 Highbridge, a division of recorded books, presents Human Errors, a panorama of our glitches, from pointless bones to broken genes, by Nathan H. Lentz, read by L. J. Ganser. Introduction Behold the Blunders of Nature Here is a story you've heard numerous times. Behold the incredible beauty, complexity, and greatness of the human body and its many systems, organs, and tissues. It seems that the deeper into our bodies we look, the more beauty we find. Like the layers of an onion, the cells and molecules that make up the human body, have seemingly infinite levels of complexity. Human beings enjoy a rich world of the mind, perform astoundingly complex physical tasks, digest food material, and then commingle it with their own matter and energy, effortlessly turn genes on and off, and every now and then produce whole new individuals in endless forms, most beautiful. Somehow, all of these processes come together to create the wondrous complexity of human life, while allowing us to remain oblivious to the underlying mechanisms. A perfectly ordinary human can sit down and play piano man, without ever having to think about the cells and the muscles of her hands, the nerves in her arms, or the brain centers, where the information to play the piece are stored. A second human can sit and listen to the song, without ever bothering to contemplate the vibrations of his eardrum, the conductance of nerve impulses to his auditory processing center, or the memory recall that allows him to belt out the refrain, however imperfectly. The song itself was composed by another such human, albeit an exceptional one. A person who I dare to suggest had little appreciation for the genes, proteins, and neurons that were hard at work, as he did so. Despite the fact that we often take them for granted, the capabilities of the human body are simply wondrous, miraculous even, so why not write a book about that? Because you've heard about it many times. Those books have already been written. If you want a book about the glorious intricacy of the human body, you are in luck. Simply walk into any medical library and you will find tens of thousands of volumes. If you count biomedical journals, where new discoveries are announced, the number of accolades to the greatness of the human form rises into the tens of millions. There is no shortage of words and pages dedicated to how well the body usually works. This is not that story. This is a story of our many flaws, from head to toe. As it turns out, our flaws are extremely interesting and informative. By exploring human shortcomings, we can peer in. Sample complete. Ready to continue?