From Publishers Weekly
Israeli physicist Schroeder extends the approach taken in previous works (Genesis and the Big Bang; The Science of God) by reviewing biological phenomena whose intricate complexity hints at "wisdom within wisdom" in the design of the universe. "If we could see within as easily as we see without, every aspect of existence would be an unfolding encounter with awe; almost a religious experience even for a secular spectator," he writes. Although Schroeder can claim no special expertise in cell biology or neuroscience, his enthusiasm and sense of wonder are personally engaging, and his metaphysical speculations reflect a wry humility that cannot be taken for granted in this genre. Schroeder writes in two moods, sometimes discerning the transcendent unity of the divine wisdom with unequivocal clarity, sometimes tracing the pattern only faintly and accentuating the continuing hiddenness of God. Although he expresses obvious impatience with orthodox Darwinism and the "materialist superstition" of hard-core reductionists like Richard Dawkins and Steven Pinker, he is gracious toward religious skeptics and often addresses them as his primary audience. While many in the scientific community have been openly distrustful of the "intelligent design" movement and suspicious of its (generally Christian) religious associations, Schroeder's professional stature and his nonliteralistic approach to the Bible may help him connect with a wider readership.
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Schroeder takes the widespread perception that science disproves religion and turns it on its head: from cosmology to neurology, the latest research makes sense only if viewed from a metaphysical perspective. The strict materialism that excludes all purpose, choice, and spirituality from the world simply cannot account for the data pouring in from labs and observatories. Nor can it explain the thrill of transcendence that occasionally pierces ordinary lives. Well schooled in the rigors of the sciences, Schroeder knows too much about natural complexity to try to wring some tidy set of doctrines out of the cosmos. Rather, it is an ineffable shiver of the divine, a deep-down stirring of wonder, that he discovers in the furthest reaches of quantum physics, glossed with the poetry of the Hebrew prophets and the mysteries of the kabbalah. At the heart of the cell, in the depths of the quasar, lies a deep wisdom encoded in a unified chain of information. Let rigid atheists and biblical literalists take a pass, but this book deserves widespread circulation among readers still alive to the hidden harmonies of the universe.
Bryce ChristensenCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
