Check out ye olde tree of life. We macro creatures are a paltry, small piece. We beat the odds for existing in a big, big way.
Now, as far as getting off the planet and anthropomorphizing Earth by giving it the desire to spread its apples: we already have Mars rocks on Earth, why not microscopic life bearing rocks from Earth on other planets?
Yes, macroscopic life does indeed exist because it works. Obviously. But you must recognize that our existence is not a pinnacle of evolution, not a spire, not even a foothill.
Now to your big, big flaw. We and no other macroscopic lifeform on Earth are in any way even remotely by any measurement of any kind anywhere close to "enslaving microscopic life." Not even on the cosmic scale. Not in a thousand, million, or billion years.
Retake an intro Biology course. We completely depend on microscopic life to LIVE. They don't just make life more comfortable, or easier, or help us along in a small way; we are utterly dependent on our symbiotic relationship with bacteria to support us.
But, for the millions of years on Earth before we macros came onto the scene microscopic life puttered along quite well. Sure they've adapted to exploit the chemical and biological riches that our bodies offer, but they are not dependent on us in the slightest.
Lesse, maybe I can provide you with some intro material...
Bacteria exist in such overwhelming number and such unparalleled variety; they live in such a wide range of environments and work in so many unmatched modes of metabolism. Our shenanigans, nuclear and otherwise, might easily lead to our own destruction in the foreseeable future. We might take most of the large terrestrial vertebrates with us--a few thousand species at most.
I doubt that we could ever substantially touch bacterial diversity. The modal organisms cannot be nuked into oblivion or very much affected by any of our considerable conceivable malfeasances....
The accompanying chart, adapted from the work of Carl Woese, our greatest pioneer in this new constitution of life, says it all, with the maximally stunning device of a revolutionary picture. We now have a system of three grand evolutionary domains--Bacteria, Archaea and Eucarya--and two of the three consist entirely of prokaryotes: that is, "bacteria" in the vernacular, the inhabitants of life's constant mode. Once we place two-thirds of evolutionary diversity at life's mode, we have much less trouble grasping the centrality of this location and the constant domination of life by bacteria.
For example, the domain of Bacteria, as presently defined, contains several major subdivisions, and the genetic distance between any pair is at least equal to the average separation between eukaryotic kingdoms such as plants and animals.
Note, by contrast, the restricted domain of all three multicellular kingdoms. On this genealogical chart for all life, the three multicellular kingdoms form three little twigs on the bush of just one among three grand domains of life. Quite a change in one generation--from my parents' learning that everything living must be animal or vegetable, to the icon of my mature years: the kingdoms Animalia and Plantae as two little twigs amid a plethora of other branches on one of three bushes, with both other bushes growing bacteria, and only bacteria, all over....
Consider two aspects of ubiquity:
1. Numbers. Bacteria inhabit effectively every place suitable for the existence of life. Mother told you, after all, that bacterial "germs" require constant vigilance to combat their ubiquity in every breath and every mouthful, and the vast majority of bacteria are benign or irrelevant to us, not harmful agents of disease. One fact will suffice: during the course of life, the number of E. coli in the gut of each human being far
But it's Silent Hill 3. Survival Horror games should not be played with the lights on. And should be connected to a sweet surround sound system for ultimate freakouts.
Wow, is this ever the classic case of the pot calling the porcelain black.
Real quick (not that you're like to read a reply several days later).
Your three ways of genes being removed are utterly wrong. Genetic selection occurs by more suited genes outbreeding the less suited genes.
Evolution doesn't spontaneously happen. In your two camps of dumb and smart people, unless there is an environmental pressure on either group they will stagnate and there will be no "progression".
Examples: sharks, cockroaches. They are both extremely well suited to their environments and have remained unchanged for millions of years.
We humans developed big ol' brains a few thousand years ago and our big brained selves were so successful that we literally outbred more physically capable but less intellectual species. We aren't currently progressing to a "perfect" being, we are simply the very best humanoids capable of living on this planet that have come along.
