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Sometimes I wonder if we're just giant machines built by microorganisms. It would certainly make an interesting story, along the idea of a robot discovering the
by version_five 4y ago
Sometimes I wonder if we're just giant machines built by microorganisms. It would certainly make an interesting story, along the idea of a robot discovering they were made by somebody else, which I believe has already been explored
- sorokod 4y agoLike the Extended Phenotype thing explored by Dawkins.
- unity1001 4y ago> Sometimes I wonder if we're just giant machines built by microorganisms I believe that we were well-organized colonies of bacteria was proven long time ago. We are literally a unified collective of cells.
- astrange 4y agoProkaryotes, not bacteria. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-domain_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-domain_system
- unity1001 4y agoEvaluates to the same concept of we being collectives.
- lanstin 4y agoWow that was awesome to read. Biology keeps blowing its old theories out of the water. All of the excitement about rapid genome sequencing is being borne out, even tho you don’t read about bioinformatics so much. So bacteria are an offshoot from our lineage. We really are learning a lot so quickly.
- CSSer 4y agoI think you’re thinking of a Philip K. Dick short story. I’ll see if I can find it. Edit: I was thinking of autofac, which is kind of like what you’re describing but arguably it was only a small plot detail. People get downvoted for the strangest things on here sometimes. In this case it just makes me laugh.
- maxbond 4y agoReminded me of The Electric Ant https://archive.org/details/PhilipK.DickTheElectricAnt https://archive.org/details/PhilipK.DickTheElectricAnt I have a hypothesis that commenters sometime interpret recommendations in this format ("I think you're thinking of X") as being presumptive, because it implies someone made a mistake in their thinking. I'm not trying to say it is or isn't, just that I've seen a pattern of similar posts downvoted, and this is my hypothesis as to why.
- version_five 4y agoI'm the poster the parent replied to and I appreciated the comment, and yours. I don't know why it would be modded down I've just been trying to remember the movie Prometheus, the discussion between David and Weyland at the beginning where Weyland explains he is David's creator - this, I believe, sort of touches on the same idea - learning someone created you, maybe not very deeply; I'll need to watch it again
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoThere's also a short story by Stephen Baxter in Phase Space (a very excellent collection) called Dante Dreams where a researcher becomes aware of the dreaming consciousness of her own organelles.
- TaylorAlexander 4y agoI mean it's a matter of perspective but... we are aren't we?
- pmayrgundter 4y agoBasically agree. There is an important part in what is meant by "machine". Mechanics, strictly speaking, is pervasive in but not sufficient to account for the life process. There's something else going on that looks like classical teleos and both the cells and the organism have it. There's interesting work to get teleos out of mechanics in far from equilibrium thermodynamics.. Prigogine, Kauffman, Wolfram, Deacon, England even Dennet.
- ip26 4y agoIn a sense that’s very true. However the biggest wrinkle is that most of your cells share a single common ancestor cell. If your body is a community of microbes, it’s mostly a village of close relatives, not a symbiote like coral.
- jvanderbot 4y agoAh, I heard quite differently when including microbiome. For example: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-43674270 https://www.bbc.com/news/health-43674270 "More than half your body is not human"
- pmayrgundter 4y agoI believe that's incidental. There are abiotic mice which seem basically the same but require smth like 20% more calories in their diet for same metabolic level.
- lioeters 4y ago> most of your cells share a single common ancestor cell We call her LUCA, last universal common ancestor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_universal_common_ancestor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_universal_common_ancestor
- klyrs 4y ago> Sometimes I wonder if we're just giant machines built by microorganisms. Wait 'til you find out that those "microorganisms" are themselves machines... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_machine#Biological https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_machine#Biological
- perfecthjrjth 4y agoYes, but with a twist: this giant machine worries about its future, its kids, its wealth, its financial assets.
- version_five 4y agoOr tricked into worrying about that as a control signal to perform its main task in service of its microorganism operators ;)
- jvanderbot 4y agoNobody in this thread has read Selfish Gene, apparently. That's the whole point of the book: That genes may as well have invented all of life to propagate themselves. In this context, species conflict is like fleets of world-ships fighting total war.
- ok_dad 4y agoThat’s an interesting SciFi idea: the real world is digital, and digital beings have created a physical world to fight battle via genetic biological machines, which are effectively concrete data structures.
- redanddead 4y agolike the scene in Jurassic park
- markdown 4y ago"It's a Unix system. I know this!"?
- theGnuMe 4y agoGenes are effectively biological computer programs.
- seqizz 4y agoReminded me: > Animals are something invented by plants to move seeds around. An extremely yang solution to a peculiar problem which they faced. (Terence McKenna)
- adammarples 4y agoAnimals evolved long before plants. What's crazy is that plants were arguably evolved by fungi using alga to farm sunlight
- 11235813213455 4y ago> Animals evolved long before plants No underwater: algae 3500MY vs sponges, worms, shells 800MY-485MY out of water: plants 470MY vs millipedes, tetrapod 420MY-400MY
- OhNoNotAnother1 4y ago
- lilgreenland 4y agoquora says animals https://www.quora.com/Which-evolved-first-plants-or-animals https://www.quora.com/Which-evolved-first-plants-or-animals
- 11235813213455 4y agoAlgae existed long before animals And even on land, he seems to be wrong (or at least not up to date): https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2018/february/plant-life-on-earth-is-much-older-than-we-thought.html https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2018/february/plant-life..., https://www.science.org/content/article/land-plants-arose-earlier-thought-and-may-have-had-bigger-impact-evolution-animals https://www.science.org/content/article/land-plants-arose-ea...
- adammarples 4y ago
- foobarbecue 4y agoWe are all servants of the selfish gene.
- chiefalchemist 4y agoWell, we are biological machines that would not survive without a spectrum of microbes (e.g., gut bacteria). And to your point, kinda, I sometimes wonder if they exist for us, or we exist for them.
- sapiol 4y agoJust ask yourself, who was first?
- User23 4y agoAsimov did a story “Hostess” that’s kind of along those lines.
- tempe1h1 4y agothat whole nanomachines sci fi, e.g. nanobots making grey goo or whatever is not as exciting if you consider cells are alreay microbits made out of protein nanobots
- andrei_says_ 4y agoI recommend Stanislav Lem’s The Futurological Congress. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/733473.The_Futurological_Congress https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/733473.The_Futurological... Beyond fascinating
- OhNoNotAnother1 4y ago