Rating: 
Summary: Excellent
Review: Awesome! Complex scientific material is presented in a readable and understandable way. Great work.
Rating: 
Summary: Much needed effort
Review: Definitely worth the read, and points out the weaknesses in the naturalistic theories concerning life's origins. The one weakness of the book was the usage of Genesis 1:2 to "predict" life's early existence. While the early existence of life remains one of many problems for naturalists, I seriously doubt that either Dr. Ross or Dr. Rana would have been able to predict this in their model using Genesis 1:2 had not the fact already been established. Otherwise, a must read.
Rating:
Summary: A Supurb Analysis
Review: Dr. Rana along with his co-author Dr. Ross present a supurb analysis of the issues surrounding the origin of life on earth. This book is a must read for any individual looking to study the issue of life's origin from a Christian perspective.
Rating:
Summary: A Supurb Analysis
Review: Dr. Rana along with his co-author Dr. Ross present a supurb analysis of the issues surrounding the origin of life on earth. This book is a must read for any individual looking to study the issue of life's origin from a Christian perspective.
Rating:
Summary: Most thorough and convincing
Review: Fana and Ross carefully address the points being made about the origin of life by natural causes, and provide clear and strong replies to each one of them.
For example, we are shown how cell walls only form spontaneously in a small range of ph in the surrounding medium, and subsequent variation in the ph makes them lapse into un-wall-like structures.
Also, molecules for building RNA/DNA have to all be left-handed (or all right-handed) in the spine of the molecule, and a miss in that requirement spoils the molecule. Yet molecules start out (and turn) 50% left-handed, and 50% right-handed, in almost all circumstances, and even in circumstances that select one type or another, there no way to have *all* the right (so to speak!) sort of molecules, to make a molecular spine. And there is a similar, and opposite requirement for sugars, if the spine is all lefty, then the sugars all have to be all-righty.
The probability just goes to zero in a hurry.
My only complaint is that their model is not so detailed, a more well-developed model to argue for in response would have been good to see.
Rating:
Summary: "Let the better model prevail!"
Review: I found this book by Drs. Fazale Rana and Hugh Ross to be fascinating, honest, thorough and readable. The book presents a great combination of background information and cutting-edge science. It also manages to bring long overdue quantitative rigor to an area question which has been dominated by fuzzy speculation. "Origins of Life" is one example of a resurgence in good science being performed and explained in the context of Christian theism rather than the prevailing presumption of naturalism. They display an enthusiasm toward scientific discovery which comes from the conviction that all truth is God's truth. I appreciated the honesty with which the authors call for a face off between models. "Let the better model prevail" is the historical battle cry of honest science which has been lost in the last century and needs to be reclaimed.
Rating:
Summary: "Let the better model prevail!"
Review: I found this book by Drs. Fazale Rana and Hugh Ross to be fascinating, honest, thorough and readable. The book presents a great combination of background information and cutting-edge science. It also manages to bring long overdue quantitative rigor to an area question which has been dominated by fuzzy speculation. "Origins of Life" is one example of a resurgence in good science being performed and explained in the context of Christian theism rather than the prevailing presumption of naturalism. They display an enthusiasm toward scientific discovery which comes from the conviction that all truth is God's truth. I appreciated the honesty with which the authors call for a face off between models. "Let the better model prevail" is the historical battle cry of honest science which has been lost in the last century and needs to be reclaimed.
Rating:
Summary: Finally, some needed balance
Review: I would highly recommend this book to science tearchers that are concerned that their students have not been given a sense of the number and type of problems that the current state of research into the origin of life has failed to solve. Its also a great resource to help someone without previous knowledge of the field get an idea of what types of articles to follow to determine how things are going in the major areas of origin of life research. There is an extensive bibliography. The book is a first attempt at comparing a scientifically integrated (general in addition to special revelation) biblical model with the evolutionary models for the origin of life. While it is a high level non-rigorous approach, it does however awaken one to big picture tests that should be taken seriously before quickly discounting the possibility of a supernatural designer. It was good to see that the simplistic probability arguments used by creationists in the past have become more sophisticated. While still not perfect (e.g. the allowed protein sequence space reference used to support Yockey's Cytochrome C analysis only considers the space of alternate side-chains and their conformations without allowing the backbone conformation to change), it still carries substantial weight.