I don't consider myself poor, religious, or stupid. I make a decent salary, I don't attend a church, and I seem to be capable of string correctly spelled words with proper grammar...unlike a certain individual that I am replying to right now.
I sincerely hope that you are trolling (successfully, in my case), and don't actually believe any of the maxims you have put forth in your post.
That the Middle Eastern countries didn't develop ships (and weren't well enough situated geographically) to reach the vast, vast riches of the New World that allowed the development of a pure intellectual class that spurred a massive trend of technological development that has yet to end.
So when is a more enterprising user than I going to map out the significant locations in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy? Even with the maps included with the book, I had a hard time keeping the character's locations straight.
Eugenics is one of the worst ideas to come along. There is just no way to scientifically predict what tools (genes) we'll need in the future. Right now we have a lot of variation; which means evolution has a lot of choice when we need to squeeze into a new evolutionary niche.
But remember that evolution is a brainless process. It has no ultimate goal, no concept of morality, no concept of science. Speaking of evolution as anything other than a reaction is silly talk, like saying the equals sign in 2+2=4 caused the 4 to happen and that 4 is greater than 2+2.
When we start clunking around our genetic toolbox, and throwing away those that don't meet our personal concepts of "superior" (by they intelligence and strength, or wealth and success) then we risk throwing away a key tool that holds the key to survival when we need it.
Evolution involves the death of weaker individuals before they can breed. With soap (the yardstick of civilisation), surgery, rescue helicopters, dentistry, wheelchairs etc, weaker individuals aren't killed off so easily before they can breed.
No it doesn't. The evolutionary process occurs by some genes out-breeding other genes. The genes that survive are not superior, or morally correct, or even better in the general sense; they are simply better suited to their environment.
I don't know what it is that causes so many people to misunderstand evolution so completely, but I end up fighting against it every single time a related story comes up.
Oh man. I sure hope you're in the group that isn't producing a lot of offspring.
Quick bullet point summary:
* Poor != stupid * Wealthy != intelligent * Evolution != progression to a superior being * Evolution == reaction to environmental stress * Religion != absence of rational thought
If "intelligent" people are choosing not to have offspring, then their genes are commiting suicide, and good riddance.
But look around you. I don't mean to be a flamebaiter, but the people having lots of babies are not the "intelligent" people.
Heh. Wealth != intelligence, and the trend is actually: as wealthy increases, the number of offspring decreases. Surely you don't think that poor people are stupid people?
Proof: murder, robbery, and war, are all profitable, and are very much *not* in humanity's best interest.
That's not proof. Murder, robbery, and war are not in the victim's best interest; but you'll find it difficult to make your case that they aren't in *humanity's* best interest. I'm not saying that they are, but it's impossible to describe the ramifications of acts for the rest of the 6.5 billion people. I could more easily argue that WWII, or the Black Plague, etc. were more good than bad for humanity as a whole.
If any of you fans of this comic are unfamilar with Chris' earlier work. You *must* read Not My Desk. I've been a notmydesk fan since 2001 and it is funnier (and truer) office humor than "Office Space", "The Office", "Dilbert", and anything else I've found.
Sorry, but this doesn't hold any water. I think you've taken the experience you had in grade school and inappropriately projected it into international affairs.
The ones with the sharpest swords and biggest guns aren't the ones in power, the ones who control the people with the sharpest swords and biggest guns are in power.
A false perception of power breeds complacency and overconfidence. Just look at China before the Opium War. They explored the world with *vast* fleets of ships. One mission that discovered and made trading contact with Persia consisted of over two hundred ships, each of which dwarfed Columbus' three, well before 1492. But they discovered that the rest of the world just wasn't all that interesting compared to their power (and it genuinely wasn't). They were the top dog so who cares what the rest of the world does or thinks?
