Cerumen, tympanic membranes, and ossicles, oh my! On a new episode of ID the Future, lend us your ears as I invite Dr. Jonathan McLatchie to give us a tour of our magnificent sense of hearing. It’ll be like going back to school as we review the anatomy of the ear with all its interconnected parts, from the oracle (ear lobe) to the curly cochlea in the inner ear. Along the way, McLatchie explains the process of hearing and how it also helps us with our sense of equilibrium.

Then he gets down to the brass tacks. “It strains credulity,” Dr. McLatchie has written, “to suppose that an unguided process of random variation sifted by natural selection could assemble such a delicately arranged system.” McLatchie explains why intelligent design offers a more reasonable explanation for our sense of hearing than a blind Darwinian process. He also explains how we can determine which parts of the hearing system are irreducibly complex. 

From sound waves to mechanical vibrations to electrical signals, our two ears help us make sense of the world around us. It’s time we got a better sense of our ears! Download the podcast or listen to it here.

Dig Deeper

• Read the article that inspired this conversation: “The Sense of Hearing is a Masterpiece of Engineering“
• Learn more about our sense of hearing in Chapter 11 of the recent book Your Designed Body.
• Learn more about Dr. McLatchie’s work at his website.