Design in Humans - 180003

0:04 [Music] 0:30 welcome to the creator revealed 0:33 I'm Tim Standish I'm a scientist and I 0:36 work for the Geoscience Research 0:38 Institute in Loma Linda California this 0:43 program and this entire series is about 0:47 the creation and what it can tell us 0:50 about the Creator 0:53 I'm Shelly Quinn and we just want to 0:56 thank you for joining us today this 0:58 program is in two segments the first 1:00 half of the program you will get some 1:03 scientific information just enough to 1:06 kind of whet your appetite and the 1:08 second part we will be talking about a 1:11 practical and biblical application what 1:14 is the life lesson we get from this Paul 1:18 said in Romans 1:20 that God's invisible 1:21 attributes were seen in everything that 1:26 he created he imprinted or encoded his 1:31 artistic and his artistic ability and 1:35 his love if you will on his creation and 1:38 today we're going to talk about a well 1:41 noted biologist who's probably more 1:44 famous for being an atheist and how he 1:46 mocks the design God's design of the eye 1:50 yes you know what I like about Romans 1:52 1:20 is that it points us in a very 1:55 clear way to the creation God God says 1:58 go and look you know the taste and see 2:02 that the Lord is good and there's no 2:07 hesitation about it unfortunately there 2:08 are some people who think that you 2:10 cannot see the hand of the creator in 2:13 the creation and some of them actually 2:16 are a certain kind of Christian I hope 2:19 we all wind up in heaven there I you 2:25 know all of our eyes obviously will be 2:27 opened at that particular point but 2:29 while we're here the Bible encourages us 2:32 to look at the creation to appreciate 2:36 what is there and particularly when it 2:40 comes to 2:41 human beings the Bible tells us 2:45 beautiful things to expect when we look 2:48 at how a human being is made I love this 2:50 text this is Psalm 139 13 and 14 for you 2:56 created my innermost being you knit me 3:00 together in my mother's womb isn't that 3:02 fantastic imagery there I really like it 3:06 that's actually why I use the NIV 3:08 version it has that it summarizes that 3:11 imagery so nicely there for this text 3:15 and then it goes on I praise you because 3:18 I am fearfully and wonderfully made your 3:22 works are wonderful I know that full 3:25 well that's the biblical view of a human 3:30 being you're created by God created in 3:35 the image of God we expect as Bible 3:41 believing Christians to see something 3:43 wonderful but of course we all know we 3:46 can't pretend that there is not another 3:48 view of what a human being is so let's 3:53 look at one way in which that has been 3:57 expressed this is Charles Darwin writing 4:00 now you'll remember that Charles Darwin 4:01 was a materialist he believed really 4:05 that the only thing was the material 4:09 world and here's what he says man in his 4:12 arrogance thinks himself a great work 4:14 worthy the interposition of a deity so 4:18 human beings think that we're fantastic 4:21 and therefore you know God somehow or 4:23 other made us he's turning things 4:25 completely around more humble and I 4:28 believe truer to consider him created 4:31 from animals but that was in 1838 that's 4:34 right this is long before the 4:37 publication of his famous book the 4:39 Origin of Species so I've always heard 4:42 that it was because of his research in 4:46 the Origin of Species that he turned to 4:49 an evolutionist and denied God but 4:51 clearly that's that's that's really a 4:53 commonly held 4:54 myth Darwin was clearly a dedicated 5:00 materialist before he ever went on the 5:03 voyage that he went on around the world 5:05 actually looking at things and he was 5:07 searching for a naturalistic explanation 5:12 for things that's that's what his 5:14 particular theory of evolution really is 5:17 all about trying to come up with an 5:20 alternative explanation to what is 5:23 pretty much obviously true to most 5:26 people and that is that human beings and 5:29 the rest of everything we observe was 5:33 created in some way for a purpose 5:36 interestingly enough yes 5:39 so yes you already mentioned Richard 5:42 Dawkins and Richard Dawkins is an 5:45 atheist you can think of him as being an 5:47 atheist evangelist so well you're a 5:49 Christian evangelist surely he's an 5:52 atheist evangelist and he's very 5:53 articulate I appreciate his writings 5:56 actually because he doesn't try to 5:57 pretend he tells you precisely what he 6:00 thinks so he's talking about the human 6:02 body now remember this Darwinian view of 6:05 things