Biomimicry and Design

The biological world on all scales exhibits mind-boggling complexity. The immensity of biological design humbles the greatest human inventive achievements. Here are a few examples to put things in perspective:



The Circulatory System

The human circulatory system distributes oxygen and nutrients to the entirety of the body, while sequestering waste to the be removed from the body. If there is an irremovable blockage in an artery, the circulatory system is capable of creating a natural by-pass by creating more new arteries to supply that area. When your body is cut or damage and a blood vessel is opened, it is usually able to repair itself before fatal blood loss occurs. This whole process is tightly managed so that it doesn't over-coagulate and cause a blood clot. The circulatory system in a human is about 40,000 miles long, which is enough that it would be able to wrap around the earth twice. This system persists the entirety of your life, and has been known to last over 100 years without so much as a conscious input from the privileged human who contains this system.



Compare this to your local highway system. Roads require an immensity of work to create and maintain. This allows economies to thrive due to proper transport of vital resources for various parts of the country. Just like blood vessels carry nutrients, roads carry resources for people in a society. Roads, as we know, certainly do not maintain their self.




Bacterial Flagellum

Imagine a submarine with a motor attached to a motile appendage that allows it to move 19,000 mph. This would be the scaled equivalent to the fastest moving bacteria that uses flagella for its mobility. The bacterial flagellum is essentially a motor attached to a tail that allows it to wisp through water:



It is likely that this tail is exhibiting some sort of yet to be understood amplifier of underwater mobility.




Heart

The heart is the longest-lasting pump known to humankind. It is able to pump non-stop for over 100 years, and it undergoes self-repair and adjusts heartrate according to various external and internal cues. Imagine talking to an engineer about designing some sort of pump that is able to perform these same functions. The heart also has an independent bundle of nerve fibers that allows it to act independently from the human nervous system, while also still being able to receive input from the human nervous system.




Brain

The brain consists of approximately 86,000,000,000 neurons, and about 86,000,000,000 supporting cells. Neurons have projections that allow them to connect to other neurons that are called axons and dendrites. The total length of axons and dendrites in the brain has been estimated to span about 528,000 miles. To put this in perspective, the world trade center has a meager 473 miles of conduit. Imagine how impossible it would be for the empire state building to electrically wire itself. Now consider the even greater improbability of the human neural system wiring itself by random chance with over 1,000x more conduit. It is clear the human brain is a masterpiece of design.



The axons on neurons, which carry electrochemical signals, are also insulated by myelin. Myelin is the equivalent of the rubber that surrounds electrical conduit. It allows faster electrical impulses along the neuron, while also stabilizing the axon as a whole. The entirety of all of these neurons and supporting cells allows conscious souls to have an existence in the material interface of the world. It generates the potential of logic, emotions, homeostasis, self-awareness, and so on. This is so incomprehensibly out of the realm of possibility for our current engineering potential. This is why it is impossible for such organic circuitry to come to be without a hyper-intelligent Designer.




Bumble Bees

We take for granted that biological life was capable of flight long before human invention managed to figure it out. Of the biological fliers, the bumble bee is quite the curiosity. Despite its wings being smaller than its body, it is able to hover and fly itself around with agility that would humble the best human helicopter. This, plus the fact that bumble bees create sweet-tasting honey from pollinating flowers. This sort of ecological dedication vastly humbles Greta Thunberg and company. They don't even require fossil fuels to fly. They are also reproducible and grow to maturity from eating honey, a trait that Boeing would love to be able to patent for its bottom-line.






Trees

If you were to tell someone that you had a solar panel that was capable of self-replicating thousands of seeds per year that could become new solar panels, you would be in total disbelief. Even more, these solar panels are capable of growing over time with water, carbon dioxide, and sunlight. The carbon dioxide they take in, is reciprocated by releasing oxygen into the air for animals to breathe. This is what makes trees the most beautifully designed ecological masterpiece. Not to mention they're beautiful and produce sweet-tasting fruits for animal consumption and nutrition. If this doesn't bewilder you, then you're due for a walk in the woods.



Oh also don't forget that they supply wood, a material that is used in the construction of mostly all buildings ever.




Biological energy generation

I will try to keep this as simple as possible, because the complexity of the details of energy generation in biological organisms can fill entire textbooks. All independent biological organisms generate their energy from a special organelle called the mitochondrion. your metabolism feeds the mitochondria with an electrochemical gradient that forms along its membrane.



This gradient powers the spinning of a turbine called ATP synthase on the membrane of the mitochondria. This spinning turbine generates ATP which is the universal energy holder of biological organisms. If you didn't notice, this works much like a motor



More specifically, it is like a hydrogen fuel cell generator. But again, imagine a hydrogen fuel cell that is self-replicable... it would be an engineer's dream. This is a hydrogen fuel cell generator because the electrochemical gradient is Hydrogen and oxygen. The oxygen you breathe is chemically aiding this reaction, and the carbon dioxide you breathe out will likely have a carbon atom from something you ate earlier in the week.


