Rational Responders # 15 - Premise 2

In Evolution: A Theory in Crisis Michael Denton mentions the machine like qualities of biological components ....
"According to Paley, we would never infer in the case of a machine, such as a watch, that its design was due to natural processes such as the wind and rain; rather, we would be obliged to postulate a watchmaker. Living things are similar to machines, exhibiting the same sort of adaptive complexity and we must, therefore, infer by analogy that their design is also the result of intelligent activity....The conclusion may have religious implications, but it does not depend on religious presuppositions." pages 339 and 341

The amazing, ingenious, useful biological adaptations examined in premise 2, such as the eye or the brain, allude to an ingenious, powerful, creator God!

Rational Responders # 13 - Premise 2

Another 'problem' of living organisms overcome by ingenious biological adaptation is the problem of data storage and retrieval. How is an organism's design documented? Michael Denton discusses the genius of DNA in 'The Puzzle of Perfection', a chapter in his book Evolution: A Theory In Crisis ....

"A chemical solution to the problem of information storage has, of course, been solved in living things by exploiting the properties of the long chain-like DNA polymers in which cells store their hereditary information. It is a superbly economical solution. The capacity of DNA to store information vastly exceeds that of any other known system: it is so efficient that all the information needed to specify an organism as complex as man weighs less than a few thousand millionths of a gram. The information necessary to specify the design of all the species of organisms which have ever existed on the planet, a number according to G. G. Simpson of approximately one thousand million, could be held in a teaspoon and there would still be room left for all the information in every book ever written." (Adler & Adler, 1985, page 334.)

DNA is another example of an amazing, useful biological adaptation that sheds light on an ingenious, powerful, creator God.

Rational Responders # 9 - Premise 2

"It is the sheer universality of perfection, the fact that everywhere we look, to whatever depth we look, we find an elegance and ingenuity of an absolutely transcending quality, which so mitigates against the idea of chance." - Michael Denton Evolution: A Theory In Crisis

The primary focus of my comments under premise 2 will relate to biological adaptations seen in living organisms and how these perfect, useful biological components are evidence for an ingenious, powerful, creator God. Much of the material that I will share on this topic comes from chapter 14 of Michael Denton's excellent book Evolution: A Theory In Crisis. (Adler & Adler, 1985.) I will share descrip- tions of a sampling of the biological adaptations described in chapter 14 which Denton aptly titled 'The Puzzle of Perfect'.

For example, Denton describes the extremely complex mammalian brain which has an incredible number of connecting fibres used to connect nerve cells within the brain. The total number of connections is a thousand million million. The brain is an ingenious and powerful biological adaptation.

Donald DeYoung said the brain has the "the greatest concentration of chemo-neurological order and complexity in the physical universe. It is a video camera and library, a computer and communication center, all in one. And the more the brain is used the better it becomes! A detailed picture of the human brain is slowly emerging, the origin of which seems entirely beyond comprehension from a naturalistic point of view. We see remarkable purpose and interdependence within the brain—every part works for the benefit of the whole."

Rational Responders # 8 - Premise 2

I attended college in the early 80s, before computers were common tools owned by your 'run of the mill' university student. We had a computer lab at my school but I never went in there because I was a broadcasting major. I knew of one student at my college who had a PC in his room, my friend Steve. It was fun to play 'Star Trek' on and I figured my friend Steve did engineering stuff on it because he was an engineering major, but I didn't know much more than that.

One day Steve showed me a few other uses for his computer that got me excited about them. He explained to me that by using something called a word processing program you could type class papers into the computer. The words appear on the screen. Make a mistake? You just back space over the word and retype it! No erasers. No liquid paper. Type your paper, check it out on the screen, and then print it out. The onscreen editing feature would save me hours and hours when typing term papers! In my estimation, computers went from being a novelty item used by engineering students to an ingenious and useful tool for anyone. I was hooked!

Another feature of Steve's word processor (WordStar) that excited me was the spell checker. You run the spellchecker and the program highlights the words that you've misspelled. This was too good to be true. I almost felt guilty using it! For me, Steve's computer was an ingenious miracle.

As stated in installment 3, the purpose of this series is to provide a list of supporting premises for the conclusion that there is a God and that God is involved in the world and wants to have a relationship with us. Premise 1 dealt with the 2nd law of thermodynamics and the requirement for design/intelligence and energy to arrive at the ordered complexity observable in our world today. My second premise delves into the incredible, ingenious, biological adaptations seen in living organisms. These perfect, astounding, useful biological components are evidence for an ingenious, powerful, creator God, just as Steve's ingenious word processing program is evidence for an intelligent software programmer. If there is a program, there must be a programmer.

An adaptation is the modification of an organism or its parts that makes it more fit for existence under the conditions of its environment. In future installments these adaptations will be discussed more thoroughly.