The Heart is Not a Machine, it is a Work of Art

In the following video Alexander Tsiaras calls the development of the human heart magnificent oragami as the heart forms with cells developing  at a rate of one million per second.

Conception to birth — visualized

It is generally believed that the heart acts as a pressure pump forcing an inert fluid through the lungs and through the bodily tissues and organs. There is evidence that this is not the case and that it is more accurate to view the heart as an organ which regulates the dynamic activity of the blood.

Here  Walter Alexander reviews Branko Furst’s radiacal alternative:

… the possibility that the dominant paradigm is deeply flawed is what Branko Furst, MD, explores in The Heart and Circulation: An Integrative Model in 2014 and in “The Heart: Pressure-Propulsion Pump or Organ of Impedance” in the Journal of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Anesthesia in 2015. In these, he marshals the evidence against the standard propulsion pump model and presents an alternative that may open new avenues for understanding circulation and, ultimately, pharmacotherapy. As a vascular anesthesiologist in a tertiary care medical center, Dr. Furst holds hemodynamic monitoring and support of circulation at the core of his acute-care concerns.

To challenge the prevailing paradigm in any field is difficult, and in the case of heart function, with its notoriously complex dynamics, myriad of interrelated influencing factors, and vast diagnostic and therapeutic implications, it is a prodigious undertaking. Dr. Furst has provided more than 800 supporting references in his book and the journal article. It is far beyond the scope of this article to fairly represent the range of this content. However, we will attempt to review the basic argument and rationale for such a challenge and give the reader a  compass for delving more deeply into the underlying research.

In the article THE HEART IS NOT A PUMP:
A REFUTATION OF THE PRESSURE PROPULSION PREMISE OF HEART FUNCTION
Ralph Marinelli writes the following:

Implicit in the notion of pressure propulsion in the cardiovascular system are the following four major concepts.
(1) Blood is naturally inert and therefore must be forced to circulate.
(2) There is a random mix of the formed particles in the blood.
(3) The cells in the blood are under pressure at all times.
(4) The blood is amorphous and is forced to fill its vessels and thereby takes on their form.
However, there are observations that challenge these notions. It is seen that the blood has its own form, the vortex, which determines rather than conforms to the shape of the vascular lumen and circulates in the embryo with its own inherent biological momentum before the heart begins to function. Just as an inert vortex in nature pulses radially and longitudinally, we tentatively assume that blood is also free to pulse and is not subject to the pulse-restricting pressure implied in the pressure propulsion concept. The blood is not propelled by pressure but by its own biological momenta boosted by the heart.

 

The recent advances in non-invasive imaging allows the dynamics of the circulatory system to be studied in much more accurate detail than ever before. And it is beginning to be obvious that the current understanding of the heart as a mechanical pump is false.

Frank Chester discovered the chestahedron, 7 sided polyhedron with surfaces of equal area. He discovered this by combining art and science. From studying this form he made many further discoveries including discoveries about its relationship with the human heart as demonstrated in this video.

Craig Holdridge gives a good description of the relationship between heart and blood:

We’ve arrived at a picture of the intricate streaming, turning, looping blood flow through the heart that follows a different pattern in each of the four chambers. The coiling, looping heart fibers create contractions that mirror and facilitate this dynamic coursing of the blood. The heart muscle does not work, as we often imagine it does, opening and closing as we can do with our fist, first forming a fist (systole) and then relaxing the fist (diasole). Rather, the heartbeat (cardiac cycle) includes a much more complex array of movements. During systole the heart moves downward and oscillates slightly to the sides and also rotates around its own axis. During diastole it moves upward and rotates back in the opposite direction. Only the heart’s interwoven spiraling muscle fibers can produce this kind of complex motion.

We see that blood flow, the form of the heart and the pattern of its fibers, and the heartbeat are intimately entwined. We can’t think of one without the others. When we go back to the origin of the blood and the heart in embryonic development, it is no simple matter to say what came first (see Brettschneider’s preface to Woernle’s chapter in this book). Maybe it’s also just our mechanical way of thinking that wants to see a clearly directional cause and effect relation between the heart and the blood instead of a more living relation of mutual dependency.

