Customer Reviews

Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design

5 star:		(235)
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2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(49)

 

 

I come to this book with two peeves, one pet, the other a stray that is beginning to wear out its welcome.

My pet peeve is fanatics who attack ID out of ideological compulsion, rather than using the "think" cells hidden deep within their brains to evaluate and argue. That includes most of the reviewers who gave the book 1 or 2 stars so far. Meyer, we are told, is "lazy," a "creationist," "idiot," "fraud," and "liar" who hawks "error-prone" "snake-oil," "gobbledygook," "pseudo-science." We should read Richard Dawkins new Greatest Show on Earth instead (I did -- it isn't about the origin of life, you numbskulls). One "reviewer" blasts the book after reading four sentences, and gets 69 of 128 "helpful" votes. Another "reviews" the first few pages and calls Meyer a liar.

Hardly any negative reviews even try to point to any scientific errors. Two exceptions: reviews by A Miller and K. M. Sternberg are worth reading. Sternberg's is particularly eloquent. (Though having written a couple books on the historical Jesus, I tend to wonder about the objectivity, awareness, and / or good sense of someone who thinks there is no evidence for the life of Jesus!)

My second peeve is a growing dislike for the way Discovery Institute often packages its arguments. I visited DI a year ago when another ID book came out -- I won't name it, seeing no need to embarrass the author. His presentation essentially said, "Look at all the wonders of creation. How can evolution possibly explain all that?" When Q & A time came, I was the only one to ask any critical questions. "That sounds impressive, but why don't you engage the explanations evolutionary biologists offer for those features?" Like the talk, the book (he gave me a copy) simply ignored detailed arguments.

This book does much better. Meyer's critics to the contrary, he does offer detailed scientific and philosophical arguments. Signature is NOT mainly about evolution per se - it is about the origin of life. It is, therefore, not strictly parallel to Dawkins' books or arguments -- ID is in a sense broader than evolution as a theory, since it seeks to explain things that evolution does not.

My main beef is the book is too long. While many of Meyer's illustrations are interesting, he uses too many, and repeats himself too often. Meyer should chop out some of the remedial 7th Grade biology, cut some stories and the "I was in Akron when I thought A and in Baton Rouge when B occurred to me" stuff, and cut the book in half.

The first-person auto-biographical is overworked. No one thinks you're neutral, Stephen -- so just argue! Don't pretend your conversion to ID was purely scientific -- reasonable people understand that people act under a mixture of motives, and the unreasonable ones are not worth arguing with. Dawkins, Behe, Stephen Hawking, and Darwin for that matter write serious arguments without losing ordinary readers; models that Meyer could profitably shoot for.

But the issue here is the origin of life, and when Meyer finally gets to it, he argues it well, I think. The central chapters seem to cover most of the main issues well. He discusses different solutions, and explains fairly clearly why they do not work, and why some sort of design seems preferable. It is interesting that none of Meyer's critics here dispute those arguments. (Again, Miller and Sternberg come closest, but do not really engage his most important points.) I wish, however, that Meyer had expanded those central chapters, and discussed in more detail leading rival contemporary hypotheses.

Many of his secondary arguments work, too. I suppose one can't complain if a philosopher of science writes a lot about the philosophy of science, and I suppose those arguments are made necessary by attempts to marginalize ID proponents through the sheer power of wordplay. Pardon the self-indulgence, but as I wrote in Truth Behind the New Atheism, in response to Dawkins' attempts to marginalize ID proponents: "David Bohm once defended science as 'openness to evidence.' The best scientist -- or theologian -- is not someone who shouts 'heresy!' when he hears strange views, but one who listens carefully and responds with reason and evidence. When it comes to ultimate questions, 'openness to evidence' is the definition that counts."

The scientific evidence is what matters, and I would have liked to have seen more detail on that. Still, all in all, a strong ID perspective on the origin of life.