inclines us to see things in a 6:09 negative sort of way no we're kind of 6:12 cobbled together we are not a product of 6:15 any intelligent thought or any planning 6:19 no no infinitely wise God made us so we 6:23 don't expect to see infinitely wise 6:26 things in the creation this is this is 6:29 what he says and he's talking about the 6:31 human eye so if you're watching this on 6:34 television he's talking about the 6:35 instruments that you are using to see us 6:38 with amazing clarity who isn't amazed by 6:42 the human eye well it turns out Richard 6:44 Dawkins isn't he says suppose I tell you 6:47 that the eyes photocells so these are 6:50 the cells at the back of the eye that 6:52 are detecting light okay the eyes 6:55 photocells are pointing backwards away 6:58 from the scene being looked at the wires 7:01 that would be the nerve 7:03 connecting the photocells to the brain 7:06 run over all the surface of the retina 7:08 so the light rays have to pass through a 7:12 carpet of masked wires before they hit 7:15 the photo cells that doesn't make sense 7:18 and it gets even worse so let's take a 7:22 look at what he's talking about here 7:23 here's the human eye most of us will be 7:26 familiar with the basic architecture at 7:28 the back of the eye 7:30 there are light-sensitive cells and at 7:32 the front you can see there is a lens so 7:35 if you're looking at my smiling face 7:38 what's happening is that lens is 7:41 focusing an image of me well both of us 7:47 on the back of your eye and those 7:49 light-sensitive cells are detecting that 7:52 image so as the light falls on it they 7:54 change and they then send a signal 7:58 through through the nerves back to our 8:02 brains and that's that's why we why we 8:05 see things the way we do so here is what 8:08 Dawkins is concerned about the nerves 8:10 that pick up that signal they run over 8:13 the front of the light-sensitive cells 8:16 they don't go behind and he thinks 8:19 that's a terrible design so let's zoom 8:22 in here on just a little part of that 8:24 retina and take a look at what what his 8:27 issue is with it all right and so here 8:33 we have our light detecting cells there 8:37 they are 8:37 and those light detecting cells they 8:42 have a they use a lot of energy that 8:47 means they need a lot of oxygen I need 8:49 sugar they then that's all bought by the 8:51 blood right so they need a blood supply 8:54 to supply the work that's why if you 8:56 injure your eye you've probably noticed 8:57 there's a lot of blood involved yes and 9:01 if you've ever tried looking through 9:03 blood you've probably noticed that 9:05 that's not really a good strategy it's 9:07 it's quite opaque so if you put the 9:10 blood in front of the light-sensitive 9:13 cells you couldn't see anything the 9:16 blood has 9:17 to go behind so this is a design 9:20 necessity that we're looking at here the 9:22 blood is behind if you have the blood 9:25 they you can't in the same place have 9:27 the nerves right there you can only have 9:29 one thing in one place at a time so 9:32 therefore the nerves have to go in front 9:36 of thee of the light detecting cells so 9:39 when light comes in this is according to 9:42 Dawkins and this was a commonly held 9:45 view when the light comes in it passes 9:48 through those nerves and it gets 9:50 dissipated a bit so that would reduce 9:53 the clarity of what we see and Dawkins 9:58 thinks this is a bad design but but we 10:00 can see it's actually necessary that 10:03 things be this way or else our eyes 10:06 wouldn't work I should tell you there 10:08 are other designs how this works they 10:11 suit the purposes of those animals that 10:15 have that design but so this is an eagle 10:17 or sibling well actually an eagle would 10:19 have this kind of design I'm talking 10:22 about things like octopuses okay they're 10:24 their eyes the same general camera type 10:27 eye as ours but their retina is arranged 10:30 differently and it suits the purposes of 10:33 an octopus but not the purposes of a 10:37 human being so so this is this is this 10:42 is what Dawkins is complaining about he 10:44 says this is bad design even though 10:46 everybody would admit hey you know our 10:49 eyes work remarkably well okay so then 10:54 he goes on and he says one consequence 10:57 of the photo cells pointing backwards is 10:59 that the wires remember that's the 11:01 nerves there that carry their data 11:04 somehow have to pass through the retina 11:07 and back to the brain what they do in 11:10 the vertebrate eye is all converge on a 11:12 particular hole in the retina where they 11:15 dive through it the