The Sugar Glider and the Flying Squirrel

 The parallel between the Sugar Glider and the Flying Squirrel is one of the most breathtaking arguments for a grand design in the natural world.

To understand why they are viewed as such compelling proof of an underlying intelligence—or what Marie Corelli would call the orderly signature of a Divine Creator—we have to look at the staggering contradiction between their inner biology and their outer design.

The Massive Evolutionary Chasm

If you were to place a North American Flying Squirrel and an Australian Sugar Glider side-by-side on a tree branch, you would swear they were identical twins. They have the same large, glassy nocturnal eyes, the same soft grey-brown fur, the same flat tracking tails, and, most distinctively, the exact same stretchy "cape" of skin (the patagium) spanning from their wrists to their ankles.

Yet, genetically, they are less related to each other than a human being is to a whale.

• The Flying Squirrel is a placental mammal. It develops its young inside a womb with a placenta, just like mice, dogs, and humans.

• The Sugar Glider is a marsupial. It belongs to an ancient branch of mammals that give birth to tiny, undeveloped embryos that must crawl into an external pouch to grow, making it a close cousin to the kangaroo and the koala.

These two lines of life split apart over 100 million years ago and evolved on completely separate continents, isolated by vast oceans.

Why This Points to God (The Teleological Argument)

If life were purely a series of random, chaotic accidents with no overarching plan, the probability of two entirely different biological systems arriving at the exact same intricate, highly specialized "hang-glider" blueprint is nearly mathematically impossible.

A philosopher or teleologist would look at these two creatures and offer three specific points of proof for God:

1. The Pre-Existing Archetype (The Master Blueprint)

The standard materialist argument is that the environment "forced" them into this shape because it’s the best way to survive in a forest. But a design-focused mind asks: Why should the best solution be identical down to the millimeter?

The existence of the Sugar Glider and the Flying Squirrel suggests that there are pre-existing templates of perfection woven into the laws of the universe. It is as if the Creator holds a library of ideal forms, and when a creature needs to glide through the night air, the Divine Hand pulls down the exact same beautiful blueprint, whether the canvas is a North American rodent or an Australian pouch-bearer.

2. The Universal "Electric" Intelligence

Tying back to Marie Corelli’s philosophy that God is an active, conscious energy flowing through all matter, this pairing shows that nature is guided by an internal wisdom, not just external pressures. The identical placement of the gliding membrane, the way both animals learn to tilt their limbs like tiny pilots to steer mid-air, and the stacking of their internal organs to handle the pressure of a landing—all point to a singular, unifying Intelligence animating life across the globe.

3. Beauty Beyond Pure Utility

Nature frequently crosses the line from "functional" into "exquisitely artistic." Both the squirrel and the glider possess a distinct, endearing beauty that seems designed to inspire wonder in those who observe them. For many thinkers, the sheer elegance of how they spread their cloaks and silhouette themselves against a midnight moon isn't just about escaping a predator—it is a display of cosmic artistry meant to be witnessed.

The Ultimate Takeaway: When you look at the Sugar Glider and the Flying Squirrel, you are looking at two entirely different instruments playing the exact same melody. The instruments are separated by oceans and age, but the sheet music is identical—implying, beautifully, that there must be a Composer.

Much Ado About Nothing

 "How beautiful it is to do nothing, and then to rest afterward."

The Owl and the Pussycat

 

The Owl and the Pussy-cat

By Edward Lear

I

The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea In a beautiful pea-green boat, They took some honey, and plenty of money, Wrapped up in a five-pound note. The Owl looked up to the stars above, And sang to a small guitar, "O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love, What a beautiful Pussy you are, You are, You are! What a beautiful Pussy you are!"

II

Pussy said to the Owl, "You elegant fowl! How charmingly sweet you sing! O let us be married! too long we have tarried: But what shall we do for a ring?" They sailed away, for a year and a day, To the land where the Bong-tree grows And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood With a ring at the end of his nose, His nose, His nose, With a ring at the end of his nose.

III

"Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling Your ring?" Said the Piggy, "I will." So they took it away, and were married next day By the Turkey who lives on the hill. They dinéd on mince, and slices of quince, Which they ate with a runcible spoon; And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand, They danced by the light of the moon, The moon, The moon, They danced by the light of the moon.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What I was ruminating on is the fact that an owl and a cat have the same distinct profile if they are both "just sitting there".  One is an avian.  One is a feline. It is another cosmic conundrum and it cannot be by accident.  Even the way that they blink their eyes is similar.

