From: Grant Callaghan (grantc4@hotmail.com)
Date: Sat 02 Nov 2002 - 22:20:48 GMT
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Grant Callaghan" <grantc4@hotmail.com>
>Kenneth,
> > >What we all forget is that everything and all start as one singularity,
>as
> > >one cell ! We all see cells working together, they are all inbedded in
> > >what collective is known as a human being, the one single cell is for-
> > >gotten ! The interest in one single cell can 't outweight the huge
>accom-
> > >plishments of finding out how other cells work together.
> > >That is my pain !
>Grant,
> > They work together because they can communicate, just as we do, but in
>their
> > own chemical language.
>
>They started to communicate in order to work together, but that wasn 't the
>initial ' goal ' of evolution so to speak, communication was just one step
>up
>on the ladder. The bias was quiet, silent with no words to speak, no
>communi-
>cation just spasphem of uncontrolled behavior inducted by stimili and
>response
>of instinctive processes on the moving of the water where the organism in
>that time
>lived in.
>
>Only when two of the same kind finally met there was something new...
>
>Kenneth
>
>
I can't speak for the goals of evolution, but even single-celled organisms
communicate and some even cooperate. Symbiosis was around before
multi-celled animals. Mitocondria established themselves inside larger
single cells before the larger cells banded together to become multicelled
organisms.
From Creative Nets in the Precambrian Age
By Howard Bloom
THE NETWORKED BACTERIAL "BRAIN"
Eshel Ben Jacob, at the University of Tel Aviv, and James Shapiro at the
University of Chicago have been studying bacterial colonies from a radically
original perspective - and have emerged with surprising results. Their
findings explain why the ripple effect is a mark of bacterial networking -
and of much, much more.
stromatolite
For generations bacteria have been thought of as lone cells, each making its
own way in the world. Ben Jacob and Shapiro, on the other hand, have
demonstrated that few, if any, bacteria are hermits. They are extremely
social beasts. And undeveloped as their cellular structure might be, their
social structure is a wonder. The ripple effect is one manifestation of a
colony's coordinated tactics for mastering its environment. We could call it
the probe and feast approach.
A bacterial spore lands on an area rich in food. Using the nutrients into
which it has fallen, it reproduces at a dizzying rate. But eventually the
initial food patch which gave it its start runs out. Stricken by famine, the
individual bacteria, which by now may number in the millions, do not, like
the citizens of Athens during the plague of 430 b.c., die off where they
lie. Instead these prokaryotes embark on a joint effort aimed at keeping the
colony alive.
The initial progeny of the first spore were sedentary. Being rooted to one
spot made sense when that microbit of territory was overflowing with
edibles. Now the immobile form these first bacteria assumed is no longer a
wise idea. Numerous cells switch gears. Rather than reproducing couch
potatoes like themselves, they marshall their remaining resources to produce
daughters of an entirely different kind - rambunctious rovers built for
movement. Unlike their parents, members of the new generation sport an array
of external whips with which they can snake their way across a hard surface
or twirl through water. This cohort departs en masse to seek its fortune,
expanding ring-like from the base established by its ancestors. The travels
of the fortunate lead to yet more food.
Successful foragers undergo another mass shift. They give birth to daughters
as determined to stick to one spot as their grandparents had once been.
These stay-at-homes sup on the banquet provided by their new surroundings.
Eventually their perch, too, is sucked dry. They then follow bacterial
tradition, generating a new swarm of outbound pioneers. Each succession of
emigrants leaves behind a circle thinned by its spreading search. And each
generation of settlers accumulates in a thick band as it sucks nourishment
from its locale. The ripples of ancient stromatolites are proof positive
that life three and a half billion years ago already took advantage of
social cooperation.
The work of Ben Jacob and Shapiro has demonstrated that bacterial
communities are elaborately interwoven by communication links. Their
signalling devices are many: chemical outpourings with which one group
transmits its findings to all in its vicinity; fragments of genetic
material, each of which spreads a different story from one end of the
population to another. And a variety of other devices for long-distance data
transmission.
These turn a colony into a collective processor for sensing danger, for
feeling out the environment, and for undergoing - if necessary - radical
adaptations to survive and prosper, no matter how tough the challenge. The
resulting modular learning machine is so ingenious that Eshel Ben Jacob has
called it a "creative net."
Grant
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