This mutuality shows itself during the embryonic development of the heart. Early in its development the heart begins to form loops that redirect blood flow. But before the heart has developed walls (septa) separating the four chambers from each other, the blood already flows in two distinct “currents” through the heart. The blood flowing through the right and left sides of the heart do not mix, but stream and loop by each other, just as two currents in a body of water. In the “still water zone” between the two currents, the septum dividing the two chambers forms. Thus the movement of the blood gives the parameters for the inner differentiation of the heart, just as the looping heart redirects the flow of blood. Blood movement and heart differentiation belong together.

In describing the heart as a machine we produce a conception of it which is far removed from reality. It needs to be understood in its true, dynamic, living nature.

 

115 thoughts on “The Heart is Not a Machine, it is a Work of Art

  1. Hey CharlieM!
    This is a very interesting take on the issue I have never come across…
    I have some friends who are cardiologists, so I’m going to bring this topic up nest time we get togther but only when they have had some blood circulation stimulant in their system… 😉

  2. ” It is seen that the blood has its own form, the vortex, which determines rather than conforms to the shape of the vascular lumen and circulates in the embryo with its own inherent biological momentum ”
    “(1) Blood is naturally inert and therefore must be forced to circulate.”

    Isn’t it amazing how all that shit gets built into artificial hearts.

  3. The only thing i have on the heart is as follows.
    I once had a muscle spasm in my arm and noted it made a beat for minutes at a time.
    i imagined that was what the heart might be. it beats because its a muscle ‘spasm”.
    its not the blood or any other wiring that makes it beat but just its shape. Then one hears about chickens once deheaded still keep walking around for a while. suggesting their heart keeps beating without blood flow anymore.
    HOWEVER i have no idea if this is class 101 WRONG. just plain wrong.
    it might be textbook page one THE HEART is not beating based on its shape/spasm.
    Wiki was unclear to me.

  4. J-Mac:
    Hey CharlieM!
    This is a very interesting take on the issue I have never come across…I have some friends who are cardiologists, so I’m going to bring this topic up nest time we get togther but only when they have had some blood circulation stimulant in their system…

    It would be interesting to hear what your friends have to say. So long as you keep the blood circulation stimulant to a level where it stimulates intelligent conversation 🙂

  5. quarrion:
    ” It is seen that the blood has its own form, the vortex, which determines rather than conforms to the shape of the vascular lumen and circulates in the embryo with its own inherent biological momentum ”
    “(1) Blood is naturally inert and therefore must be forced to circulate.”

    Isn’t it amazing how all that shit gets built into artificial hearts.

    It doesn’t. That is why there are so many problems with them.

    Up until now artificial hearts do a very good job of keeping people alive until a transplant becomes available. And hopefully the more they can mimic the natural heart the more effective they will become.

    See here

    Although artificial hearts have been around for some time now, there’s just one that’s approved for human use in the US, and it’s only intended to keep patients going until they can get a heart transplant. A device being developed by the Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), however, is designed to be a permanent fix…

    Another thing that differentiates the OHSU heart from other devices is the fact that it creates a blood flow that mimics a natural human pulse, as opposed to a continuous flow. According to the university, this should minimize blood damage and clotting, plus it may also reduce the risk of gastrointestinal bleeding and stroke.

  6. CharlieM: It doesn’t. That is why there are so many problems with them.

    But we could built it all in, right?

    This seems like science to me. Artificial hearts can be improved. Outcomes that can be measured.

    CharlieM: And hopefully the more they can mimic the natural heart the more effective they will become.

    But they’ll always be making a machine, right?

  7. Robert Byers:
    The only thing i have on the heart is as follows.
    I once had a muscle spasm in my arm and noted it made a beat for minutes at a time.
    i imagined that was what the heart might be. it beats because its a muscle ‘spasm”.
    its not the blood or any other wiring that makes it beat but just its shape. Then one hears about chickens once deheaded still keep walking around for a while. suggesting their heart keeps beating without blood flow anymore.
    HOWEVER i have no idea if this is class 101 WRONG. just plain wrong.
    it might be textbook page one THE HEART is not beating based on its shape/spasm.
    Wiki was unclear to me.

    Hi Robert

    I suppose you could say that the heart beats due to muscle spasm, but it is a precisely controlled muscle spasm.

