Walking on water explained by mathematicians and mechanical engineers who described their findings in Nature vol. 424, p663, 7 August 2003. Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology studied waterstriders – small insects that walk across the surface of ponds, rivers and the sea – to find out how they managed to go forward without going under. Using high speed video and particle tracking methods they worked out that the insects produce vortices under their feet which propelled them along. They then tested their theory by building a mechanical model of a waterstrider that moved in the same way the living water strider moved. Their “robostrider” was able to walk on water using the same vortex generating movement as a living insect but “in a style less elegant than its natural counterpart”.
Editorial Comment: The “robostrider” with its inelegant gait is proof that living waterstriders were designed and built by a smarter engineer who not only made living organisms to be functional but also to work in a most elegant style. The scientists who studied waterstriders and used their knowledge and creative intelligence to design and build an inferior copy are truly without excuse for failing to acknowledge their Creator. (Ref. waterstriders, insects, design)