First a note on the reviews I have been reading on this book:

A lot of the one star book reviews seem to be attacking Dr. Meyers, and not the topic of his book. Please let us get something out of the way up front. "Signature of the Cell" is not about Stephen Meyer, the Discovery Institute or God for that matter. It is about an argument, and a lot of the negative (and positive, let's be honest) reviews seem to overlook this fact. There is a lot of spin on both sides of the Intelligent Design debate. One side often states that Judge Jones III was appointed by George W Bush, while another side makes certain we know that Judge Jones III was previously a former Head of a Liquor Control Board. Please let us approach this topic with reason and give our honest-if biased-opinions.


In "Signature in the Cell", Dr. Meyers walks us through what information is and the different ways information is defined, created and discovered. He also goes into great detail on probability theory and the history of scientific reasoning. He then lays out the history of origins of life research including a fascinating exposition of the discovery of the DNA double helix, and the surprise of specified information that lies within. Dr. Meyers argues why the current OOL theories fail to explain how the first cell could have arisen by chance alone due to the insufficient probabilistic resources (temporal as well as physical) of the universe. He further argues why self organization/bio-chemical predestination models do not provide an adequate explanation for the origin of life. He also explains why the RNA world and other current models fail to explain the OOL, or what Dr Meyers calls the "DNA enigma"

The DNA Enigma is that which researchers have not been able to uncover. That is, the origin of specified information or digital code in every living cell. The information in the DNA molecule is not only complex, but has specified complexity. All of the current OOL models Dr. Meyer critiques contain what he terms the "displacement problem" That is they push back the source of the information or assume that the information simply occured or merely ignore the source, and put it on the back burner. In the book Dr. Meyers explains why evolutionary computer simulations and that why trying to manufacture "life in the lab" are actually very good examples of ID and are ideal cases for design theory.

Dr. Meyer does not make an appeal from ignorance or a "God of the Gaps" argument, but makes a positive case for design in OOL. Dr. Meyer appeals to the same historical branch of science that Darwin employed, and argues that if ID theory is arbitrarily deemed unscientific then Darwin's theory would fail to be classified as scientific on the same reasoning.

For those that say that "ID is not science", please read chapter 18 of the book-"But is it Science?" Following are the headings for the reasons Dr. Meyers regards ID as science, specifically historically scientific..
Reason 1: The case for ID is based on Empirical Evidence.
Reason 2: Advocates of ID use Established Scientific Methods.
Reason 3: ID is a Testable Theory.
Reason 4: The Case for ID Exemplifies Historical Scientific Reasoning.
Reason 5: ID Addresses a Specific Question in Evolutionary Biology (OOL).
Reason 6: ID Is Supported by Peer-Reviewed Scientific Literature.
(You'll have to read the book for the details.)

"Signature in the Cell" is not "Creationist Tripe", but a 600 page argument. Dr. Meyers does not necessarily argue for a God as the intelligent agent behind the OOL, but that an intelligent agent is the most likely cause of the specified information in the double helix and information processing systems of the cell. Dr. Meyers argument is not that "It is way too complicated to understand
so therefore God did it" but an appeal to what we know about how information is created and that information comes from minds, or agents. As some like to say and I'm paraphrasing several ID opponents here.."Let's not kid ourselves, we all know who Dr. Meyers means when he says an intelligent agent, he means God" Well maybe, or if your ontology will allow, probably, but both Richard Dawkins and Francis Crick believe in, or are at least sympathetic to an intelligent agent as the cause of life on earth. They just believe that the intelligent agent was or could have been extra-terrestrial. The panspermia theory too has it's problems, and ultimately pushes back the OOL or "DNA Enigma" to an earlier time and certainly from what we know of the universe, one is stopped by the previously mentioned wall of probabilistic resources.

In the epilouge Dr. Meyers opens the door to some of the latest discoveries of the hierarchical nature of DNA information storage. Quite interesting really, Super folders, folders within folders in optimized locations for efficient retrieval. He also touches briefly on what used to thought of as "Junk DNA" or non protein coding regions of the DNA molecule. What was once considered to be only leftovers and redundancies from transcriptions can now be shown to work as a sort of operating system. It will be interesting to see what comes from the ongoing research..