    The sino-atrial (SA) node in the top of the heart produces an electrical impulse which travels through the heart muscle causing it to move and twist. The rate of impulses vary according to the needs of the body.

    A good place to get an understanding of an alternative view on the functioning of the heart and blood system is Thomas Cowan’s website https://www.humanheartcosmicheart.com/

    There is a review of the book of the same name here and Dr. Mercola Interviews Dr. Cowan on the Book here.

  8. OMagain: But we could built it all in, right?

    This seems like science to me. Artificial hearts can be improved. Outcomes that can be measured.

    But they’ll always be making a machine, right?

    Yes, as it stands it will always be a machine. When they can totally replicate the self organising, self-repairing, self-determined nature of living substance then it will be more than a machine. But for the moment other than transplants machines are all that we have available and this is better than nothing at all. Although preventing heart disease in the first place when possible would be an even better option.

  9. Can anyone present an argument that all this isn’t nonsense? It seems painfully evident with even a cursory reading. Blood moves by itself in spirals? When has this ever been observed? (Incidentally, this seems a very Reichian notion. Anyone familiar?)

  10. The blood is not propelled by pressure but by its own biological momenta boosted by the heart.

    Heh. “Biological momenta”.

  11. John Harshman:
    Can anyone present an argument that all this isn’t nonsense? It seems painfully evident with even a cursory reading. Blood moves by itself in spirals? When has this ever been observed? (Incidentally, this seems a very Reichian notion. Anyone familiar?)

    I might have some answers next week from a variety of views, but mainly cardiologists… I have no clue what this is all about…
    I had always thought the heart worked similarly to a pump… if that view is adjusted, would the blood pressure thingy have to adjust too???

  12. Robert Byers:
    The only thing i have on the heart is as follows.
    I once had a muscle spasm in my arm and noted it made a beat for minutes at a time.
    i imagined that was what the heart might be. it beats because its a muscle ‘spasm”.
    its not the blood or any other wiring that makes it beat but just its shape. Then one hears about chickens once deheaded still keep walking around for a while. suggesting their heart keeps beating without blood flow anymore.
    HOWEVER i have no idea if this is class 101 WRONG. just plain wrong.
    it might be textbook page one THE HEART is not beating based on its shape/spasm.
    Wiki was unclear to me.

    I have a feeling that Bob might have something here… I don’t really know what that could be, but the laws of randomness that whole materialistic world has been built on tell me, that Byers has a chance…And,why not? Materialistic nonsense is no better…

  13. I must say I was getting ready to be impressed until I read the same thing: ‘the blood moves by itself’. Maybe I need to consult all 800 references.

  14. CharlieM,

    I did read about the spark but didn’t understand if the shape of the muscle was relevant. So you say it could be the shape and so na “spasm”. Interesting.
    I checked out one of your videos.

  15. CharlieM: When they can totally replicate the self organising, self-repairing, self-determined nature of living substance then it will be more than a machine.

    We’re machines. Organic machines. We’re still “just” machines.

  16. John Harshman:
    Can anyone present an argument that all this isn’t nonsense? It seems painfully evident with even a cursory reading. Blood moves by itself in spirals? When has this ever been observed? (Incidentally, this seems a very Reichian notion. Anyone familiar?)

    Blood is not an inert liquid, it is a living tissue and movement is a feature of life. It does not have to use some ‘woo-like’ force to propel itself through the body. Just common or garden electro-magnetic, chemical, mechanical, osmotic, heat forces will do. You would not need to invoke reichi-like forces to explain squirrels running up trees or a dynein motors ‘walking’ along microtubules would you?

    Moving in vortices and spiral formation is a ubiquitous feature of life. We do you find it so strange that vortices and spirals are present in the circulatory system?

    See here

    The shape of the healthy heart is optimized for vortex ring formation.

    The laws of fluid dynamics govern vortex ring formation and precede cardiac development by billions of years, suggesting that diastolic vortex ring formation is instrumental in defining the shape of the heart. Using novel and validated magnetic resonance imaging measurements, we show that the healthy left ventricle moves in tandem with the expanding vortex ring, indicating that cardiac form and function is epigenetically optimized to accommodate vortex ring formation for volume pumping. Healthy hearts demonstrate a strong coupling between vortex and cardiac volumes (R2 = 0.83), but this optimized phenotype is lost in heart failure, suggesting restoration of normal vortex ring dynamics as a new, and possibly important consideration for individualized heart failure treatment. Vortex ring volume was unrelated to early rapid filling (E-wave) velocity in patients and controls. Characteristics of vortex-wall interaction provide unique physiologic and mechanistic information about cardiac diastolic function that may be applied to guide the design and implantation of prosthetic valves, and have potential clinical utility as therapeutic targets for tailored medicine or measures of cardiac health.