So unknown to them the western powers grew in strength and ability. When there was finally a confrontation China was absolutely crushed.
So are we *that* oblivious to the world? You would say, no; but then consider your example of Iraq. Most reasonable, intelligent people knew how a land war in Iraq was going to go (I recall the word "quagmire" being used extensively in our conversations); but we, as a country, went anyway. Blind to the ineffectiveness of our might.
We are a powerful country, but *only* when dealing with countries. Against nationless groups we are not only hindered, we are almost absolutely powerless. Our leaders thought that by attacking the countries that these groups were in, we would create an hostile environment that would drive them out or crush them from within. Instead we walked into the nest of vipers and started recklessly stepping on them.
Now you say that we as a people are safe from outside attack due to our military might. I agree that we are safe, but it's because of our geographic location rather than our military. The *only* way for another nation to attack us would be with an intercontinental missile (or to be Mexico or Canada). Even with a barrage of missiles, we wouldn't be defeated but merely inconvenienced (as a nation). Until transporter technology allows entire armies to zip around the globe instantly, we will never be conquered. Most of our defense spending is actually offense spending, and is largely superfluous unless you want to be the police for the rest of the world.
We don't have the power to do whatever we want. Our military is stretched so thin that we simply can't invade another country or adequately perform peacekeeping activities OR keep the ranks filled. Have you noticed the consistently dropping military application standards? As a military nation, our power is bleeding away and eventually the vultures will be circling; ready to pick off pieces one by one.
Ex: China will want to incorporate Taiwan. We'll bluster and stammer but, thanks to our impotence in Iraq, will ultimately have little to say about the matter. It's hard to talk about military might when we our supposely indefeatable military is demonstrated on a daily basis to be anything but.
No empire lasts, the longest empires are built on diplomacy (Rome, China), the shortest are built on military might (Alexander the Great, Ghengis Khan). If you think that our military might is enough to make that fact irrelevant you might need to study your world history more.
As a nation we are barely two hundred years old. As a strong world power we are barely fifty. How much longer do you think we can keep it going? Don't you see the cracks in our system and our power? I hope you don't, and I hope that you don't ever have to. I hope that we grow out of our military focus and our crippling reliance on oil. I hope that we mend the diplomatic bridges that we've burned all over the world. But historical precedent doesn't make that hope a safe bet.
Yes. Civics is where you learn the benefits that we have as citizens. What benefits do we have that other countries don't?
Although trite, I seriously do want an answer for what you think we have that other developed countries don't. It's as if you think that we're the ONLY country with an immigration problem. (We aren't.)
I really do want an answer and I'm especially interested in a comparison to western European countries.
No, I've had a very different experience. Here at UNC-Chapel Hill, incoming freshmen have been required to buy or own laptops for six years. I work in the Undergraduate Library and I took a class recently (great perk) and I was the *only* student (out of 60) in the class taking notes with pen and paper. Many also had iPods with microphones and were recording the lecture.
For more interesting reading along those lines, check out "Genesis of the Grail Kings" and "Bloodline of the Holy Grail" by Lawrence Gardner. The books cover the Old and New Testaments, respectively.
Slashdot Mirror
Check out ye olde tree of life. We macro creatures are a paltry, small piece. We beat the odds for existing in a big, big way.
...
...
Now, as far as getting off the planet and anthropomorphizing Earth by giving it the desire to spread its apples: we already have Mars rocks on Earth, why not microscopic life bearing rocks from Earth on other planets?
Yes, macroscopic life does indeed exist because it works. Obviously. But you must recognize that our existence is not a pinnacle of evolution, not a spire, not even a foothill.
Now to your big, big flaw. We and no other macroscopic lifeform on Earth are in any way even remotely by any measurement of any kind anywhere close to "enslaving microscopic life." Not even on the cosmic scale. Not in a thousand, million, or billion years.