As we can see, all aspects of biology from the small to the large scale are mostly beyond the capabilities of human design. Since human design is incapable of creating many of the facets of biology, we must realize that a greater-than-human intelligence was required to create biological organisms. This hyper-dimensional Being is what has been deemed "God", among many other names, throughout history. The study of biology is the study of the design of this Master Architect.

If anyone is interested in hearing why any aspect of biology must have come from design, please name any aspect of biology and I will try my best to explain why.

This was great man. I really liked the description on how mitochondria work.

Excellent, but the ignorant will always ignore Gods work, to join the “it” gang, yell and scream and behave like animals,

originally posted by: Randomname2
Excellent, but the ignorant will always ignore Gods work, to join the “it” gang, yell and scream and behave like animals,

For a science-minded person, If the human brain having 528,000 miles of interconnected neural circuits to allow their existence doesn't prove to them that they're designed, then nothing will. Not even if someone rose from the dead for them.

a reply to: cooperton

Ah yes, ye olde watchmaker argument.

I take it you have studied the counter argument if the desire above all else is to identify the truth and discard what is not regardless of whether it confirms to your bias?

If this is what you believe, then why not just proclaim your faith as opposed to the need to prove it?

a reply to: cooperton

Everything God does makes sense, people are still hung up on page 1 of the Bible and ignore the rest, God inspires Awe, and that every human has 528,000 miles neural circuitry, AMD and IBM can only fathom of the power of the computer chip they can make, yet God made us of flesh, leaves a person in awe and inspires people like you to post the truth, to lead people to the right track, which is what God wants, if you see someone going over a cliff and God isnt helping, then it’s up to you to try to save him, it’s easier for God to take us all to Heaven when we die, than fix the mess on this Planet. He gave us an example to live so we can be prepared to live in Heaven and perfect our bodies so we are incapable to sin. Like Jesus new body. So, what more do people want, the power to extend human lifespan already exists, but greed has taken over, the young make a fatal mistake, that they will be young forever, but like a switch, your body will turn onto dying mode old age.

a reply to: cooperton

Hey coop,

PM for You.

a reply to: cooperton
Bumble bees do not make honey nor do they add anything to the production of honey. Honey bees make honey.

Don't take it personal but how are we going to trust you on anything without sources and such a # up?

Formatting is good

originally posted by: 19Bones79
a reply to: cooperton

Ah yes, ye olde watchmaker argument.

I take it you have studied the counter argument if the desire above all else is to identify the truth and discard what is not regardless of whether it confirms to your bias?

Bro it's not bias, there's just no way that 500,000 miles of neural circuitry can self-wire itself lol. In college I majored in neuroscience where I started to doubt evolutionary theory.

originally posted by: ThatDamnDuckAgain
a reply to: cooperton
Bumble bees do not make honey nor do they add anything to the production of honey. Honey bees make honey.

Don't take it personal but how are we going to trust you on anything without sources and such a # up?

Formatting is good

bumble bees do make honey, just not in surplus. This is why they're not farmed for their honey but they do make enough for their own colony.

"Bumblebees eat nectar and pollen made by flowers. The sugary nectar provides the bees with energy while the pollen provides them with protein, according to The Bumblebee Conservation Trust. They make honey by chewing the pollen and mixing it with their saliva, according to Animal Diversity Web (ADW). They feed the honey to the queen and the developing brood."

www.livescience.com...

a reply to: cooperton

Bro it's not bias, there's just no way that 500,000 miles of neural circuitry can self-wire itself lol. In college I majored in neuroscience where I started to doubt evolutionary theory.

There is no way therefore a god? How did they receive your thesis? Surely your findings were suppressed when you told them there is simply no way?

And why the need to cut off the foreskin? Not good in hindsight?


I take it this god you attribute these wonders to is the Christian god?

Your choice for settling on Him specifically also not bias?

a reply to: cooperton

If anyone is interested in hearing why any aspect of biology must have come from design, please name any aspect of biology and I will try my best to explain why.

Yes, I'm interested. Please explain to me these two aspects of biology: death, and life. Please, explain to me why death is there by design; and, above all, explain to me why birth is also required by design.

a reply to: cooperton

Yeah technically they produce honey on the go after chewing on the pollen, but there is almost zero surplus and if, only in temporary makeshift storages. You won't ever see it and if it's tiny specks and not near the quantities. They don't need to because all will die over winter except the queen. What they do is chew the pollend, mix it with saliva and feed it to their larva. The stuff isn't also what we would recognize as honey.

Many bumble bees build nests in the Earth or inside stone piles, we have badgers here that would scavenge them if there was any honey around. Bumble bees can sting several times but that would not interest the badger.

