Table of Life.
I asked myself a quick but significant question the other day, who should be at the head of the table of life?
It got me thinking about who or what should take that most prominent position. What kind of ability or life skill qualifies for the answer to my question. First, I thought about the fact that amongst the species of jelly fish is the immortal jelly fish and as its name implies it simply does not die. This is quite a concept to comprehend! Achieved once it becomes mature, it has the ability to return to a former immature stage of life and keep repeating the process. However it still is vulnerable to other forms of death.
Maybe single cell prokaryotic and eukaryotic organisms deserve a mention, as they first appeared on earth about four billion years ago and for a considerable amount of time all life was actually microorganisms.
An impressive stepping stone in the table of life are creatures that posses qualities of vegetation and animal behaviour, such as the green sea slug that uses photosynthesis for survival.
The Euglena is a good example of having the traits of life and processes for both vegetation and animal. It is small, narrow and propels itself through water by a whip like appendage. They have chloroplasts that are clearly visible and convert sun light into energy for living processes. This form of algae are incredible in their energy transfer ability and definitely ranking up there on a table of life.
The flat worm has a mind boggling ability to replace damaged or lost parts of its self, converting and regrowing accordingly so as to continue survival. I will not go into the details as they are slightly stomach turning. Did I say stomach? That reminds me of tape worms.
The Archaeopteryx caused a great debate over possessing bird feathers and scales, as well as teeth in its mouth. It also had a claw on its wing to help with climbing.
Not to be outdone with unusual attributes, the platypus is a mammal with a duck bill that lays eggs and is a carnivore. It has webbed feet and on its hind legs, a poisonous spur. It also is covered in fur and has a flattened tail. It’s habitat is in streams and rivers based in Australia and Tasmania
Is that the sound of a human baby crying? Compared with other forms of life, the human young take a very long time to reach the stage of being able to survive on its own. The human brain and the ability to speak, as well as cooperating for survival, are important attributes. However they are influential, as it is quite possible that these human models of civilised behaviour, could destroy the ecosystem by design or accident?
It should be pointed out that at a real table, most of these guests would be eating each other or infested with parasites and bacteria, not to leave out of course viruses. Yet it is important to realise that this is the way of life and for millions of years, even after mass extinction of creatures, there has been a new surge of life.
It got me thinking about who or what should take that most prominent position. What kind of ability or life skill qualifies for the answer to my question. First, I thought about the fact that amongst the species of jelly fish is the immortal jelly fish and as its name implies it simply does not die. This is quite a concept to comprehend! Achieved once it becomes mature, it has the ability to return to a former immature stage of life and keep repeating the process. However it still is vulnerable to other forms of death.
Maybe single cell prokaryotic and eukaryotic organisms deserve a mention, as they first appeared on earth about four billion years ago and for a considerable amount of time all life was actually microorganisms.
An impressive stepping stone in the table of life are creatures that posses qualities of vegetation and animal behaviour, such as the green sea slug that uses photosynthesis for survival.
The Euglena is a good example of having the traits of life and processes for both vegetation and animal. It is small, narrow and propels itself through water by a whip like appendage. They have chloroplasts that are clearly visible and convert sun light into energy for living processes. This form of algae are incredible in their energy transfer ability and definitely ranking up there on a table of life.
The flat worm has a mind boggling ability to replace damaged or lost parts of its self, converting and regrowing accordingly so as to continue survival. I will not go into the details as they are slightly stomach turning. Did I say stomach? That reminds me of tape worms.
The Archaeopteryx caused a great debate over possessing bird feathers and scales, as well as teeth in its mouth. It also had a claw on its wing to help with climbing.
Not to be outdone with unusual attributes, the platypus is a mammal with a duck bill that lays eggs and is a carnivore. It has webbed feet and on its hind legs, a poisonous spur. It also is covered in fur and has a flattened tail. It’s habitat is in streams and rivers based in Australia and Tasmania
Is that the sound of a human baby crying? Compared with other forms of life, the human young take a very long time to reach the stage of being able to survive on its own. The human brain and the ability to speak, as well as cooperating for survival, are important attributes. However they are influential, as it is quite possible that these human models of civilised behaviour, could destroy the ecosystem by design or accident?
It should be pointed out that at a real table, most of these guests would be eating each other or infested with parasites and bacteria, not to leave out of course viruses. Yet it is important to realise that this is the way of life and for millions of years, even after mass extinction of creatures, there has been a new surge of life.
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