Retake an intro Biology course. We completely depend on microscopic life to LIVE. They don't just make life more comfortable, or easier, or help us along in a small way; we are utterly dependent on our symbiotic relationship with bacteria to support us.
But, for the millions of years on Earth before we macros came onto the scene microscopic life puttered along quite well. Sure they've adapted to exploit the chemical and biological riches that our bodies offer, but they are not dependent on us in the slightest.
Lesse, maybe I can provide you with some intro material...
Ah! Stephen Jay Gould's "Planet of the Bacteria".
Some quotes:
Bacteria exist in such overwhelming number and such unparalleled variety; they live in such a wide range of environments and work in so many unmatched modes of metabolism. Our shenanigans, nuclear and otherwise, might easily lead to our own destruction in the foreseeable future. We might take most of the large terrestrial vertebrates with us--a few thousand species at most.
I doubt that we could ever substantially touch bacterial diversity. The modal organisms cannot be nuked into oblivion or very much affected by any of our considerable conceivable malfeasances.
The accompanying chart, adapted from the work of Carl Woese, our greatest pioneer in this new constitution of life, says it all, with the maximally stunning device of a revolutionary picture. We now have a system of three grand evolutionary domains--Bacteria, Archaea and Eucarya--and two of the three consist entirely of prokaryotes: that is, "bacteria" in the vernacular, the inhabitants of life's constant mode. Once we place two-thirds of evolutionary diversity at life's mode, we have much less trouble grasping the centrality of this location and the constant domination of life by bacteria.
For example, the domain of Bacteria, as presently defined, contains several major subdivisions, and the genetic distance between any pair is at least equal to the average separation between eukaryotic kingdoms such as plants and animals.
Note, by contrast, the restricted domain of all three multicellular kingdoms. On this genealogical chart for all life, the three multicellular kingdoms form three little twigs on the bush of just one among three grand domains of life. Quite a change in one generation--from my parents' learning that everything living must be animal or vegetable, to the icon of my mature years: the kingdoms Animalia and Plantae as two little twigs amid a plethora of other branches on one of three bushes, with both other bushes growing bacteria, and only bacteria, all over.
Consider two aspects of ubiquity:
1. Numbers. Bacteria inhabit effectively every place suitable for the existence of life. Mother told you, after all, that bacterial "germs" require constant vigilance to combat their ubiquity in every breath and every mouthful, and the vast majority of bacteria are benign or irrelevant to us, not harmful agents of disease. One fact will suffice: during the course of life, the number of E. coli in the gut of each human being far
Dude. Bacteria. The planet belongs to the microscopic.
They survived billions of years without us, yet we wouldn't last a minute without them. All macroscopic life is an evolutionary abberation.
But it's Silent Hill 3. Survival Horror games should not be played with the lights on. And should be connected to a sweet surround sound system for ultimate freakouts.
Wow, is this ever the classic case of the pot calling the porcelain black.
Real quick (not that you're like to read a reply several days later).
Your three ways of genes being removed are utterly wrong. Genetic selection occurs by more suited genes outbreeding the less suited genes.
Evolution doesn't spontaneously happen. In your two camps of dumb and smart people, unless there is an environmental pressure on either group they will stagnate and there will be no "progression".
Examples: sharks, cockroaches. They are both extremely well suited to their environments and have remained unchanged for millions of years.
We humans developed big ol' brains a few thousand years ago and our big brained selves were so successful that we literally outbred more physically capable but less intellectual species. We aren't currently progressing to a "perfect" being, we are simply the very best humanoids capable of living on this planet that have come along.
I don't consider myself poor, religious, or stupid. I make a decent salary, I don't attend a church, and I seem to be capable of string correctly spelled words with proper grammar...unlike a certain individual that I am replying to right now.
I sincerely hope that you are trolling (successfully, in my case), and don't actually believe any of the maxims you have put forth in your post.
