5 ms·

Biodiversity is important because biology has been doing chemistry, physics, medicine, and neuroscience far longer than humans have. Many modern technologies ex

Biodiversity is important because biology has been doing chemistry, physics, medicine, and neuroscience far longer than humans have. Many modern technologies exist only through studying nature. There's no need to love the splendor of nature to know that destroying a discovery before we know it exists is shooting ourselves in the foot.

hinkley 6y ago
I don't think we understand redundancy as well as we say we do. We have backups and alternatives within cultural and civil systems and we often try to cut them back. Different organisms have come up with different solutions to the same problem, and because of that they can break in different situations. The 'service' they provide will be affected differently by an environmental shortage or excess. If twenty microbes are responsible for recycling organic matter and dust or drought or some chemical affects 10 of them, the others will expand to pick up some of the slack.
- anigbrowl 6y ago
  Indeed. Often the drive for efficiency is rooted in the desire to extract economic value that seems to be going unclaimed or wasted (in the present) without regard for structural utility (over time).
- framecowbird 6y ago
  The risk is how long that takes. Sure, other microbes pick up the slack, but when? A hundred years? A thousand? Millions?
  - hinkley 6y ago
    Oh I'm talking about existing populations. If you're talking about for instance, "what will eat all of this plastic?" then I agree with you. There is nothing, never has been, and we don't know when there will be something we can happily coexist with.
emiliobumachar 6y ago
Great pitch! The flagship, IMO, is antibiotics. Any contenders?
- cmrx64 6y ago
  crop disease resistance maybe? i sure do like eating.
- TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago
  A few that spring to mind, all plant blazed: Aspirin occurs naturally in Willow bark; morphine and codeine from opium poppies; ephedrine and amphetamine is derived from Ephedra sinica (Ma Huang); quinine and it's derivatives from Cinchona calisaya; digoxin from foxglove (Digitalis lanata). And botox from the bacterium Clostridium botulinum and related species has medical uses primarily for muscle spasticity conditions and migraines.
  - mrob 6y ago
    Salicin occurs naturally in willow, not aspirin. It's a prodrug of salicylic acid, which has some anti-inflammatory effects. Aspirin is acetylsalicylic acid. It's also a prodrug of salicylic acid, but it has additional anti-inflammatory and anti-thrombotic effects, because unlike salicylic acid itself, it can irreversibly inactivate COX enzymes (enzymes that synthesize compounds needed for inflammation and blood clotting) by acetylating them. It's also less irritating to the digestive system.
- pvaldes 6y ago
  Paper would be my candidate. Being able to store huge amounts of information in thousands of books in a room transformed human societies much more than antibiotics did. How the humans invented something so incredibly useful? Most probably after watching "useless" social wasps to mash bark to make its nests.

hinkley 6y ago

I don't think we understand redundancy as well as we say we do. We have backups and alternatives within cultural and civil systems and we often try to cut them back. Different organisms have come up with different solutions to the same problem, and because of that they can break in different situations. The 'service' they provide will be affected differently by an environmental shortage or excess. If twenty microbes are responsible for recycling organic matter and dust or drought or some chemical affects 10 of them, the others will expand to pick up some of the slack.

anigbrowl 6y ago
Indeed. Often the drive for efficiency is rooted in the desire to extract economic value that seems to be going unclaimed or wasted (in the present) without regard for structural utility (over time).
framecowbird 6y ago
The risk is how long that takes. Sure, other microbes pick up the slack, but when? A hundred years? A thousand? Millions?
- hinkley 6y ago
  Oh I'm talking about existing populations. If you're talking about for instance, "what will eat all of this plastic?" then I agree with you. There is nothing, never has been, and we don't know when there will be something we can happily coexist with.

emiliobumachar 6y ago

Great pitch! The flagship, IMO, is antibiotics. Any contenders?

cmrx64 6y ago
crop disease resistance maybe? i sure do like eating.
TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago
A few that spring to mind, all plant blazed: Aspirin occurs naturally in Willow bark; morphine and codeine from opium poppies; ephedrine and amphetamine is derived from Ephedra sinica (Ma Huang); quinine and it's derivatives from Cinchona calisaya; digoxin from foxglove (Digitalis lanata). And botox from the bacterium Clostridium botulinum and related species has medical uses primarily for muscle spasticity conditions and migraines.
- mrob 6y ago
  Salicin occurs naturally in willow, not aspirin. It's a prodrug of salicylic acid, which has some anti-inflammatory effects. Aspirin is acetylsalicylic acid. It's also a prodrug of salicylic acid, but it has additional anti-inflammatory and anti-thrombotic effects, because unlike salicylic acid itself, it can irreversibly inactivate COX enzymes (enzymes that synthesize compounds needed for inflammation and blood clotting) by acetylating them. It's also less irritating to the digestive system.
pvaldes 6y ago
Paper would be my candidate. Being able to store huge amounts of information in thousands of books in a room transformed human societies much more than antibiotics did. How the humans invented something so incredibly useful? Most probably after watching "useless" social wasps to mash bark to make its nests.