The food of life

Have you ever looked on the side of a packet of crisps, a chocolate bar or indeed any type of food? Well here in the UK each pack lists the content in terms of fat, carbohydrate, proteins and various salts. This list has become avid reading for many a weight watcher or health conscious shopper as they count their calories or try to balance their diet. Nothing too incredible there until you consider that these lifeless substances are taken into our body on a daily basis and, together with a good helping of water, are used to maintain our structure. What else can our bodies be made of apart from the substances we eat and drink? These lifeless substances are arranged into a pattern - the pattern of a human being. This is a dynamic pattern that is ever changing and yet very strictly defined. This is a pattern which has emerged over unimaginable periods of time from other durable but yet changing patterns - the creatures of a younger world.
The dynamic patterns characteristic of life are made of lifeless substances and through these patterns flow intangible and invisible energies. Electricity courses through our bodies and we are bathed in magnetic fields. Our bones, our nerves, our skin and cells are all held together by the laws of physics that deal with intangible and invisible but very real forces.
Somehow the combination of the lifeless and the invisible combine to form the glory that is a living body. But what sets us apart from a packet of crisps, a pile of chemicals and electric circuit? The spark that turned the lifeless to the living on a primitive plant Earth is mysterious and tantalising and scientists can at present only speculate on this wonderful event. There is however something that differentiates the living from the lifeless and whether scientist or preacher, we should all agree it is in itself glorious and currently beyond our grasp. So next time you look at the label on your favourite snack, be reminded that life is wonderful, special and mysterious.. Also be reminded of the truth in the saying that in many ways, you are what you eat.

The author has worked in academia and the biotech industry for over 20 years. He is a contributor to Natural Insight writing articles on our natural history and the human condition.