Geoff Robinson Interviews Fazale Rana about The Cell's Design Q: What is the central thesis of your book? A: In the last decade or so molecular biologists, biochemists, and biophysicists have developed a wide range of new techniques that give us an unprecedented view of life’s operation at a molecular level. In my opinion, these new insights provide some of the most compelling evidence that life must stem from the work of a Creator. The Cell’s Design is my attempt to communicate the breadth and depth of these discoveries and organize them into a formal argument for intelligent design (ID). To make my case, I utilize a form of analogical reasoning called pattern recognition. I attempt to define an intelligent design pattern using the behavior of human designers as a guide. Remarkably, the defining characteristics and features of life’s chemical systems closely correspond to the intelligent design pattern. In my view, this analogy compels the conclusion that life stems from a Creator. It’s not that life’s chemistry appears to be designed. But it appears to be designed in the same way that a system or object created by a human designer appears to be designed.
Q: Why did you feel The Cell’s Design needed to be written at this time? A: In my opinion, the scientific evidence for the work of a Creator and the reliability of the Old and New Testaments abounds in all areas of science. As a biochemist, I think the most compelling evidence for ID is found in biochemistry, the study of life’s most fundamental systems. I find that very few people appreciate the power and extent of the biochemical evidence for ID. Most science apologetics works are quick to jump on the problems with evolutionary explanations for life’s origin, including the information content of living systems. These works might make some mention of Behe’s concept of irreducible complexity (IC), but that usually is about it. A small number of apologetics works give the appropriate attention to the case that can be made for a Creator’s existence using biochemistry. Of course the two chief exceptions are Michael Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box and his new work The Edge of Evolution. Both of these seminal works focus on the biochemical case for ID. Still, much of Behe’s attention is focused on explaining why evolutionary processes can’t yield IC biochemical systems or trying to define the boundaries of biological evolution at a molecular level. The two goals I had for The Cell’s Design were to:
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