More Than Machines: Why It’s Time to Rethink How We Talk About Human Biology

How Our Metaphors Shapeand Sometimes Limit—Our Understanding of the Human Body

For centuries, humanity has used metaphors to describe the human body. From hearts as pumps to brains as computers, these analogies have helped us grasp the body’s complex systems. But what if these comparisons—drawn from man-made inventions—do more than explain? What if they restrict our imagination, limiting how we view ourselves and the possibilities of medicine?

How have these metaphors have shaped the history of anatomy and why it might be time to evolve our language and thinking.

Metaphors: The Lens Through Which We See the Body

Metaphors are more than poetic language. In science, they act as mental models—helping us visualize, explain, and experiment with abstract concepts. They simplify complexity, making ideas easier to teach, understand, and apply.

Take the heart as a pump. This metaphor, popularized by William Harvey in the 17th century, transformed our understanding of circulation. Or the brain as a computer, which gave rise to modern neuroscience and artificial intelligence.

But metaphors also frame our assumptions. They spotlight certain features and obscure others. As writer and philosopher Susan Sontag argued in Illness as Metaphor, the language we use around health and the body carries cultural weight—and consequences.

2. The Machine Metaphor: A Double-Edged Sword

The most dominant metaphor in modern anatomy is that of the body as a machine.

The brain is a computer: It stores data, processes information, and sometimes needs a "reboot."

The heart is a pump: A mechanical device that pushes blood through pipes (vessels).

The immune system is an army: Patrolling cells defend the body against invading enemies (viruses and bacteria).

These metaphors mirror the Industrial and Digital Ages—when machines and computers became the most advanced technologies we knew. They helped medicine become more systematic, measurable, and predictive.

But here's the problem: the human body is not a machine.

Machines are static, predictable, and fixable by replacing parts. Bodies are adaptive, self-healing, and deeply interconnected. Our health is influenced by context, environment, emotion, and experience—things machines can’t replicate.

3. How Metaphors Can Mislead Medical Thinking

Reductionism: Seeing the Body as Parts, Not Wholes

The machine model encourages a "fix the part" mentality—treating the organ or symptom rather than the whole person.

Chronic illness may be approached by treating isolated organs rather than considering the systemic imbalances behind it.

Mental health might be framed as a "chemical imbalance," ignoring trauma, environment, or social factors.

Over-Simplification of Disease

The war metaphor in immunology and cancer research—where cells are enemies, drugs are weapons, and the goal is total destruction—can lead to aggressive, sometimes harmful interventions.

For example, autoimmune diseases don’t arise from external enemies, but from confused self-recognition—a more nuanced, less combative process.

Over-reliance on antibiotics (our “weapons”) has led to resistant strains, a real-world consequence of war-based thinking.

Missed Connections and Innovations

Some breakthroughs in health were delayed because they didn’t fit within the dominant metaphor:

The gut-brain axis—the connection between digestion and mental health—was long overlooked because the brain and gut were seen as separate systems.

The microbiome—a community of trillions of microorganisms—defies machine metaphors altogether. It's more like an ecosystem than a mechanical part.

Toward Better Metaphors: New Ways to See the Human Body

To fully grasp the complexity of human biology, we may need new metaphors—ones that are dynamic, integrative, and reflective of nature rather than industry.

The Body as an Ecosystem

Views the body as an interdependent web of systems, including microbes, cells, and environmental inputs.

Encourages a balance model of health rather than a war model.

The Body as a Symphony

Organs and systems play their roles in rhythmic harmony, guided by internal and external signals.

Health becomes about tuning and coordination, not just mechanical function.

The Body as a Network

Reflects how neural, hormonal, and immune systems are connected like a mycellium web of the hidden root system of funghi.

This model helps us understand phenomena like emergence, where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Why This Matters for the Future of Medicine

The metaphors we use guide research funding, treatment development, and patient care. They influence how doctors diagnose, how patients understand illness, and how society talks about health.

By expanding our metaphors, we can:

Develop more personalized, holistic medicine.

Embrace complexity instead of simplifying it

You Are Not a Machine. You Are a Living Being.

Your body carries immense intelligence.

It senses, it adapts, it speaks — sometimes through strength, sometimes through struggle.

Listening to your body doesn’t mean pretending that everything can be healed with awareness.

It means being willing to stay in relationship with yourself — even when there is discomfort, limitation, or uncertainty.

Sometimes sensing and responding is enough to bring change.

Sometimes, we need the support of others: skilled movement specialists, wise clinicians, scientific insight, a broader circle of care.

Seeking help is not a failure.

Living with what cannot be fixed is not a failure either.

Honoring your body means honoring its complexity — its capacity for healing, and its real vulnerabilities.

It means responding with presence, whether that means resting, moving, learning, or reaching out.

At The ENERGYBODI Sensation, we practice this deeper kind of listening:

Not trying to ' fix '

But to be in relationship with it — in all seasons, with all its needs.

“We need to re-vision our images of the body—not as a machine, but as a place of presence and living intelligence ”

Heather

Founder / Owner of

The ENERGYBODI Sensation

www.energybodi.space