hole filled with 11:17 nerves is called the blind spot and this 11:20 is the most shocking statement he says 11:21 it's not just bad design it's the design 11:24 of a complete idiot but it's interesting 11:28 being an atheist that he is still calm 11:31 design interesting yes this is this is a 11:35 this is a fascinating thing because 11:36 frequently people will argue Oh 11:38 something is badly designed therefore 11:41 it's not designed no no we we experience 11:44 bad design all the time but it's that 11:47 the things are still designed yes the 11:49 the issue is really how competent the 11:54 designer is so let's see what he's 11:56 talking about here you see you see there 11:57 where the nerves go through that's the 11:59 blind spot he has a problem with that 12:01 you will probably notice that most 12:03 people have two eyes and the great thing 12:07 is because of our two eyes we have this 12:11 180 degree view of everything and the 12:13 blind spot isn't in the same place in in 12:15 both eyes so your brain puts the image 12:17 together you don't see any blinds okay 12:19 this is actually brilliant design 12:22 there's something else that's more 12:23 recently being discovered and that is 12:25 that in fact the light does not get 12:29 dissipated what happens is there are 12:32 these special glial cells that act like 12:34 fiber optics and what they do is they 12:36 carry that light through so it isn't 12:40 dissipated what happened was the 12:42 designer actually anticipated that 12:46 problem with the nerves running over the 12:49 front of the ayats and Mary's engineered 12:52 in a brilliant solution and because of 12:55 that brilliant solution human beings can 12:58 do amazing things we have these senses 13:01 and those senses are coordinated by our 13:04 amazing brains so that we can we can see 13:09 we can hear we can put all of this 13:11 information together and we can 13:13 understand to some degree the creation 13:16 so poor Richard didn't have this 13:19 information when he's mocking God's 13:21 design he didn't have the information 13:23 about the glial cells he had all the 13:25 other information yes disapprove it well 13:29 he's it's been shown that that was a 13:31 foolish and presumptive view of things 13:33 remember the Bible encourages us to look 13:37 for God the evidence of God to to to to 13:42 contemplate what he created 13:45 and what we can learn about God nature 13:47 the creation doesn't tell us everything 13:50 but it tells us plenty so there are a 13:53 number of points that we can get out of 13:56 this I think you know the Creator is 13:59 really revealed in the design of humans 14:01 his love is shown in his provision of 14:05 senses such as sight so that we can 14:07 appreciate and enjoy the creation he 14:09 made for us his love is evident in the 14:12 way he anticipated and solved problems 14:15 created by design necessities so that we 14:18 enjoy senses far better than a minimally 14:21 necessary for survival and he 14:24 demonstrated his love by providing us 14:26 with nervous systems designed for a 14:29 relationship with him when you consider 14:32 the human eyes certainly you see that 14:34 there had to be intelligent design we're 14:37 going to take just a short break we'll 14:39 be back in 60 seconds to talk about the 14:43 practical life application hello and 14:53 welcome back to the creative revealed we 14:57 are talking about design in humans and 15:00 we have someone joining us right now who 15:03 is a doctor and also teaches human 15:06 anatomy so that's right this is dr. 15:08 Lucinda Hill she teaches at Southern 15:11 Adventist University in Tennessee which 15:14 happens to be the school that my 15:15 daughter went to she's a graduate of it 15:17 so we are fans southern Adventist 15:20 University excellent education there and 15:23 they have an excellent program there in 15:29 Origins which dr. hill also teaches that 15:35 course there as well so she is a 15:38 multi-talented woman and it's an honor 15:40 to have her with us hello dr. hill it's 15:45 great to have you thank you 15:51 we're doing fabulously now we'll be 15:54 talking about design in the human body 15:58 and and you're a physician and you teach 16:02 human anatomy so I wonder if you could 16:05 tell us what what would be in your mind 16:08 a good example I I I already talked a 16:11 little bit earlier about the human eye 16:13 and some of the some of the interesting 16:15 things that are going on there but you 16:18 work with the entire human body but 16:20 what's something that would jump out at 16:22 you something that is really amazing to 16:26 me