That the Middle Eastern countries didn't develop ships (and weren't well enough situated geographically) to reach the vast, vast riches of the New World that allowed the development of a pure intellectual class that spurred a massive trend of technological development that has yet to end.
So when is a more enterprising user than I going to map out the significant locations in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy? Even with the maps included with the book, I had a hard time keeping the character's locations straight.
...
Serenity was by the same guy who made Firefly, not the other way around.
And how can you be a slashdot reader and not have ever heard of Firefly?
Mind->boggles;
A Google fight between 'coffee heart disease' and 'coffee antioxidants' makes it clear that this no contest.
Coffee heart disease: 8,860,000 results
Coffee antioxidants: 1,500,000 results
Now should I feel like Fry when they discovered what Slurm really was?
"Ewww!" (sip)
Eugenics is one of the worst ideas to come along. There is just no way to scientifically predict what tools (genes) we'll need in the future. Right now we have a lot of variation; which means evolution has a lot of choice when we need to squeeze into a new evolutionary niche.
But remember that evolution is a brainless process. It has no ultimate goal, no concept of morality, no concept of science. Speaking of evolution as anything other than a reaction is silly talk, like saying the equals sign in 2+2=4 caused the 4 to happen and that 4 is greater than 2+2.
When we start clunking around our genetic toolbox, and throwing away those that don't meet our personal concepts of "superior" (by they intelligence and strength, or wealth and success) then we risk throwing away a key tool that holds the key to survival when we need it.
Evolution involves the death of weaker individuals before they can breed. With soap (the yardstick of civilisation), surgery, rescue helicopters, dentistry, wheelchairs etc, weaker individuals aren't killed off so easily before they can breed.
No it doesn't. The evolutionary process occurs by some genes out-breeding other genes. The genes that survive are not superior, or morally correct, or even better in the general sense; they are simply better suited to their environment.
Thank you!
I don't know what it is that causes so many people to misunderstand evolution so completely, but I end up fighting against it every single time a related story comes up.
I should really just relax.
Oh man. I sure hope you're in the group that isn't producing a lot of offspring.
Quick bullet point summary:
* Poor != stupid
* Wealthy != intelligent
* Evolution != progression to a superior being
* Evolution == reaction to environmental stress
* Religion != absence of rational thought
If "intelligent" people are choosing not to have offspring, then their genes are commiting suicide, and good riddance.
But look around you. I don't mean to be a flamebaiter, but the people having lots of babies are not the "intelligent" people.
Heh. Wealth != intelligence, and the trend is actually: as wealthy increases, the number of offspring decreases. Surely you don't think that poor people are stupid people?
Sounds like you need to get out into the world. We are quickly becoming the antiquated laughing-stock of the world.
That's crazy talk. I've used XeTeX to write Chinese for years.
Screenshot of Chinese/Japanese Unicode support.
All the beauty of TeX, all the ease of unicode.
Proof: murder, robbery, and war, are all profitable, and are very much *not* in humanity's best interest.
That's not proof. Murder, robbery, and war are not in the victim's best interest; but you'll find it difficult to make your case that they aren't in *humanity's* best interest. I'm not saying that they are, but it's impossible to describe the ramifications of acts for the rest of the 6.5 billion people. I could more easily argue that WWII, or the Black Plague, etc. were more good than bad for humanity as a whole.
We must resort to name-calling when debating with idiots or those who find trivial reasons to ignore valid arguments, lest we go mad.
If any of you fans of this comic are unfamilar with Chris' earlier work. You *must* read Not My Desk. I've been a notmydesk fan since 2001 and it is funnier (and truer) office humor than "Office Space", "The Office", "Dilbert", and anything else I've found.
Two of my favorite essays: Fired and See Spot; Run.
Sorry, but this doesn't hold any water. I think you've taken the experience you had in grade school and inappropriately projected it into international affairs.
The ones with the sharpest swords and biggest guns aren't the ones in power, the ones who control the people with the sharpest swords and biggest guns are in power.
