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Darwin Devolves

The New Science About DNA That Challenges Evolution

Audiobook (Includes supplementary content)
1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available

The scientist who has been dubbed the "Father of Intelligent Design" and author of the groundbreaking book Darwin's Black Box contends that recent scientific discoveries further disprove Darwinism and strengthen the case for an intelligent creator.

In his controversial bestseller Darwin's Black Box, biochemist Michael Behe challenged Darwin's theory of evolution, arguing that science itself has proven that intelligent design is a better explanation for the origin of life. In Darwin Devolves, Behe advances his argument, presenting new research that offers a startling reconsideration of how Darwin's mechanism works, weakening the theory's validity even more.

A system of natural selection acting on random mutation, evolution can help make something look and act differently. But evolution never creates something organically. Behe contends that Darwinism actually works by a process of devolution—damaging cells in DNA in order to create something new at the lowest biological levels. This is important, he makes clear, because it shows the Darwinian process cannot explain the creation of life itself. "A process that so easily tears down sophisticated machinery is not one which will build complex, functional systems," he writes.

In addition to disputing the methodology of Darwinism and how it conflicts with the concept of creation, Behe reveals that what makes Intelligent Design unique—and right—is that it acknowledges causation. Evolution proposes that organisms living today are descended with modification from organisms that lived in the distant past. But Intelligent Design goes a step further asking, what caused such astounding changes to take place? What is the reason or mechanism for evolution? For Behe, this is what makes Intelligent Design so important.

Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

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      December 1, 2018
      Lehigh University biochemist Behe argues against random DNA mutations and natural selection as plausible engines of the evolution of life. Unlike other advocates for intelligent design, Behe accepts a theory of limited evolution for species struggling to survive their immediate habitats. But he believes that basic components of life could not have arisen without deliberate engineering. Behe forgives Charles Darwin for not explaining evolutionary forces satisfactorily because the naturalist did not know about atoms or DNA, but he criticizes Darwin for suggesting life is not purpose-driven. Again unlike many intelligent design proponents, Behe does not insist that life's controlling mind is a deity, though that is his personal belief. Most of the book focuses on disproving Darwinian processes. While Behe intends his book for general readers and offers nontechnical analogies, much of the rhetoric relies on detailed genetic, molecular, and biochemical explanations. Darwin Devolves is bound to be controversial. For other theories reaching beyond Darwinian evolution, read David Quammen's The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life (2018).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

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