Page 88 - Consciousness in the Cell

CONSCIOUSNESS IN THE CELL

WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO READ IS GOING

ON IN YOUR BODY, THIS VERY MOMENT

Hemoglobin is the special molecule that is responsible for car-
rying oxygen to other cells. Hemoglobin takes up oxygen in the
lungs, leaves off carbon dioxide there, then moves onto the mus-
cles. Meanwhile, the muscle cells have burned nutrients and pro-
duced carbon dioxide. When hemoglobin reaches the muscles, it
does the opposite of what it first did in the lungs, depositing oxy-
gen and picking up carbon dioxide.
Scientists think of hemoglobin as an extraordinary molecule
because of these two different processes it carries out. In The Great
Evolution Mystery, Gordon Rattray Taylor, an evolutionist himself,
has written the following about hemoglobin:
… It is a remarkable molecule indeed which at one moment has
an affinity for oxygen and a few seconds later loses that affinity;
that it simultaneously changes its preferences with respect to
carbon dioxide makes it even more remarkable. (Gordon R.
Taylor, The Great Evolution Mystery, Harper and Row Publishers,
New York, p. 108)

As this shows, the hemoglobin molecule is seemingly con-
scious, making the necessary move at exactly the required time
and place, never confusing oxygen with carbon dioxide.
This is obviously thought-provoking. How can a tiny molecule,
which can't even be seen under a microscope, make decisions and
have preferences?
As a result of the extraordinary consciousness displayed by
this molecule, all air-breathing creatures on Earth can continue
their existence with ease. About 900 million red blood cells are
produced in the human body every hour. And there are about 300
million molecules of hemoglobin in one red blood cell alone.

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