Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholdee

You know how they say that every snow flake is unique and different?

I believe you can say the same for eyes.  But not just, "Every person has a unique pair of eyes."  I think that each eye is different even if they are on the same face.

Now, lets take a step back for a second and really think about what the eye does for us.  It doesn't technically "see" for us... does it?

[Here is the "sciencey" part of this post]  
Reflected light passes through the clear cornea and the aqueous humor in order to enter the eye through the pupil.  (Now depending on the amount of light coming in, the radial or the circular muscle may contract.  If there is a small amount of light, the radial muscle will contract and dilate the pupil.  If there is an excessive amount of light, the circular muscle will contract causing the pupil to constrict.) After the light has passed the pupil, it goes through the lens.  This lens is made up of transparent proteins called crystallins.  What is interesting about the lens is that it can be adjusted in your eye without you knowing.  There are muscles called ciliary that contract and stretch the lens so that your eyes can adjust to maintain a clear focus on an object as its distance changes. Once the light passes through the lens it enters the eye[ball] and travels through a jelly like substance called the vitreous humor.  Finally, the light hits the back of the eye, the retina.  There, the photo receptors (rods and cones) of the retina undergo chemical and electrical reactions to send signals out the optic nerve to the brain where these signals, caused by the light entering your eye, are translated into the sensation of seeing. [End of "sciencey" part]

Now, I could further explain how the rods and cones work and all the different types of cells responsible for making and transferring the signal to the brain and even how the brain crosses the signals from each individual eye before all the signals are translated into "vision" but, I think it is more interesting to imagine seeing things without eyes...

You have to admit that it might be possible to stimulate the neurons in your occipital lobe (the lobe containing the primary visual cortex) in such a way as to mimic the signals that the eye sends to the brain.  Then wouldn't you see something?

I mean, you don't have eyes!  But the same process that happens to perceive "sight" should happen in your brain if you stimulate the neurons in the same way your eyes do.

Ok, so why do we have eyes? Well, eyes just make everything easier... but that isn't a creative answer. 

I like to think they serve a greater purpose.  After all, we are created in the image and likeness of God.

I think they tell something about who you are (window to the soul).  The uniqueness of each individual eye just makes the person who has them that much more unique.

I think that eye color is something that helps my argument...
(Now I don't mean for this to be a "every person is unique and different" post.  I just want to comment on interesting facts of the eye)

I looked up different eye colors and this is what I found: brown, blue, hazel, gray and green.

In my experience, eyes have two regions for color in them.  The region right around the pupil and the region that surrounds that.  For the sake of clarity: lets call the region near the pupil region 1 and the other region 2.  Region 1 is rarely a perfect circle but region 2 extends from the edge of region 1 to the sclera (the white of the eye).

(Now, this doesn't mean that there can only be two different colors in an eye.  There can be many different shades in these two regions.)

The best way I can describe region 1 is a "splash."  It looks as if someone splashed a drop of color around the pupil and froze that splash.

What is cool about these regions is that they are in all different eye colors.  It can be that region 1 is a light shade of brown/blue/hazel/gray/green and region 2 is a darker shade of brown/blue/hazel/gray/green (or vice versa).

All eye colors are attractive.  This "splash" is something that makes them so.

There are so many songs about eyes and eye color...

One of my best friends, Bailey, loves the song "Brown Eyed Girl" by Van Morrison. (and it just so happens that she has brown eyes)

One final thought...

You can never know your eyes better than someone else.  This makes sense since you can never "see" your eyes.  Well, you could see them in a mirror or a reflection in the water (like Mulan).  But those reflections can't be trusted because it is almost impossible to have a perfect mirror or perfectly calm pond.  Besides, what you'd be seeing is a reflection- not the real thing.  Only another human can truly "see" your eyes (with their own).

This makes for an interesting proposition:

Since the eyes are the window to the soul, is it possible that the best way to get to know yourself is through another?


Thanks for hanging in there with me.  I know this is a long post but I think everything here needs to be said (including the shout out!)

Thanks again to Wikipedia and this time webMD!

Mental Sweating

This topic came across my mind as I was studying for an Organic Chemistry test.

I thought, "Why do I get so tired after I study for a long time or if I take a long test?"

After all, I'm not working out, running, or playing hockey.  How can I be more tired after I take the SAT than after I play a hockey game?

After examining the question for a while, I tried to come up with a logical reason why brain function can tire me out.

At first I thought:

Well, I get tired after I use my muscles.  My brain must just be a muscle that expends energy.  Like my gastrocnemius or tounge.  But when I typed "Is my brain a muscle?" into Google, this is what I got:

"No.  Its composed of two things called gray matter and white matter, gray matter is made from the cell bodies of the nerve cells, and the white matter made from the bundles of their axons (which transmits the nervous signals to other neurons or effector cells"(site: WikiAnswers)

So, why/how does the brain need/get it's energy?

After a little more research, I learned a little bit more about it.

Your brain cells need two times more energy than the other cells in your body.

Neurons, the cells that communicate with each other, have a high demand for energy because they're always in a state of metabolic activity. Even during sleep, neurons are still at work repairing and rebuilding their worn out structural components.

They are manufacturing enzymes and neurotransmitters that must be transported out to the very ends of their– nerve branches, some that can be several inches, or feet, away.

Most demanding of a neuron's energy, however, are the bioelectric signals responsible for communication throughout the nervous system. This nerve transmission consumes one-half of all the brain's energy (nearly 10% of the whole body's energy).

Thank you Wikipedia!

Ok so now this makes a lot of sense!  The brain cells need two times the amount of energy that your normal cells need.  So, for every hour I spend totally devoted to studying or completely invested in a text, it is (time to break out the calculator!) like two hours of physical work.

Well, that is not entirely true because there is plenty of overlap in the types of work.  You use your brain to communicate with your muscles so you are using brain cells when moving.  Then you can't really know if it is just your brain making you tired during or after a test.

I know that I move my wrist, fingers and arm during a test to write my answers down.  
But surely that can't take up too much energy.  Can't it?

Maybe I unintentionally twitch my leg up and down while thinking about a question.
Again, how can only that be the cause of my exhaustion?

I was not doing any physically demanding processes at all during the test to have gotten that tired afterwards.  It must have been the thinking!

I want to call to your attention exactly how tired I got after taking the SAT.
Once I got home, I laid on the couch the rest of the afternoon watching movies and dozing off multiple times.  I didn't talk.  I didn't move.  I didn't even get up to get food when I was hungry.  All I wanted to do was nothing.

Now perhaps I was being a bit dramatic. (It is very likely given my dramatic nature) But I was very tired and I know I wasn't the only one who felt that way.

This was where I was going to give you an example of a person who just recently took the SAT and said she was tired and all she wanted to do was nap after the test and not move from her bed...

Well, when I called my sister to ask her about how she felt after taking the test, she said she was relieved.  That wasn't the answer I was going for so I asked her if she felt tired at all after taking the test...

She said no...

Well, now I don't know if I'm the crazy one or she is.

I'm leaning towards me being the crazy one.  And if that is true then why are you reading a crazy person's blog?

Not just any crazy person either.  Someone who thinks thinking is so physically demanding that he must sleep after taking tests.  I mean just thinking about this brain stuff has gotten me all tuckered out.

Happy Valentines day everyone!  
I love you all!