Your Amazing Body
Exerpts from "Enhance Your Life Experience and Chiropractic Philosophy" by Dr. Joseph Strauss
The Principle or law of innate intelligence goes into effect the moment a sperm and egg unite. Without any thought on our part, without any encouragement from us and even without our knowledge, this principle causes the cells to begin to divide and form a human being. That formation takes place to a great extent before the mother-to-be is even aware that she is pregnant. As this one cell begins to divide something unique happens, the cells begin to form different types of tissues. Some become what will eventually be heart tissue, kidney tissues, some skin, some bones. How do these cells know what to do?
The communications system, the nerve system, is not even formed yet. But even at the moment of conception, the union of those two cells contains all the information, the programming to determine eye and hair color, facial characteristics and everything else that makes a person unique. Contained within is all the information to build two eyes, two ears, a nose , a mouth, ten little fingers and toes and to put them all in the right place! We may not know whether it will be a boy or a girl or whose side of the family it will resemble but we know where all the parts will be located! It is all contained within the DNA of those two cells and all the information in the DNA necessary to design human beings , the "blueprints" of every member of the human race on the face of the earth at this very moment could be combined and contained in the space the size of a dime!
That blueprint is followed for each person as the innate intelligence of the body "builds" a human body in nine months. It first forms what will be the brain and nerve system and then all the parts.
If the innate intelligence of the body is capable of building a body in nine months without any outside help from a medical doctor, or anyone else, then it follows afortiori that the innate intelligence of the body is capable of running and repairing the body for the next 80 to 120 years. Building the human body is the tough job, repairing it is a snap in comparison. We marvel at newborns as beautiful creations, and yet, we believe that their bodies cannot work properly for a lifetime without outside help. We constantly turn to educated minds to run them for us. The fact is that all the educated minds in the world could not build one single, living cell. Yet, your body does it billions of times a day!
It is a fact that every member of the human race is a unique individual. The innate intelligence may be the same in all living things but the matter (the material) that it is working through is different. Even members of the same species are different. You only need to look at the various people on a crowded bus to realize we are all unique. If people are physically unique, then their norms and needs are unique to them. Understanding the uniqueness of each individual is important. Every student of anatomy has studied the "Circle of Willis" which is the main blood supply to the brain. The blood vessels making up this structure take up almost two pages of Gray's Anatomy in description. It takes the average student hours to memorize it. However, at the bottom of the page is a small footnote saying that the diagram is only correct for 40% of the population! We are as different on the inside as we are on the outside.
Let's tale a look at some of the amazing ways your body is designed.
The Defense System
In understanding and appreciating the human body one only has to look at its defense system. The white blood cells (leukocytes) are the fighting troops of the body. They live for only a few days. The body is constantly producing new ones to replace those that die. On any given day there are 30 - 40 billion white blood cells on duty to fight infections and foreign organisms. The moment you cut your finger, millions of these blood cells are moved into the area to fight a potential infection. It has only recently been discovered that there are greater numbers of these white blood cells in the tonsils, lungs, the lymph nodes and the appendix making these important areas of first line defense. Since these findings, medical science has ceased, if only gradually, the unnecessary removal of the appendix and the tonsils. It is important to note that not being aware of their function did not make those organs any less important.
The Life BloodThe blood of the human body is one of nature's most amazing fluid. A drop of it, just 1/25th of an inch, contains 5 million red blood cells (erythrocytes), 7,000 white blood cells and thousands of platelets. A red blood cell live about 120 days and during that time it makes 300,000 trips through your blood stream, almost two times every minute! 10,000 wear out every second. If one could take all the red blood cells in the body and place them one on top of another like a stack of coins, the pile would stretch half way to the moon! Yet, every one of them dies in 4 months and is replaced by new healthy ones at a rate of 3 million every second (providing the body is healthy).
The Irreplaceable Heart
Not to long ago the medical profession was excited about the idea of artificial hearts. Today it is very common to hear of a heart transplant on the news. Considering the shortage of donors, why is it that the use of artificial hearts is not a more common procedure? Perhaps part of the reason is the inability of biomedical engineers to develop a mechanical heart that can replace the human heart. Science, with all its technology that 'can put a man on the moon', has just touched on designing artificial hearts. They simply cannot design one as well as the original!
