Dominant life form on Earth

[Admiral Valdemar]

http://www.creationscience.com/onlinebo ... atypus.jpg

NB: Yeah, a creation website, but it's a good pic.

I'll have to say, the things are adorable... whatever they were trying to become that is.

[InnerBrat]

OK, dominance has to go to the class that has the most ecological effect.

Yes, microbes work bloody hard at sustaining the atmosphere content / global and local climate,, but currently their efforts are being matched by one species alone.

Add into that the ecological effects of the megaherbivores in keeping back forests, and the contribuiton cow farts have to global warming, and we have a winner!

(who's the best, well that'll be insects)

[Admiral Valdemar]

Bah, insects are cool and all, but they're also irritating most of the time unless we're talking cute, fuzzy-wuzzy, busy bumbly bees.

[InnerBrat]

Bah, insects are cool and all, but they're also irritating most of the time unless we're talking cute, fuzzy-wuzzy, busy bumbly bees.

They were the first animlas to fly by a LONG way, they've got a stupidly wide range of flying abiliteis and techniques, they've mastered altruism and I'll think you'll find there's a greater body mass of them in your house than mammals...

[Admiral Valdemar]

Bah, insects are cool and all, but they're also irritating most of the time unless we're talking cute, fuzzy-wuzzy, busy bumbly bees.

They were the first animlas to fly by a LONG way, they've got a stupidly wide range of flying abiliteis and techniques, they've mastered altruism and I'll think you'll find there's a greater body mass of them in your house than mammals...

Yeah, but they're still nothing compared to microbes of all kinds.

[InnerBrat]

BUt that's not really fair - most of the other contenders are classes - mammalia/insecta/aves/reptilia (ok not a real class) - then the micorbes get to enter jointly amoung a number of kingdoms! That shouldn't be allowed.

[Admiral Valdemar]

BUt that's not really fair - most of the other contenders are classes - mammalia/insecta/aves/reptilia (ok not a real class) - then the micorbes get to enter jointly amoung a number of kingdoms! That shouldn't be allowed.

Life's a bitch.

Okay, Kingdom Monera versus all. Actually, that's a bit broad.

Bah, I don't see what's wrong with microbes versus all! Mwahaha!

[Datana]

Microbes (I'm assuming by this you mean Kingdom Monera). If you remember your endosymbiosis theory, nearly all of the eukaryotes are already completely dependent on prokaryotes -- these useful little things called mitochondria. In addition, there are the points already listed about requirements in animal digestion and environmental maintainence, plus bacteria can survive nearly anywhere, more so if division Archaea is included with the eubacteria. Let's see the eukaryotes survive at above boiling with only hydrogen sulfide as an energy source and meager quantities of dissolved carbon dioxide as growth media. If it's all about survival, the microbes have it made.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Microbes (I'm assuming by this you mean Kingdom Monera). If you remember your endosymbiosis theory, nearly all of the eukaryotes are already completely dependent on prokaryotes -- these useful little things called mitochondria. In addition, there are the points already listed about requirements in animal digestion and environmental maintainence, plus bacteria can survive nearly anywhere, more so if division Archaea is included with the eubacteria. Let's see the eukaryotes survive at above boiling with only hydrogen sulfide as an energy source and meager quantities of dissolved carbon dioxide as growth media. If it's all about survival, the microbes have it made.

Well done, I overlooked the fact that the very powerhouses in eukaryotic organisms are bacteria themselves, albeit tamed ones.

That alone would doubly fuck over all other organisms without the above mentioned ways of fighting. Just as well these guys don't have hive minds and a grudge.

[phongn]

I beg to differ, mankind is wiping out thousands of species from each kingdom every year, we are actually the single most destructive force species wise other than that giant rock that hit 65 million years ago. This is why, unless we control our insatiable craving for resources, we will lose most of our beneficial species within the next hundred years.

Bah. K-T was impressive, but what about the oxygenation of the atmosphere? O2 is an poison to anaerobes.

[phongn]

Microbes (I'm assuming by this you mean Kingdom Monera). If you remember your endosymbiosis theory, nearly all of the eukaryotes are already completely dependent on prokaryotes -- these useful little things called mitochondria. In addition, there are the points already listed about requirements in animal digestion and environmental maintainence, plus bacteria can survive nearly anywhere, more so if division Archaea is included with the eubacteria. Let's see the eukaryotes survive at above boiling with only hydrogen sulfide as an energy source and meager quantities of dissolved carbon dioxide as growth media. If it's all about survival, the microbes have it made.

You also forgot chloroplasts, since they're directly responsible for the vast majority of food on the planet (except for exotica like simple chemoautotrophs)

[Datana]

You also forgot chloroplasts, since they're directly responsible for the vast majority of food on the planet (except for exotica like simple chemoautotrophs)

Yeah, but we were talking about the animals here, so bringing in the chloroplasts would have seemed tangental.

[Darth Yoshi]

Insects. The Mummy, anyone?

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Microbes were on this planet most of a billion years before anything even resembling multicellular animals. They shall also be here for quite a while after increasing solar radiation makes it impossible for higher forms of life to exist on Earth.

Thus, they win.

[InnerBrat]

I beg to differ, mankind is wiping out thousands of species from each kingdom every year, we are actually the single most destructive force species wise other than that giant rock that hit 65 million years ago. This is why, unless we control our insatiable craving for resources, we will lose most of our beneficial species within the next hundred years.

Bah. K-T was impressive, but what about the oxygenation of the atmosphere? O2 is an poison to anaerobes.

Bah BAH! K-T was NOTHING compared to P-T, and that had nothing to do with space rocks.

[Rye]

Haven't microbes outnumbered everything else at all times in the earth's life history?

[Darth Gojira]

I wonder what is the total tonnage of all the microbes of the world combined?
BTW, I voted insects. They're the only ones who hang around with microbes and not withstand disease, but spread it at an alarming rate.
Whaddya guys think about the reclassification of the Kingdom Animalia after taking dinosaurs into consideration?

[Admiral Valdemar]

Insects. The Mummy, anyone?

Scarabs.

As much as I like them, I think microbes edge out, though a joint effort with the insect empire and the microbe one would be cool.