Dr. Meyer concludes the book in Appendix B with solid critique of multiverse theories and in chapter 17 provides a very powerful answer(rebuttal) to the ubiquitous "Who designed the designer?" question (challenge).


There IS an answer to the DNA Enigma, and Dr Meyer's positive argument is that life on earth was caused ~3-4 billion years ago by an intelligent agent, most likely God. Perhaps he is correct.

Stephen Meyer answers this question. But why was the creation of this excellent work necessary? What could motivate Stephen Meyer to make himself (and his family) a target for the inevitable derogation and questioning of his credentials, intellect and character? The simple fact is this; the evolutionists have declared war on any thought not of their origin, indeed academia is generally intolerant of any ideas not of their creation, aggressively intolerant. A recent quote by one of the god's of evolutionary dogma; "It is absolutely safe to say, that if you meet somebody who does not to believe in evolution that person is ignorant, stupid or insane", the tone of this sediment is ubiquitous. That the disagreement between divergent points of view has been passionate is nothing new, the tone and overt antagonism from those with a naturalist view point, perhaps is. The purpose of this tactic is to shut down any discussion or disagreement with their orthodoxy; this to me displays a lack of confidence with the premise of their belief and argument, obfuscation by derogation.

Stephen Meyer not only explains with clarity why what the evolutionists believe is simply not possible or even remotely possible, but gives creditable proof of design, intent and purpose in the architecture of cells. The hostility towards Meyer in exposing the inherent flaws in the theory of evolution take a tone of religious zealotry. The false superiority, arrogance and condescension of the vast majority scientist and academics make this work (and others like it) necessary.

This work begins with the concept of what is the best explanation possible for the origin of life based on "historical scientific reasoning". To answer this question Meyer reviews many origin of life theories, specifically relating to DNA and RNA. He dissects each of these theories, the end result for nearly all of these ideas is that they are based on certain amounts of specified information existing as a premise for the subsequent parts of the theory to function, in other words they do not explain or solve the problem of where biological information comes from, but simply displace the problem, I will not bore you with the details of the competing theories. Meyer goes on to give a very detailed (and extremely interesting) probability analysis regarding the possibility for even one functioning protein to come into existence simply by chance at 10/164, to put that number in some kind of perspective, there are only 10/65 atoms in the known universe. Meyer further explains how at least two hundred different kinds of proteins are necessary for the simplest cell to exist, which would then put the probability of one cell existing by chance at 10/41,000, this is an order of magnitude more than the probabilistic resources of the entire universe. He then quotes recent work by James Brook and Gordon Shaw regarding geological and geochemical evidence for the prebiotic atmospheric conditions being friendly or not, for the production of amino acids and other essential building blocks of life. Their work is conclusive, there is no evidence in metamorphosed Precambrian sedimentary rocks that such conditions as envisioned by evolutionist ever existed. This puts the probability for evolutionary theory providing a credible explanation regarding the origin of life at exactly zero. (my words, not his)

He continues on the theme of what provides for the best explanation possible for the origin of life which begins his argument in favor of intelligent design. His discussion develops on what does the evidence suggest? Below is a sample;

"Intelligence is the only known cause of complex functionally integrated information processing system. It follows once again, that intelligent design stands as the best- most causally adequate- explanation for this feature of the cell, just as it stands as the best explanation for the origin of the information present in DNA itself".

Meyer then concludes his work with a discussion of the "implications" regarding the theory of Intelligent Design, which does after all get to the real problem secularists have with any compromise regarding ID as a scientifically relevant concept. One thing that is particularly well illustrated in the final chapters is that any argument against ID as a legitimate scientific concept apply with equal (perhaps more so) weight against the theory of evolution.