is the way our bodies are so 16:29 incredibly integrated with our nervous 16:32 system I have here a model of a human 16:36 arm hand think about the incredible 16:41 things that you can do with your hand 16:43 you reach out twist to open a door if 16:48 you're with your spouse you hold hands 16:51 to communicate love with your children 16:54 you use your hands to pick them up we 16:57 write we type on computers and we have 17:01 muscles a variety of muscles which my 17:04 students have to memorize and then they 17:09 have to learn the nerves but think about 17:12 how in order to make a movement the 17:17 muscles on one side of the arm contract 17:20 while the muscles on the other side have 17:23 to relax and the brain controls all of 17:27 that and so we have centers in our brain 17:29 that receive signals and then give the 17:33 correct response to make these complex 17:36 movements of these muscles to do the 17:39 incredible activities that we do with 17:41 our hands and arms you know what I'm 17:44 looking at that I mean yeah you know 17:45 when you've got all of these pots all 17:47 together it's it's it's pretty amazing 17:49 but what I was looking at was where the 17:52 muscles are and what they operate 17:55 because it's there there are all of 17:56 those tendons and things that go down 17:58 into the hand from muscles that are 18:00 actually up here in the forearm and so 18:03 you have a muscle contracting in the 18:05 forearm that's actually moving your 18:08 fingers for example 18:10 it's it's it really looks like a machine 18:14 and in a way you could say it is but 18:16 it's so much more than just sort of a 18:18 regular normal machine and and and I'm 18:22 also thinking about other things that 18:24 are there like all those tendons they 18:26 have to be lubricated so you've got 18:29 nerves to tell them which muscles to 18:32 contract and which ones to relax tendons 18:34 that are moving moving fingers and stuff 18:37 way out here and then you've got a 18:39 system of lubrication but you're you're 18:44 a doctor you're a physician and what I'm 18:48 wondering about is what happens when 18:51 when one of these things is damaged in 18:53 fact I can tell you that from harsh 18:55 personal experience I I know what 18:58 happens when a hand to some degree when 19:01 a hand gets damaged Wow 19:06 you know there's there are a lot of 19:09 things going on there that I simply 19:11 hadn't thought about very much before 19:14 myself so what happens when when you're 19:17 dealing with with with a patient who has 19:20 damaged something like that well that's 19:24 an excellent point 19:25 so many times somebody will come into 19:27 the emergency room and I practiced 19:29 emergency medicine for many years and 19:31 they have a laceration if it's just a 19:35 simple cut on the skin even then think 19:39 of the complexity of how do you heal 19:43 that wound how do you prevent an 19:45 infection from setting in and then if 19:48 it's in the hand like what happened to 19:50 you let's look at our model again and 19:52 out here in our fingers we have the 19:56 insertion points of these tendons so you 19:59 got a though that would be that would be 20:01 the place where the tendon attaches 20:03 that's what you're calling it an 20:05 insertion point right yes that's correct 20:09 and so to flex your finger you're going 20:12 to contract the muscle and then that's 20:15 going to be attached to the bones and 20:17 your finger that will then pull and Bend 20:22 the finger at the joint 20:23 think of the joints what happens if we 20:25 don't have joints in the finger if those 20:27 joints are stiff but back to the 20:30 lacerated tendon if somebody lacerates a 20:33 tendon they're going to have a 20:36 life-changing injury unless that tendon 20:39 is sewn back up and unless we prevent a 20:42 major infection which can also do damage 20:45 to the tendon and yet our body has an 20:47 immune system it has mechanisms of 20:50 healing and we as physicians we work 20:53 with those designed mechanisms to sew 20:57 things back up so that they're aligned 20:59 correctly so that the healing process 21:01 occurs normally it's absolutely well 21:04 actually I can demonstrate that can you 21:06 see how I can't I can't straighten this 21:09 little finger 21:10 I can't straighten it out because the 21:13 tendon here is is broken so I can I can 21:16 just get it that far that's it I can I 21:19 can contract it but I can't pull it back 21:22 even though it will readily go back 21:23 it'll it'll readily go back but I simply 21:26 have no control over it because the 21:28 tendon is damaged today