Inside the Human Genome
A Case for Non-Intelligent Design
John C. Avise
ISBN13: 9780195393439
ISBN10: 0195393430
Hardback, 240 pages
Jan 2010, Not Yet Published
Price: $19.95 (01)
Description
Humanity's physical design flaws have long been apparent--we get hemorrhoids and impacted wisdom teeth, for instance--but do the imperfections extend down to the level of our genes? Inside the Human Genome is the first book to examine the philosophical question of why, from the perspectives of biochemistry and molecular genetics, flaws exist in the biological world. Distinguished evolutionary geneticist John Avise offers a panoramic yet penetrating exploration of the many gross deficiencies in human DNA--ranging from mutational defects to built-in design faults--while at the same time offering a comprehensive treatment of recent findings about the human genome. The author shows that the overwhelming scientific evidence for genomic imperfection provides a compelling counterargument to intelligent design. He also develops a case that theologians should welcome rather than disavow these discoveries. The evolutionary sciences can help mainstream religions escape the shackles of Intelligent Design, and thereby return religion to its rightful realm--not as the secular interpreter of the biological minutiae of our physical existence, but rather as a respectable philosophical counselor on grander matters of ultimate concern.
Product Details
240 pages; 14 line illus.; 5 1/2 X 8 1/4;
ISBN13: 978-0-19-539343-9
ISBN10: 0-19-539343-0
About the Author(s)
John C. Avise is Distinguished Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, at the University of California, Irvine, and an elected member of both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
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Source/Fonte: Oxford University Press
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NOTA IMPERTINENTE DESTE BLOGGER:
Por outro lado, a leitura do livro Signature in the Cell, Dr. Stephen Meyer mostra que o código digital embutido no DNA aponta justamente o contrário do livro de Avise. Tudo isso baseado em novas descobertas científicas que apontam para o design inteligente como sendo a melhor explicação para a complexidade da vida e do universo.
Alguém precisar avisar o Avise sobre a opinião de um ateu sobre o livro de Meyer:
Stephen C. Meyer’s Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design (HarperCollins) is a detailed account of the problem of how life came into existence from lifeless matter – something that had to happen before the process of biological evolution could begin. The controversy over Intelligent Design has so far focused mainly on whether the evolution of life since its beginnings can be explained entirely by natural selection and other non-purposive causes. Meyer takes up the prior question of how the immensely complex and exquisitely functional chemical structure of DNA, which cannot be explained by natural selection because it makes natural selection possible, could have originated without an intentional cause. He examines the history and present state of research on non-purposive chemical explanations of the origin of life, and argues that the available evidence offers no prospect of a credible naturalistic alternative to the hypothesis of an intentional cause. Meyer is a Christian, but atheists, and theists who believe God never intervenes in the natural world, will be instructed by his careful presentation of this fiendishly difficult problem.
— Dr. Thomas Nagel, University Professor; Professor of Law; Professor of Philosophy, New York University
Source/Fonte
