Sunday, July 02, 2006
From my okcupid journal, so good, have to put it here too!
First, We see lots of microscopic viruses and organisms that interact in various ways with their hosts, and I agree that mutualism is the best way for these organisms to survive. If the organism simply eats everything available and does it extremely effectively (like humans, viruses, aggressive bacteria, etc.), either it destroys it's food supply and dies, it's food supply destroys it, or it is isolated from hosts for a marginalized existence and death.
The best example of mutualism of an organism is with mitochondria. These microscopic prokaryotic bacteria live in our cells, producing usable energy for us. Without them, eukaryotes (multicelled organisms - humans, fungus, plants, etc.) wouldn't exist. We give them a warm place to live and plenty of food, they give us lots of free energy. These bacteria are transferred to the fetus, if not, the fetus would die. These organisms have integrated into 100% of their food supply in such a manner that their current food supplier can't live without them. This is the model for the correct way to ensure genetic continuation of a lifeform. Please note that viruses don't qualify as life. Although retro-viruses can successfully transfer RNA codes to an organism's DNA to be passed down by that lifeform's descendents, this doesn't meet the full conditions for life.
Now for others . . . Take the dinosaurs for example. They didn't play nice. They ran around munching on anything they could find and they became extinct, because no food wanted to continue to play with them anymore. Then these furry little mammals no longer had to hide from the dino's, so they grew both as individuals and as communities, to the point that we're at today, where we're going same route as our last great predators. In this case, wouldn't you rather be the prey? Fish, Insects, or something that has a chance of survival? Maybe the third dominant eukaryotes will be descended from cockroaches. I say that in jest, but that actually looks to be the way it's heading (Insect kingdom becoming dominant). Maybe we're just helping the insects evolve every time we kill a slow one that can't sense the impending death swat. In fact, I'd guess the primates or their precursers did the best job of evading the dino. This ensured the passing down to us of our most useful genes. Looking at it now, we can see the birds also survived. These are the more modern ancestors of the reptiles (mammals is the close second). It's remarkable the rapid rate of evolution for birds, and mammals, to a lesser extent. The only way I see humans performing a similar feat to the avians is by the grace of a more scientific ruling class. And with the current world rulers not even acknowledging the most well proven science, there is little hope of a technocracy sweeping through the world, revolt now!
These were actually not as much of a microscopic example as I had planned, so let me look more at that. How about the bacteria that causes Leprosy or TB? These were very mean organisms who didn't respect their hosts, where are they now? exactly, on the run, fugitives. A similar sort of ideology would be nice if used on other bad guests of larger size.
On another note, I would suggest that maybe our solar system and universe is just one of a larger organism's environment. What if our evolution here on earth were part of a virus-like chain of events set in motion, which may ultimately lead to the utter destruction of the larger universe? Could it be that we are on a path towards utter annihalation of space itself? Perhaps it is similar to the God - Devil struggle. God is the creator of matter itself. The Devil represents the evolutionary forces attempting to create a virus strong enough to break the universe and God itself.
That was a fun excercise, and although time intensive, hopefully some of you enjoyed it and may have become enlightened in some way.
Comment Away!!
¶ 2:57 PM
The best example of mutualism of an organism is with mitochondria. These microscopic prokaryotic bacteria live in our cells, producing usable energy for us. Without them, eukaryotes (multicelled organisms - humans, fungus, plants, etc.) wouldn't exist. We give them a warm place to live and plenty of food, they give us lots of free energy. These bacteria are transferred to the fetus, if not, the fetus would die. These organisms have integrated into 100% of their food supply in such a manner that their current food supplier can't live without them. This is the model for the correct way to ensure genetic continuation of a lifeform. Please note that viruses don't qualify as life. Although retro-viruses can successfully transfer RNA codes to an organism's DNA to be passed down by that lifeform's descendents, this doesn't meet the full conditions for life.
Now for others . . . Take the dinosaurs for example. They didn't play nice. They ran around munching on anything they could find and they became extinct, because no food wanted to continue to play with them anymore. Then these furry little mammals no longer had to hide from the dino's, so they grew both as individuals and as communities, to the point that we're at today, where we're going same route as our last great predators. In this case, wouldn't you rather be the prey? Fish, Insects, or something that has a chance of survival? Maybe the third dominant eukaryotes will be descended from cockroaches. I say that in jest, but that actually looks to be the way it's heading (Insect kingdom becoming dominant). Maybe we're just helping the insects evolve every time we kill a slow one that can't sense the impending death swat. In fact, I'd guess the primates or their precursers did the best job of evading the dino. This ensured the passing down to us of our most useful genes. Looking at it now, we can see the birds also survived. These are the more modern ancestors of the reptiles (mammals is the close second). It's remarkable the rapid rate of evolution for birds, and mammals, to a lesser extent. The only way I see humans performing a similar feat to the avians is by the grace of a more scientific ruling class. And with the current world rulers not even acknowledging the most well proven science, there is little hope of a technocracy sweeping through the world, revolt now!
These were actually not as much of a microscopic example as I had planned, so let me look more at that. How about the bacteria that causes Leprosy or TB? These were very mean organisms who didn't respect their hosts, where are they now? exactly, on the run, fugitives. A similar sort of ideology would be nice if used on other bad guests of larger size.
On another note, I would suggest that maybe our solar system and universe is just one of a larger organism's environment. What if our evolution here on earth were part of a virus-like chain of events set in motion, which may ultimately lead to the utter destruction of the larger universe? Could it be that we are on a path towards utter annihalation of space itself? Perhaps it is similar to the God - Devil struggle. God is the creator of matter itself. The Devil represents the evolutionary forces attempting to create a virus strong enough to break the universe and God itself.
That was a fun excercise, and although time intensive, hopefully some of you enjoyed it and may have become enlightened in some way.
Comment Away!!
¶ 2:57 PM
