"When future intellectual historians list the books that toppled Darwin's theory, The Design of Life will be at the top." So writes Lehigh biochemist Michael Behe, a leading critic of Darwinism and proponent of intelligent design.The scientific community continues to wrestle with deep and fundamental questions: Where did the universe come from? How did life originate? How did a coded language like our DNA come to form the basis of life? How could multicellular life form so suddenly from unicellular life? What is the origin of the complex molecular machines, essential to life, which are inside every cell of our bodies? The Design of Life gives all interested parties in the debate over biological origins the hard scientific evidence they need to assess the true state of Darwin's theory and of the theory of intelligent design. But it does much more: it carefully fosters the attitude of open inquiry that science needs not only to thrive but also to avoid becoming subservient to special interests. In this book, authors William Dembski and Jonathan Wells empower readers to navigate the captivating and controversial waters of biological origins.The Design of Life has nine chapters, each of which is accompanied by Endnotes and Discussion Questions. The ninth, an Epilogue, is followed by a 12-page Glossary and a 14-page Index. The General Notes on an accompanying CD supply each chapter with additional analysis and discussion at a more advanced level. A Foreword by University of South Dakota biologist William S. Harris introduces the book. Chapter 1 - Human Origins. This chapter addresses key topics in human origins - the 98% gene identity (base sequences) between chimpanzees and humans, the significance of brain size to intelligence, the uniqueness of human language, and the challenge that altruism poses to evolutionary ethics. Chapter 2 - Genetics and Macroevolution. This chapter examines Darwin's theory of evolution, Mendelian inheritance, the adaptational package, the molecular basis for genes and evolution, and evolutionary developmental biology ("Evo-Devo").Chapter 3 - The Fossil Record. This chapter examines major patterns in the fossil record, the failure of Darwin's theory to match up with these patterns (a failure Darwin himself regarded as the "gravest objection" to his theory), and why fossils alone cannot establish evolutionary lines of descent. Chapter 4 - The Origin of Species. This chapter describes theories about how new species originate. It explains the critical distinction between evidence for small changes and claims about vast transformations (micro- vs. macroevolution), It also explains why the current examples of alleged new species (observed speciation) provide no evidence for macroevolution.Chapter 5 - Similar Features. This chapter discusses analogy and homology - do things look alike because they do the same job, like scissors, or because they are related, like siblings? The puzzling story of the pandas provides a useful illustration. It also looks at molecular phylogeny, vestigial structures, and the discredited story of recapitulation.Chapter 6 - Irreducible Complexity. This chapter discusses biochemist Michael Behe's concept of irreducible complexity and then applies it to molecular machines inside the cell, such as the bacterial flagellum. Conventional evolutionary explanations (coevolution and co-option) are contrasted with intelligent design explanations, which are seen as more powerful and scientifically fruitful. Chapter 7 - Specified Complexity. This chapter characterizes specified complexity as an information-theoretic property of structures that places them beyond the reach of chance-based explanations (such as natural selection and random variation). It then applies the theory of specified complexity to biological systems, demonstrating their actual design.Chapter 8 - The Origin of Life. This chapter describes why the origin of life is such a difficult problem and examines the main materialistic proposals (Oparin's Hypothesis, the Miller-Urey experiment, the RNA world, self-organization, molecular Darwinism). It summarizes the failure to find a non-intelligent origin.Chapter 9 - Epilogue: The "Inherit the Wind" Stereotype. The Epilogue examines key social interpretations of the issues: The movie "Inherit the Wind" (Hollywood's stereotype of the Scopes "Monkey Trial"), the actual Scopes Trial, the importance of keeping science honest, and the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover trial.