Lastly I would to thank Mr. Meyer for the elevated tone and substance of his latest work, this book contains no vitriol, condescendence, arrogance or anything remotely unpleasant. It does contain well reasoned arguments for his points of view with extensive documentation in the notes and Bibliography. Meyer has taken no cheap shots at the scientists who do not happen to share his point of view, this in marked contrast to the screeds presented to the public as legitimate scientific discussion by the evolutionists. While I at times enjoy returning the fire of evolutionary zealots with a nuclear weapon, Meyer has chosen his words with the upmost care and demonstrated a particular graciousness to those who will not and perhaps cannot reciprocate this courtesy, this in my mind demonstrates the confidence and pure scientific ability bought to this study. I give the highest endorsement possible to the purchase of this worthy publication.

I won my copy of Signature in the Cell in an essay contest on the intelligent design advocacy blog, Uncommon Descent. I didn't even pay for shipping. I made a strong attempt to read it through in order to write a review of the book for UD. Sadly, that blog often bans dissenting voices, so my review will have to be published here instead.

The book is too long for its stated purpose. For its unstated purpose, it is about right. The stated purpose is to review the history of DNA science, and Meyer's own life, as a framework to explain the inadequacy of naturalistic explanations of the genetic code. The unstated purpose is to throw a lot of basic history and science at the reader so that when the science becomes merely 'sciencey' most will not notice the transition. The result is that three small books (DNA for Dummies, My Life, and ID, the Theory That Couldn't) have been woven together and sold as one.

On p. 143, Meyer tells us that "The idea of design helped liberate Western science from such fact-free reasoning." "Such" reasoning belonged to the Greeks that argued from first principles, and purely from logic, to the actual state of the world. Signature in the Cell almost immediately falls back into that error when Meyer argues purely from logic, analogy, and common sense instead of experiment and calculation. This abandonment of experiment is what most clearly justifies calling the book non-scientific, and even anti-scientific.

A good example is Meyer's treatment of Michael Polanyi's arguments on pp 237-243. Meyer is convinced when Polanyi 'argues', 'insists', and 'concludes' all without doing a single experiment. It is the logical structure that is convincing. This is a retreat from science.

Polanyi's argument is central to many claims of ID, so lets talk about it a bit deeper. Polanyi makes the claim that to function as a code, the order of the bases can't be forced by potential energy. ATC and G must be free to come in any order.

This is argued by analogy to human communication systems. However, we already know there are exceptions to such rules. In English, Q must be followed by U. And yet, we somehow stumble forward using English to communicate. Similarly, there may be slight influences in base to base sequence. Polanyi was writing when almost nothing had been sequenced, today we have thousands of complete genomes to test the idea. But testing the idea is irrelevant if Meyer is already convinced by the logic.

Since Meyer is focused on the genetic code, Polanyi's argument is a major intellectual roadblock. Sequence independence of symbols is far less important than the translation from one symbol system to another, in understanding what a code is and how it functions. DNA is a code for protein (and RNA). Sequence independence means random sequences can acquire meaning slowly and stochastically, not that the entire code was graven on tablets of stone before the world's creation, and then delivered from heaven by a choir of angels. This process of "acquiring meaning" in the case of the genetic code means narrowing down the association of each triplet of bases from any random amino acid to a specific amino acid. There is a lot of evidence that this process is at least in part driven by the laws of physics and chemistry, contra Polanyi's pronouncements of 40 years ago. But you are not going to learn that from Signature in the Cell.

Meyer also indulges in a 'big number' argument about the size of proteins (and RNA polymers). Starting from an assertion that we need 150 amino acids for functionality, and old and often refuted argument follows that the universe doesn't have the resources to find even one such protein. Sadly no. Meyer ignores all evidence that vastly smaller fragments of protein have useful function. Function in proteins is often associated not with a specific arrangement of amino acids, but with the polar/non-polar nature of the amino acid. (If you want to think in terms of symbols, this is cutting down the number of symbols from 22 to 2.) While the universe can't explore 22^150 sequences, it certainly can explore 2^15 sequences, then use two of the best 15-length sequences together in a 30-length sequence. Etc, Etc. But Stephen Meyer is not going to tell you that.