The human heart weighs less than a pound yet it beats 40 millions times a year. The arteries and veins, "the plumbing system" in your body, if stretched out, would cover a distance of about 12,000 miles. Imagine having a pump that would pump fluid a distance of about 12,000 miles! The heart pumps 2.5 gallons per minute or 1,314,000 gallons a year through those arteries and veins. Man has not come close to inventing a pump that can perform like the human heart.
The Lungs
The lungs are a beautiful example of how design benefits function. The lungs use about 90 gallons of pure oxygen every day. There are little sacs called "alveoli" which are finger-like projections lining the walls of the lungs. Each of your lungs is not much longer than an outstretched hand, yet the inside surface of them with these projections is approximately 40 - 60 square miles! Imagine having 40 - 60 square miles of surface area in your chest! You breathe approximately 9 million times a year, pumping air at the rate of two gallons a minute when at rest and 26 gallons per minute when exercising.
So Much Activity!
These are only a very few examples of all the functions your body is performing at this very moment. The coordination of all this activity demonstrates the law of life, the innate intelligence. Coordinated activity is an indication of intelligence. Whenever we see organization or coordinated activity, we know there is some intelligence behind it. Nothing organizes itself. The human body is the most organized thing in the world. Billions upon billions of cells work together in a coordinated manner, each doing its job to benefit the whole. There are more than 600 muscles in your body. To press a barbell over your head takes the action of 200 of them, 31 in your face alone.
Within the healthy body, every moment, there are thousands of chemicals being produced in just the right quantity and quality to carry on every function necessary to life and health. Just think for a minute what happens when you put food into your mouth. Chemicals called "enzymes" are produced to begin the digestion process while the food is still in the mouth. Some say even before you eat, olfactory (smell) sensors triggered by the aroma of food cooking begin the chemical production necessary for optimal digestion of that food.
When you swallow, the epiglottis closes, (the small trap door in your throat that prevents food from going into your lungs). You don't think about it or will it. It just happens innately . The food then passes down the esophagus in the stomach. Maybe you think, "No big deal. Its gravity, like a drain pipe." But actually, it is not gravity. It is the action of the muscles lining the wall of the esophagus. You could swallow food while hanging upside-down and it would still pass into your stomach! Once in the stomach, strong acids are produced to break down the food. The acid is so strong that a drop of it on your skin would leave a painful blister. Your body provides 2 1/2 quarts of this acid every day, over 60 thousand quarts of it to digest 40 tons of food over a 70 year period and yet it does not eat a hole in the lining of your stomach!
The walls of your stomach constantly produce a mucous-like substance that protects them from damage. Once the food passes through the stomach, the process of "assimilation" takes place. The food is made into flesh and blood. All of this is occurring while we are going about our daily activities, totally oblivious to what is happening. It's just as well because any thought on our part would not help the process one bit. In the small intestine, the body begins to extract what it needs from the food. It demonstrates selectivity, absorbing the necessary substances like vitamins, minerals, and sugars to be used by the body. It only takes what is necessary, passing along what it cannot use. In the large intestine, fluid is absorbed for use in the body and you are informed by your body to get rid of everything that is not usable. We can be grateful that this process is innate. If we had to think about everything occurring from the time we swallowed our food, we would not have any time during the course of the day to do anything else!
These facts about the human body are amazing and incredible and only a small sample of the wondrous complex workings of our bodies. The purpose in presenting them is to develop in you an appreciation for the wisdom that runs your body. While we marvel at the instrument, the creation, we must give credit to the Builder and Creator. We admire a beautiful painting but the paint and the canvas are not the objects of our admiration and appreciation, it is the artist and their talent that deserves the credit. After the beautiful symphonic concert, we do not applaud the violins, french horns, and tympani. We acknowledge the musicians. An appreciation and respect for the innate intelligence of the body is the essence of a viewpoint off life that focuses on health.
Let's look at health and life differently . . . . to health.