The Simplest Living Cells Are Incredibly Complex

Fact: no scientist in the world has ANY idea how the first cells were formed. The more we learn about the simplest cells, the greater the mystery becomes

Scientists are still just beginning to understand the complexities of living cells. The number of chemical processes, and the range of features within cells are enormously complex.

The tiniest of bacterial cells weighs less than a trillionth of a gram. Nonetheless, it contains thousands of intricately designed pieces of molecular organizations, made up of some 100 thousand million (100,000,000,000) atoms. This is a structure far more complicated than any machine ever made by human hands.

In Darwin’s time, the technology for studying cells was limited to ordinary optical microscopes. The details within the cell were not clearly visible, and scientists assumed cells were just small bits of protoplasm, proteins surrounded by an outer surface. The question of how cells perform the multitude of functions that govern the complex internal biochemistry didn’t concern them very much. They were expecting simple answers to what they assumed were simple questions.

With the invention of the electron microscope, we now have the ability to see and study the intricate details of cells. The field of microbiology was born.

“Between a living cell and the most highly ordered non-biological systems, such as a crystal or a snowflake, there is a chasm as vast and absolute as it is possible to conceive.” Geneticist Michael Denton, PhD.

“Anyone who tells you that he or she knows how life started on earth some 3.45 billion years ago is a fool or a knave.” Dr. Stuart Alan Kauffman (M. D., theoretical biologist)

When Charles Darwin wrote “The Origin of the Species”, he clearly stated that it did not explain how the first living cells appeared, and that he assumed other scientists would find the answer. Darwin’s theory began with the assumption that simple cells somehow existed, and then mutated into more complex organisms; those mutants that had a better chance of survival and reproduction evolved into more advanced creatures. There was no knowledge of genetics at that time, and his theory was based only on the external features of the various creatures.

Now, over 150 years later, we know a lot more about cells but we still have no idea whatsoever of how the first cells appeared. The more we learn, the more difficult it becomes to imagine a way that living cells could be formed by any known natural causes.

After Dr. Stephen C. Meyer wrote his first book, “Signature of the Cell”, he received letters from numerous scientists, saying “you don’t have to convince us that cells are far too complex to have been formed by random chemical processes. We already know that.”

The amazing complexity of the simplest cells is just part of the story. Keep reading for mystery #5, where it becomes even more extraordinary.