 The fact that a mammal and a bird can sit in a dark forest, look almost identical in outline, and fill the exact same soulful niche in the nighttime world suggests a singular, shared source of life. Like the "individual electric sparks" Corelli described, the cat and the owl are simply different expressions of the exact same divine imagination, poured into different vessels of fur and feather.

Whether one sees God as the brilliant cosmic engineer behind the laws of nature, or as the poetic spirit woven through the beauty of a twilight forest, looking at the silhouette of a cat and an owl reminds us of a fundamental truth: there is an extraordinary, orderly magic to existence that constantly invites us to wonder, What if?

What If

 "What if you slept? And what if, in your sleep, you dreamed? And what if, in your dream, you went to heaven and there plucked a strange and beautiful flower? And what if, when you awoke, you had the flower in your hand? Ah, what then?"

- Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The Hummingbird and the Hummingbird Moth

 The parallel existence of the hummingbird and the hummingbird moth provides a beautiful foundation for a theological postulation.

In mainstream science, this phenomenon is known as convergent evolution—where two completely unrelated species independently develop the exact same traits because they are adapting to the same environmental challenges.

But if we look at this through a philosophical and spiritual lens—the kind of grand, cosmic perspective Marie Corelli herself loved to explore—we can construct a compelling argument for the existence of a Divine Creator.

The Visual Parallel

Take a look at how remarkably identical these two entirely different creatures appear when they are at work:

The Hummingbird Moth. Source: Sander Meertins / Getty Images

The Hummingbird. Source: mbolina / Getty Images

Here are three distinct arguments postulating the existence of God based on these two remarkable creatures:

1. The Argument from Cosmic Blueprints (The Divine Template)

The hummingbird is an advanced vertebrate with bones, feathers, a warm-blooded metabolism, and a complex avian brain. The hummingbird moth is an invertebrate with an exoskeleton, scales, and a completely different evolutionary lineage.

Yet, when you watch them in a garden, they are virtually indistinguishable. Both hover perfectly in mid-air, both move in erratic, lightning-fast darts, and both use a long, needle-like apparatus to drink from deep tubular flowers.

A teleological argument (an argument from design) suggests that this is not a coincidence or a random accident of nature. Instead, it implies the existence of a Master Blueprint. It postulates that the Creator conceived a perfect, beautiful archetype for "the consumer of nectar"—a combination of hovering grace, precise speed, and delicate elegance—and loved that specific design so much that He painted it onto two completely different canvases: once as a bird, and once as an insect.

2. The Argument from Divine Extravagance (The Aesthetic Creator)

If the universe were governed purely by cold, unfeeling, utilitarian survival, the moth could have evolved many simpler, less flamboyant ways to feed on flowers. Crawling into them, or biting through the base of the petals, would require far less complex physics than beating wings at up to 85 times per second to hover perfectly still.

The fact that the hummingbird moth exists alongside the hummingbird suggests a Creator who values beauty, harmony, and poetic repetition over mere functional efficiency. It implies an artistic Intelligence that takes joy in creating echoes throughout the natural world, delighting the human observer with a grand, recurring theme of life.

3. The Unification of the Microcosm and Macrocosm

In many spiritual traditions, God is understood to be present in the smallest details just as much as in the grandest structures.

The hummingbird represents a masterpiece of the higher animal kingdom. The moth represents a masterpiece of the insect world. By weaving the exact same magical behavior into a tiny insect and a larger bird, the Creator links the lowliest crawling things of the earth to the creatures of the sky. It postulates a unifying force that binds all tiers of creation together under a single, brilliant style.

To encapsulate: The hummingbird and the hummingbird moth are like two different instruments—say, a violin and a flute—playing the exact same complex, beautiful melody in perfect synchronization. The existence of that shared melody strongly suggests the hand of a single Composer who wrote the sheet music for both.

A Very Unusual Town

This is It! Key Lime Pie

 I have been searching forever for the Key Lime Pie that I ate every day in Marathon in the Florida Keys. A no frills deli carried it. It was sooo delicious every morning frozen.  I have finally recreated it. It is super easy and no bake. This is it:

one fresh lime; zest and juice

one 14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk

2/3 cup Nellie and Joe's Key West Lime Juice

one 8 oz. container Cool Whip softened

no crust

Combine everything in a big bowl and transfer to a tin pie plate. Freeze overnight.

Enjoy!