and has repeatedly called this person his daughter, though the court has forbade it.

On Tuesday… .He was the arrested and jailed. The warrant was issued by Judge T4mmen on March 4, 2021.

H00g1and opposes his child’s undergoing “gend3r affirmative” medical procedures, and has stated this opposition again and again, in the hope of saving his child from irreversible harm. The Canadian medical system, the legal system, and the child’s mother press ahead with social and medical tr4nsition of the child.

On December 14, 2020, H00g1and was compelled by Justice M4rz4ri’s court to collude in the gend3r “tr4nsitioning” of his fourteen year old daughter and told not to call his biological female child his daughter. In response, H00g1and made a Charter challenge engaging his right to freedom of speech.

Unfortunately, there is no freedom of speech nor freedom of religion in Canada. They simply do not exist, because regardless of what is on paper, the taxpayer-funded judges and politicians who run Canada are secular left fascists – the same kind who have been at the head of Marxist governments in other times and places that resulted in so much suppression of liberty and human rights. When it comes to human rights, Canada has more in common with North Korea than it does with the United States of America.

You might remember that I recently blogged about a Canadian man who was forced to pay $50,000 a month to a woman that he never married, had children with or even lived with. And another Canadian man who was taken to court for grounding his daughter, and a female judge ruled against him. I think I would feel very discouraged about getting married in Canada. Having a family seems to expose you to people in power who have nothing but contempt for male leadership in the home.

Canada is notorious for letting sexual deviants into positions of power. Canada also had an education minister who championed the sexual exploitation of children in their education curriculum who was also arrested for child pornography. Why not just assume that EVERY secular leftist who talks about tolerance and compassion in public is privately involved in abusing children OR approves of it? How many times must children suffer before we see things as they really are?

Fourth and finally, it’s important to understand that secular leftists who are involved in promoting evil tend to respond to disagreement with fascism. Canada currently has a publication ban on any stories about government overriding the rights of parents. They use ARMED POLICE and IMPRISONMENT to restrict speech that criticizes many of the priorities of the secular left, e.g. – abortion, infanticide, tr4nsgenderism, g4y rights, etc. They are not afraid to use coercive methods. I have blogged about people on the secular left using doxing, termination of employment, boycotts, vandalism, violence, and even DOMESTIC TERRORISM (in the case of the g4y activist who attacked the Family Research Council building with a GUN). These methods are either performed by OR approved by secular leftists. Don’t expect them to respect your liberties and human rights, because there are no God-given liberties or human rights in a naturalistic / materialist universe. And in a naturalist / materialist universe, anything goes for a secular left fascist trying to feel good and get peer approval.