What is a cell and how does life actually work?

As we strive to improve health, we should focus on the most important basic unit of health – the cell  

Exploring the potential for knowledge enhancing tourism concepts, we feature today an excerpt of writing by a Finnish tourist in Sri Lanka who travels around the world researching nature based healing, holistic wellbeing and the integration between earth and human health alongside factors such as indigenous knowledge. We will be featuring his life story in our upcoming editions. The below article is a translation from the original version which was in the Finnish language.

By Olli Posti

Humans are made up of a huge number of tiny, tiny cells. How many people have really thought about this? As we strive to improve health, we should focus on the most important basic unit of health – the cell. How can we help these little creatures flourish?

My aim here is to provide a fascinating look at the overall understanding of the inner life of the biological cell. It is mind-bogglingly interesting how much our understanding of cells and the nature of life as a whole is changing, finally.

A simple calorie factory?

We are often told, “just eat the right amount of calories”, as if humans were a simple calorie-burning machine. Biology works much more subtly than any machine invented by man. 

The cell does not like the poisons of chemicalisation, which did not exist a few generations ago and which we are now increasingly putting into our food, drink, skin and indoor air. 

It’s good for the cell to get back the nutrients that we have been removing from food over the last decades and even millennia to some extent. The cell likes the natural things it recognises from prehistory, such as natural light rhythms, natural water, real food and direct contact with the earth’s electrical field rather than artificial electrical devices. Swimming in natural waters, climbing trees and rocks, lying in the meadows... Natural light, such as fire and sun, and contact with the earth, support cellular energy production and reduce inflammation, as long as you don’t burn yourself to a crisp or freeze to death. 

Why are natural elements good for cells? Because for millions of years cells have adapted to our surroundings, which we have since replaced with artificial versions. Or if you look at the same thing through the lens of biblical creation theory, man was naturally created in the conditions of Eden, which only later began to be destroyed with the knowledge of good and evil.

Cells are not machines

Industrialisation brought mankind many wonderful inventions, so we excitedly started calling everything a ‘machine’. The human body is a machine; the cell is a machine; the ecosystem and even society is a machine from which we can draw a static diagram. We draw simplified models of complexity – and then we actually believe our models more than our eyes or even common sense. We are “surprised” when the world does not work according to our imaginary models. When we don’t respect or even acknowledge the complexity of the real world, we think we can manipulate and control it, based on our “perfect knowledge”. And what we get is disaster after disaster.

Life is about subjects that should be treated with the love, or at least the appreciation, that a subject deserves, like a master gardener treats his garden.

Biomimicry has proven time and again to be a fruitful idea: we have taken inspiration or copied ideas from nature for many of our inventions: nature has already solved a problem, and all we have to do is follow suit. When the analogy goes the other way, i.e. when we start describing the wondrous nature through the vastly more primitive piecemeal inventions created by man, problems arise.

Cellular activity is by no means predetermined, but full of randomness. The ‘machinery’ of the cell not only tolerates randomness, but exploits it. Remember what Jeff Goldbum said in Jurassic Park to that control freak scientist in love with his intellect? “Life finds a way.”

What if there is different matter and phenomena happening in a living cell than what we can yet even study?

What we know about cells so far

The size of the cells in the human body is slightly smaller than what can be seen with the eye. Under the right lighting conditions, a sharp-eyed person might be able to just barely see the largest cell, the egg cell, but not any others. 

When humans build a quantum computer, they have to build huge structures and use tremendous amounts of energy to keep the temperature of the microchip almost at a record low near absolute zero. A cell, on the other hand, can play with quantum phenomena at room temperature and humidity that would destroy a modern microchip in an instant. 

Biology is more resilient to disturbances than semiconductor industry – but mainly only to the kinds of disturbances it is designed to bend and dance with. Today, delicate little cells may have to withstand unnatural levels of up to hundreds of thousands of new chemicals, tens of thousands of which did not exist a few generations ago, not to mention a whole range of electrical or even acoustic noise.

Cellular membrane

Cells exchange a huge amount of stuff with their environment. They take in nutrients and remove waste at tremendous rates. This is possible because the cell is incredibly small compared to scales we are more familiar with.

Cells are even smaller in diameter than a hair. Inside the cell there’s no room for normal water, but a living miracle fluid with very high surface tension. That’s where the quantum magic of Life happens. 

By correcting the nutrient deficiencies and other unnatural conditions caused by modern pollution, we can give this cellular organ a better chance of being happy, so that the whole organism can feel content. These tiny creatures inside tiny cells are sensitive to sensing the environment and tuning in to things like light rhythms or even thoughts. Their well-being is a major determinant of mental health and stress tolerance. And on the other hand, their well-being is affected by every emotion.

Summary

It is worth appreciating our cells, which are vastly more wondrous, complex and subtle than science will come close to understanding for a long time to come. 

Note: This is an edited version of selected excerpts from a longer version of writing, edited and shortened to enable publication in this page. 

Resources:

Cells - Course Trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FpPDGTcJD4&list=PLSQl0a2vh4HAMkwzY9aUz8Xam3PGlKLMr

How Quantum Biology Might Explain Life’s Biggest Questions | Jim Al-Khalili | TED Talks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qgSz1UmcBM&t=549s

Enzymology takes a quantum leap forward

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2854803

How NOT To Think About Cells

https://www.subanima.org/veritasium

Is the cell really a machine?

https://philpapers.org/archive/NICITC.pdf