A false perception of power breeds complacency and overconfidence. Just look at China before the Opium War. They explored the world with *vast* fleets of ships. One mission that discovered and made trading contact with Persia consisted of over two hundred ships, each of which dwarfed Columbus' three, well before 1492. But they discovered that the rest of the world just wasn't all that interesting compared to their power (and it genuinely wasn't). They were the top dog so who cares what the rest of the world does or thinks?
So unknown to them the western powers grew in strength and ability. When there was finally a confrontation China was absolutely crushed.
So are we *that* oblivious to the world? You would say, no; but then consider your example of Iraq. Most reasonable, intelligent people knew how a land war in Iraq was going to go (I recall the word "quagmire" being used extensively in our conversations); but we, as a country, went anyway. Blind to the ineffectiveness of our might.
We are a powerful country, but *only* when dealing with countries. Against nationless groups we are not only hindered, we are almost absolutely powerless. Our leaders thought that by attacking the countries that these groups were in, we would create an hostile environment that would drive them out or crush them from within. Instead we walked into the nest of vipers and started recklessly stepping on them.
Now you say that we as a people are safe from outside attack due to our military might. I agree that we are safe, but it's because of our geographic location rather than our military. The *only* way for another nation to attack us would be with an intercontinental missile (or to be Mexico or Canada). Even with a barrage of missiles, we wouldn't be defeated but merely inconvenienced (as a nation). Until transporter technology allows entire armies to zip around the globe instantly, we will never be conquered. Most of our defense spending is actually offense spending, and is largely superfluous unless you want to be the police for the rest of the world.
We don't have the power to do whatever we want. Our military is stretched so thin that we simply can't invade another country or adequately perform peacekeeping activities OR keep the ranks filled. Have you noticed the consistently dropping military application standards? As a military nation, our power is bleeding away and eventually the vultures will be circling; ready to pick off pieces one by one.
Ex: China will want to incorporate Taiwan. We'll bluster and stammer but, thanks to our impotence in Iraq, will ultimately have little to say about the matter. It's hard to talk about military might when we our supposely indefeatable military is demonstrated on a daily basis to be anything but.
No empire lasts, the longest empires are built on diplomacy (Rome, China), the shortest are built on military might (Alexander the Great, Ghengis Khan). If you think that our military might is enough to make that fact irrelevant you might need to study your world history more.
As a nation we are barely two hundred years old. As a strong world power we are barely fifty. How much longer do you think we can keep it going? Don't you see the cracks in our system and our power? I hope you don't, and I hope that you don't ever have to. I hope that we grow out of our military focus and our crippling reliance on oil. I hope that we mend the diplomatic bridges that we've burned all over the world. But historical precedent doesn't make that hope a safe bet.
Yes. Civics is where you learn the benefits that we have as citizens. What benefits do we have that other countries don't?
Although trite, I seriously do want an answer for what you think we have that other developed countries don't. It's as if you think that we're the ONLY country with an immigration problem. (We aren't.)
I really do want an answer and I'm especially interested in a comparison to western European countries.
What are these benefits that only we Americans get, exactly? I think I missed that day in civics.
This was a COMP class so clearly the demographic is skewed, but I didn't know *how* skewed it was.
No, I've had a very different experience. Here at UNC-Chapel Hill, incoming freshmen have been required to buy or own laptops for six years. I work in the Undergraduate Library and I took a class recently (great perk) and I was the *only* student (out of 60) in the class taking notes with pen and paper. Many also had iPods with microphones and were recording the lecture.
Yeah "gives" away "free" iPods. Nevermind that those iPods are paid for many, many times over by the student's fees and tuition. :-)
For more interesting reading along those lines, check out "Genesis of the Grail Kings" and "Bloodline of the Holy Grail" by Lawrence Gardner. The books cover the Old and New Testaments, respectively.