    Do you think that because the heart appears somewhat solid and the blood somewhat liquid, the former has the power of movement but the latter does not? It is the moving blood which allows the formation of the heart and the blood vessels in the first place.

    Your question is still to be answered: Can anyone present an argument that all this isn’t nonsense?

  17. keiths: Heh.“Biological momenta”.

    Banging one’s head against a brick wall – biological momenta 🙂

  18. J-Mac: I might have some answers next week from a variety of views, but mainly cardiologists… I have no clue what this is all about…
    I had always thought the heart worked similarly to a pump… if that view is adjusted, would the blood pressure thingy have to adjust too???

    There is a book I would love to read, Heart’s Vortex: Intracardiac Blood Flow Phenomena by Ares Pasipoularides. It might be something your cardiologist friends could take a look at if they had access and wanted to explore this further. Or of course any of the other links I provided.

  19. I have just read a short article by Belle Monappa Hegde. He begins:

    Decades ago in the 1960s when one of my papers in the then
    Journal of Physicians of Madras,which later became the JAPI (Journal of the Association of Physicians of India), I think, appeared in print entitled ‘Should we be drugging every patient with raised blood pressures’. That paper almost cost me my job as a teacher in the medical school. I survived by the skin of my teeth!

    He writes:

    It was very uncomfortable to accept that the heart is a simple muscular pump, which could pump blood through the enormous swimming pool of capillaries of which there are 800 kilometers in just one kilogram of body fat. We are lost in measuring the artifact, called arterial pressure, in a few meters of the arteries or, for that matter, in the veins. We do not even know what happens to millions of miles of capillaries and to their mean capillary pressure. The mean capillary pressure is the one that determines life from death. We now call this as capillary chaos…

    Lots of simple questions should baffle anyone when told that the heart, an organ which weighs about 300 grammes, could pump about 8,000 litres of blood daily at rest, which goes up exponentially on exercise, without tiring. Converted to mechanical energy, this amounts to lifting 100 pounds of weight to a height of a mile, write Ralph Marinelle and colleagues in that remarkable article in the Frontiers Perspectives, referred to earlier. They have given extensive literature references to substantiate the claim that the heart can not, by any stretch of imagination, be just a simple muscular pump . More amazing is the concept that the heart could pump blood, five times thicker than water, through millions of miles of capillaries where even a single RBC might not pass through those capillaries but for its capacity to change shape.

    I would like to ask anyone who believes that the blood is pumped through our bodies by the heart: Have you studied the evidence for yourself, or do you just uncritically accept it because that is what we are all taught and therefore it must be true?

  20. CharlieM: I would like to ask anyone who believes that the blood is pumped through our bodies by the heart: Have you studied the evidence for yourself, or do you just uncritically accept it because that is what we are all taught and therefore it must be true?

    I just uncritically accept it because that is what we are all taught.

    I don’t think that “therefore it must be true”–but I understand, as you (and many others here) obviously do not, that I am not in a position to substitute my own judgment for that of experts in every fucking area of science and the humanities. What the hell do you know about it?

  21. walto: but I understand, as you (and many others here) obviously do not, that I am not in a position to substitute my own judgment for that of experts in every fucking area of science and the humanities.

    Although most of us learn to recognise the little red flags like those in the wiki page of Dr. Hegde:

    He has published a research on using silver nano particles infused with water for curing malaria in three days[11]. He has proposed that ‘quantum healing’ can bring sick persons back to normal[12][13].

    … and approach the writings of said person with a little more caution.

  22. CharlieM: Blood is not an inert liquid, it is a living tissue and movement is a feature of life.

    This is hopelessly confused. Movement is not a feature of life. It’s a feature of the application of certain physical forces, some of which occurs in some living things. You treat it as a mystical essence of life, which it is not.