and I can't do 21:31 it yet you know the most amazing thing 21:33 to me is that there is all of this works 21:37 together without us even thinking of it 21:41 on a cognizant level it's just it works 21:44 you know what I was thinking about when 21:46 do you talk about just a simple 21:47 laceration you your body has to tell 21:51 cells to start growing there right well 21:55 how do those cells know to start growing 21:57 and when to stop growing why doesn't it 21:59 just turn into cancer or something and 22:02 just grow into this horrible great big 22:06 growth excellent point that is an 22:11 excellent point we have so many 22:12 different mechanisms that we don't even 22:15 think of and as you said it's just 22:18 automatic if those processes don't work 22:22 correctly we're in a world of hurt and 22:25 yet it's incredible how well they work 22:28 most of the time what amazes me as much 22:32 as anything about the human body is the 22:35 way in which 22:37 it can absorb insults if you are damaged 22:41 so redundancy that's built in there I'm 22:45 thinking III guess that it's it's common 22:49 to compare biological things with with 22:52 machines of some kind so if you said 22:54 well a body is something like let's say 22:57 a complex machine like an aeroplane in 23:01 aeroplanes they have redundant systems 23:03 so they can be some damage to an 23:05 aeroplane and it can keep flying but 23:08 with a human being and by the way that's 23:11 indicative of great design when you when 23:14 when you have something example that 23:17 I've got a wonderful example my 23:18 grandfather was having some balance 23:21 issues I took him to a balance center to 23:23 be tested and once they put the halter 23:25 on him and went through the test when 23:28 they had him close his eyes he was down 23:31 so what they told me was he was relying 23:36 compared he had inner ear problems no 23:39 balance center in either ear he was 23:42 relying totally on his vision for 23:45 balance and to me that's amazing yeah I 23:49 mean that's redundant see yeah and and 23:53 yet he could stand up and walk still 23:55 just because he had sight even though 23:58 the rest of the system wasn't working 23:59 yeah to me what astonishes me is that 24:03 you can you can cut entire organs out of 24:07 a human beings body and they don't die 24:11 immediately I know that you know we 24:13 think about things like the appendix but 24:16 are there others I mean gall bladder 24:19 uterus well we can live with that one of 24:25 our kidneys spleen yes and even when we 24:30 have neurological damage in the brain 24:32 we're learning so much about the 24:35 plasticity in the brain where one part 24:37 is able to take over a function for a 24:40 damaged area and still allow even though 24:43 there are certainly bad effects from the 24:46 original injury yet that's mitigated by 24:49 these redundancies 24:50 by the ability to heal it's incredible 24:53 yeah it really is is amazing as we think 24:58 about the human body the more we know 25:01 about it really the more amazing it 25:04 becomes and the more amazing we 25:06 understand it to be the more designed it 25:10 looks absolutely and the more glory 25:13 really is attributable to the designer 25:16 who of course the Bible reveals to us 25:19 introduces to us as God 25:22 God Himself it's quite incredible yeah 25:26 well thank you so much for joining us 25:28 dr. hill it's been a pleasure thank you 25:30 for your insights it's been a pleasure 25:34 to be with you thank you good bye well 25:38 you know I feel that with this 25:43 particular subject we've we've been 25:46 talking about it for almost half an hour 25:49 and we haven't even begun just 25:52 describing where do you the human body 25:58 it's it's not just that it's this 26:01 machine it's also a work of art it's 26:05 it's a beautiful beautiful thing with 26:08 the most amazing computer that has ever 26:11 been created right here and the ability 26:14 of that computer that brain to control 26:18 all of these parts ultimately though the 26:21 ability to praise the Creator who made 26:25 us this has been such a special program 26:29 thank you so much 26:30 and you know it is so true as David said 26:34 Lord you knit me together in the room I 26:36 am fearfully and wonderfully made and I 26:41 just want to take this moment to 26:43 encourage you to praise God there's so 26:46 many things sometimes we get ill and we 26:48 think poor pitiful me but praise God for 26:52 the ability to regenerate praise God for 26:55 the way he has created you and praise 26:58 him for everything that you 27:00 thank you 27:02 [Music]