BOOK REVIEW - STEPHEN C. MEYER’S Darwin's Doubt

Darwin's Doubt:

My dog-eared paperback book

As the book's title suggests, this reading is going to be about difference of thought process around evolution between the common Darwinian model and the other being where the author wants its readers to focus, the fact that multitude of fossil records do not depict gradual change through microevolutionary variations with mere accumulation of tiny changes in morphology, that is the Cambrian Explosion.

Picture by - Fossil of Trilobite

Stephen Meyer is quite elaborate and succinct in putting forth details on the Cambrian period. This period, in evolutionary terms, is a period where evolution theories take on a paradoxical spontaneity. The most sudden explosion of a variety of unique life forms happened in this period of evolutionary history. 

The book presents an elegant dialogue that revolves around Palaeontology, Geology, Molecular Biology and Epigenetics to assist in explaining scientific challenges to understand evolution.

Picture by - DARWIN’S HMS BEAGLE

Definitely, the book highlights how Darwin himself expressed that the sudden appearance of the Cambrian animals posed a significant challenge to his own theory. 

Picture by - burgess_shale

Readers will get to explore several theories and hypotheses that were made in this matter and many more that were devised to rule out the Cambrian Explosion, some of which deemed natural forces, Earth's changing heat and pressure, lack of fossil preservation and many more being the cause behind the explosion. 

The author has skilfully highlighted how these theories lack foundation and were ultimately recalled, making Cambrian Explosion Nature's unique paradox, most striking being the discovery of Chen and Chien's fossil sponge embryos in China.

Strikingly, the author's prowess at describing things is remarkably reader-friendly.

Picture by - Gregor Mendel

The book also aims to vividly sketch the regressive functionality of the Darwinian model of 'Blended Inheritance', in the light of Mendelian Genetics.

Does the story of Gregor Mendel and his peas strike a chord? Yeah, that one! 

Author also highlights the work of various scientists who experimented to produce mutations, explaining factors that work to decipher evolution.

Apparently, before the breakthrough discovery of the DNA framework, many evolutionary biologists believed that a single mutation could change a gene that could produce a new trait. 

Picture by - James Watson and Francis Crick with their DNA model at the Cavendish Laboratories in 1953

Once the DNA structure was revealed, out of everything else, one fact about mutation was clear as crystal; that overtime, accumulation of mutation would degrade the quality of a gene and eventually lead to its loss of functionality, rendering it useless.

On a fun side, let me distract you a bit by how the word mutation always makes me wonder about X-Men. Wolverine tops my list of favourite super heroes. 

Which one is your's?

After careful analysis, the author takes the audience to the importance of evolution in the emergence of proteins. If new life forms arose, so must the new building blocks of life called the proteins must have arisen, implying that the explosion of new life forms must have involved emergence of new proteins and new protein folds to perform new functionalities.

Picture by - nadeline

The most important point of discussion in this book is the fact that, the more complex an organism is in its form, the more genetic information it would need to create those traits which make it complex. 

Towards the end of the book, the author draws our attention to another major factor that plays immense role in shaping us, the branch of Epigenetics. 

Epigenetics, in simple terms, means the affect of our behavior and environment on the functionality of genes. Its not just the genes. Genes in turn are affected by the nuances of epigenetics. Eventually, we are not always just the way we are born! 

Picture by - Wikipedia

The book should lead its readers to a reasonable intrigue as to why people denounce or ignore the very doubts and confusion Darwin himself had, which left gaps in his own theory.

The book brought joy to me, for it took me down the memory lanes of school and college level Biology. It will be of interest to the readers who find delight in thinking about evolution and are enamored by fields of study like those of Geology, Palaeontology, Cell Biology and Genetics. 

Nevertheless, I believe the book is for everyone as the author has made sure to put a comprehensible explanation to every scientific topic covered. 

Picture by - www.icr.org

To end my review, it is imperative that I draw the attention to the fact that the book indeed, does justice by enlightening us about the existence of an Intelligent Design, as in the words of the author himself, "Intelligent Design is not based upon religious belief, nor does it provide a proof for the existence of God. But it affirms and suggests the design we observe in the natural world is real. This evidence of a purposeful design behind life offers the prospect of significance, wholeness and hope."