    It does not have to use some ‘woo-like’ force to propel itself through the body. Just common or garden electro-magnetic, chemical, mechanical, osmotic, heat forces will do.

    You mention forces that have nothing to do with blood circulation as well as the one that does: mechanical forces, i.e. the pressure generated by the heart acting as a pump. If you disagree, tell me how any of those other forces cause movement of the blood.

    You would not need to invoke reichi-like forces to explain squirrels running up trees or a dynein motors ‘walking’ along microtubules would you?

    Nope, but your source is invoking “reichi-like forces”, not physical ones. Incidentally, I’m surprised that such a woo-meister as you is unacquainted with the work of Wilhelm Reich (not to be at all confused with Reiki).

    Moving in vortices and spiral formation is a ubiquitous feature of life. We do you find it so strange that vortices and spirals are present in the circulatory system?

    I would certainly find it strange to find spirals in the circulatory system, but vortices seem reasonable. But of course those are the result of the heart acting as a pump. The heart is a pump.

  23. walto: I just uncritically accept it because that is what we are all taught.

    I don’t think that “therefore it must be true”–but I understand, as you (and many others here) obviously do not, that I am not in a position to substitute my own judgment for that of experts in every fucking area of science and the humanities. What the hell do you know about it?

    I know very little about anything. But I do know that we should always ask questions. We should not accept anything as a fact before exploring the details from as many angles as possible. Science moves forward not by accepting facts but by questioning dogmas.

  24. Corneel: Although most of us learn to recognise the little red flags like those in the wiki page of Dr. Hegde:

    … and approach the writings of said person with a little more caution.

    If we are trying to understand the world is good to approach the writing of anybody with open-minded caution. We may find that currently we do not have enough evidence to decide on its merits and only by further learning we might approach a point where we can make an informed judgement. If what someone writes is proven to be true or false that does not mean that we can take everything they say or write to be equally true or false.

  25. CharlieM: We should not accept anything as a fact before exploring the details from as many angles as possible. Science moves forward not by accepting facts but by questioning dogmas.

    A. You are not in a position to “explore the details” of any scientific theory.
    B. If you WERE in a position to explore the details of some scientific theory, you would not do so by consulting nutjobs who post nonsense on the internet.
    C. If you were both in a position to explore the details of some scientific theory and did so in a competent fashion, you would still not either accelerate or slow down the movement of science.

  26. CharlieM: If we are trying to understand the world is good to approach the writing of anybody with open-minded caution. We may find that currently we do not have enough evidence to decide on its merits and only by further learning we might approach a point where we can make an informed judgement. If what someone writes is proven to be true or false that does not mean that we can take everything they say or write to be equally true or false.

    A. You are not in a position to determine the adequacy of available evidence for any scientific theory.
    B. Your judgments are not “informed” by watching youtube videos by nutjobs.
    C. It really makes no difference whatever whether you take this or that scientific assertion to be true or false. I mean, you’re free to believe whatever you want, but you’re wrong if you think that your views ought to carry the slightest bit of weight with anybody else.

  27. CharlieM: I know very little about anything. But I do know that we should always ask questions. We should not accept anything as a fact before exploring the details from as many angles as possible. Science moves forward not by accepting facts but by questioning dogmas.

    I believe that it’s time for this quote (Carl Sagan paraphrasing someone else): “Keeping an open mind is a virtue—but, as the space engineer James Oberg once said, not so open that your brains fall out.” There are some things it isn’t profitable to rethink because you will inevitably decide that the standard view was correct. Pigs don’t fly, gravity doesn’t repel, owls are not the sister group of humans, and blood doesn’t circulate all by itself.

  28. John Harshman: This is hopelessly confused. Movement is not a feature of life. It’s a feature of the application of certain physical forces, some of which occurs in some living things. You treat it as a mystical essence of life, which it is not.

    There is nothing mystical about it. Do you think that Newton’s first law applies equally to a grain of sand and a bacterium?

    You mention forces that have nothing to do with blood circulation as well as the one that does: mechanical forces, i.e. the pressure generated by the heart acting as a pump. If you disagree, tell me how any of those other forces cause movement of the blood.

