Meet Euhaplorchis californiensis. This little bug is a parasite that lives in salt-water marshes in southern California. It is a strange little bug.
This thing, as it turns out, lives in three different hosts. Try to follow this. The eggs of this parasite arrive in pools of water in shorebird (host #1) droppings. In these pools of water there is a water snail called a horn snail (host #2) that consumes these eggs. The thing is, these parasites don't like to live in horn snails. I mean, who would? So they hatch in larva form in the horn snails. They use the snail's digestive system to asexually produce clonal forms called rediae. These radiae become a new form called cercariae that can swim. Thousands of these things exit the snail a day. In the water, where they find killifish (host #3). When they find this fish, they bore into the sides of the fish and work their way into the killifish's brain where they excrete a substance that forms a shell around the parasite and then alter the brain function of the host. These killifish start acting erratically in ways that will naturally call attention to themselves from ... you got it ... shorebirds. Since it is in the shorebird gut that they can reproduce, this is their final aim. The shorebird sees these "crazy fish", consumes them, and puts the parasites into its intestinal tract so they can lay eggs and restart the cycle. By accident. All as a matter of Evolution. Trust me.
"Oh, that's weird," I can hear you say already. "A parasite that manipulates the behavior of one host in order to end up in another? Really?" Yeah. Really. And there is more than one.
Meet Toxoplasma gondii. Estimates are that 11% of Americans are infected with this single-celled organism ... and possibly half of all people worldwide. How is this parasite so successful? It functions similar to the shorebird/snail/fish one. Get this. This little thing likes to live in cats. Go figure. According to the CDC, "The only known definitive hosts for Toxoplasma gondii are members of family Felidae (domestic cats and their relatives)." So this parasite only reproduces in the digestive tracts of cats and its spores reside in cat feces. Problem: How to get into more cats? Well, their spores get into the soil or water or on plants which are then consumed by rats. Getting a connection here? I mean, cats love rats. So ... but wait ... how does this help? Well, once in these rats, they make their way to the rat brains. Once there they alter their behavior. They make the rat react to cat urine so that, instead of fleeing the danger, they become aggressive ... against cats. They will charge them and attack. This, of course, is not a winning strategy. It simply makes them more easily eaten ... by cats. They become zombie rats, in essence, and the cats eat it up ... literally. So, given the ubiquity of rats and cats, it is easily possible for these parasites to get into humans as well. Now, humans are not a good host for these things and typically there are no effects, no symptoms, no problems. However, some scientists have wondered if this might be one contributor to schizophrenia? Probably not, but you have to admit that "This all happens from a natural, Evolutionary process" seems really far-fetched.
I ran into these two (who are not, by the way, alone in their bizarre stories) recently in a couple of scientific reports. It was interesting. I showed the information to a couple of my colleagues who are, by no means, Christians. Both had identical responses. "Wow, that kind of makes 'natural selection' look nigh unto impossible." One said, "I can't believe I'm saying that, but it sure looks like the only possible answer is Intelligent Design." Yes ... yes it does.
4 comments:
I read this to my family out loud without telling them the author. They were mesmerized, as was I, and were impressed when they learned that they knew the author.
Oh, cool! I know the author, too. :)
Oh, who's the author? Do I know him?
A friend of Danny's.
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