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Life by Design
LIFE BY DESIGN is a brief introduction to biology for non-major undergraduate students and advanced secondary level students. It departs from a tedious encyclopedic approach to biology in favor of stating and exemplifying 12 basic principles that describe all living things. Examples are taken from the everyday lives of students. This text is integrative of science and other disciplines, giving science a rich context in the non-major student's thinking. LIFE BY DESIGN invites the student to examine the origins of life forms from both a Darwinian and a design perspective and aids the reader in following the authors' analysis of these two perspectives.
612 pages, Paperback
First published November 30, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 6, 2017
*grabs a megaphone* I AM DONE, WORLD. WINTER BREAK IS HEREEEE.
I didn't really care for this, but again, we're talking textbooks, people. It's not supposed to be entertaining. xD
Despite its claims of being "easy to read"...um, yeah, no. IT WASN'T. My brain could not comprehend a lot of Things. :P However, as a whole, I think it was well-presented. I'm just not a science person.
Like most of my textbooks, there were some things I really liked and others I didn't. The last half of the book was more interesting to me than the first half - and the last couple chapters were especially engaging. I didn't agree with everything, but it had the best discussion on evolution I've seen presented. It was very objective even though the author of this book believes in Creation by design. (Which I also believe, btw.)
Honestly though? I AM SO GLAD TO BE DONE. *gladly throws textbooks aside and hugs all the fiction awaiting me*
3 stars
I didn't really care for this, but again, we're talking textbooks, people. It's not supposed to be entertaining. xD
Despite its claims of being "easy to read"...um, yeah, no. IT WASN'T. My brain could not comprehend a lot of Things. :P However, as a whole, I think it was well-presented. I'm just not a science person.
Like most of my textbooks, there were some things I really liked and others I didn't. The last half of the book was more interesting to me than the first half - and the last couple chapters were especially engaging. I didn't agree with everything, but it had the best discussion on evolution I've seen presented. It was very objective even though the author of this book believes in Creation by design. (Which I also believe, btw.)
Honestly though? I AM SO GLAD TO BE DONE. *gladly throws textbooks aside and hugs all the fiction awaiting me*
3 stars
September 3, 2014
The main textbook for my Biology class. A massive tome, this one gave me quite the headache as I tried to push through that thing in eight weeks. However, it was very interesting nonetheless.
The main thesis of the book is that biological life, in all of its many forms, is so unbearably complex that there is no reason to doubt the existence of a Great Designer (by implication, God).
Starting from the smallest known level of complexity, which is the electrons/neutrons/protons which make up an atom, the authors go out from there until they have reached the overall ecosystem. The authors, while genuinely credentialed biologists, make no apologies for advocating the Creationist view throughout their text. They even "warn" the reader that this is what they're going to do in the introduction, so that there's no sense of being deceived on the reader's part.
As a Christian, I found this to be an excellent book!
The main thesis of the book is that biological life, in all of its many forms, is so unbearably complex that there is no reason to doubt the existence of a Great Designer (by implication, God).
Starting from the smallest known level of complexity, which is the electrons/neutrons/protons which make up an atom, the authors go out from there until they have reached the overall ecosystem. The authors, while genuinely credentialed biologists, make no apologies for advocating the Creationist view throughout their text. They even "warn" the reader that this is what they're going to do in the introduction, so that there's no sense of being deceived on the reader's part.
As a Christian, I found this to be an excellent book!
July 10, 2014
While I appreciate the attempt to view this science stuff from a more religious perspective, I found the constant (!) exclamation (!) points (!) very annoying and distracting. Some of the book's suppositions were also highly opinionated. I don't need my biology textbook to lecture me about the morality of drinking alcohol under the thinly veiled guise of science.
I already hated reading about biology before they tried to be all peppy (!) about it, but now I hate it even more.
So glad this class is over.
I already hated reading about biology before they tried to be all peppy (!) about it, but now I hate it even more.
So glad this class is over.
August 24, 2017
Read this book "Life by Design" for my Principles of Biology class. I will say it did have some interesting facts inside the book. I enjoyed it, and what I learned from it, throughout the class, when I attended the class and read this book I was actually in the class with the professor who wrote this book.
April 6, 2015
Loved how the book was faith based and described biology from a creationist point of view. Points to the fact that all life cannot be separated from the Creator God who designed it. Only downfall was having to read through it in 8 short weeks.
May 5, 2015
Very interesting read from a Christian standpoint. It would have gotten a higher rating if it wasn't so technical at times. I feel like it expected me to know some of the things in depth before reading. Plus, as another reader stated, the constant (!) was annoying.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews