Life
A virus that developed on planet Earth during the Archean period. The virus is unique in its having completely taken over the chemical composition of the planet and is the only known virus to have acheived interplanetary travel.
The virus has approximately twelve different strains, most of which are grouped under the polyphyletic Empire bacteria, but include Chlamydia and Cyanobacteria.
The most successful strain, Eukarya, is usually treated, along with Archaea, as a separate Empire.
Eukarya is unique amongst all known viral strains and may be a result of the unique history of planet Earth, the fact that the planet is essentially the larger part of a double planetary system, protected from normal levels of comet bombardment by the gravitational mass of Jupiter.
The strain Eukarya has developed the ability to form multicellular groupings with rare capabilities.
Amongst the many variations of Eukarya, the most notably successful are Animalia, Fungi, and Plantae, all of which grow to vast sizes compared to normal viral structures.
This may well be unique.
The unique history of the protected Ecosystem, planet Earth, has resulted, after four billion of years of comparative protection, that may well be an isolated occurance in the galaxy, in the final development of the Ape, one species of which, Homo Sapiens, has taken viral intelligence to a new level.
It has mastered the laws which gave it birth.
Through the Ape, the virus Life has become the most successful virus in the universe.
Viruses are almost certainly universal, this one may be unique.
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10 comments:
Well, it's time someone found a cure for this virus then. May I suggest infinite quantities of cheap lager? It's bound to work for me, eventually.
Recognising the beauty of any living creature makes it hard to hate anything ... or anyone!
Even Hitler was beautiful.. in his own way.
...And it's good to know the PC brigade arent present on this blog and are able enough to understand the true meaning of that sentence.
Well, may I represent the PC brigade and admit I don't know what you're talking about?
TD- Ah, I hear Agent Smith is here...
We eliminate other viruses because they are our competitors.
All us viruses are in competition.
Other strains of the Life virus life off eachother, and try to absorb the matter contained in other strains into their own.
That's what we're all trying to, us viruses, convert matter in to replicas of our chemical sequences.
Just we're the best of the best :)
David- It's about seeing it in relative terms. Myself, I think really understanding what we count as our relatives, and we don't is a moral issue.
Fact is, we live by absorbing other parts of the process, we have to.
MY view, is that that the debate about whether viruses count as life (the consensus is not), is the wrong question.
Eukaryote life, is really just one type of bacteria, really, all multicellular life, fits into one box, equal in cladistic terms, to the Chlamydia box.
And ALL of it, really, is a virus.
It's not that virus is a type of life, life is a type of virus.
But we sem to have problems finally facing the final conclusion about life.
I expect we'll find viruses exist pretty much most places. We'll find evidence that they existed on Mars at some point, I think we'll find them on some of the moons of the gas giants.
But Eukarya?
Here and here alone, I think there's a very good chance of that.
The only sensible answer to the ET paradox.
Welshcakes- As you've probably noticed, theoretical posts are on a hiatus, as large scale blog visiting has been.
This is because I've been largely occupied with attempting to re-assess the life process in as clinically objective terms as I can.
And this is the best definition I can think of.
Well, may I represent the PC brigade and admit I don't know what you're talking about?
Because however evil he may have been, he was still human ... and human beings are beautiful... every one.
This is way over my head although in a way I feel it should not be. Out to lunch today.
Don't you think it smacks of randomness, Ingsoc ?
Interesting that for life to develope elsewhere in the universe there needs to be an Earthlike planet AND a Jupiter nearby.
David- Understanding the Nazis is fundamental to understanding humanity. Hitler is a case in point.
The memoirs of Speer are worth reading, in fact it's one of the key texts, I think, for understanding the period.
Why? Because it's written a man who spent twenty in Spandau coming to terms with what he was part of. I don't think he truly did, I think he turned a blind eye to things he doesn't admit a blind eye to- but it helps us get to grips with how National Socialism worked.
Even Mein Kampf- scary book, very scary. Why?
Because it isn't the book it's presented as. Ninety percent of it is pretty sane- the rest is based on pure conspiracy theory. The guy was wrong- his worldview was based on bad textbook science and Grassy Knollington thinking, and it led to evil.
But it led to evil, because he DID care- just in a very warped way.
And I think we're all capable of that.
We're doing it now in Iraq.
jmb- It's just me outdawkinsing Dawkins :)
Seriously, I think this is how future textbooks will read.
I'm very much a fan of cladistics. Cladistics is all about regrouping biological classifications based on new knowledge.
What it means is, the statement that man and apes shared a common ancestor is false.
False, because man's ancestor was an ape, but also, because the two closest related hominid genera, are Pan and Homo.
Therefore man IS an Ape. Man applies to one specis of ape, but all hominis species are apes, including us, cladistically speaking.
Further, Reptile is a bad term. Bad, because Crocodiles are closer relatec to birds than turtles. Further, the ancestors or Manmmals, cynodont reptiles, are classed as Reptiles. It's bad terminology.
Regrouping the amniote classes as Therian (Mammals and their Synapsid reptile ancestots), Testudines (Tortoises and Turtles) and Saurians (all other Reptiles AND birds), is better Science.
Moleculer biology also means, that Animals, Plants and Fungi are merely the most conspicuous three of about twelve eukaryote kingdoms.
Further, of the three Empires, the Empire Bacteria, is in fact polyphyletic itself. Several strains of Bacteria divided from eachother BEFORE Eukaryote life appeared.
So in future, I suspect we'll have a ten-twelve empire classification sysytem.
With Life itself just classified as a specific virus- Orga- equivalent to any other virus- like Cancer or AIDS.
Evidence suggests that viruses form easy- in fact, they need a parent.
Mystery of life solved.
EK- No, thermodynamics. Randomness doesn't happen. Everything drives inexorably towards heat death as fast as it can. Even you and I are are driving that way, by blogging. The universe has chosen our blogging as the fastest route to heat death.
The conditions that have led to the successful proliferation of Life, are fairly odd. The Moon is vital, because it creates tides. Tides fling matter onto land, causing plants to colonise land. Where plants go, animals follow. For the brave that can risk land, a virgin food feast awaits.
The likelihood of an earth sized planet having a Moon the size of ours- essentially forming a double system- is statistically highly unlikely.
And of course, we have Nemesis, the theorised brown dwarf that ploughs through the Oort cloud every 26 billion years, scattering comets and threatening those species that have ossified into evolutionary complacency.
And again, most stars are part of binary systems. The jury is still out on whether life could develop in a binary system, in the way it has here.
Fact is, we're back to the ET paradox. We should have been invaded millions of years ago. We haven't been.
There's nobody out there. Wasn't, isn't, and won't be.
Just us.
It's all ours, if we choose to take it.
Very subtle, clever post!
Fact is, we're back to the ET paradox. We should have been invaded millions of years ago. We haven't been.
There's nobody out there. Wasn't, isn't, and won't be.
Just us.
Sorry, CBI, don't agree. There's shedloads of people out there. People without bodies, people who hang around in atmospheres, people who have only one internal organ and who live to the age of 400. People who've visited in dreams and in the early hours, people who've made us think we're mad, people we just don't like to talk about, people who we've shagged and found a bit better than earth-people. CBI, there are fuck loads of aliens around if only you look.
Unfortunately I haven't seen any, but I have faith that I will....
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