Page 11 - Advanced Apologetics and World Views Revised

from a few microns to well over a foot and a half in length, and untold mysteries of how—almost
flawlessly—all these components work together. This is the amazing brain.
iv

Your brain has about one hundred thousand billion electrical connections. That’s
1,000,000,000,000,000 electrical connections! In fact, your brain has more electrical connections than
all the electrical appliances on the face of the earth. Yet your brain with its hundred thousand billion
electrical connections fits in a quart jar and operates for 70 years on ten watts of power, fueled largely
by cheeseburgers and French fries.

Every cubic inch (2.54 centimeters) of the human brain contains at least 100 million nerve cells
interconnected by 10 thousand miles of fibers.

Isaac Asimov said that man's 3-4-pound brain is the most complex and orderly arrangement of matter
v
in the entire universe! Far more complicated than any computer, the human brain is capable of
storing and creatively manipulating seemingly infinite amounts of information. Its capabilities and
potential stagger the imagination. The more we use it, the better it becomes.

The brain capabilities of even the smallest insects are mind-boggling. The tiny speck of a brain found in
a little ant, butterfly or bee enable them not only to see, smell, taste and move, but even to fly with
great precision. Butterflies routinely navigate enormous distances. Bees and ants carry on complex
social organizations, building projects, and communications. These miniature brains put our computers
and avionics to shame, in comparison.

The eye...can distinguish among seven million colors. It has automatic
focusing and handles an astounding 1.5 million messages --
simultaneously. Evolution focuses on mutations and changes from and
vi
within existing organisms. Yet evolution alone cannot explain the initial
source of the eye or the brain.

Just so you can understand the complexity of the human eye,
here is a brief overview of the biochemistry of vision. When light
first strikes the retina, a photon interacts with a molecule called
11-cis-retinal, which rearranges within picoseconds to trans-
retinal. The change in the shape of retinal forces a change in the
shape of the protein, rhodopsin, to which the retinal is tightly
bound. The protein's metamorphosis alters its behavior, making
it stick to another protein called transducin. Before bumping into
activated rhodopsin, transducin had tightly bound a small
molecule called GDP. But when transducin interacts with
activated rhodopsin, the GDP falls off and a molecule called GTP
binds to transducin. (GTP is closely related to, but critically different from, GDP.)

GTP-transducin-activated rhodopsin now binds to a protein called phosphodiesterase, located in the
inner membrane of the cell. When attached to activated rhodopsin and its entourage, the
phosphodiesterase acquires the ability to chemically cut a molecule called cGMP (a chemical relative of
both GDP and GTP). Initially there are a lot of cGMP molecules in the cell, but the phosphodiesterase
lowers its concentration, like a pulled plug lowers the water level in a bathtub.

10