The human heart was a wonder before humans knew much of anything scientifically or medically about it. It is the organ in our body most often turned into a metaphor: to “have a heart” (as distinguished from “having heart,” which means something different), “of pure heart,” “light of heart,” “a heart bursting with…,” and more. As we feel it working in our chest, it can tell us things before we register them consciously. Different kinds of palpitations may alert us to the presence of an enemy or predator, or before we realize it, that we are in love.

Now add to this the wonders revealed by science about this biological pump. A new video, “The Miracle of the Human Heart Explained by Biologist Michael Denton,” notes that if we live to be 80 years old, it will have beat 2 billion notes of life. Each beat, Dr. Denton points out, pumps a hundred billion red blood cells: “By the heart’s unceasing activity, it ensures a bountiful supply of oxygen to provide us with the vital energy of life.” No human invention can compare with it.

But there is still more that most people – probably most scientists – have never even considered, and that seals the case for the heart’s intelligent design. As Denton explains in his recent book, The Miracle of Man, nature was specially crafted — he calls it “prior fitness” — to make the work of the heart possible. Here, he mentions just three illustrations: the prior fitness of light, of water, and of transition metals. A proper accounting of nature’s prior fitness for human life would “fill many volumes.” This brief video gives only a hint of that. The Miracle of Man gives more than a hint. Learn about the miracle and share it with friends and family: