Whatup ya'll? So I have to write a long research/argument paper on a topic of my choice by tomorrow and the requirements include a "survey" or a poll that relates to my topic. I am trying to prove that Humans are actually a bacterial infection upon the Earth and all we do is harm it and its inhabitants. Almost everything we do pollutes the ozone: We burn fossil fuels, cut down trees (it releases CO2 at a much more rapid rate than normal), contaminate water with our chemicals and we build cities that ruin the natural land (LOL LOS ANGELES).
My question to you guys is what you think about this whole idea.
Poll: Are Humans Bacteria Upon the Earth? (Vote): Yes, we ruin the earth through our bacterial ways. (Vote): No, we are just the dominant species (Vote): I have a different opinion (please explain)
I agree with your point and understand the basic premise to it, in essence that we are bad for the planet. However I think you should replace the word bacteria for something else. Off the top of my head I can't actually think.
We're just the dominant species, and the reason we pollute kill destroy everything is all because of money and stuff (basically concepts which originated from our own minds). Actually our intellect may be our own downfall. :s
I wrote this paper almost against my own ideas. I think that we are the dominant species and I am using that idea as my counter argument. I paralleled humans to the disease "necrotizing fasciitis" which is the flesh eating bacterial infection and said that humans eat the flesh of the Earth through our activities. This parallel keeps losing power though
OO? You wrote a long paper not knowing whats the difference between a parasite and a bacteria? You do realize that without bacteria we wouldnt exist and most bacteria are actually useful to the world oO
What are you majoring in or are you still in High School? I suggest changing bacteria to parasite immediately and actually search up the words on wikipedia.
Also btw if you are including non living objects + ecosystems in your definition of a parasite most organisims will be parasites in one way or another inevitabely for their source of energy/metabolism/materials/resources for growth/synthesis. So yeah even though it sounds like a good metaphor the idea is pretty meh, but you can work the paper as a symbolic representation of the rather large negative influence our species is inflicting upon this world. Research your paper more, and if this is not for a general english class you have to rewrite most of this stuff.
I think bacteria are the dominant species. There's really no way we can get rid of them, whereas they could potentially get rid of us (bubonic plague made a good effort). Also, in terms of numbers, Wikipedia says that there are about 5 x 10^30 (five nonillion) bacteria in the world, compared to ~7 x 10^9 (seven billion) humans. Also, humans could not live without bacteria--there are more bacterial cells in your body than human cells, and these bacterial cells are essential in digestion. Bacteria, of course, would be just fine without humans around.
ur under the impression that bacteria are something destructive by nature. not the case. use your words carefully. i dont even think parasite would apply because we do not live in another organism's intestine or shit like that. damn dude this is gonna be bad paper, u got 0% supporting your idea lol. and btw, humans are only responsible for like 1% of the world's total co2 emmissions or something crazy low like that. everything emmits co2 into the atmosphere, a crushing wave, a cow's fart, etc. gl, ur gonna need it
edit: and one last thing...if ur trying to make it seem like "destroying the earth and using up its resources" is a horrible thing, u have to prove that its a horrible thing. and u have to prove why a human cutting down a tree is so much more horrible than an ant eating a little leaf. ur really just jump-starting your paper from the popular point of view of "omg humans are destroying the planet we are so bad" and thats weak. not too long ago humans used to think the earth belonged to them and it was in their rightful nature to exploit it, and some still do (i, for one, agree with this to a certain extent). after all, we are all living organisms, and we have to utilize resources to survive. unless ur advocating to the extermination of the human race. then i'd be interested in your paper.
Bacteria are a type of organism, nothing to do with humans. And many bacteria are not harmful. I think you're looking for a word that implies humanity is an infectious disease or pathogen. But the thing is, any species with our level of consumption is going to harm the earth. It's not really our species thats the problem, it's just that there's too many of us, using too many resources.. kind of like an algae bloom or something similar.
Ripoff from The Matrix I presume? It is not a bacteria, we are a virus. We infest a source(aka planet) and drain all the power and energy until it is nothing left, and the source dies. Just like virus does. We use the oil and other fossil fuels that are not renewable. Then eventually we will be our own doom cuz we use and spend and dont think about the future, even when we do care about the future we dont change our behavior at all.
A virus does not live on its own as a bacteria does. A virus infests another bacteria, thats the only way they can survive. So u can change the bacteria with the earth. A bacteria itself can be a good thing, but some are not. But they dont live off other sources as a virus does.
My English there might not be good enough but watch this clip from the Matrix. This might give u some tips
On November 18 2009 02:11 samachking wrote: OO? You wrote a long paper not knowing whats the difference between a parasite and a bacteria? You do realize that without bacteria we wouldnt exist and most bacteria are actually useful to the world oO
What are you majoring in or are you still in High School? I suggest changing bacteria to parasite immediately and actually search up the words on wikipedia.
