Thursday, December 3, 2009

Unintelligent Design

Had my annual physical at the doctor's yesterday. Passed, of course, with flying colors, seeing as I am a Viking type bull-of-a-man and all the weaklings in our line bred out - left to die exposed on the ice floes and along the glacier line quite some time ago I suspect. (Ah, yes, we of the Kurman Nation are well known for our humility).

Nevertheless, a superior physical specimen such as myself does still have complaints. Specifically, I had trouble hearing out of my right ear, and would occasionally get trapped water in there. My curmudgeon of a doctor stuck his lighted ear inspection tool in there and exclaimed: 

"Jeez, I can't even see your ear drum"!

Chockfull of ear wax I am, and the left ear not much better. So, he gets out the giant metal syringe to flush the wax out - and succeeds in completely plugging up my ear canal. Nothing for it but to take ear drops the next few days to soften the wax, then go back for a proper flushing. In the meantime, I am, like, "What? What?" to everyone around me, dude.

But it got me thinking about design flaws, and how we poor shambling humans seem to have quite a few flaws in our design. Consider: 

The prostate. Not the best positioning, don't you think? Guys get older, prostate swells up, gets hard to pee, not good. Couldn't there have been a better place to put the thing?

Knees, hips, backs. Not quite the optimal design for bipedal locomotion.

The blind spot in the eye. Not to mention the flimsy connection of the retina makes you think it was manufactured in Bangladesh. A good slap on the back, and the retina detaches. And not covered by warranty.

Ectopic pregnancy. The egg becomes attached to cervix, fallopian tube, or even the ovary, rather than the uterus. Really nothing humorous at all about this as it usually results in death to both the mother and child. Good thing abortion is an available procedure.

While we are on it, something should be done about the size of the birth canal. Breech births are not an optimal method.

Hernias. Men's testicles descend from the abdomen, leaving a weak spot in the muscles. Prior to current surgical methods, hernias could result in gangrene, followed by death.

Congenital Diseases. Scoliosis. Sciatica. Wisdom teeth. Scurvy, due to our unique inability to manufacture Vitamin C. The descent of the pharynx within the throat, making Man the only animal that can choke. Most embarrassingly, sometimes on his own vomit.  

Well, the  list goes on, and on, and on. 

I'm not trying to shake anyone's personal belief structure - not too much anyway. But I am suggesting that maybe those who buy into Intelligent Design should occasionally allow themselves to be confused with the facts? 

2 comments:

  1. Excuse me...I think I'm coming down with a brain tumor.

    ReplyDelete
  2. That's the best argument against intelligent design I have ever heard. I'll remember this one.

    ReplyDelete