Welcome to Science, Scripture, and Salvation, a radio ministry of the Institute for Creation Research. In this program, we want to encourage you in your Christian faith by showing how scientific evidence supports the Bible, particularly the Genesis account. The book of Genesis lays the foundation for all matters addressed in the rest of the Bible. The nature of God, His sovereignty in creation, man's purpose, sin, marriage, family, and why we need a Savior are all introduced and explained in Genesis. When we see that the first and most foundational book of the Bible can be trusted in all matters, including science, it builds confidence in the rest of the inspired word all the way to Revelation.
I'm Frank Sherwin, Zoologist and Research Associate with the Institute for Creation Research. Join me for today's show of Science, Scripture, and Salvation. Imagine for a moment watching a hungry beetle eater like a toad or a frog seeing a delicious looking beetle. Just as the amphibian shoots out his sticky tongue to snag the beetle, boom, there's an explosion at 212 degrees Fahrenheit from the back of the beetle straight into the mouth of the hapless frog. The end result is the frog's tongue gets coated with a yellowish, foul-tasting residue.
Well, this is the famous Bombardier Beetle, built by God to have complex muscle and nerve attachments and a tightly integrated combustion apparatus. You see, when in danger, the Bombardier Beetle mixes two different chemicals hydroquinone, which is an organic compound, And hydrogen peroxide, an inorganic compound that's stored in two reservoirs within the beetle. The beetle then injects them into an explosion chamber. Within this design chamber, an enzyme is added called catalase, which causes a series of multiple discharges or explosions. The resulting steam, which is at 212 degrees Fahrenheit, the boiling point of water.
is released through two nozzles or cannons at a distance of several feet. The hydroquinones oxidize into foul smelling benzoquinones, which are highly irritating chemicals. The hydrogen peroxide quickly decomposes into oxygen and boiling water during this rapid discharge. Yeah. In an editor's summary from Science magazine April of 2015, the author states, and I quote, Bombardier beetles shoot a toxic pulse at potential predators and other harassers.
The toxic spray is created by a chemical reaction that occurs inside the beetle's body. Although the details of the reaction are known, how the beetle is able to precisely combine the chemicals at appropriate times and release the pulse at regular intervals has remained a mystery. Ardent et al. used synchrotron X-ray imagery to observe the process as it occurs within live beetles. Expansion and contraction of an internal expansion membrane facilitate the precise cyclic injection of reactants and the subsequent ejection of toxic sprays that keep the beetle's predators at bay.
As was mentioned, the Bombardier Beetle opens and closes the inlet valve to its combustion chamber with great precision, but it has yet to be fully understood. And if and when it is fully understood, will it point to design complexity or just mindless mutations? The beetle also controls the pressure and the direction of the explosion with pinpoint accuracy at whatever is trying to annoy it. Biologists thought the beetles generated one explosion, but it's now been shown to be multiple discharges at 300 pulses per second. per second.
Years ago, in a university laboratory in Southern California, I actually had the opportunity to gently hold a Bombardier Beetle between my fingers.
Well, he evidently didn't like that. And I was able to experience, first hand, so to speak, the hot, defensive, explosive release of the angry bombardier beetle. And sure enough, my fingertips were soon coated with a foul, yellowish residue from the oxidized compounds. Creation scientists maintain all these parts of the Bombardier Beetle must work together from the start. It would be dangerous or useless to the beetle if these finely tuned structures came together through chance, time, and just natural processes.
Indeed, how could a mechanism that delivers a carefully timed and aimed explosion evolve by alleged stepwise Darwinian processes? Is it just the result of time and chance and unguided natural developments? Or is it through plan and purpose and special creation? As one secular encyclopedia recently stated, and I quote, the full evolutionary history of the beetle's unique defensive mechanism. is unknown.
Before the bombardier beetle can have any survival value, every part of the beetle's defensive apparatus must be in place. Years ago, evolutionist Richard Lewontin said that such quote perfection of structure was, and ICR says, is the chief evidence of a supreme designer, end quote.
Well creationists certainly agree. The very existence of this fascinating beetle argues against the ability of the natural selection to build irreducibly complex systems. And clearly, the systems involved with the Bombardier Beetle are very intricately complex. Scientists continue to learn from and adapt facets of this beetle's amazing physiology and anatomy. In fact, several years ago, creation researcher Andrew McIntosh of Leeds University in England won an award for a design of a pressure sprayer inspired by the design of the Bombardier Beetle.
Now it's time for a short break. Stay with us. The design of the human body inspires awe and fascination, and for good reason. It's made up of so many different parts and systems, all working together for a greater purpose. Check out our book, Guide to the Human Body, to discover astonishing facts about the construction of the cell, the mechanics of hands and feet, and the incredible abilities of the brain.