    From this article

    Optical tweezers help determine that red blood cells move without external force

    It is wrong to think of the blood as some sort of passive hydraulic fluid being acted on from without. It is an extremely active part of the circulatory system.

    Nope, but your source is invoking “reichi-like forces”, not physical ones. Incidentally, I’m surprised that such a woo-meister as you is unacquainted with the work of Wilhelm Reich (not to be at all confused with Reiki).

    My mistake.

    Incidentally, no matter how twisted his views were I was surprised to read that six tons of Wilhelm Reich’s publications were burned by order of a US court. I thought we’d moved on from that by then.

    I would certainly find it strange to find spirals in the circulatory system, but vortices seem reasonable. But of course those are the result of the heart acting as a pump. The heart is a pump.

    Have you not seen the structure of the layers of the myocarium?

    Also Spiral flow in vessels

    In the past few decades it has been well established that that blood flow in medium and large size vessels is spiral, which means that the blood velocity vectors are not parallel to the vessel wall. The existence of secondary flow motions in vessels is related to both the physiological function and anatomical structure of the cardiovascular system.

    Thank you for giving me food for thought. I much prefer civilised discussion with people who hold views opposite to my own. This I can learn from. I learn nothing from criticism without any content to back it up.

  29. CharlieM: Do you think that Newton’s first law applies equally to a grain of sand and a bacterium?

    Yes, I do.

    If you do not think so, then you do not understand Newton’s first law.

  30. Neil Rickert: Yes, I do.

    If you do not think so, then you do not understand Newton’s first law.

    So what external physical force causes a bacterium to switch from running to tumbling? What external force causes you to walk across a room?

  31. CharlieM:
    walto,

    walto,

    I would prefer to discuss the subject rather than my shortcomings.

    Keep in mind that I don’t attribute any shortcoming to you that I’m not also attributing to myself here….except hubris. I recognize that my views on the nature of blood circulation are utterly worthless.

  32. CharlieM: So what external physical force causes a bacterium to switch from running to tumbling? What external force causes you to walk across a room?

    Strange. When I check the Wikipedia entry, I am not seeing “external”.

    In any case, Newton’s third law gives the answer to your question. When I am walking, my feet push against the floor. And the floor pushes back (3rd law).

  33. Newton’s third law is the external force that causes Neil to walk across a room.

    Neil is unique like that.

  34. CharlieM: There is nothing mystical about it. Do you think that Newton’s first law applies equally to a grain of sand and a bacterium?

    Is this what you call holistic thinking? Picking sentences that have some of the same words as a point someone might want to make? The answer is “yes”. So?

    From this article

    It is wrong to think of the blood as some sort of passive hydraulic fluid being acted on from without. It is an extremely active part of the circulatory system.

    Again with sentences, and a reference, that have some of the same words you might use in a reply. But none of that has anything to do with blood circulation.

    Incidentally, no matter how twisted his views were I was surprised to read that six tons of Wilhelm Reich’s publications were burned by order of a US court. I thought we’d moved on from that by then.

    Yes, that sentence did have the term “Wilhelm Reich” in it, but that’s about all.

    Have you not seen the structure of the layers of the myocarium?

    OK, so that one almost has the word “myocardium”.

    Also Spiral flow in vessels

    Now that one is actually relevant. The fact that they used the wrong word — it should be “helical” — is not your fault. But note that it doesn’t mean that the motive force is not pumping by the heart.

    Thank you for giving me food for thought. I much prefer civilised discussion with people who hold views opposite to my own. This I can learn from. I learn nothing from criticism without any content to back it up.

    So, can you support a claim that the heart is not a pump and doesn’t not provide the motive force in blood flow?

  35. CharlieM: There is a book I would love to read, Heart’s Vortex: Intracardiac Blood Flow Phenomena by Ares Pasipoularides. It might be something your cardiologist friends could take a look at if they had access and wanted to explore this further. Or of course any of the other links I provided.

    Hey CharlieM,
    So for all I got is that the circulatory system (including the heart) is irreducibly complex… I have read about it, and I would go beyond that: every part of the circulatory system can’t even evolve without disrupting its proper and essential/life sustaining function…
    Anybody claiming otherwise, is a despicable moron…

    Dawkins used to make similar claims about Junk DNA (that it is nonessential) and now changed his mind… I guess he is writing a new book for people with insecurities who want to be reassured that still there is no sign of ID/God….

