With thousands of other people, I attended the recent anti racism march in Belfast. As I looked around me at the gathered crowds, I couldn’t help but reflect that we are wonderfully made. Our bodies have 650 muscles, 206 bones, 100 joints, over 100,000 kms of blood vessels, 13 million nerve cells which sent impulses to our brains at almost 330kph. Our entire blood supply, 4 litres, races through our lungs once each minute. We contain enough lime to white wash a small shed, enough phosphorous to make 2000 match heads, enough iron to make a 3cm nail, and the equivalent in carbon to make up a 28kg bag of coke. Better still all these components make up a functioning body, which is much more than the sum of its parts. Yet despite these commonalities, we tend to highlight the differences.
Posted on 10 Jun 2014 by
Dr Michael Wardlow