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Mitochondria Are Alive

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Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#371

Post by realo »

gjs4786 wrote: post #370

Okay, what about the Earth? If mitochondria are alive, you must also consider the Earth as being alive too. Personally, I think it's a simple answer. Here's my reasoning on the topic for anyone daring enough. It can be a very blurred line, but much of that is our shadow. Mitichondria are more alive than they are dead. Simply because they exist as potential and can go on and are intended for this, for lack of better w…

Wake me up the day we find a new earth, a baby earth right by us and the moon...

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#372

Post by syllablehq »

gjs4786 wrote: post #370

Okay, what about the Earth? If mitochondria are alive, you must also consider the Earth as being alive too. Personally, I think it's a simple answer. Here's my reasoning on the topic for anyone daring enough. It can be a very blurred line, but much of that is our shadow. Mitichondria are more alive than they are dead. Simply because they exist as potential and can go on and are intended for this, for lack of better w…

"Molecular biologists tend to focus on characteristics like metabolism, growth and development, response to stimuli, reproduction, and the ability to process information or evolve."

Even if you stretch the others real hard, I don't see how you'd argue that the Earth "reproduces." Especially not the more rigorous definition of reproduces fertile copies of itself which can evolve.

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#373

Post by Jerrrrrrry »

quantadev wrote: post #311
Jerrrrrrry wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I say cannibalized, because avoiding eating your own species is a higher brain function that would've came far later, Two convergent intuitions as to why this is true, but for the wrong reasons: Species (maybe only [di?]morphic ones) rarely kill other instances of their own species, only maim - usually to the point of socially/reproductive shame/selective behavior; as infra-species violence is usually done for sexua…

I have no idea what you meant by liver. Maybe it's a biology term I'm unaware of. Certainly you didn't mean the organ. lolz. Anyway, an interesting point about evolution is that things had to have been eating other smaller things long before the brain had enough processing power for "Species Recognition". It would've initially been a simple brain and rod/cone eye neuron and motor neuron in a fish that executed primar…

Liver/kidneys are organs where toxins are filtered, from the prey the predator consumes.

I am not a biologist obviously.

Because of the "food chain" actually being a pyramid, those organs contain the same "toxins" that are to be avoided, exponentially accumulating in whatever "organ" had the function to add resiliency by storing these toxins.

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#374

Post by science4sail »

syllablehq wrote: post #372
gjs4786 wrote: post #370

Okay, what about the Earth? If mitochondria are alive, you must also consider the Earth as being alive too. Personally, I think it's a simple answer. Here's my reasoning on the topic for anyone daring enough. It can be a very blurred line, but much of that is our shadow. Mitichondria are more alive than they are dead. Simply because they exist as potential and can go on and are intended for this, for lack of better w…

"Molecular biologists tend to focus on characteristics like metabolism, growth and development, response to stimuli, reproduction, and the ability to process information or evolve." Even if you stretch the others real hard, I don't see how you'd argue that the Earth "reproduces." Especially not the more rigorous definition of reproduces fertile copies of itself which can evolve.

On an ecosystem (not geological) level, one could argue that space colonization is reproduction and that spaceships are the ecosystem's spores.

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#375

Post by quantadev »

smolder wrote: post #327
Jerrrrrrry wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I say cannibalized, because avoiding eating your own species is a higher brain function that would've came far later, Two convergent intuitions as to why this is true, but for the wrong reasons: Species (maybe only [di?]morphic ones) rarely kill other instances of their own species, only maim - usually to the point of socially/reproductive shame/selective behavior; as infra-species violence is usually done for sexua…

> it is not generally advantageous to actually hurt the opponent more than needed to signal dominance It is advantageous to beat a rival and take their energy even within a species. That's part of the whole 'survival of the fittest' thing. Preserving them for cooperation or something like slavery happens, but it's a rare strategy specific to intelligent animals like the GP implies.

As Dawkins points out in `Selfish Gene`, it's the DNA sequence that's the evolutionary entity. For example, all mothers (and most fathers) protect their young even though it's a food source. Eating your own species (even children of other mothers) is counterproductive for the DNA itself, despite being productive for the particular copy of the animal doing the eating.

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#376

Post by erikerikson »

dukeofdoom wrote: post #261
incompatible wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Very much alive," in the sense of being a living organism in their own right. By that standard, each cell in the human body can also be considered a separate living organism, simply cooperating with other humans cells in a complex way. It makes sense, since we have no problem identifying the trillions of bacteria cells living on or in the human body as separate living organisms.