Signature in the Cell is padded with a lot of historical information. Dr Meyer can claim that it is included to show that he is giving every argument a fair opportunity. Exactly the opposite is true. In chapter 14, pp 296-297, Meyer recounts an exchange with Dr Kenneth Miller over his coverage of the RNA world in an article from 2000. The article, DNA and Other Designs, is still available on the Discovery Institute web site. I recommend reading it, since it says just about everything that Meyer says in this large book, and for free.

But just as Signature in the Cell recapitulates and expands on that article, it recapitulates the error of that article as well. As Dr Miller complained in 2000, Stephen Meyer lies by omission by "not having the space" to mention 20 years worth of research in the RNA World hypothesis. Now it is 28 years, and the page count of Signature in the Cell spent on long forgotten theories crowds out discussion of current theories and work that directly undercuts the main ideas of the book. There is no mention of the work of Michael Yarus' lab, no mention of the stereochemical hypothesis in the origin of the genetic code.

This is the key work that Meyer has to come to grips with if his whole facade of looking into every possibility is to have any credibility at all. It might be an acceptible debating technique to dodge your opponents best arguments until the time runs out, but that kind of rope-a-dope argumentation isn't science.

That is the bottom line verdict on this book. It is not looking at everything and arguing to the best explanation. It is picking and choosing, retelling lots of old stories, personal stories, and some basic science, while avoiding the experiments and evidence that would challenge ID, and collapse its claim to be the best explanation of anything in the universe larger than Stephen Meyer's paycheck. ID explains that perfectly well.

This book is long. No, not long...it is LOOOOOOOOONG. It is kind of a stream of consciousness narrative that incorporates the author's journey of discovery into a larger web of the history of modern biological science. I totally don't care about the author's job looking for oil in the gulf of Mexico before transferring to Oxford University. Oh, my. Who will read and enjoy this book?
Unfortunately, scientific illiterates will not enjoy this book. It will be overwhelmingly complex and difficult to understand. Although they will have the occasional "aha" moment, they will have a difficult time following the development of the thesis of the book.
More unfortunately, those of us who are knowledgeable about science will find the prolonged rehash of basic scientific concepts to be insufferably boring. After wading through page after page, it is easy to lose the philosophical underpinnings of the thesis of the book.
I guess what I am trying to say is that the medium is drowning out the message. Reading this book will require a great deal of patience and tolerance.

Okay, so what is the thesis of the book? The thesis is EXACTLY the same thesis that has been espoused by Watson and Crick in their "panspermia" theory of the origin of life. In case you don't know, "panspermia" is the idea that life originated from aliens who seeded our planet with life. Presumably, these aliens were "intelligent." And, presumably, they "designed" the sperm or seed that caused life to originate in our solar system. Basically, the idea is that DNA is a complex computer code, more complex and compact than the highest tech computers that we have ever designed on earth. The likelihood of all this information showing up spontaneously, due to random chance, is almost infinitely small. So it follows that there was some sort of intelligence that caused life to exist on earth. For Watson and Crick, that intelligence was an alien intelligence. For Stephen C Meyer, that intelligence was...well, he does not make any speculations about the nature of the intelligence that caused life on earth. In this way, Stephen Meyer's "Intelligent Design" is far more intelligent than Watson and Cricks "Intelligent Design." But BOTH are advocating ID.
Difference between PANSPERMIA and ID:
Intelligent design speculates that there might be an intelligence behind the bioinformatics of the cell. Panspermia is ID with aliens. Which version is in the textbooks? That's right--the one with the aliens. (I know, I read one of my kid's bio texts)

Oh yes, and a rebuke to the "one star" crowd that is spamming this review site with comments about "religious crap" and "creationist dogma"....all I can say is that you obviously have not read this book at all. If you had read the tome (and I suspect many of you are not capable of digesting a full 500+ page read of this caliber) you would realize that Meyer never invokes any religious ideas at all, nor does he engage in any "pseudo-science." Rather, he recounts the amazing history of genetic research and information theory. He also covers the history of the philosophy of science and origins, finally asking some questions of his own. Ultimately, the reader will be led to evaluate his own assumptions and think. Granted, there are those who are not willing to do either.