I didn't think about the definition of bacteria and confused it with parasite. I'm a sophomore in college majoring in engineering. Also my idea was more of a figurative parallel than a scientific definition because the Earth, although it is "living" it is not biologically an organism in itself.
I was thinking though maybe I could bring up the idea that some humans are good bacteria while most are bad. For example "environmentalists" could be considered good for the earth and oil companies could be bad bacteria, this way I don't run into the problem of arguing that environmentalists are still parasites. I did consider the word parasites but bacteria seemed more fitting for some reason...
Its for english comp 2 which is a general english class that I hardly care about but i still want a decent paper.
On November 18 2009 02:11 samachking wrote: OO? You wrote a long paper not knowing whats the difference between a parasite and a bacteria? You do realize that without bacteria we wouldnt exist and most bacteria are actually useful to the world oO
What are you majoring in or are you still in High School? I suggest changing bacteria to parasite immediately and actually search up the words on wikipedia.
I didn't think about the definition of bacteria and confused it with parasite. I'm a sophomore in college majoring in engineering. Also my idea was more of a figurative parallel than a scientific definition because the Earth, although it is "living" it is not biologically an organism in itself.
I was thinking though maybe I could bring up the idea that some humans are good bacteria while most are bad. For example "environmentalists" could be considered good for the earth and oil companies could be bad bacteria, this way I don't run into the problem of arguing that environmentalists are still parasites. I did consider the word parasites but bacteria seemed more fitting for some reason...
I added a bit on your topic by editing my post, the thing is, as an objective metaphor while including a-biotic systems within the definition of a parasite, every living thing( to my knowledge, there might be exceptions) is a parasite since they consume resources, although they give back resources in their own way, its still usually not a symbiotic relationship completely. A better way to do this paper is to think of the biosphere as a zero-sum game of parasitism and limited resources, and we humans at the top of the chain consume the most resources and hence are the greatest parasites to this world, thats a cool spin on it.
edit:English class, I suppose if the teacher isnt too picky just go with it, its a nice metaphor. If she is gay about it she probably has too much time on her hands.
Yeah, I have to agree, you are using a very bad analogy, parasite would work best...I don't really think virus would work at all, and bacteria is just kinda retarded. A good portion of bacteria is helpful to the larger organism that it lives in/on. (There are bacteria in our digestive systems that pretty much digest our food for us, or at least break it down into things that we can digest.)
Edit: Well, seems from above others have already steered you away from bacteria.
On November 18 2009 02:11 samachking wrote: OO? You wrote a long paper not knowing whats the difference between a parasite and a bacteria? You do realize that without bacteria we wouldnt exist and most bacteria are actually useful to the world oO
What are you majoring in or are you still in High School? I suggest changing bacteria to parasite immediately and actually search up the words on wikipedia.
I didn't think about the definition of bacteria and confused it with parasite. I'm a sophomore in college majoring in engineering. Also my idea was more of a figurative parallel than a scientific definition because the Earth, although it is "living" it is not biologically an organism in itself.
I was thinking though maybe I could bring up the idea that some humans are good bacteria while most are bad. For example "environmentalists" could be considered good for the earth and oil companies could be bad bacteria, this way I don't run into the problem of arguing that environmentalists are still parasites. I did consider the word parasites but bacteria seemed more fitting for some reason...
I added a bit on your topic by editing my post, the thing is, as an objective metaphor while including a-biotic systems within the definition of a parasite, every living thing( to my knowledge, there might be exceptions) is a parasite since they consume resources, although they give back resources in their own way, its still usually not a symbiotic relationship completely. A better way to do this paper is to think of the biosphere as a zero-sum game of parasitism and limited resources, and we humans at the top of the chain consume the most resources and hence are the greatest parasites to this world, thats a cool spin on it.
edit:English class, I suppose if the teacher isnt too picky just go with it, its a nice metaphor. If she is gay about it she probably has too much time on her hands.
I am going to re work my thesis and see what I can come up with. I guess there is a reason I couldn't find research on it because it makes no sense; that's what I get for half assing it haha.
yep virus or pathogens are more like it. not really parasite or bacteria. but gosh boy. why do u want an entire paper to be a metaphor? why dont u just argue that humans have gone way beyond the fight of extinction vs. survival, and moved on to a destructive quest for higher quality of life. include the metaphor in the paper, but dont make the entire paper a metaphor thats just...yea
I dug myself into a hole then because I have it all worked around that thesis and it's due tommorow! FUCK. I will rewrite it and post the thesis to see if it is legit.
Your teacher isn't going to look favorably on an online, anonymous poll.... and you probably want to stay away from a really abstract analogy that's just a total bite off of the matrix.
