What really goes on at the cellular level.
My body is made up of some 10^24 cells. For those who can’t count that high, let me put that into perspective – it’s a WHOLE LOT of cells! A few of those cells – like those in my gut – are not human. They are single-celled bacteria, fungus, and plants living on my body and the food I intake. These tiny organisms have their own “consciousness” – they appear to have volition and the ability to hunt, gather, escape, and etc.
How much of my body is human and how much is non-human, then? According to Paul Hawken of the University of Portland, “In each of you are one quadrillion cells, 90 percent of which are not human cells.”
WHAT?!!! MOST of “me” is NOT ME?!!
If our consciousness is derived from the individual consciousnesses of all the cells in our bodies – a world within a world where each cell, creature and plant within that world contributes to the consciousness of the whole – then…
Hmmm… I wonder…
WHO THE BLAZES AM I REALLY?
That’s interesting, I wonder if the same is true for other multicell life forms. When I think of the huge variety of life forms on the earth – we are probably like fractal forms or tiny mirrors of our incredible earth – it makes a lot of sense. Now, let’s get even more bizarre by considering that there are much smaller life forms living on the life forms that live on us, and then even tinier ones that live in and on them, and on and on…
If these tiny life forms within us and on us are like fractals to us – like we are to earth – I wonder if earth is a microscopic life form on which much larger life forms unconsciously coexist with… or conscious
Could it be that we are part of an infinite feeding/feeder system? I wonder if there are any other ways to exist!
I LOVE IT!!! Zoom! It reminds me of the photos of the ear mites that themselves had ear mites. How deep does the rabbit hole go? As you say, maybe “infinite”… WOW!
So, “Horton! Did you hear that?”
LOL! I think that Horton’s natural skill reminds us that popular opinion can’t override the truth, no matter how loud their voices are.
Perhaps I would have been more correct in asking, “WHAT the blazes am I really?”.
So ironically funny. I wonder if we share that condition with every other life form. What if plants carry human cells within them as part of their own life support system? If all of life is capable of sharing the external space, why not the internal one as well?
Good point. Perhaps we are far more interconnected than we can imagine. If I’m mostly NOT human, then other animals may be mostly not their species either, etc. We can accurately say that we are MOSTLY other species and they are mostly other species and we are ALL integral parts of the whole organism we call life on earth (and maybe beyond?).
Ooooooohhhh – shuddering goose bumpies…. from all those “mini-me’s” that are “not-me’s”…
How ironically funny! It is beyond comprehension to me that life kept returning after so many globally destructive periods. Makes me question WHY more than HOW this was accomplished. Life forms became more sophisticated after each “cleanse,” makes me wonder if there was some intended purpose behind it all?
Certainly evolution with its attendant aspects (particularly that of adaptation to environmental factors) could account for what happened after each “cleanse” – answering the “how” question.
As to the “why” question – perhaps earth has a “predisposition” to create and sustain life forms, particularly those based on carbon and DNA.
DNA is incredibly resilient and can express itself in infinite variety. The fact that DNA survived each of the mass extinctions on earth, going on to express itself in so many new life forms each time, tells me that this one molecule is “magical” on earth.
How did DNA get here? Or is it native to earth? So far, nobody has been able to artificially create DNA. Perhaps as we learn more and more about it, someone will eventually answer some of these “why” questions…….. And, maybe they won’t.
Considering the wide variety of DNA that makes up my own body, I can’t help but think that the “magic” is in the “sauce”.