life processes to function. These mitochondria are great at what they do,
but not perfect. Simply put, they leak, and this yields free radicals that
are extremely reactive and damaging to nearby proteins and DNA. Cell
repair mechanisms keep things functioning, but it is a losing battle and the
cell eventually succumbs. This is all part of the ageing process that every
organism faces.
Even inside young, healthy cells, there is a perpetual, dynamic reorder-
ing of things that is necessary for homeostasis—a balanced steady state
utterly dependent on continual change. An important part of this dyna-
mism is the recycling of virtually all of our proteins. On average, 5–7 % of
our proteins are recycled daily—a complete turnover every two or three
weeks. This recycling of used, worn out, broken, mis-folded proteins is
mediated by a completely unexpected system involving a complex cellular
organelle (the proteasome) and hundreds of small proteins called ubiqui-
tins (because they are ubiquitous), and duly dubbed the UPS (ubiquitin-
proteasome system). 8
Biologically speaking then, death is inevitable due to limited resources,
the need for reproduction, and simple wear and tear. The good news is
that from the death and decay of organisms come the resources for new
life. Death does not win, life wins. So biology with all its competition, pre-
dation, parasitism, infections, infestations, and decay leads to new life. All
of the constituents that make up living things are always being recycled—
some very slowly, others quite rapidly. Life is able to overcome limited
resources by recycling. And this continual reuse of exactly the same chemi-
cal resources has resulted in a fl ourishing of life that leaves us in wonder. It
sometimes smells, it pricks your skin, it can make you sick, or delight you
beyond measure, but it is alive. You can’t keep it down. It’s been going
on for billions of years and has exploded in diversity over the past 500
million years such that the world is full beyond our understanding. To
fully appreciate “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof” (1 Cor.
10:26) requires a good appreciation of modern biology. 9
Nonbiologists often have trouble with life’s messier, more odoriferous
aspects. Predation seems cruel, competition to the death seems excessive,
parasitism seems devilish, pathological infections seem horrid. Butterfl ies,
fuzzy animals, babies of almost anything, are fi ne. Even Charles Darwin
had trouble with the juvenile lifestyle of Ichneumonid wasps whose larvae
parasitize caterpillars and emerge, en masse , after eating all the innards of
their host. 10 But what emerges, though not a moth or a butterfl y, is just as
beautiful to the biologist. Ichneumonid adults include some of the most
LET THERE BE LIFE!: TOWARD A HERMENEUTIC OF BIOLOGICAL... 301