The publisher, InterVarsity Press, October 5, 1998
Empirical evidence for intelligent design theory.
For over a century, the scientific establishment has ignored challenges to the theory of evolution. But in the last decade such complacency about its scientific and philosophical foundations has been shaken. As cracks in the Darwinian edifice have begun to appear, many are asking whether a defensible alternative exists.

In response to this growing crisis, a movement has emerged among scholars exploring the possibility of intelligent design as an explanatory theory in scientific descriptions of the universe. As Michael Behe has proposed in his landmark Darwin's Black Box, at the cellular level there appears to be a high level of irreducible complexity that suggests design.

In this book Behe is joined by eighteen other expert academics trained in mathematics, mechanical engineering, philosophy, physical anthropology, physics, astrophysics, biology, ecology and evolutionary biology to investigate the prospects for this emerging school of thought. Challenging the reigning ideology of materialistic naturalism on both scientific and philosophical grounds, these scholars press the case for a radical rethinking of established evolutionary assumptions.

Contributors include Michael Behe, David Berlinski, William Lane Craig, Sigrid Harwig-Scherer, Phillip Johnson, J. P. Moreland, Del Ratzsch, Hugh Ross, Siegfried Scherer and others.

William A. Dembski holds a Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Chicago, a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Illinois at Chicago and an M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary. He lives in Irving, Texas, and is currently a fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture. He is also the author of The Design Inference (Cambridge).

Customer Comments

Timothy Standish (standish@andrews.edu) from USA, October 12, 1999
A good crack at separating design theory from religion
Mere Creation is an excellent collection of current thoughts on the weaknesses of evolutionary theory. This book has been put together with the specific objective of addressing just one question, "Is nature a result of design or not?" What a breath of fresh air to not have to wade through all the theological assumptions of an author to get to the meat of their argument. The fact that a group of scientists and thinkers like those in this book, coming from divergent philosophical and religious traditions can still look at the data and logically reason to the conclusion that design was involved in the origin of life is remarkable. That they could do it without invoking their theology is amazing. No, this book will not make the most conservative creationists happy and the most extreme evolutionists will smart at the conclusions. The people who will be made happy reading a book like this are those who appreciate logic, value data and want to understand the thinking on both sides of the creation evolution debate.

Rev. Jim Miller (jimnyo@pacbell.net) from Los Angeles, CA, June 10, 1999
An excellent critique of a dogmatically held paradigm.
If you're like me, you've resolved by now to accept certain basic understandings about life without question. You have to tell your kids about Santa because it's fun, you don't have to fire your President when he has an affair, you should pay your taxes without thinking too hard about where it's going, and so forth. It's always earth shattering when someone undermines one of these fundamental beliefs, because it makes you realize that some arena of your life was governed more by habit than clear reason. "My goodness!" you would say after such a revelation, "I guess a cup of coffee isn't really worth $3.50 after all!" And you would stop going to Starbucks.

Now a team of scientists, philosophers, and a stray lawyer are after one of the most fundamental presumptions of the modern mind: naturalism. After Phil Johnson cracked the Darwinian tyranny with Darwin on Trial, word spread that you could, in his words, sink the battleship. After a 1996 consortium to discuss the crumbling edifice, Bill Dembski put together a collection of their work. It's called Mere Creation, and it's destined to be remembered as one of the key stepping stones to undermining modern scientific arrogance.

Thomas Kuhn exposed the secret. Dembski is giving us the first real case study. Watch what happens.

The book offers eighteen essays arguing the case for the intelligent design of the universe. Their sources are varied: biology, cosmology, biochemistry, philosophy, astronomy, and history. But their goal is the same, and it is NOT to defend Genesis like an archaic, Inherit the Wind kind of stereotype. The goal is a refined, intellectual critique of a religiously held paradigm: Darwinian naturalism.

We've been taught (and lazily acquiesced to) the doctrine that humanity evolved from different species in the soup of time, chance, and natural selection. If we have a theological bent, we may have rationalized God into the picture as a silent but present agent. But what happens when 150 years after the fact, hard scientific data has still not closed a convincing case (I thought the O.J. trial went long!)?

The book is fascinating for it's analysis, courageous for its vision, respectable for its caliber, and deadly for its force. While the uninitiated may be lost in some of the detail, the thoughtful participant in the debates over intelligent design and human origins will find in this data a heavy sword with which to march back into the scientific arena.

And chances are, the tides really are turning. The establishment, having failed to produce an airtight defense, is now resorting to name-calling to avoid the present danger. While I remain unthreatened by the possibility that life has evolved, this book made me doubt that our family photo album will really read that way.

Shannon Lewis, UGA Science Library Staff (SLEWIS@libris.libs.uga.edu) from Athens, GA, March 23, 1999
A mandatory reference piece for any thinking persons' shelf.
Though written by both scientists and philosophers for scientists and philosophers, anyone studied in the fields covered in Mere Creation's broad scope take the time to read it. The chapters are concise, and, although sometimes dense, for the most part quite readable. Mere Creation isn't nearly as entertaining as Darwin's Black Box (which should be read prior to approaching the material here, since it uses it as a spring-board), but is indeed a MUST OWN! I think we'll be feeling the impact of the Intelligent Design theory of life's origins for years to come, and pray that this book is just the beginning in ID theory.

A reader from Seattle, WA, October 22, 1998
We are on the cusp of a scientific revolution
This book bristles with the excitement of a new intellectual movement, and gives one a glimpse at the fecundity of the concept of intelligent design. Dembski's introduction alone should convince all fair-minded readers that design theory has predictive and empirical content. I have no doubt that it will be attacked, but it cannot be dismissed. InterVarsity Press did well to secure this volume.

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