Brain and Artie - Part 2

 We talked about how single complex molecules started to form plates, and then a sphere.  The cells had some molybdenum to render other molecules.  Tearing apart hydrogen, nitrogen, bonds, etc, is hard as CellBarbie says.  But as bacteria and cells started to float all over the place, they needed a way to eat and not be eaten.  This is evolution where a million years is a heartbeat.

Plants came first, and were just blobs of organic things.  The key factor here was that they just sat around and didn't move, and they just sucked in stuff that floated by.  They used their quantum atoms to make the trick of turning light energy (photons) into food.  Bacteria had it first, so plants just sucked them in.

Life is boring with just plants.  How about something that moves around and eats things?  That would be animals.  In a million years there was improvement through evolution, which is simply 'eat or be eaten'.  We had two good structures for something that could move, reproduce, and eat.  The first is the spherical blob.  Very nice, and those were the clams.  We went through that.

Next was the tube.  Water could come in one end and out the other.  Perfect!  These became worms.  Remember the big constraint of evolution is that each molecular change must impart an advantage in the 'eat-eaten' department.  For a tube, it would be nice for the head to know what the rear was doing.  This was defined by the water flow.  One end always won, and the other was the ass.

- to be continued

The 10 Scaling Limits for the Brain - Part 1

 I wasn't going to do this, but I'm dying in Blackfly Heat.  I don't know if there are 10 right now, but I'll try.  In the beginning, there was a nerve cell.  We are talking about the great time of the fossils down in the creek, when life was divided into molluscs, and worms.  The worms became us.  That's because they had a top, and the clams were all blobby things.  

Nerves were wonderful things that could transmit a whack to the clam.  The main cell is the powerhouse, with mitochondria, etc.  Then they have the cables, that they can grow everywhere, called axioms, but cables are good enough.  Those specialists and their jargon.  I call it a 'priesthood', all designed for featherbedding.  That's why the physics people were destroyed early in the clange game.

A single nerve for the clam is good.  It has a single axiom on the lips, and another one one the 'closing button'.  When it is whacked, an electrical signal is sent from ax1 to the main cell, which has a conniption fit and energizes all the axioms.  That sends an ion surge (the way the electrons move) to the door switch.

Now, the nerve cells like to duplicate and grow, and soon there are many more, mostly by evolution and nerve channels.  The nerve cells do not duplicate like rabbits, or else the clam would be a 'bundle of nerves'  Ha!  They are high maintenance, and get in the way of living.  So, the clams develop 'just enough'.  Another scaling factor - too many nerves spoil the clam.

-- to be continued

Cold everywhere but me

 

Ha, Spain Guy is freezing his nummies off.  We have the only heat in town.  

ps absolutely stagnant!  Sweating just sitting.

ps an every-day earthquake hits the Islands - no damage.

ps I'm going to write my new play:  "Incredibly Hot, With Blackflies"