Thread: There has to be an answer

Interesting thoughts. I think everything that exists has a purpose or it would have been weeded out by nature by now. Though I don't think 'making humans money' is a valid enough reason for something to exist. There has to be more to it. Most things have existed and had a purpose long before our tiny little fraction of advanced human history.

Originally Posted by marlie

germs-keep whole industrys alive.

Germs and bacteria are really the most prosperous creatures on the planet, outnumbering the number of humans on it multiple times, and we are all alive at their mercy. Bacteria keeps us healthy, but can also make a sick. If bacteria was ever advanced enough to decide to get rid of us, we'd all be dead, just like that.

So yeah, I think they're kind of important. The purpose of something doesn't revolve around us anyway.

Pandas

Yep Pandas lol, they should be dead by now. Maybe they helped stop the bamboo from growing everywhere, but we do a good enough job of that now so....

BTW your reasons for the things you mentioned sucked. DeeryTheDeer's post explains why.

Sloths, humans.

Depends what your definition of pointful and pointless is.

Originally Posted by marlie

There has to be something completely pointless, which isnt eaten, making people money, contributing anything to the world.
any suggestions?

Very anthropocentric view of the world there.

Something's pointless if it doesn't have a use by humans huh?

Really Marlie, really? Can you not yourself reflect and see how silly this is?

Originally Posted by Carôusoul

Very anthropocentric view of the world there.

Something's pointless if it doesn't have a use by humans huh?

Eaten could mean eaten by anything- not neccesarily a human, contributing to the earth could mean.. polination. Its only human based in your mind, not mine.

Really Marlie, really? Can you not yourself reflect and see how silly this is?
Its not silly to discuss things that arent of interest to YOU.. its an open forum... dont like my thread, please skip past it.

sigh

Originally Posted by tommo

Yep Pandas lol, they should be dead by now. Maybe they helped stop the bamboo from growing everywhere, but we do a good enough job of that now so....

BTW your reasons for the things you mentioned sucked. DeeryTheDeer's post explains why.

Sloths, humans.

I dont know much about sloths, but you could have the answer with humans, we do more harm than good to the earth, really i am looking at it from the planets point of view.. rather than a human one... if thats possible.. i dunno.. its a slow day at work.. and as i suspected i couldnt quite put into words what was in my head lol.
Depends what your definition of pointful and pointless is.

.

Pandas may exist for our amusement. Our amusement exists for? Then that which exists for our amusement exists for? Ad infinitum.

Reasons are illogical on an objective scale.

Exactly what I was thinking cloud. We have to define pointful and pointless first.

I know what the most important animal is though, can anyone guess it? By most important I mean no other animal could survive without them if they were to die right now.

Originally Posted by marlie

sigh

you heavily implied that it was use by humans, that's why all the other posts have independently recognised that.



also it doesn't matter if it's of interest to me, i was pointing it out because i think you're wrong in how you think.

Interesting thoughts. I think everything that exists has a purpose or it would have been weeded out by nature by now.

That doesn't really make any sense.

What do you mean by purpose? Do you mean to provide some kind of natural harmony? That's not really true, organisms exist to recreate themselves, not serve a higher purpose.

And if by purpose you in fact mean 'to exist and hence reproduce themselves'; well, then there have never been any organisms without purpose so it's an empty statement.

Originally Posted by Carôusoul

you heavily implied that it was use by humans, that's why all the other posts have independently recognised that.

how so exactly? eaten could have been by anything, human or otherwise, infact the only part of my post that was specifically human related.. were just 2 of infinite points possible to make

also it doesn't matter if it's of interest to me, i was pointing it out because i think you're wrong in how you think.
theres no wrong or right because u took what i said as a completely literal statement, and ignored the fact that i was asking for peoples input, not claiming to know the answer, i started this thread because i am feeding a small thought i had to see where other peoples thought process took it

Pherhaps i should have started a thread on catgirls or manga.. may have been more accepted... god forbid anyone attempts a thought process different to everyone elses here.

I think this is the question marlie meant to ask:

Is there any organism on Earth that could be removen completely, without any other organisms being affected in any way, at all, directly or indirectly?

Originally Posted by Marvo

I think this is the question marlie meant to ask:

Is there any organism on Earth that could be removen completely, without any other organisms being affected in any way, at all, directly or indirectly?

This is better.

I suppose then the biological term would be a single-species ecosystem.

*Googles*.

http://ecoworldly.com/2008/10/11/sci...arths-surface/

Wow. That's incredible.

Marlie, the answer is 'yes' in the sense that they don't interact with any other species.

However if that makes them pointless then by induction everything is pointless.

Originally Posted by Marvo

I think this is the question marlie meant to ask:

Is there any organism on Earth that could be removen completely, without any other organisms being affected in any way, at all, directly or indirectly?

Thankyou Marvo.. you got me completely,that is exactly what i was trying to ask.. in a roundabout, cackhanded sleep deprived way

Originally Posted by ClouD

Pandas may exist for our amusement. Our amusement exists for? Then that which exists for our amusement exists for? Ad infinitum.

