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Holobionts: a new Paradigm to Understand the Role of Humankind in the Ecosystem
You are a holobiont, I am a holobiont, we are all holobionts. "Holobiont" means, literally, "whole living creature." It ...
Saturday, December 19, 2020
The Secret of Holobionts
Thursday, December 10, 2020
On the Importance of Having Limbal Rings. The Evolution of Humankind
Note the difference from other mammalian eyes. Most animals, even our close relatives, the apes, have dark eyes, no limbal rings, and not even a large and well detectable sclera. You see it in the image: this (probably) female bonobo doesn't look at all like Sarah Brightman, although she also surely sends powerful epigamic signals to the males of her species.
Friday, December 4, 2020
The Loving Reaper as a Holobiont. An Interpretation by Jenny Jinya
I don't think I'll engage in commenting the details of this story by Jenny Jinya, the young German lady who has been creating incredible stories (see here, here and here.). After all, we all know that the way to boredom lies in telling the details. But try to take a look at this story. It is not just a moving story, it has an unbelievable depth. It resonates of so many motives and ideas that are part of human history that it left me breathless: the Goddess, Death, the Otherworld, kindness, piety, benevolence, mercy, and much more.
But the bewildering element of this story is how all these things are linked together. Jenny Jinya has truly understood how the universe works: life and death need each other and neither could exist alone. The holobiont concept is not just about symbiosis, it is about communication. And the universe is a giant holobiont that moves, changes, grows, shrinks, expands, returns, and restarts, all because its elements communicate with each other and the result is the never-ending cycle of life and death. Sometimes, we use the term "love" for this kind of communication and it is truly the most powerful force in the universe.
Thursday, December 3, 2020
Can Plants Perceive Us? The Opinion of Professor Suzanne Silard
Sunday, November 22, 2020
A New Holobiont in Gaia's Family
Friday, November 20, 2020
The Wolf Song. A Few Minutes of Bliss in a Difficult Time
A splendid song, splendidly sung by Jonna Jinton, Swedish singer. The images are haunting and beautiful, suggesting the beauty of the forest inhabited by wolves, humans, and other creatures that form a single system, holobionts within the greater holobiont that covers the land. A few minutes of bliss, welcome in the difficult times we are living.
These are the words in Swedish ("vargen" means wolves) -- Here you can find a more traditional version. Note how gentle and compassionate is the song, with the mother
understanding the hunger and the distress of the wolf and willing to
give it a pig tail or a chicken shank.
Han vill men kan inte sova
Hungern river i hans varga buk
O det är kallt i hans stova
Ungen min får du aldrig
Ylar av hunger o klagar
Men jag ska gen en grisa svans
Sånt passar i varga magar
Ungen min får du aldrig
Låt vargen yla i natten
Men jag ska gen en hönsa skank
Om ingen annan har tatt den
Ungen får du aldrig
Ooo
Ungen den får du aldrig
And here is a version in English (translated using Google, revised using common sense, as I don't speak Swedish. May not be perfect).
Friday, November 13, 2020
Sex Among Holobionts: Love is a Horizontal Thing
Marc Chagall (1887-1985) is reported to have said, "Only love interests me, and I am only in contact with things that revolve around love." His paintings have a certain "holobiontic" quality. This one, "Les Amoureux de Vence" was painted in 1957,
What do holobionts, empathy, and harmony have in common with sex? One thing: they are all forms of horizontal transmission of information. We tend to see ourselves as multicellular organisms and, for us, sex is indeed a "horizontal" thing, in a certain sense.
But, sex was not invented by multicellular creatures. On this planet, sex is mostly something that bacteria engage in, freely exchanging genetic materials among themselves. It is free love that goes on all the time among single-celled creatures. And it is the way they evolve. It is by exchanging genetic materials that bacteria have become more and more capable to resist to the human attacks against them by means of antibiotics.
And even viruses, which can't reproduce by themselves, have sex with each other. It is just that they can only do that when two different viruses find themselves in the same host cell. That can become even a little weird when the two viruses come from different previous hosts, say a pangolin and a human being. In any case, viruses evolve very fast, that's why almost every year a new wave of influenza spreads over the world.
For larger holobionts, such as human beings, the situation is different when you consider the reproductive mechanism of the main organism, the human one. Two human organisms exchange genetic information, but then this information must be "read" in a complex process that involves the birth of a new human being (and, unfortunately, the death of the old one). It is slow: in terms of evolutionary prowess, viruses and bacteria run circles around us. Fortunately, our immune system can also change fast enough to match the new threats, and we are also defended by the "good" biome that form the human holobiont, the bacterial and viral symbionts we carry with us. And we are part of the larger holobiont we call the ecosystem.
Holobionts are fractal systems: the true embodiment of the poem of Jonathan Swift
The Vermin only teaze and pinch
Their Foes superior by an Inch.
So, Nat'ralists observe, a Flea
Hath smaller Fleas that on him prey,
And these have smaller yet to bite 'em,
And so proceed ad infinitum:
And so it goes.