God Code: The Secret of Our Past, the Promise of Our Future Book

This book is completely erroneous, in the best scenario. Probably, is just a big lie. That's why:

1. The common believe is science
"Population statistics from the 2000 are believed to be the most accurate in history, indicating that we share our world with approximately 6.2 billion of our kind. Of that number, nearly 95 percent, or 5.9 billion people, believe in the existence of a higher power or Supreme Being of some description. More than half of those people refer to this power as 'God'. These and similar statistics suggest that the question of our day may be less about whether or not we believe that God exists, and more about precisely what such a presence means in our lives" (p.43).
Then God exists because 95% of humans believe in it. This is the starting point of the book: we already know that God exists, and we are trying to demonstrate how It exists, not whether It exists or not.
The comment about the exact number of people around the world will be treated on the point number 10.

2. Actually, everything is science
"Of the many ways that we may define 'science' today, the American Heritage Dictionary suggests that 'any methodological, activity, discipline or study' is a science. Through this widely accepted definition..." (p. 95). It is hard to say what's the quality of the American Heritage for defining science upon it (not to mention that this is not its main definition, but the second one ()), but clearly that definition of science as everything is not a widely accepted one.

3. There are no coincidences, but a deep and hidden explanation
"How could the members of the Nicean Council have known that the book they would produce would eventually become the basis for one of the great religions of the world [...:]?" (p. 49). Well, they actually do. They probably don't know that Christianity will be the most important religion around the world fifteen centuries later, but they know that they were creating its basis. But the point is what Braden tries to insinuate with his comment. That old members of the Nicea Council had the power to forecast the future? It seems so.

4. And when there is a simple explanation... there are coincidences who bring us to another deep and hidden explanation.
"The message within our DNA reads precisely the same in both the Arabic and Hebrew languages" (p. 232). The relation between the Arabic and the Hebrew alphabets is clear, simple, and historically proved. But there is no mention to it, but an insinuation of a hidden link between Arabic and Hebrew builded on Cabbala's numbers, showing precisely which Braden wants to show (even if this link can demonstrate whatever else).

5. There is something hidden, something that we have not seen yet, even if it always was there.
"Through our advancement as a civilization from wood-burning fires to microwave ovens, is it possible that we could have left something behind?" (p. 67), states Braden clearly. "Even today, the details of the [alchemy:] remain hidden to all except those who are directly involved with the tradition, to prevent the misuse of its power" (p. 75).

6. There is something hidden... against us.
The conspiracy for banning some of the old Bible books was intended (p. 49) for a determinate purpose, what we don't know (even Braden doesn't venture it either; in this case it is more powerful the insinuation than the revelation). Obviously, we don't have evidences of that hidden purpose.

7. In this hidden world, every hidden truth supports our hidden truth
Among the vague and scarce structure of this book, there are here and there some secondary lines of research presented for given support to the Braden's main thesis, even if they are not related in any way. The purpose is blurring the borders of knowledge and transform the world in a mysterious space where everything is possible. This is the case of quoting the Russian archaeologist A. Gorbovsky (don't google his name, it's worthless - ), who allegedly created a theory of a nuclear war happened in India in the Old Age. Let's be crazy and reckless, and let's believe in it: what that matters for this book about God and genetics?

8. Quotation is not needed
"s science confirms the ancient models, revealing that the alchemical elements of Fire, Air and Water actually represent three of the most abundant elements of our bodies: hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen, respectively" (p. 85). Through pages 81-83 this derivation is developed without any quotation nor references. The first of these pairs (air-nitrogen) is demonstrated with this sentence: "is it possible that [the ancient alchemist:] were saying to us, in the language of their day, that nitrogen was the substance they were referencing? For the purpose of this discussion, we will assume this is the case" (p. 82). This assumption is the basis of the rest of the book, with any further proof or reference.
"The majority of scholarly opinion holds that, in the days of Moses, YHVH was pronounced 'Yah-Weigh'". Not to mention that we don't know which time was the Moses' time, there are no solid theories about how Moses spoke Hebrew... if he spoke Hebrew. We are not paying attention now to the very peculiar way to notate the pronounce.

9. But quotation is needed for referencing unrelated things.
"In addition to preserve the oldest and most mysterious works of the Kabbalah, the Sepher Yetzirah is undoubtedly the most controversial" (p. 58). Undoubtedly for whom? Apparently for the prestigious historian of religions Karen Armstrong, quoted in the next sentence of this paragraph. What if Armstrong quote doesn't support that? Who cares? When some known scientists are quoted by Braden, the quotation doesn't support what Braden wants to. The names of Carl Sagan (p. 179) or Einstein (p. 231) are used in this way.

10. Maths are presented to support us... even if they don't.
"There is the slim probability of .00042 percent that the letters YHVG would arrange themselves purely by chance". Yes, this is true. There is the same probability for four Hebraic letters will be chosen for forming a word. It's the same probability of 'corn' or 'blow' in English (actually, this is even more difficult because there are more letters in English language than in the Hebraic alphabet), and we don't consider corn a miracle or something exceptional. This is a complete non-sense, because letters don't combine in any language just randomly: we can't use probability for explaining language.
The aim of this false probability is support the assumption that YHVG (the allegedly Hebraic letters for 'humanity'), are an equivalent for hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen and carbon. But following the Cabbala's method proposed by Braden, there are not 22 letters playing this game, but ten: "probability" is dropped dramatically, even more when we know that it is not possible repeat any letter and that the position of these letters is irrelevant. The equivalence element-number is based on the atomic mass, for he considers it "of the 17 characteristics that define [the elements:] only one matches precisely with the hidden number values of the Hebrew language" (p. 112). There are no more reasons for taking into account the atomic mass apart precisely that this is the only what matches. But even this is not true: the atomic mass for hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen and carbon are 1.0, 14.0, 15.9, and 12.0, respectively. 14 is transformed in 5 (1+4), 12 is transformed in 3 (1+2), 1.0 is transformed in 10 (no reason for that, apart that 1 doesn't match Braden's theory) and 15.9 is transformed first in 15 (not in 16, as expected) and then in 6 (1+5). This should be enough to dismount the main purpose for the book. The name of the humanity is a combination of four elements, like, for instance, B-N-O-C or Zr-S-Sm-K. There are actually hundreds of those possible combinations, but not the Braden's one.

11. More scientific tenets: if a correlation is right, there is a Big cause behind.
Following a study stating that patients who were prayed for did better in heart diseases (p. 80), the next step is to believe that God was involved in it. The institution who carried the study on, the Saint Luke's Health System, states on its web site's definition (first line): "The Saint Luke's Health System is a faith-based [...:] health system...". This worthless sentence is not taken into account in the Braden's book, nor the huge amount of critics on methodology and bias of the research published by eminent doctors in Archives of Internal Medicine. Let's remember the important bit: science has proved the existence of God.

12. And if a series is right, every element in it is right
For the purpose of proving that we have to consider the Bible as a historical book telling us the truth, Braden shows how other allegedly legendary books have told us some truth: the Iliad and the discovery of Troy, the discovery of Machu Picchu, and the discovery of the Noah's Ark (p. 46). Is the Noah's Ark not discovered yet? What it matters, if the rest of the series is right, and most importantly, if we want to convey that the Bible is truth?