I know for sure because I scavenge in December for old bumble bee nests, they are mostly in the earth and often in old mouse holes or under tree stems. No worries, there are no bumble bees inside there anymore, they all (queens) leave the nest but will choose places to hibernate near the nest.

A bit like saying, apples do contain alcohol. Yes they do in trace amounts, as there is always little fermentation, but I never heard one saying apples contain alcohol

originally posted by: 19Bones79

There is no way therefore a god? How did they receive your thesis? Surely your findings were suppressed when you told them there is simply no way?

You have to go pray to the white coats to ask for an answer about how a biological supercomputer with 500,000 miles of conduit compressed into 78 cubic inches of space in the skull would have been made? Think for your self. It is obvious this did not come to be by random chance.

originally posted by: Direne

Yes, I'm interested. Please explain to me these two aspects of biology: death, and life. Please, explain to me why death is there by design; and, above all, explain to me why birth is also required by design.

life on earth in its current state would not perpetuate if organisms did not die. Not just overpopulation, but also the fact that dead organisms fertilize living plant matter.

When a leaf dies it falls to the ground, fertilizes, and reintegrates with the tree that gave it life.

originally posted by: ThatDamnDuckAgain

A bit like saying, apples do contain alcohol. Yes they do in trace amounts, as there is always little fermentation, but I never heard one saying apples contain alcohol

Bumblebees feed the honey to developing bumblebees, so it would be more like saying cows make milk for their developing children.

Thanks for the other info that is interesting.

a reply to: cooperton

Indeed, but that's then a very suboptimal design. Better a design in which there is no need for either life or death, no?

originally posted by: Direne
a reply to: cooperton

Indeed, but that's then a very suboptimal design. Better a design in which there is no need for either life or death, no?

Glad you asked. Although that is the design of the fallen world, apparently there is a state of deathlessness that has been and will be again. When humans go against their design, the world falls, but when they rise up in synchrony with the Designer, the archetype emerges. It's like whether or not you follow an instruction manual... If you operate a machine against it's design it will begin to break.

a reply to: cooperton

This leads to the dilemma of whether birds have wings because they fly, or they have wings in order to fly...

In other words, if life forms are the way they are because they were designed like that, then obviously there is an error in the design because obviously life forms are all fragile and eventually cease to operate the moment you change the environment in which they operate. If you allow the designed life forms to adapt to a changing environment which you do not control, they will eventually adapt and evolve diverging from your initial design.

The best solution seems to be able to design both the environment and the life forms in it, but there is no way you can avoid the environment to change, and hence the life forms to also change. I think that's a complicated design, after all.

Wouldn't be better a design of a Universe devoid of any life form? Unless there is just one life form, alone, in solitude, imaging there is other life forms and even a Universe.... sort of a God that imagines he creates universes and life forms...

a reply to: cooperton

Out of the thousands of gods out there, I correctly assumed which one you worship.


Imagine that.

originally posted by: Direne
a reply to: cooperton

This leads to the dilemma of whether birds have wings because they fly, or they have wings in order to fly...

In other words, if life forms are the way they are because they were designed like that, then obviously there is an error in the design because obviously life forms are all fragile and eventually cease to operate the moment you change the environment in which they operate.

This goes back to the user's manual. If a bird is trying to live underwater it is going against it's designed purpose.

If you allow the designed life forms to adapt to a changing environment which you do not control, they will eventually adapt and evolve diverging from your initial design.

Within the design there is a lot of wiggle room for organisms to adapt to extremes. It's like your vacuum cleaner being able to adjust to high carpet or no carpet settings. These abilities are already present in the genome of the organism. For example, humans can acclimate to higher altitudes within a relatively quick amount of time with a few reversible epigenetic changes. Because these attributes are reversible, it shows the ability was already present within the possibilities of the organism's design, whereas evolution supposes that organisms can gradually change into something distinctly new which we have never seen to be possible.

Take antibiotic resistance as another example. This was thought to be evolution, but the organism is actually adapting to an extreme environment by increasing the production of a detoxification pump to allow it to handle higher antibiotic loads. Once the antibiotic is removed, the pump production resumes normal in the bacteria. This is because the change was due to reversible epigenetic mechanisms.

epigenetic inheritance

The best solution seems to be able to design both the environment and the life forms in it, but there is no way you can avoid the environment to change, and hence the life forms to also change. I think that's a complicated design, after all.

There is the possibility for migration though. Sadly some times organisms cannot persist in the same geographic location due to whatever the reason may be (usually humans unfortunately).

Wouldn't be better a design of a Universe devoid of any life form? Unless there is just one life form, alone, in solitude, imaging there is other life forms and even a Universe.... sort of a God that imagines he creates universes and life forms...

I do think we eventually head back to a unified form of consciousness. But I suppose this stage is so we have some sort of individual awareness before joining back with the Totality. I think the tree analogy is spot on... when a leaf dies it falls to the ground and re-integrates with the Tree that gave it life.