When we look at the human body, especially the nervous system, we should conclude that the human body has an innate knowledge of harnessing electrical energy to change it into other forms of energy. When we consider the scale of the operation (i.e. at the atomic and microscopic levels), we can only wonder at God’s profound wisdom in creation.
The nervous system is composed of two parts: the central nervous system, which is the control center comprising the brain and the spinal cord, and the peripheral nervous system, which consists of nerves connecting other parts of the body to the control center. Via a combination of electrical and chemical processes, the nervous system is used to control the functioning of the entire human body.
Scientific Phenomenon
Scientists inherently acknowledge that the nervous system is built according to an electrical design. The scientific literature describing the nervous system is replete with references to electrical theory and electrical devices that man uses today. Such references include technical words like batteries, transducers, motors, pumps, calculators, transmitters, electrochemical potential, circuitry, binary system, current, resistance, voltage, capacitance, charge. The difficulty of describing the nervous system without resorting to such language implies the Creator’s understanding prior to man’s electrical inventions.
The basic building block of the nervous system is the nerve cell, called a neuron. The brain itself consists primarily of neurons. Under a microscope a neuron looks like an octopus with many tentacles. A neuron can transmit an electrical impulse to the next neuron. The network of electrical impulses enables us to receive information from the physical world and then send it to our brains, and vice versa. Without the neuron circuits our bodies would completely shut down, like turning off the power supply to a city.
We speak of it as the most local circuit, or a microcircuit. It is very common for a particular type of microcircuit to be repeated throughout a layer or a given cell type, thus acting as a module for a specific type of information processing.
Information from the physical world to our brain is relayed via our five senses using electrical devices which change one form of energy into electrical energy. Our bodies have sensory receptor cells because there are different types of physical stimuli to be changed into electrical signals. For example, a different type of receptor cell is required for hearing stimuli than for smell stimuli.
The neuron may be likened to a switch which is turned either on or off according to the right conditions. Under normal body conditions, the frequency of [electrical pulse] transmission may range between 10 and 500 impulses per second. The impulse is not generated unless the neuron has been given a strong enough stimulus. It is hard to imagine the complex integration of electrical signals without realizing the Creator’s power and wisdom.
To gain a true comprehension of the complexity of this circuitry, we must understand that co-ordination between neurons is essential. The computations required for such co-ordination are enormous. There may be from ten trillion to one hundred trillion synapses [i.e. connections between neurons] in the brain, and each one operates as a tiny calculator that tallies signals arriving as electrical pulses. Thus, messages to and from the brain are relayed, moving from one neuron to another.
It is difficult to understand how anyone can believe that the nervous system, particularly the brain, could have been produced by evolutionary randomness and selection. We have barely touched on some of the electrical design present in the rest of the body. The truth is that scientists are always discovering more about its workings, since its complexity, which far surpasses anything produced by man, is nothing short of a miracle.
References:
Shepherd, G.M., Neurobiology, Oxford University Press, London, p. 577, 1983.
Tortora, G.J. and Anagnostakos, N.P., Principles of Anatomy and Physiology, Harper & Row, New York, p. 290, 1981.
Gitt, W., The Wonder of Man, CLV Publishing, Germany, p. 82, 1999.
Restak, R.M., The Brain, Bantam Books, New York, pp. 34–35, 1984.