Rating:
Summary: Creationism presented as a scientific model seems compelling
Review: One of the most common reasons for the rejection of the Creation viewpoint has been the so-called "argument from ignorance" which basically assumes Creationists invoke a Creator to make up for lack of (or the inconclusiveness of) evidence. However, many recent books (including this one) make it quite clear that the Creationist viewpoint can be presented intelligently, with a great deal of evidential support. One of the most interesting discoveries I learned is the "evolution" (pun intended) of hypothesis' that the naturalist proponents have gone through as the evidence mounts. What was once assumed to become easier to explain over time and as science advanced has become more difficult from the naturalistic viewpoint: the search for the origin of life on Earth has become frustrating to the point where extraterrestrial origins have become more vigorous. Similarly, history seems to be repeating itself: once, Copernican's Principle changed our viewpoint from that of Earth as unique and special to that of Earth as a mundane ordinary planet, but more recently we have begun to realize, again, that Earth is indeed a special planet with fine-tuned conditions meant to support life - and according to the authors, all life and conditions prior to the introduction of man were designed especially for a technologically advanced civilization that we have become. At times, the position of creationism as presented in the RTB Model in this book seems a bit all-encompassing: whereas they eloquently show that the evidence invalidates many of the naturalists' evolutionary predictions, the Creator model does give the appearance of being a "catch-all". Meaning, of course the Creation model is going to account for it because a Creator can do whatever He wants through miraculous intervention. However, when you dig a little deeper, the RTB Model's precitions do satisify scientific investigation and can be falsifiable as well. Some of the scientific evidences presented in the book are very recent, which dates the book. What's important is what makes sense over time as more discoveries are made and more evidence in presented. It's clear to me, at least, that Creation makes more sense now that we know much more about the universe we live in. While this book easily coincides with some of the ID (Intelligent Design) books by Behe, Dembski, and some of the other ID folks, its main concern is solely on the Origin of Life, not the evolution of man which is addressed in more complete form elsewhere. Highly recommened!
Rating:
Summary: Creationism presented as a scientific model seems compelling
Review: One of the most common reasons for the rejection of the Creation viewpoint has been the so-called "argument from ignorance" which basically assumes Creationists invoke a Creator to make up for lack of (or the inconclusiveness of) evidence. However, many recent books (including this one) make it quite clear that the Creationist viewpoint can be presented intelligently, with a great deal of evidential support. One of the most interesting discoveries I learned is the "evolution" (pun intended) of hypothesis' that the naturalist proponents have gone through as the evidence mounts. What was once assumed to become easier to explain over time and as science advanced has become more difficult from the naturalistic viewpoint: the search for the origin of life on Earth has become frustrating to the point where extraterrestrial origins have become more vigorous. Similarly, history seems to be repeating itself: once, Copernican's Principle changed our viewpoint from that of Earth as unique and special to that of Earth as a mundane ordinary planet, but more recently we have begun to realize, again, that Earth is indeed a special planet with fine-tuned conditions meant to support life - and according to the authors, all life and conditions prior to the introduction of man were designed especially for a technologically advanced civilization that we have become. At times, the position of creationism as presented in the RTB Model in this book seems a bit all-encompassing: whereas they eloquently show that the evidence invalidates many of the naturalists' evolutionary predictions, the Creator model does give the appearance of being a "catch-all". Meaning, of course the Creation model is going to account for it because a Creator can do whatever He wants through miraculous intervention. However, when you dig a little deeper, the RTB Model's precitions do satisify scientific investigation and can be falsifiable as well. Some of the scientific evidences presented in the book are very recent, which dates the book. What's important is what makes sense over time as more discoveries are made and more evidence in presented. It's clear to me, at least, that Creation makes more sense now that we know much more about the universe we live in. While this book easily coincides with some of the ID (Intelligent Design) books by Behe, Dembski, and some of the other ID folks, its main concern is solely on the Origin of Life, not the evolution of man which is addressed in more complete form elsewhere. Highly recommened!
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