On November 18 2009 03:09 Hawk wrote: Your teacher isn't going to look favorably on an online, anonymous poll.... and you probably want to stay away from a really abstract analogy that's just a total bite off of the matrix.
its ok my teacher likes me alot so ill probably get a B or A no matter what but only if i put a little more effort in. And this is a survey it doesnt matter where i got it.
As a species we have a negative effect on biodiversity. We introduce flora and fauna to evironments outside their natural range where they run rampant. Some subspiecies are created by us as pets and livestock. These only add to the problem. We destroy biotopes. We even endanger ourselves by destabilizing the whole planetwide ecosystem as a whole. A parasite destroying its host?
I think that this topic is too inherently biased to be able to write a fair paper about. Writing about something that you yourself are taking part in means you have an inherent bias, whether it is in favor of your side or against it.
I doubt you can consider humans as polluters any more than cyanobacteria. Consider how 3.4bya, when life first began, most organisms were anaerobic. They hated oxygen, and lucky for them there was very little oxygen around. Yet in 2.7bya, cyanobacteria came about and were able to undergo photosynthesis. This benefited them: they have a massive source of energy available to them, and all that happens is that they produce some oxygen instead. Of course, oxygen is toxic to a massive amount of the organisms at the time, and the resulting mass oxygenation event resulted in the mass deaths of unknown numbers of anaerobes. That is definitely a source of pollution, but nobody seems to give a flying fuck that humans are doing the same thing (as a natural process), except that unlike cyanobacteria we actually are trying to do something to mediate our effect. Yet we have this mentality to compare ourselves to a pox on the earth, when in fact we should compare ourselves to algae. They have reduced biodiversity as much as we have, changed the atmosphere as much as we have, and yet we're not on a manhunt to destroy all the cyanobacteria. Go figure.
On November 18 2009 03:58 Caller wrote: I think that this topic is too inherently biased to be able to write a fair paper about. Writing about something that you yourself are taking part in means you have an inherent bias, whether it is in favor of your side or against it.
I doubt you can consider humans as polluters any more than cyanobacteria. Consider how 3.4bya, when life first began, most organisms were anaerobic. They hated oxygen, and lucky for them there was very little oxygen around. Yet in 2.7bya, cyanobacteria came about and were able to undergo photosynthesis. This benefited them: they have a massive source of energy available to them, and all that happens is that they produce some oxygen instead. Of course, oxygen is toxic to a massive amount of the organisms at the time, and the resulting mass oxygenation event resulted in the mass deaths of unknown numbers of anaerobes. That is definitely a source of pollution, but nobody seems to give a flying fuck that humans are doing the same thing (as a natural process), except that unlike cyanobacteria we actually are trying to do something to mediate our effect. Yet we have this mentality to compare ourselves to a pox on the earth, when in fact we should compare ourselves to algae. They have reduced biodiversity as much as we have, changed the atmosphere as much as we have, and yet we're not on a manhunt to destroy all the cyanobacteria. Go figure.
Yea there is an obvious bias too because I am a human and only see things from a human perspective. You can say that about anything pretty much. The thing about this paper is that it is meant to get me thinking and looking up information on some specific topic which I am doing so i am not too worried about it.
That is a good idea though, I could have a massive counter argument to my initial thesis that totally disproves it and points out the flaws then work backwards from there and flip the entire thing around. Thanks
I've heard multiple theories along these lines and I think there are a lot of flaws and assumptions you make. First of all, we can't be a parasite/bacteria "to the earth" because the earth isn't a living organism. If the counter-argument for that is along the lines of: "humans act parasitically towards the living entities in the environment around them," then I postulate that every animal acts that way, by eating the plants or other animals for sustenance. To the argument that we're "harming nature" in what we do, I would respond that we are a part of nature, we came from nature, and everything we do, therefore, is natural.
The by-products and pollutants that we're spewing from our machines and technologies aren't so much a plague to life on earth so much as it is a plague to ourselves. By changing the environment that we evolved to thrive in we're stabbing ourselves in the foot. Of course, there are many other animals that we're also stabbing in the foot with our actions, but our habits are not going to wipe out life. At worst, the rapid climate shift would wipe out a majority of the species, and those that it didn't wipe out will likely thrive and evolve in the new world. Whether or not we're going to be a part of that is yet to be seen.
Furthermore, the very definition of "parasite" or "bacteria" excludes the human race. We made up those terms to define micro-organisms. The observed similarities between what we do and what those organisms do are no more significant than the observation that we fuck the same way monkeys fuck, we eat fish like bears eat fish, we live in shelters we create just like the pygmy boar of India lives in it's own shelter, etc.
