Observing Africa's incredible biodiversity while hunting sparked reflections on life’s intricate design, fueling my drive to ideas and perspectives featured in my book
Here is a sample of the writing:
Living Wonders
Earth is alive with a symphony of sights and textures, sounds and vibrations, smells and tastes, electric and magnetic fields.
Picture a scene in Africa. A leopard silently approaches an impala, while a hare scurries nearby. A migratory bird, such as a European swallow, soars above them. An owl gracefully perches on a branch overhead. A python snake glides stealthily along the ground. An insect-eating bat hangs upside down from the tree. A golden orb spider weaves its web among the tree branches. A mosquito hovers in the air, and a honeybee alights on a blossoming flower. Now, amid this diverse gathering, introduce yourself – a human who appreciates the wonders of the animal kingdom.
The shifting light and temperature variations signal to the European swallow that it’s time to go on its migration across continents. Sensing Earth’s magnetic field with its internal compass, the bird takes flight. However, it’s not only migratory birds that utilize natural reference points for navigation; the bee, with its special ability to sense ultraviolet light, skillfully collects nectar from flowers and returns to the hive.
The leopard stealthily approaches the impala, and the impala senses that something is wrong. The snake flicks its tongue, detecting the trail of the hare, and readies itself for an ambush. A mosquito, guided by its antennae, cuts through the air, attracted to the source of carbon dioxide in the human’s breath. Each creature in this scenario is actively perceiving its surroundings, capturing the scents via smell. The mosquito lands on the human’s skin, preparing to take a meal, but a swift swat sends it away, disturbing the hare in the process. The alarmed hare emits a squeak audible to the bat, making it take flight. Meanwhile, as the mosquito strays into silken strands of the spider, the spider senses the vibrations of struggling prey and moves in for the kill.
Not known to the attacking spider, high-frequency sound waves bounce back to the bat that sent them. The bat’s sonar is so precise that it not only navigates in the dark, but also accurately pinpoints the spider in its web, plucking it with precision.
The place becomes dark after sunset, and the footsteps of the hare become too faint for human ears but easily discernible to the sitting owl. The disc of stiff feathers on the owl’s face funnels sound toward its sensitive ears, with one ear slightly higher than the other. This asymmetry allows the owl to precisely locate the source of the hare’s skittering in both vertical and horizontal planes. It swoops down just as the hare comes within striking range of the waiting python.
Equipped with two pits on its snout, the snake senses the infrared radiation emitted by warm objects, effectively seeing heat. To the snake, the hare’s body appears to be on fire, and it strikes. While the owl shifts its attention to a new arrival on the scene, a nearby rodent whose footsteps are too faint for other creatures to hear.
Before the leopard can launch its attack, the impala’s ears detect the movement, prompting a fast escape, allowing it to live another day. The leopard continues its nocturnal hunt under the veil of darkness.
The truth is that a myriad of living organisms coexist in the same physical space on and under the ground. The majority of these organisms are microscopic and invisible to the naked human eye. Billions of nanomachines operate within the cells and bodies of each of these living organisms.
All these living wonders are the result of their gene expressions. You can read and understand this thanks to your gene expressions.
The place becomes dark after sunset, and the footsteps of the hare become too faint for human ears but easily discernible to the sitting owl. The disc of stiff feathers on the owl’s face funnels sound toward its sensitive ears, with one ear slightly higher than the other. This asymmetry allows the owl to precisely locate the source of the hare’s skittering in both vertical and horizontal planes. It swoops down just as the hare comes within striking range of the waiting python.
Equipped with two pits on its snout, the snake senses the infrared radiation emitted by warm objects, effectively seeing heat. To the snake, the hare’s body appears to be on fire, and it strikes. While the owl shifts its attention to a new arrival on the scene, a nearby rodent whose footsteps are too faint for other creatures to hear.
Before the leopard can launch its attack, the impala’s ears detect the movement, prompting a fast escape, allowing it to live another day. The leopard continues its nocturnal hunt under the veil of darkness.
The truth is that a myriad of living organisms coexist in the same physical space on and under the ground. The majority of these organisms are microscopic and invisible to the naked human eye. Billions of nanomachines operate within the cells and bodies of each of these living organisms.
All these living wonders are the result of their gene expressions. You can read and understand this thanks to your gene expressions.
Human cognitive abilities like memory, learning, language processing, executive functions, emotional regulation, attention, focus, problem-solving, and creativity are the results of the gene expressions of our exceptional sets of genes.
Bats use echolocation for navigation and hunting prey. Genes and their expressions involved in the development of specialized structures in their larynx, like the laryngeal echolocation chamber, are what make such unique behavior possible, along with the ability to fly.
It is the unique sets of genes and their expression that give electric eels the ability to generate electric fields for navigation, communication, and hunting. Genes involved in the development of specialized cells called electrocytes contribute to this unique trait.
Chameleons are renowned for their ability to change colors to match their surroundings or express emotions. Gene expression in skin cells controls the distribution of pigments, allowing them to exhibit a diverse range of colors.
The incredible navigation skills of monarch butterflies that migrate thousands of miles is the result of special gene expressions associated with the circadian rhythm in the genome of that butterfly.
The theory of evolution claims that the mechanism of evolution, driven mainly by random, unguided mutations, creates and introduces changes to the instruction manual for building and running living things.
Quandary
Can these random, unguided mutations – or any other random, unguided mechanisms – create and/or add the absolute necessary changes to the genetic code instructions, allowing for the creation of different cells, organs/organelles, body plans, unique traits, and behaviors?