My reason for awarding a mere 3 stars to this weighty work is that the editor did not do his job. This book should not have been written in this lengthy narrative style. It is very difficult to tease out the philosophical bits from the technical bits. It is impossible to use this book as any sort of reference. You basically need to mark up the book with page notes and highlights if you ever expect to piece together a narrative that is useable. The editor should have gone through and marked up the book for us. But he didn't. Boo for him.

Intuitively, for anyone who has written more than 10 lines of computer code that actually did something, considering the DNA code; several billion lines long, written in 3D with chemicals instead of 0's and 1's, error checking, error correcting, very small, very efficient, replicating, and most important a working program (with consciousness and self awareness as a bonus), denying the fact that an intelligence wrote the first code is intellectual prostitution. The biology departments at our august learning institutions need to be subsumed by the computer science departments and the emphasis should be on reverse engineering the code and teaching software engineers more chemistry so they can try designing similar type code.

Many professor-tutes are wasting the people's time and money waging a reborn inquisition trying, I assume, to protect their position, job and/or funding. Please shut up, learn the code and share the code's information with the rest of us. It is a crime that some noisy biologists are using the force of law, with help from the ACLU!?![pages 432-433], to garrucha, toca and potro [torture] those who dare to challenge CURRENT biological orthodoxy. Opposition to Dr. Meyer has been Climategate times ten, going after teaching and editorial positions, refusing publication and hiding or losing the source data.

This is a very good book. The DNA program is not just very good, it is spectacular and I would like to learn more about what each part does and why. (Is it possible there are any comment/remark statements in the code?)

As a former agnostic who had his eyes opened in micro and
cellular biology classes as a pre-med student I very much
appreciated such a concise work by one of the greatest
intellects in the field.

I was amazed as a student at the blind unquestioning way
that my peers accepted that the genetic code and impossibly
complex, and easily demostrated irreducibly complex structures
and functions of the cell "just happened".

That was when I realized that a lot of "educated" people were
simply idealogues plodding along a path determined not by the
facts and science, but by their apriori assumptions.

This book is refreshing and validating for real free-thinkers
and truth-seekers willing to follow the facts rather than their
prejudices.

A must read.

I just realized that my response to a negative review (by D. Kannon) may speak volumes regarding the book itself - and its detractors. The most interesting aspect is that dissecting their review suggests that they seem not to have read the book, but skimmed it. Or, read the book, but failed to understand its contents. (Brings to mind "Dollhouse" Topher's hilarious "but it's cute that you're trying!" Sorry.)

Hello, David,

At first I thought yours was one of the more reasoned critiques mentioned by the other reviewer, David Marshall. Upon further reading, you seem to be advocating outdated theories to rebut Meyer, but I am open to seeing where I could be wrong. Sadly, I see a lot of ad hominem in these comments as well, which tell me more about the dearth of reasoned rebuttal than Meyer's arguments.

--On p. 143, Meyer tells us that "The idea of design helped liberate Western science from such fact-free reasoning." "Such" reasoning belonged to the Greeks that argued from first principles, and purely from logic, to the actual state of the world. Signature in the Cell almost immediately falls back into that error when Meyer argues purely from logic, analogy, and common sense instead of experiment and calculation. This abandonment of experiment is what most clearly justifies calling the book non-scientific, and even anti-scientific.

This critique is interesting because that is precisely the state of evolutionistic "explanation" that Behe and other ID-ers decry - there is no experiment, observation, or calculation, only vague pronouncements based on novel features "appearing", being "conserved", "springing forth", yin and yang, etc. The molecular level is where evolution had hoped to triumph. Instead, it has been dealt a serious body blow, as agnostic Denton shows from the data regarding developmental biology and sequence comparison.

