12 October

If you drop a slinky spring, it hangs suspended in the air for a moment before falling. 'Defying gravity', the elastic potential energy of the spring acts against the gravitational force downwards. When I say our bodies are suspended in space, this is what I mean. The tissue in our bodies is elastic. Our bodies are not symmetrical, so just being upright makes us permanently unstable. That instability is absorbed by the tissues of our bodies, which are wrapped around us in a spiral, preventing the instabilities from making us fall. It's those instabilities which charge up those tissues in each moment, like constantly re-dropping the slinky spring. 'Gravity' is what holds us up - we're suspended effortlessly in space - not what pulls us down.