  36. J-Mac: Anybody claiming otherwise, is a despicable moron…

    Great attitude to take on a discussion site, right there.

  37. walto: Great attitude to take on a discussion site, right there.

    I’ve learned it well from the master walto

  38. J-Mac: So for all I got is that the circulatory system (including the heart) is irreducibly complex… I have read about it, and I would go beyond that: every part of the circulatory system can’t even evolve without disrupting its proper and essential/life sustaining function…

    Oopsie

    Insects, like all other arthropods, have an open circulatory system which differs in both structure and function from the closed circulatory system found in humans and other vertebrates. In a closed system, blood is always contained within vessels (arteries, veins, capillaries, or the heart itself). In an open system, blood (usually called hemolymph) spends much of its time flowing freely within body cavities where it makes direct contact with all internal tissues and organs.

    J-Mac: Anybody claiming otherwise, is a despicable moron…

    Are we feeling a bit insecure, J-Mac?

  39. walto: Keep in mind that I don’t attribute any shortcoming to you that I’m not also attributing to myself here….except hubris. I recognize that my views on the nature of blood circulation are utterly worthless.

    But on the nature of blood circulation you do presume yourself to be capable of determining which scientists are genuine researchers and which are nutjobs 🙂

  40. Neil Rickert: Strange.When I check the Wikipedia entry, I am not seeing “external”.

    In any case, Newton’s third law gives the answer to your question.When I am walking, my feet push against the floor.And the floor pushes back (3rd law).

    So you have no mind of your own. Your actions are all caused by the laws of Newton.

  41. John Harshman:

    CharlieM: From this article

    It is wrong to think of the blood as some sort of passive hydraulic fluid being acted on from without. It is an extremely active part of the circulatory system.

    Again with sentences, and a reference, that have some of the same words you might use in a reply. But none of that has anything to do with blood circulation.

    Do you agree that this article shows red blood cells to be capable of autonomous locomotion?
    Here is some further evidence:

    The Heart and Circulation – An Integrative Model by Brank Furst:

    Finally, we observed flow of blood at the level of the microcirculation well beyond the timing of the cardiac arrest in all 3 experimental groups (fig 3). The phenomenon of circulation persisting at the organ and tissue level after the recordable LVMA supports the concept that blood possesses its own kinetic energy determined by the metabolic demands of the tissues and calls for a revision of the conventional, pressure-propulsion circulation model (Furst 2015, Alexander 2017, Forouhar et al. 2006). Intravital microscopy of early embryonic circulations has confirmed that a low-pressure circulation already exists before the functional integrity of the heart (Forouhar et al. 2006). It has further been shown that the valveless embryo heart functions as an impedance pump which rhythmically interrupts the already existing flow of blood (Furst 2014). Irrespective of structural differences, the function of the mature heart is essentially the same as that of the embryonic heart.

  42. John Harshman:

    CharlieM: Also Spiral flow in vessels

    Now that one is actually relevant. The fact that they used the wrong word — it should be “helical” — is not your fault. But note that it doesn’t mean that the motive force is not pumping by the heart.

    I think you are being a bit picky about the use of the word spiral. Most people would understand what they mean by spiral flow in vessels. And they explain at the beginning, “In the past few decades it has been well established that that blood flow in medium and large size vessels is spiral, which means that the blood velocity vectors are not parallel to the vessel wall.”

    Grant’s Atlas of Anatomy

    The helical (double spiral) arrangement of the myocardium, (Modified from Torrent-Guasp et al., 2001). When the superficial myocardium is incised along the anterior interventricular groove and peeled back starting at its origin from the fibrous ring of the pulmonary artery, the thick double spirals of the ventricular myocardial band are revealed. A band of nearly horizontal fibers forms an outer basal spiral that comprises the outer wall of the right ventricle…

    Read on for more of the same.

    And there is this:
    From Pubmed, [Spiral arrangement of muscular elements in the walls of blood vessels and their role in hemodynamics]

    The article claims that contractions of the cardiac left ventricle produce a whirling (turbulent) movement of blood that is maintained in the aorta. In the walls of large and small arteries, as well as in the arteriolar walls, myocytes have a spiral arrangement. Their contraction maintains the turbulent blood stream in the vessels with a small diameter, in spite of the fact that the Reinolds’ number for them is rather small. The author considers that while making a mathematical analysis of the blood flowing in the arteries, it is necessary to take into account that the walls of the arterial vessels actively influence the blood stream.

