Page 110 - The Miracle in the Immune System

108 THE MIRACLE OF THE IMMUNE SYSTEM

own. In medical terms this phenomenon is referred to
as "tolerance".
This constitutes an extremely important miracle.
We can clearly see that the defence system is fully capa-
ble of differentiating between thousands of proteins. For
example, the defence system must distinguish the hae-
moglobin found in blood from the insulin secreted by
the pancreas and from the vitreous humour contained in
the eye, and indeed, from everything else in the human
system. The defence system knows that while it fights a
merciless war against foreign molecules, it must not
harm any tissues belonging to the human body.
For many years, researchers have tried to under-
stand how the defence system has learned to be toler-
ant towards its own tissues. Yet, details concerning why
the most important lymphocytes, namely, the T and B
cells, do not attack the human body have only been re-
vealed in the last 20 years. The tolerance process, only
a small portion of which mankind has been able to dis-
cover as the result of years long research, has been in
operation since the human being came into existence.
How then has the defence system possessed the
ability to distinguish the various different structures
from each other? Can this be the result of unconscious
coincidences as the theory of evolution suggests? It is
certainly impossible for structures made up of uncon-
scious atoms to coincidentally acquire this selection
ability that requires such consciousness, information
and intelligence.
When specially designed structures of lymphocytes
enabling them to make the right choise is investigated, it