Much of the effort in Intelligent Design is aimed at demonstrating that it can and does have a place in scientific investigation. William A. Dembski does this in his book The Design Inference. But for the Creationist any rational discussion of the subject of Intelligent Design in the Universe must start with the Word of God. And the statement in Genesis 1:11: “And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself“, cannot be overemphasized,. Both the phrase “after his (its) kind and “whose seed is in itself” point to two important aspects of life and two major problems for evolutionary theory. The types or genus of living things are after their kind (see Paul Nelson’s article in Signs of Intelligence) Also the means for that life to continue is contained in the life itself and this for the evolutionist brings up the problem of beginnings. In order for natural selection to work and for the possibility for evolution to explain the complexity of life on this planet, there must be an initial living organism that could change (through selection and genetic mutation) and propagate itself. Nor must this “primitive” organism just have life, but it must be able to replicate itself. Cells from the “most primitive” organisms to the most complex replicate themselves through the same amazing process, that being cell division or mitosis. This incredible process is common to and required by every living organism known to man, including those speculated about by Darwin that were the basis for all other life. It would be more probable for a bus involved in a auto accident to be split into two mini vans than for this form of cell replication to have occurred by chance and yet it is postulated as fact by the evolutionists. This imaginary first cell of the Darwinian’s must have already had the capability to divide or it could never replicate itself. And if it did not do so by the means we know life to replicate itself today, it could not be the precursor to the life we see around us.

And even this level of complexity is not enough, but if natural selection is to “work it’s magic” this living thing must be able to adapt (or mutate). It must be inherently more complex than that which is able to sustain and replicate its own life. If not there is no method for it to change or “evolve”. For the evolutionist this life had to have just “showed up on the scene” pre-constructed and ready to go without the intervention of outside intelligence. Intelligent design is calling these monumental assumptions into question as good science, postulating they might be more accurately classified as religion.

As many have pointed out the knowledge of the mechanics of life in Darwin’s time was exceedingly crude. Microscopes could not even see into the cell to understand its workings. Darwin’s observations on natural selection were on a much broader scale, observing entire living organisms. With the increase in our understanding of the underpinnings of life Darwin’s observations become less and less adequate in explaining the ultimate origin of life, as we know it. We now know that even the most basic organisms are incredibly complex machines. The genetic code within living organisms contains data, so much data that Bill Gates referred to it as “far more advanced than any software we’ve ever created” in his book “The Road Ahead” and even the evolutionist Richard Dawkins referred to it as having as much information as “1,000 Encyclopedia Britannica’s” in his book the Blind Watchmaker. Every form of life in extent today uses the same complex system, with the same voluminous informational content. There are no vestiges of another “simpler” form that gave rise to the life in evidence now. Intelligent Design rightly recognizes that complex data alludes to a designer while the evolutionists are unsuccessfully looking for their answers in an alleged “primordial soup”. In the book Signs of Intelligence, a compilation of fascinating articles, Stephen Meyer shows the statistical dilemma resulting from this line of thinking.