I Wonder, Therefore I Worship

The word ‘interest’ is a reminder that you have the intellectual faculty of placing your mind ‘into the essence’ of things. Your capacity to wonder, to be caught, to interest yourself in reality is an aspect of the child-likeness you’ll need to get to Heaven. Here are a few things my interest has caught:

We Shall Be Like Trees

I’m writing a book about communication, so I was very interested to learn about the way trees communicate through networks of fungi beneath our feet. There are a number of YouTube videos about this phenomenon. I enjoyed hearing Suzanne Simard discuss the way she tested the hypothesis, as one of the first to imagine that trees might be ‘in touch’. Peter Wohleben’s book The Hidden Life of Trees and Simard’s memoir of her journey of discoveries, Finding the Mother Tree might be of interest to anyone who has read Psalm 1: We shall be like trees! If you’d rather watch than read, the two authors have a video for you: Intelligent Trees.

Being ‘Like Bread’

While we’re on the subject of Biblical metaphors, have you ever noticed the structure of bread? If you’re a baker, you’ve cared about the ‘crumb’ of your bread, but may not have realized it is a structure of great interest to scientists. Foam describes that lovely combination of substance and space that makes a perfect texture for buttering hot and devouring. Foam also describes the bubbling of a gas into a substance, such as beer, or styrofoam, or ocean foam. Beer, bread, merengue and foamed watermelon interest me more than polymerase foams and surfactants, but you can watch The Science of Foam, or read Universal Foam: From Cappucino to the Cosmos (by Sidney Perkowitz) to see for yourself. One fascinating connection: your bones have a foam-like interior structure. You are more like bread than you realized!

Who Copies Whom?

It takes some humility to learn from a spider, a gecko, or an ant. It would take more to acknowledge you are learning from their Creator. There’s an amazing array of innovations and problem solutions coming from the world of Biomimicry, where we see at least that initial humility and wonder that may lead people to the deeper magic. Look at the Biomimicry Institute’s resources, or at many books written on the topic . A quick peek at ten examples is available in the video Biomimicry Examples: 10 Amazing Examples of Biomimicry. Who knew a mosquito’s proboscis, a butterfly’s wing, a hummingbirds vibrations, or a gecko’s foot could teach scientists and engineers practical lessons for improving the world for humans??

Remember, just because people discussing biomimicry don’t often give glory to God doesn’t mean you can’t. In fact, maybe we need more Christians in touch with ideas that inspire and those who wonder as a result. Wonder is the starting point for philosophy!

Well, that’s it for now. I would dearly love to hear what fascinates you, where you place your interest, what topics you could talk about for hours. Please let me know! Editor@ChestertonAcademyKC.org