I am trying to prove that Humans are actually a bacterial infection upon the Earth and all we do is harm it and its inhabitants. Almost everything we do pollutes the ozone: We burn fossil fuels, cut down trees (it releases CO2 at a much more rapid rate than normal), contaminate water with our chemicals and we build cities that ruin the natural land (LOL LOS ANGELES).
What does ANY of that have to do with bacteria?
I was thinking though maybe I could bring up the idea that some humans are good bacteria while most are bad. For example "environmentalists" could be considered good for the earth and oil companies could be bad bacteria, this way I don't run into the problem of arguing that environmentalists are still parasites. I did consider the word parasites but bacteria seemed more fitting for some reason...
This just sounds very convoluted...
I think you're looking at bacteria and parasites as inherently bad, which is just wrong.
In the words of Agent Smith, we are a virus! :D In all seriousness I agree that bacteria is probably not the best term to use. You could say we have a parasitic symbiotic relationship with the planet. But then you would to assume that the planet is a "living" organism, which is isn't. The planet itself is merely rock which all living things live and depend on. Its true that we are messing it up real bad though. But I always recall the words of Ian Malcom from Jurassic Park where he talks about how its a joke all this "save the planet" stuff because the planet has and will survive worse then us and we really are just trying to save ourselves because we probably kill ourselves and the planet will just stay here chilling until life forms again. We don't have the capability to really hurt the planet, just our living conditions on it (and it will repair itself in the long run anyway after we are gone).
On December 28 2009 05:17 Hypnosis wrote: i know don;t worry
Yeah, unfortunately you bumped your blog and everyone who reads it is going to momentarily forget it's the middle of winter holidays and you couldn't possibly still need advice T.T
This bacteria analogy is rather quite abstract. You're best off changing it so that the topic isn't just a debate over some definitions. Topicwise, I think that we are bacteria in that we live to be, just as any other organism does. We're not ruining it rather we're doing things that are beneficial for us that have negative effects on the earth; where as other animals are doing things that are beneficial for them that is percieved as having a "natural" effect on the world.
On November 18 2009 01:57 DwmC_Foefen wrote: We're just the dominant species, and the reason we pollute kill destroy everything is all because of money and stuff (basically concepts which originated from our own minds). Actually our intellect may be our own downfall. :s
His question is "are humans scourges of the earth?" I would say yes.
The question "are humans bacteria" makes no sense because biologically speaking, of course not, and metaphorically speaking, not all bacteria are harmful.
@Hypnosis you are Wrong, wrong in Facts, and you are brain washed by the media.
" I am trying to prove that Humans are actually a bacterial infection upon the Earth and all we do is harm it and its inhabitants. " You will fail at logic trying to Prove this.
The Earth does not give a fuck about how we "harm" it, it also does not give a fuck about its inhabitants. If earth has a pocket full of fucks, and every single human is handing over a cliff about to fall to their death, and looks up to earth and ask " would you plz give me a fuck???" Earth will no doubt and reply " Too Bad for you guys, But you know, I don't give a fuck" We human are the one who actually giving a fuck, we give a fuck not because we are trying to save the planet, it is because we want to save ourselves.
Consider the following, Human as a specie has been existed on earth for a friction of the 4.6billion years of age. It had been here for long long time, way way before any human developed critical thinking ability. The planet does not give a shit what we human do, it doesn't care how much CO2 we releases, how much nuke we drop on each other, it will still be there at the end of the day, and will be here for a long long time after human as a specie gets wipe out.
Then who cares about the planet?, WE DO!!!!!. Why??? Because we want to survive, we don't want to go away, we are the only specie that do not need to adapt to the environment we live in, we change our environment as we see fit.
You need to stop using phases such as "Saving the environment saving the Earth", because the earth and its environment does not need you to save, WE DO. when you use those phases what you are really saying is "save the humans from themselves"
But if my words are not entering your ear, or perhaps they are existing your left ear right after it enters your right, then maybe George Carlin have more credibility than I do around here.
We're clearly not bacteria in the biological sense. Bacteria are referred to in popular culture as an invisible danger. Look at anti-bacterial soap - it's a shield against this invisible enemy. I does nothing but sit on your hands and dry, and yet it's protecting you. One might call it superstitious if they didn't know better. And think of the way that the dangers of bacteria are presented in the news and in the classroom - they're too small to see, but when they get inside of you they cause you harm.
The word you're looking for is parasite.
And we're not that either, sorry. Sure you can weaken the definition of the word to include humans, but then all animals are parasitic. Every husband is parasitic. Every business is parasitic. Essentially all you'd be doing is destroying a word that has a niche use
On December 29 2009 11:22 GrayArea wrote: bacteria are prokaryotes. humans are eukaryotes.
On a more fundamental level, bacteria is a domain level classification, where as human (homo) is a genus level classification, or a species level classification (sapiens).