    So, can you support a claim that the heart is not a pump and doesn’t not provide the motive force in blood flow?

    As Waldo has pointed out, I am not an expert. But there are experts who have done plenty of research on this. Such as the link I gave you above by Branko Furst.

    Must dash, grandkid duty 🙂

  43. CharlieM: Do you agree that this article shows red blood cells to be capable of autonomous locomotion?

    No. It shows that they can wiggle. Even if wiggling induces a certain amount of motion, it can’t possibly be enough to account for the velocity of blood flow, with the conceivable exception of the occasional capillary.

    Here is some further evidence:

    The Heart and Circulation – An Integrative Model by Brank Furst:

    Finally, we observed flow of blood at the level of the microcirculation well beyond the timing of the cardiac arrest in all 3 experimental groups (fig 3). The phenomenon of circulation persisting at the organ and tissue level after the recordable LVMA supports the concept that blood possesses its own kinetic energy determined by the metabolic demands of the tissues and calls for a revision of the conventional, pressure-propulsion circulation model (Furst 2015, Alexander 2017, Forouhar et al. 2006). Intravital microscopy of early embryonic circulations has confirmed that a low-pressure circulation already exists before the functional integrity of the heart (Forouhar et al. 2006). It has further been shown that the valveless embryo heart functions as an impedance pump which rhythmically interrupts the already existing flow of blood (Furst 2014). Irrespective of structural differences, the function of the mature heart is essentially the same as that of the embryonic heart.

    I would like to know what “microcirculation” means. I suspect it refers to a tiny amount of motion. If the heart really weren’t responsible for blood flow and in fact acted to slow down flow, then stopping the heart would actually increase the rate of blood flow. Is that what’s observed, do you think? What do you think could possibly provide blood with “its own kinetic energy”, sufficient to explain not just “microcirculation” but the actual circulation? You are showing a distinct preference for woo.

  44. CharlieM: I think you are being a bit picky about the use of the word spiral.

    Perhaps, but that was peripheral to my point: this spiral flow tells us nothing about the motive force of circulation. Do you think it does?

  45. CharlieM: I would like to ask anyone who believes that the blood is pumped through our bodies by the heart: Have you studied the evidence for yourself, or do you just uncritically accept it because that is what we are all taught and therefore it must be true?

    I tend to accept it more or less uncritically if it seems to make sense. The model of the heart as pump has been generally successful with regards to cardiology at large. If that analogy was not useful, I would expect the larger community of cardiologists to be the first ones to abandon it since the life/death of their patients depends in large part upon their understanding of the system.

    With that being said, your Branko Furst reference was actually quite interesting. I found another article of his on the NIH Library website that was fascinating:

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5215277/

    As with virtually every other topic in science that I’ve ever personally studied, the reality is much more complex than any of the simple models proposed for it. Does the heart pump blood through the circulatory system? Yes, of course it does. But it’s not the same as pumping water through copper pipes.

    Blood is a complex non-Newtonian fluid filled with a diverse array of biological material and the circulatory system (particularly the capillary system) is not a passive conduit. For an extreme example of this, look up HAPE or HACE which are fairly common causes of death in moutaineers.

    It doesn’t seem far-fetched to me that the biochemical processes of the cells in blood could allow it to create a pressure gradient of some sort. Similarly, if the contraction and expansion of capillaries was unable to create a pressure gradient, we would not have plants higher than an inch or two above the ground. The system works together as a whole and while some parts of it can be replaced with artificial substitutes, they will not function as well as the originals in most cases. Aftermarket parts are never quite as good as factory parts in my experience;-)

    Not a fan of the Chestahedron lark. While I am sure that Chester is a fascinating guy, his ‘sacred geometry’ does not hold much value to those of us stuck doing research in the material world.

    -Sidenote- I’m still fairly new to WordPress. The hyperlink tool in the OP menu makes it easy to paste a link, but how do I do that in comments? What command goes inside the angle brackets to specify a hyperlink? I see many of the other posters doing it regularly.

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