Is Meyer arguing in the manner of the Greeks? Well, he starts with certain facts - the daunting complexity of DNA and its required transcription mechanisms. There are other facts, such as the (as yet) chemical barriers to chemical evolution of anything remotely resembling life. Since - contrary to your claim - decades of experiments and data show that chemistry does not favor chance formation of life molecules, nor has any other theory made experimental headway, logic gives us certain answers based upon experience. This is perfectly valid, as non-ID scientists such as Shapiro admit.

Elsewhere you write "It might be an acceptible [sic.] debating technique to dodge your opponents best arguments until the time runs out, but that kind of rope-a-dope argumentation isn't science." But that's par for the course in evolutionary "explanations" - I'm surprised you haven't noticed this phenomenon. The bulk of evolutionary "explanation" is "we can't tell you how this happened in enough detail, but we're sure we will someday."

--Polanyi's argument is central to many claims of ID, so lets talk about it a bit deeper.

But the argument is misstated. The problem is that since the bases can occur in any order and are not chemically "forced", the origin of the code cannot be explained naturalistically. Meyer does not accept this argument purely on the basis of logic but does in fact question Polanyi's conclusion, and goes on to detail the scientific findings that prove that the DNA sequence is in fact not determined by bonding affinities. It is THIS data that is indeed an obstacle ... for evolutionism. Now I'm wondering just how much of the book you actually read. If you did read it, you could have taken issue (well, at least in theory) with his assertion that there are "no bonds at all" to explain base ordering. Instead, you have filled your review with misinformation.

--There is a lot of evidence that this process is at least in part driven by the laws of physics and chemistry,

This claim is simply false. As any origin of life researcher knows, the laws of physics and chemistry actually work against chance formation of DNA or its precursors, because of chirality and cross-reactions, not to mention the degrading effect of the environment, such as UV, etc. I must assume you were simply unaware of the findings of the last couple of decades in this regard. If you had read the book, you would have been aware that Dean Kenyon repudiated his own book on biochemical predestination based on similar analysis.

--Starting from an assertion that we need 150 amino acids for functionality, and old and often refuted argument follows that the universe doesn't have the resources to find even one such protein.

You claim this has been "refuted." Again, this is misleading. More accurate to say it has been simply "ignored." You write [Meyer ignores all evidence that vastly smaller fragments of protein have useful function.] But how small? And to what end? You complain about lack of calculation, but you fail to specify what function a 15-length protein could perform and replicate, what experiments show this, and how perhaps a collection of such could eventually create a living cell. It's rope-a-dope.

--then use two of the best 15-length sequences together in a 30-length sequence. Etc, Etc. But Stephen Meyer is not going to tell you that.

But you are not going to tell anyone that it's much more complex than 2^15 ... why not? Because you have to factor in chirality (50%), peptide bonds (50%), wrong sequence (1 in 20 to make it easier). For the ridiculous 15-chain molecule, this gives us 1/20^15 x .25 = 7^-21, not 2^15.

You also didn't mention that Meyer actually addresses the scenario you mention when discussing Kauffman's theory. Is it because he informs us that 40 or 50 amino acids are required "at a minimum"?

--As Dr Miller complained in 2000, Stephen Meyer lies by omission by "not having the space" to mention 20 years worth of research in the RNA World hypothesis. ...There is no mention of the work of Michael Yarus' lab, no mention of the stereochemical hypothesis in the origin of the genetic code.

Has Yarus' work showed us experimentally how the RNA world originated by chance? I must have missed it. Because he is stuck on Dawkins' flawed WEASEL argument. It's not encouraging that he hasn't realized that it instead argues FOR ID, since it's selecting for some purposeful goal. The situation hasn't changed much since Gerald Joyce debunked the RNA hypothesis, "The most reasonable interpretation is that life did not start with RNA." And this does not even address the fragility of chance formations of RNA. Unless Meyer's claim that "the properties of biological building blocks do not determine the arrangement of monomers in functional DNA, RNA, or proteins" has been superseded, I'm not sure what tossing in Yarus' name accomplishes, other than to imply something that is not true.

