Genes determinism and God Analysis

The purpose of the book is to draw the attention of the reader to the role of the free will and sovereign will of God in the human behavior, and Alexander expose perfectly on the ambiguous theme of the role of God and human free will in governing the human behavior (pp. 27-29)1 Background information From 1880-1940, roughly more than a half-century, it was believed that heredity was the determiner of the race, mental health, class, and intelligence. The Eugenic legislation helped to ensure that sterilization of the physical and the mental defectives was compulsory in the USA, Germany, and Denmark. In 1940, it was declared that the feeble minded people should be prohibited from reproducing since the feeble-minded families were mostly characterized by illegitimacy, desertion, promiscuity, unhappiness, crime and ill-health and the writer was thus fully convinced that genes determined the feeble-mindedness and the associated pathological conditions.

The very extreme application of the eugenics resulted in the gas ovens of the Buchenwald and Auschwitz (p. 103-105)1 The book critically surveys the state of play that is currently in place with regards to the role played by genes to human personhood and focuses on the special relationship involving the human behavior and the genetic variation, and the ideas about the determinism and the human freedom. It is more of the contemporary biological more than the ideological considerations that subvert every kind of the dichotomous pairing the hereditary-learning. The developmental biology offers the needed breakthrough and significant part of the book is dedicated to elaborating to the non-specialists on how the human person-hood tends to emerge from the lengthy multi-casual development process whereby the genome is only but an important element of the molecules that constitute the human being (pp.

This results in the survey of the many underlying methods and many assumptions of the quantitative human behavior that concerns genetics before indulging in the molecular genetics of the human behavior that is followed by the critical analysis of the applications of the genetic behavior that’s involved in the study of the intelligence, politics, criminality and the sexual orientation 1 Many philosophical questions pop up throughout the whole book and especially those that are related to the genetic causation and a question that is pertinent to both the human behavior and the animal difference. Questions such as what does it really mean by saying that a certain gene is the cause of something? And specifically, what does it cause? These questions become very relevant in the chapter that explains the theme of determinism and free will.

It’s also addressed in the question on the extent one is allowed to manipulate the genome and fourthly it’s explained through the celebrating the diversity found in the community and this is enahnced by both theology and genetics. Finally, Alexander explains it in the form whereby the God’s image always gives the theological underpinning of all the notions of free will and moral responsibility (pp. 50-57)1 Evaluation Dennis Alexander brings out the ambiguous topic on the free will and the moral responsibility and the role of God in the influence of human behavior in a more elaborative manner and successfully captures the attention of the readers to fully understanding of the topic. His beliefs are in line with the content of his book and by this, he is very persuasive and passionate in his writing with the aim of convincing the readers and correcting any wrong notion they might be having pertaining the human behavior and free will.