With a Subtitle: What science cannot recreate about human identity reveals body, soul, and divine order

A brief Excerpt: Science says human teleportation is impossible, but that limitation points beyond physics. This article explores how the Christian worldview explains human identity, the soul, and God’s design better than science alone.

The Author is: Debra Hodges

Introduction

Star Trek fans know what the phrase “Beam me up, Scotty” means. It usually refers to an episode in which one or more crew members of the starship Enterprise need to be quickly removed from a dangerous situation or location. They are desperately hoping that the transporter device is working and the person operating it has them within range, so they can be safely transported back to the ship. In this article, let’s see how that phrase relates to real life and the Christian faith.

Background

I love YouTube science videos and was intrigued by this one by Richard Feynman on teleportation: The physics that makes teleporting a human impossible. Richard Feynman (1918–1988) was a Nobel Prize-winning American physicist renowned for his work in quantum electrodynamics and for his contributions to the Manhattan Project. [1] He was also an atheist and very adept at explaining complex topics in terms that the average person could easily understand. In his video, he explained the mechanics of teleporting a human to another location and the ramifications of the process.

Science Says You Cannot Be Copied

Human beings are more than physical matter. They are a bridge between the spiritual and the material (for more on this, please see my article Scientific Evidence for the Soul). Feynman concluded that human beings cannot be reduced to physical patterns and data because everything required to transfer and recreate the “7 billion billion billion atoms” in a human body would violate the laws of physics.

For example, he explained that to teleport someone, step one would be to scan every one of those atoms, and identify each one (carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, etc.), which would take more data than the storage capacity of every computer on the planet. After that, it would take the energy output of a large power plant running for about 200 years to convert the mass of an average human body into energy. And then, he said you would end up, not with a human being, but with some kind of soup. He went on to explain it would take longer than the age of the universe to transmit the blueprint of someone from point A to point B, and how difficult it would be to find the raw materials to rebuild the pattern into the original person, which he insisted wouldn’t be the original person at all, only a copy.

By now, you probably get the picture, but it’s fun to watch the video. Feynman goes into much more detail on why teleportation is impossible in so many ways, but most importantly, because of the Uncertainty Principle, a concept discovered by Werner Heisenberg. That’s the principle of quantum mechanics, which states that the position and momentum of a particle can’t both be known with precision. One variable will always be less precise than the other. [2]

What Human Teleportation Reveals About Christianity

We Are More Than Physical Matter

Feynman’s insight that a person can’t be reconstructed from purely physical information aligns with the Christian worldview in several important ways. The first way is the Bible teaches that we are composed of both body and soul, and that our identity is rooted in the image of God (the imago Dei), not in our atoms or DNA. The verses below indelibly stamp the truth that we are more than physical beings upon our minds.

Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. (Genesis 2:7, NIV)

What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? (Mark 8:36, NIV)

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell. (Matthew 10:28, NIV)

The Limits of Science Point to a Creator

The second way is how Feynman’s discoveries of the limitations of science actually point to the existence of a Creator of the universe. Dr. Hugh Ross agreed with Feynman’s conclusion in his article Is Teleportation Possible? He also showed that teleporting a human body is physically impossible because it would violate the laws of physics and the second law of thermodynamics (entropy). [3]

The recognition of each person’s uniqueness lends greater credibility to intelligent (even divine) design. The complexity and irreducibility of human life point to the work of an intelligent Creator rather than to random processes.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful; I know that full well. (Psalm 139:14, NIV)

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. (Psalm 19:1, NIV)

The Laws of Nature Reflect God’s Order

The third way is that the quantum and physical laws that make teleporting a human body impossible illustrate God’s order in the universe. By these consistent laws, a divine, rational Lawgiver is revealed, giving us the answer not only to how the world operates but also to why it exists at all (for His glory).

By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. (Hebrews 11:3, NIV)

He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Colossians 1:17, NIV)

Conclusion

Did Richard Feynman realize that his video laying out exactly why it’s impossible to teleport a human body actually highlights the basic tenets of Christianity? In his video, we see that humans are physical and made of atoms like everything else, but also spiritual in that they are made in God’s image. We also see how the physical limits of the laws of nature point to divine design and order, and we understand that Science can describe how creation operates, but only Scripture explains why it exists and what gives it meaning.

We know that what is impossible for man is entirely possible with God. He has no problem teleporting anyone, as we see in the Bible, in the lives of Enoch, Elijah, Jesus, and, eventually, us, as believers in His magnificent grace, mercy, and love.

Jesus replied, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.” (Luke 18:27, NIV)

References

1. Wikipedia contributors. (2026, April 12). Richard Feynman. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman
2. Sabine Hossenfelder. (2022, December 10). The uncertainty principle: what does it mean, how does it work? [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qC0UWxgyDD0
3. Reasons to Believe. (2022, November 4). Is teleportation possible? — Reasons to believe. https://reasons.org/explore/publications/questions-from-social-media/is-teleportation-possible