Reasons are illogical on an objective scale.

you make my tiny brain hurt

Nature abhors a vacuum. Most of us have heard this classic phrase before. What does this mean for this question? Every living creature right now fills a niche in the eco-system, including man. If that creature were to disappear, it creates a vacuum, that another creature will fill.

No creature is 'pointless' because everything is a part of a much larger picture. Even the so called pointless creatures that go extinct still played a role for evolution.

Originally Posted by marlie

Thankyou Marvo.. you got me completely,that is exactly what i was trying to ask.. in a roundabout, cackhanded sleep deprived way

I just answered the question. Hullo? I promise I'm not invisible.

Nature abhors a vacuum. Most of us have heard this classic phrase before. What does this mean for this question? Every living creature right now fills a niche in the eco-system, including man. If that creature were to disappear, it creates a vacuum, that another creature will fill.

No creature is 'pointless' because everything is a part of a much larger picture. Even the so called pointless creatures that go extinct still played a role for evolution.

Yeah I just showed an example of how that isn't true.

And why does evolution mean that it had a point? Because it led to the creation of more pointless creatures? How does that make it not pointless? Or are you thinking that it may have led to the evolution of man?

This entire thread has a large anthropocentric bias. Once again, what exactly is the meaning of 'purpose'?

If you think about the butterfly effect, everything does interact with everything else eventually.
but if everything has a purpose, then how special can having a purpose be?

Originally Posted by marlie

humans, we do more harm than good to the earth,

But if a big meteor were to come crashing towards our planet, wouldn't human beings would be the only ones who
could save the planet? By launching a nuclear bomb at it or something.

Originally Posted by marlie

Pherhaps i should have started a thread on catgirls or manga.. may have been more accepted... god forbid anyone attempts a thought process different to everyone elses here.

It's good that your not afraid to express your opinion.
That's just what all of us are doing also.

Is anyone going to define pointful and pointless????
3 people have said we need to do so yet no one had tried.
I am looking to marlie since you started the thread.

I know what the most important animal is though, can anyone guess it? By most important I mean no other animal could survive without them if they were to die right now.

Originally Posted by Bonsay

Pandas

Ditto.

Originally Posted by tommo

Is anyone going to define pointful and pointless????
3 people have said we need to do so yet no one had tried.
I am looking to marlie since you started the thread.

By pointless i meant, should it become extinct nothing else would notice/ be affected by its loss...

Im sure though it could be argued that many specific insects would fall under that category.. because if they were food for another creature.. the creature would move onto another kind of insect.. pherhaps. So maybe it has to go deeper than "being part of a food chain"

xei is gonna shout at me in a minute because he i guess answered probably as well as i could hope.. a single species eco system... would i assume.. cover that criteria.

Humans are pointless. We're parasites.

"In general, parasites are much smaller than their hosts, show a high degree of specialization for their mode of life, and reproduce more quickly and in greater numbers than their hosts."
We're smaller than the Earth, are very specialized in our lives having forced nature to adapt to us instead of the other way around, and reproduce to the point that we're not facing a serious population problem.

"Parasites reduce host fitness in many ways, ranging from general or specialized pathology (such as castration), impairment of secondary sex characteristics, to the modification of host behaviour. Parasites increase their fitness by exploiting hosts for food, habitat and dispersal."
We have modified the Earth's 'behaviour' (global warming - climate is acting differently than it should), we abuse resources regularly.

The quotes are from Wikipedia.

You take us off the Earth, nothing harmful happens. In fact, it would be the opposite. Plantation would take over (like in Chernobyl) once our technology stops running without our aid and eventually wildlife would bloom as well. The climate would return to normal, resources would replenish, etc.

Originally Posted by Moose

Humans are pointless. We're parasites.

"In general, parasites are much smaller than their hosts, show a high degree of specialization for their mode of life, and reproduce more quickly and in greater numbers than their hosts."
We're smaller than the Earth, are very specialized in our lives having forced nature to adapt to us instead of the other way around, and reproduce to the point that we're not facing a serious population problem.

"Parasites reduce host fitness in many ways, ranging from general or specialized pathology (such as castration), impairment of secondary sex characteristics, to the modification of host behaviour. Parasites increase their fitness by exploiting hosts for food, habitat and dispersal."
We have modified the Earth's 'behaviour' (global warming - climate is acting differently than it should), we abuse resources regularly.

The quotes are from Wikipedia.

You take us off the Earth, nothing harmful happens. In fact, it would be the opposite. Plantation would take over (like in Chernobyl) once our technology stops running without our aid and eventually wildlife would bloom as well. The climate would return to normal, resources would replenish, etc.

Why such a negative view about humans? When talking about parasitic relationships, it only pertains to living organisms, not the earth. Otherwise almost every animal would be considered a parasite. There are also organisms with populations many times larger than ours, but they aren't parasites.