Published by the Institute for Creation Research, Guide to the Human Body will answer questions you didn't even know you had. How do our eyes give us sight? How does a baby take its first breath? What happens to the human body in outer space? Guide to the Human Body's full-color images and easy-to-read format shows our amazing design points to the ultimate designer, God.
Order your copy from the Institute for Creation Research by calling 800-628-7640 or visiting icr.org. That's 800-628-7640 or visiting icr.org. Welcome back to Science, Scripture, and Salvation, a radio ministry of the Institute for Creation Research. We were discussing how the biotechnology that is inspired by God's creation has given us technological apparatus and concepts that we first can see by looking at God's creation. And this is true with Dr.
Andrew McIntosh at Leeds University, where he won an award for design of a pressure sprayer inspired by the design of the Bombardier Beetle.
Well, according to a press release from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, the micro mist spray technology enables droplet size, temperature and velocity to be closely controlled, allowing advancements in a variety of areas where the properties of the mist are critical. Such applications include the fuel injection, medical drug delivery systems, fire extinguishers, and fire suppression, all of which face major challenges relating to the demand of greater performance and reduced environmental impact.
So, Dr. Andrew McIntosh likens the beetle's defense mechanism to a pressure cooker controlled by a complicated system of valves. And I quote: Essentially, it's a high-force steam cavitation explosion. Using a chamber less than one millimeter long, this amazing creature has the ability to change the rapidity of what comes out. its direction.
and its consistency. Continuing the quote Nobody had studied the Beetle from a physics and engineering perspective as we did, said doctor McIntosh, and we don't appreciate how much we would learn from it. End quote.
So, how simple is this mechanism? Using intelligent design analysis, his team took five years to duplicate it for their invention. Isaiah chapter thirty and verse six says, The burden against the beasts of the south, Through a land of trouble and anguish, from which came the lioness and lion, the viper and fiery flying serpent.
Well, sometimes when Christians read this they get uncomfortable with fire breathing animals. It seems mythological and unscientific. But as we have seen today, the bombardier beetle rapidly shoots out chemicals at the boiling point of water.
So is a fire breathing dragon really that far fetched? The Apostle Paul says in Romans chapter one and verse twenty that God's creation is clearly seen, and it's obvious that the bombardier beetle has intricate design features that points clearly to our all wise designer.
However, theistic evolutionists and atheistic evolutionists insist bombardier beetles indeed all beetles evolve from a non beetle ancestor that in turn must have evolved from a non arthropod deep in the evolutionary past.
Well, arthropods are animals that have paired jointed appendages and what is called a chitinous exoskeleton. And the insects are simply a small part of this large group called the phylum arthropoda.
Well, within the insects are the beetles, and beetles are incredibly numerous. Is there any evidence showing how this might have happened a beetle evolving from some arthropod that through evolutionary time evolved from a non arthropod?
Well, the answer is, there's absolutely no evidence of any kind of insect evolution, one kind of insect turning into another kind of insect through the alleged millions and millions of years of evolutionary time. In fact, bombardier beetles are obviously beetles, and the oldest beetle fossils are from the Lower Permian, approximately three hundred million years old by evolutionary dating. But they're still beetles. PaleoSeminar said in the year 2010, a 296 million year old insect has been reclassified as a beetle, pushing back the origin of beetles by millions of years. We can safely say today that beetles have always been beetles as God has created them.
In 1859, Charles Darwin wrote his infamous book called On the Origin of Species. And yet, ironically, one thing that he never discussed was the origin of species. We would add to this in the 21st century: where is the evidence for beetle evolution? They are certainly very, very common today, and they must have had an evolutionary origin, according to evolutionists, but still, They have no idea where beetles came from.
So, to conclude, evolutionists are constantly revising and rethinking their perceptions of insect evolution, ignoring the creation account given to us. In Genesis. Thank you for joining us on Science, Scripture, and Salvation, a radio ministry of the Institute for Creation Research. That's all the time we have for our program today, but we would love to connect with you through our website at icr.org. For over 45 years, ICR has equipped believers with evidence of the Bible's accuracy and authority by showing how science supports the Genesis creation account.
Our scientists research the evidence for creation and communicate their findings through books, articles, DVD series, and conferences. Please visit our website at icr.org for more information about the latest scientific discoveries, to subscribe to our free magazine and devotional, and to locate our next creation conference at a venue near you. All of this and more at icr.org. If you've enjoyed this podcast, subscribe to Science, Scripture, and Salvation on iTunes. Also, do us a favor and rate and review the show so that more listeners can find us.
Thanks for listening and God bless.