--It is picking and choosing, retelling lots of old stories, personal stories, and some basic science, while avoiding the experiments and evidence that would challenge ID, and collapse its claim to be the best explanation of anything in the universe larger than Stephen Meyer's paycheck. ID explains that perfectly well.

Ends on an ad hominem, and a completely vacuous claim. Isn't it strange that the only rigorous mathematical study of the odds of beneficial mutation done in decades is by an ID-er (Behe)? You are surely aware of this. Kevin McCarthy would be ashamed. I can see his critique now: "Kannon has no formal training in biology or information theory. While I don't say that someone with no formal training could make a significant contribution to science, that person must make every effort to understand everything that has come before him. He must also make sure that every bit of information related to his topic is examined and incorporated or refuted. Kannon does none of this."

An excellent summary for the case for Intelligent Design (ID). Meyer answers critics who label ID as unscientific, citing Stephen Jay Gould, who described evolutionary biology, geology, paleontology, etc. as "historical sciences." Meyer explains how the theory of ID fits these parameters.

Clearly, the biological information contained in DNA is code-like, so much so that people like Dawkins and Crick have to remind scientists that it only "appears" that way. In his first premise, Meyer recounts a thorough history of the search for life's origin and how each theory has yielded no results on how the genetic code evolved. For his second premise, he demonstrates that the only known cause for the generation of information (specified complexity) is an intelligent agent. We look at cave paintings and chipped flint and scientists determine that some sort of intelligence produced this work. SETI searches the galaxies for patterns of information that designate intelligence. Every one of us creates information daily.

The conclusion of Meyer's argument is an inference that, as the only known cause of information, intelligence was the cause of the rise of DNA. This inference, incidentally, is the same logic used by Darwin himself (the observation of micro-evolution and the inference that chance and natural selection, stretched back over time, determined the origin of species).

One point I found interesting was the discussion of the predictions of evolution and ID concerning "junk DNA." ID predicts non-protein coding sequences should perform biological functions. It shouldn't be useless or junk. The model of natural selection predicts a genome "riddled with useless information, mistakes, and broken genes." Scientists have labeled this area between genes as junk ("gene deserts") and proof against design, but research coming out of the ENCODE Project ([...]) are showing these parts of the genome are in fact highly functional. As Philip Kitcher said, "Intelligent Design has deep roots in the history of cosmology, and in the earth and life sciences." Kitcher's argument against ID is this supposed inability to explain "junk DNA," yet clearly, ID can be a guiding principle and theory.

This is a book for those that truly want to understand the theory of intelligent design. There is a hard break that scientists use (methodological naturalism) which excludes anything supernatural from being considered as scientific. This book explains, step by step (sometimes a bit too slowly, perhaps), why ID is a viable theory that only invokes intelligence as a causal agent. There are, of course, theistic implications, but there are anti-religious implications from evolutionary theory as well. Meyer's approach, however, is completely evidence based. Meyer quotes Antony Flew, a long time atheist who now accepts ID, asserting, we must "follow the evidence wherever it leads," regardless of the implications.

Meyer's book is a great combination of history, philosophy and science. I especially enjoyed the historical backstory that explained how scientists and philosophers began changing their minds concerning the separation of the organic and inorganic. I agree with one reviwer that the auto-biographical style of the book is distracting at times, but the substance of the arguments are sound, closely reasoned, and well illustrated. Meyer's work represents a distinct constellation of historical/philosophical reasons why one should be suspicious of neo-Darwinian scientific claims; especially as these claims lead to, not scientific conclusions, but dogma. As such, it fills a role in the ID literature that cannot be filled by other seminal works. Those seeking a comprehensive idea of ID claims must take Meyer's approach into account.