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Originally Posted by Michaelangelica
Thanks for your comments on bacteria. they certainly don't fit the Natural Selection Hypothesis.
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Not what he said I think.
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Originally Posted by CraigD
When Darwin wrote “The Origin of Species” from about 1840 to 1859, I don’t think he anticipated how unlike the beasts, birds, bugs, and plants he was able to study were organisms like bacteria. Nonetheless, bacteria appear to compete for resources – to “fight for survival” - as or more intensely than other organisms, so the “survival of the fittest” idea, though an imprecise one, appears to apply as well to them as to the organisms with which Darwin was familiar
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Originally Posted by Michaelangelica
Some explanation as requested:-
In 1926, people in Europe and America began to come down with a strange sleeping sickness which became known as Encephalitis lethargica. Victims would go to sleep and not wake up. In ten years the disease kills some five million people then quietly went away
The 1918 bird/swine flu killed untold millions (Estimates vary from 20-100 million). It appeared in Madrid, Bombay and Philadelphia all in the same week (!?!) then it disappeared.
(my thanks to Bill Bryson)
The point is that some viral and bacteria epidemics (at least among humans -God knows what is happening with the rest of life on the planet) DIE.
This is not good "Survival of the Fittest" How does Darwin explain Death, extinction?
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One way to explain it is like this.
These particular diseases were likely to virulent for their own good. They killed people to fast.
This single factor in their genetic makeup proved to be a considerable weakness. One which, given time, they would have evolved a solution to. Alas, they did not have the time, or perhaps the luck, to evolve a less virulent form of themselves before a combination of:
- lack of hosts (less social contact)
- existing hosts exposed and immune
- man quickly isolating sick people
- And I am certain a variety of other things as well.
Left the organisms without susceptible hosts to infect.
Survival of the fittest. They did end up killing themselves, but not because of evolution, but rather lack of timely evolution.
