Set points appear at many levels, and our survival usually depends on them not changing too drastically. Our body, for example, has many regulatory systems that work like a thermostat, keeping our bodies in equilibrium. Your brain has to stay near 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit or really, really bad things will start to happen. If it rises only a few degrees, you start convulsing, and a few degrees more and you’re dead. Your body has several strategies for maintaining the optimum temperature: increasing or decreasing blood flow through dilation, decreasing brain activity, or even the outright destruction of nerve cells. We have similar systems at work for pH levels, our endocrine system, and many others.
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