![\"Durban](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2020\/01\/80685702_2675804732502599_5306504893903667200_o.jpg\")
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When I was a young\u2019un \u2014 long, long ago, in a galaxy far away \u2014 there was a rather powerful weekly magazine called Newsweek<\/em>.\u00a0 Apparently it still exists even now, at least online.\u00a0 And, just today, this wonderful article went up:\u00a0 \u201cBlack Mormon Told They Can\u2019t Marry White Members Because \u2018Seed is Cursed'\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n Virtually all of the responses, thus far, have been negative toward the Church.\u00a0 And quite understandably so.\u00a0 I replied in the comments section \u2014 I know, I know: it\u2019s the very definition of an exercise in futility \u2014 as follows:<\/p>\n I would . . . like to know the name of the leader mentioned in this story, and I would like to hear whether he (or she) agrees with Ms. Achenbach\u2019s account of what he (or she) allegedly said. In the event that Ms. Achenbach\u2019s account is accurate, I very much doubt that it was one of the general officers of the Church because it\u2019s flatly false doctrine. If a local leader said it, he or she should be reported to higher Church authority and corrected (or released from office). During my tenure as a bishop in the Church, I happily sent at least two \u201cmixed race\u201d couples to the temple for marriage.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Last night, I began a slow-motion reading of Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design<\/i> (New York: HarperCollins, 2009)<\/a>, written by Stephen C. Meyer<\/a>.\u00a0 I\u2019ve had it for years and have long intended to read it, but I had always been put off by its sheer size.\u00a0 I thought that I would eventually get to it, but just not yet.\u00a0 Now, though, I\u2019m beginning to work my way through it, and I must say that, thus far, I\u2019m really enjoying it and am positively impressed.\u00a0 Dr. Meyer provides a wonderfully lucid and readable account, for instance, of the scientific history leading up to the pivotal discovery of the double-helix structure of DNA by Francis Crick and James Watson at Cambridge University\u2019s famed Cavendish Laboratory.\u00a0 And I\u2019m pleased by his calm, reasonable tone.<\/p>\n I also like his brief treatment of the origin, character, and development of the \u201cintelligent design\u201d movement.\u00a0 He was, in fact, \u201cpresent at the creation.\u201d\u00a0 It was a presentation by the three scientists named just below that led him to give up his career as a geologist and go off to England, to the University of Cambridge, for a doctorate in the history and philosophy of science.\u00a0 Here are three passages that I marked in my first few minutes of reading Signature in the Cell<\/em>:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n [T]he modern theory of intelligent design was not [contrary to some allegations] developed as a legal strategy, still less as one to abet creationism.\u00a0 Instead, it was first considered in the late 1970s and early 1980s by a group of scientists \u2014 Charles Thaxton, Walter Bradley, and Roger Olsen \u2014 as a possible explanation for an enduring mystery of modern biology: the origin of the digital information encoded along the spine of the DNA molecule.<\/p>\n As I explained repeatedly to reporters and cable-new hosts, the theory of intelligent design is not based on a religious text or document, even if it does have implications that support theistic belief (a point to which I will return in Chapter 20).\u00a0 Instead, intelligent design is an evidence-based scientific theory about life\u2019s origins that challenges strictly materialistic views of evolution.<\/p>\n Indeed, the theory of intelligent design challenges a specific tenet of contemporary evolutionary theory.\u00a0 According to modern neo-Darwinists such as Oxford\u2019s Richard Dawkins, living systems \u201cgive the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.\u201d\u00a0 But, to Dawkins and other contemporary Darwinists, that appearance of design is entirely illusory, because wholly undirected processes such as natural selection and random mutations can produce the intricate design-like structures in living systems.\u00a0 In their view, natural selection can mimic the powers of a designing intelligence without being guided or directed in any way.<\/p>\n In contrast, the theory of intelligent design holds that there are tell-tale features of living systems and the universe that are best explained by an intelligent cause \u2014 that is, by the conscious choice of a rational agent \u2014 rather than by an undirected process.\u00a0 Either life arose as the result of purely undirected processes, or a guiding intelligence played a role.\u00a0 Advocates of intelligent design argue for the latter option based on evidence from the natural world.\u00a0 The theory does not challenge the idea of evolution defined as change over time or even common ancestry, but it does dispute the Darwinian idea that the cause of all biological change is wholly blind and undirected.\u00a0 Even so, the theory is not based on biblical doctrine.\u00a0 Intelligent design is an inference from scientific evidence, nor a deduction from religious authority.\u00a0 (4)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n This book makes a case for that same idea [i.e., for \u201cintelligent design based upon various examples of nanotechnology in the cell . . . [and] the problem that complex systems systems have posed for neo-Darwinism\u201d] . . . on the basis of a different class of evidence [than that adduced by Michael Behe in another book]: the information \u2014 the digital code \u2014 stored in DNA and the other large biological molecules.\u00a0 The case I make for intelligent design is less well-known than Professor Behe\u2019s and, therefore, to many completely new.\u00a0 Even so, it is not based upon a new discovery.\u00a0 It is, instead, based upon one of the most famous breakthroughs of modern biology: the discovery in 1953 of the information-bearing capacities of the DNA molecule, what I call the \u201csignature in the cell.\u201d\u00a0 (7-8)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n As evolutionary biologist Francisco Ayala has recently explained, Darwin explained the appearance of design without recourse to an actual designer.\u00a0 He gave us \u201cdesign without a designer.\u201d\u00a0 But is this really true?\u00a0 Even if we grant Darwin\u2019s argument in the Origin<\/em>, does it really follow that he refuted the design hypothesis?\u00a0 (9)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0 \u00a0 When I was a young\u2019un \u2014 long, long ago, in a galaxy far away \u2014 there was a rather powerful weekly magazine called Newsweek.\u00a0 Apparently it still exists even now, at least online.\u00a0 And, just today, this wonderful article went up:\u00a0 \u201cBlack Mormon Told They Can\u2019t Marry White Members Because \u2018Seed is Cursed’\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[33765,33747,7872,12143,14528,3196,19469,33753,1809,20851,1806,16571,289,20952,6994,33762,596,249,20848,33750,4619,4138,2187,123,20857,2905,1812,1815,7113,33744,788,55,1667,16574,16577,1260,4147,177,33759,33741,32161,33738,20878,33756,20854],"class_list":["post-98301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-achenbach","tag-behe","tag-black","tag-blacks","tag-cell","tag-cell-biology","tag-charles-darwin","tag-charles-thaxton","tag-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints","tag-crick","tag-darwin","tag-darwinian","tag-darwinism","tag-darwinist","tag-dawkins","tag-digital-code","tag-dna","tag-evolution","tag-francis-crick","tag-francisco-ayala","tag-id","tag-information","tag-information-theory","tag-intelligent-design","tag-james-watson","tag-latter-day-saint","tag-latter-day-saints","tag-lds","tag-lds-church","tag-michael-behe","tag-mormon","tag-mormonism","tag-mormons","tag-neo-darwinian","tag-neo-darwinism","tag-racism","tag-racist","tag-richard-dawkins","tag-roger-olsen","tag-signature-in-the-cell","tag-sir-francis-crick","tag-stephen-c-meyer","tag-stephen-meyer","tag-walter-bradley","tag-watson"],"yoast_head":"\n<\/a>