Darwin's Doubt - Stephen C. Meyer

Darwin's Doubt

By Stephen C. Meyer

  • Release Date: 2013-06-18
  • Genre: Life Sciences
3.5 Score: 3.5 (From 127 Ratings)

Book Synopsis

When Charles Darwin finished The Origin of Species, he thought that he had explained every clue, but one. Though his theory could explain many facts, Darwin knew that there was a significant event in the history of life that his theory did not explain. During this event, the “Cambrian explosion,” many animals suddenly appeared in the fossil record without apparent ancestors in earlier layers of rock.  

In Darwin’s Doubt, Stephen C. Meyer tells the story of the mystery surrounding this explosion of animal life—a mystery that has intensified, not only because the expected ancestors of these animals have not been found, but because scientists have learned more about what it takes to construct an animal. During the last half century, biologists have come to appreciate the central importance of biological information—stored in DNA and elsewhere in cells—to building animal forms.

Expanding on the compelling case he presented in his last book, Signature in the Cell, Meyer argues that the origin of this information, as well as other mysterious features of the Cambrian event, are best explained by intelligent design, rather than purely undirected evolutionary processes.

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Latest Impressions

  • Noice

    5
    By Sir Rami #21
    Where are the evolutionists and atheists now?
  • Evolution is real

    1
    By RiptideRunner
    Get over it already. Why the hell is this book outside of the fiction category?
  • The 1 Star Reviewers only show their own biases

    5
    By MusicMaker96813
    All books that challenge the sacred cow of scientific naturalism inevitably receive the harshest of criticisms by reviewers who often haven’t even read the book they are reviewing, let alone fairly or objectively considered its arguments, and this book is no exception. The 1 Star reviewers here only display their own close mindedness and ignorance of the actual claims made by Neo-Darwinian evolution, the actual paucity of hard evidence for it, and the inability for blind, natural forces that inherently lack any ability to plan ahead to create specified complexity in anything at all, let alone in highly complex living systems. The level of indoctrination displayed here by many of these reviewers is sadly the norm in today’s culture. People who have the ability to be truly self-critical, to both recognize and challenge their own assumptions, will indeed give this book a fair and honest evaluation. But those who have bought into the lies of scientism, philosophical naturalism, and empiricism as the only valid epistemology all have self-imposed blinders on that hinder their ability to think critically and rationally. And thus fail to recognize the self-defeating and/or circular nature of their own biases and assumptions. Scientism is self-defeating. Arguments against ID based on naturalism are circular and therefore invalid reasoning. And those who object to this book by immediately assuming a religious motivation is behind it are blinding themselves to their own metaphysical biases underlying their own objections and their refusal to consider all possible explanations for life’s origin and diversification. The book never assumes the Christian God did this (as one reviewer wrote). Who the designer is doesn’t at all affect the ability to infer intelligence was involved. The bottom line truth is the forces of chemistry, physics, and the like are unable to plan ahead. By nature they can only act on what already exists at that specific moment in time. Any organism or body plan or truly novel function that requires multiple, predetermined and time-phased steps to eventually bring that novel form into existence can never explain the origin of life, or the rapid development of wholly novel biological information. Only intelligence is able to select a desired end state, compare against the current state, identify the time-phased and sequenced steps required to transition from the current to the future state, and then implement those predetermined steps. Random Mutation acted on by Natural Selection is incapable of planning ahead, and can only act on what currently exists. It cannot predetermine which mutations will or can arise. It cannot influence the origin of anything, only act to preserve something beneficial once it has already arisen. And therefore it cannot generate wholly new, novel forms, body plans, or anything else that requires information not already present in the organism that it can repurpose. And so the Cambrian Explosion is really an information explosion where previously non-existent information appears in the fossil record without any prior existence. It is hard evidence against the idea that all of life is the result of random reshuffling and undirected changes made to already existing information that is merely preserved when beneficial for survival, as the modern synthesis theory requires. New information was clearly inserted, and the mechanisms proposed to explain the origin of this information have failed to provide more than just-so stories to account for it.
  • read twice...

    5
    By Applestar81
    well apparantly the Royal Society in London agrees with the conclusion I got from reading this book… Darwinism isn’t only in trouble but its officially done… instead of removing Darwinism from textbooks, it’ll be left till a suitable alternative can be found… what is this world come to? I think I would suggest this book as a suitable substitute …
  • Better than most

    4
    By theappleofadam
    While I totally disagree with the conclusions in this book, at least I can say the man did his homework. The data is real data and their are some legitimate critiques here. Logic is flawed (science is not based on logic alone, it requires conclusions that can be tested) in the end, but I will doff my hat to a real attempt to use argument and data.
  • Thought-provoking

    5
    By Read-ponder-review
    Having spent most of my career in the field of science, I have lived by the mantra "seek the truth - whatever it may be". In our current world of sound bites, headlines and Facebook, people seem little interested in this approach to answering life's (and science's) most baffling questions. It is far more likely that, if you pay close attention, you will see scholars, scientists, researchers, reporters, and personage from every intellectual endeavor (supposedly in search of truth, or at least claiming to be unbiased), only seeking to find a way to prove themselves correct in their own hypotheses, no matter how ridiculous. Sadly, the pursuit of truth with an open mind is viewed as a fanciful notion of outdated, irrelevant and ignorant dreamers. Even the most intelligent conversations I have had regarding things such as the fossil records, Cambrian Explosion, or the Origin of Life, etc., have ended with the same (poor-at-best) arguments. This book has logically, and convincingly provided research, theory, and discussion regarding very difficult and "touchy" issues. For anyone reading this book with an agenda, you will either feel "happily proved right", or "disgusted by such drivel". For those who read it with an open mind, those seeking insight or perhaps a new way of looking at some of the very complex and unsatisfying explanations offered by the current intelligencia of our post-modern culture...you may find when you reach the bibliography, you have new ideas and thoughts to ponder, and possibly, you may have found some Truth. This book was thought-provoking, and offers plausible answers, especially when compared to the highly unplausible Darwinian Theory.
  • Very Careful

    5
    By dgsb
    This book is heavily researched and gives due attention to counterarguments. From what I can tell from the one star reviews, they have only read the blurb. None give any evidence of knowing what is in the book.
  • Darwin's doubt

    1
    By Pan theist
    Why is this book in the science section? Just crap.
  • Let the evidence be the path

    5
    By 14Yeshua
    It is obvious that many who read this book will dismiss it out of hand simply because of the conclusions that it brings us to. But isn't this what science is all about? We follow logical conclusions of to evidence as it is presented without bias or prejudice. Those who attempt to discredit Dr. Meyer are simply being disingenuous as to their motives. Dr. Meyers research and analysis are spot on.
  • Eye-opening book

    5
    By Darwindog96
    Darwin had doubts and so should you.