"Sperm and egg cells, known as gametes, fuse during fertilization to create a zygote. " Since all humans were just 2 cells at one point. It seems to follow that the entirely of the code for what a human is, is contained in just those 2 cells. Not just code for a finger. But even code for our deeply ingrained fear of snakes. Was just at one point contained in those 2 cells. Kind of blows your mind. If they are separat…

No. The expression of genes is controlled by their environment. We are products of both nature and nurture.

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#377

Post by softfalcon »

meneton wrote: post #179

This article is framed as if there is something novel and profound here, but the "aliveness" of mitochondria is simply a matter of how we choose to apply the label "life" - a human linguistic construct that exists independently of the biological phenomena. This is not a new discussion - science has been considering this question for many decades, just as it has with viruses. These all come down to arguments about sem…

I don’t disagree with your take. The concept of the semantics of “what is alive?” has been going on for a long while now.

Have you considered that this is a more formal version of a Bill Nye science explainer, but for adults?

The reason I say this is that while unintended (I think) your post has a, “of course they’re alive, we’ve known this forever” vibe, which can inadvertently come across as condescending.

I don’t mean to pick on you, we’re all guilty of such speak when we deem concepts to be obvious or well known.

Your post reminds me of the “1 in 10,000” XKCD comic:

https://xkcd.com/1053/

Again, I don’t disagree that your knowledge of history and science is correct. Am just curious why you wrote your explainer in the way you did.

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#378

Post by Jerrrrrrry »

smolder wrote: post #327
Jerrrrrrry wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I say cannibalized, because avoiding eating your own species is a higher brain function that would've came far later, Two convergent intuitions as to why this is true, but for the wrong reasons: Species (maybe only [di?]morphic ones) rarely kill other instances of their own species, only maim - usually to the point of socially/reproductive shame/selective behavior; as infra-species violence is usually done for sexua…

> it is not generally advantageous to actually hurt the opponent more than needed to signal dominance It is advantageous to beat a rival and take their energy even within a species. That's part of the whole 'survival of the fittest' thing. Preserving them for cooperation or something like slavery happens, but it's a rare strategy specific to intelligent animals like the GP implies.

  >reserving them for cooperation or something like slavery happens, but it's a rare strategy specific to intelligent animals
Exactly, GP thinks this is a higher order behavior.

I should had clarified, this is lower, more intuitive behavior. It is not, which is why it arises emergently in lower-complexity/class systems.

  >beat a rival and take their energy even within a species
Beating a rival and taking their energy is awesome!

And if done with literal, figurative, social, and complex "CLASS", it is literally sexy too!

National Geographic is entertaining for many dimensions of reasons.

Actually dismembering your sexual-rival and literally consuming their poor caloric conversion is pitifully inefficient compared to making them a sub-ling, whether it be via hen-pecking or innate dominance. It made sense before sexual dimorphication (moreso), but less so now.

Ladies like a gentleman, and gentleman's agreements are literally non-colluding emergent behavior to abide by unspoken higher-order rules for one's own explicit conscious self-incentive (lower order, high entropy), but also the implicit collective unconsciousness incentive (higher social order, lower entropy)

Both are reslience traits, which only emerge when selected for.

Re: Mitochondria Are Alive

#379

Post by quantadev »

Jerrrrrrry wrote: post #373
quantadev wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea what you meant by liver. Maybe it's a biology term I'm unaware of. Certainly you didn't mean the organ. lolz. Anyway, an interesting point about evolution is that things had to have been eating other smaller things long before the brain had enough processing power for "Species Recognition". It would've initially been a simple brain and rod/cone eye neuron and motor neuron in a fish that executed primar…

Liver/kidneys are organs where toxins are filtered, from the prey the predator consumes. I am not a biologist obviously. Because of the "food chain" actually being a pyramid, those organs contain the same "toxins" that are to be avoided, exponentially accumulating in whatever "organ" had the function to add resiliency by storing these toxins.

Oh, I see. You expected people to infer "toxins" from the words "resilience/filter". Got it.

However, liver eating is a moot point regardless, because evolutionary theory would suggest eating toxins would have a bad taste/smell, so that organ would simply be avoided, while eating the rest. So it has no bearing on whether cannibalism happens or not.

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