On Wed, 21 Apr 2004 03:34:27 +0000 (UTC), Tim Tyler 
wrote:

>irr  wrote or quoted:
>> "Tim Tyler"  wrote in message
>> > IRR  wrote or quoted:
>
>> > > > The bacteria are disadvantaged - since they can't
easily cooperate
>> > > > with one another, and build large structures - and such 
>> > > > cooperation seems to pay off.
>> > > >
>> > > > They have been (literally) overshadowed - and
relegated to the nooks
>> > > > and crannies of the world.  These days much of the
work gets done 
>> > > > by macroscopic organisms - such as trees.
>> > > >
>> > > > Once bacteria ruled the world - but now they in the middle of
>> > > > a period of decline.  Their decline seems likely to
continue - as much
>> > > > of the world's chemical processing gets taken over
by machines - who
>> > > > will have stolen the bacteria's enzymatic secrets
from their genomes.
>> > >
>> > > This anthropocentric misinformation that you've slipped
in at multiple
>> > > points in this thread has no factual basis and no support in real
>> > > science.  There have been at least half a dozen articles
in just the 
>> > > past few years in Science and Nature alone that point towards an 
>> > > inverse scale free relationship between organism size
and organism 
>> > > density.  That is, the very
>> > > smallest organisms outnumber slightly larger organisms
by orders of
>> > > magnitude, and outnumber even larger organisms by many
more orders of
>> > > magnitude.
>> >
>> > Well, yes - becuase they are so tiny.  I am outnumbered millions-to-one
>> > by my own gut bacteria - but that doesn't mean that they are more
>> > important than I am.
>> 
>> Certainly not what I meant to imply -- I'm not even sure if Kolmogorov had a
>> metric by which we could start to categorize importance :).  But I would
>> maintain that the enormous numbers of microorganisms that are out there
>> argue they aren't in any sort of period of decline.  In fact in the middle
>> of this 6th mass extinction we've apparently instigated, I'd say they are in
>> better shape than anyone.
>
>Once they were the only form of life - but now they are excluded from many
>large and significant niches by competition from plants.
>
>The rise of complex organisms seems destined to continue - and if life 
>remains confined on Earth, as complex organisms rise, bacteria practically 
>must fall back - and give up their carbon atoms to make more room.
>
>> > > In fact the largest organisms on Earth (ourselves among them)
>> > > make up only a minute fraction of the global biomass.
>> >
>> > A *lot* of the global biomass is in the form of trees - e.g.:
>> >
>> > ``The ongoing enrichment of the atmosphere with CO2 raises
the question of
>> >   whether growth of forest trees, which represent close to 90% of the
>> >   global biomass carbon, is still carbon limited at current
>> >   concentrations of close to 370 p.p.m.''
>> >
>> > ...most of which are much bigger than us.
>> 
>> Unfortunately these very dated statistics are only valid if you're on Bush's
>> Science Advisory Board.  See for example Whitman et. al's
"Prokaryotes: The
>> unseen majority" (Proc. of the National Academy of Sciences,
95: 6578-83.
>> 1998) for a starter read and follow the trail of references therein.
>
>It seems that agrees that plants have equal or greater biomass than
>procaryotes.  Does it really support the idea that complex organisms
>make up only a minute fraction of the global biomass?
>
>> Notice that this article is already 6 years old and so predates recent major
>> discoveries into the "deep subsurface" biosphere (e.g.
Lidy hot springs and
>> similar studies) that we've only scratched the surface of, and that may
>> represent an unseen microbial contingency larger than all combined
>> terrestrial life.
>
>*Maybe* there's an "unseen microbial contingency larger than all combined 
>terrestrial life".  Maybe not.
>
>Even if true, that wouldn't make the biomess of organisms larger than
>us "a minute fraction of the global biomass".  Trees really are pretty
>significant carbon sinks - and I think they do not deserve dismissal.
>
>> And of course I'd argue that the counting is already biased -- every cell
>> from every macroscopic organism has anywhere from one to a few dozen
>> mitochondria (and quite a good number have chloroplasts) that were unjustly
>> abducted from the microbial domain and now count towards the eukaryotic
>> total!
>
>These are systemtically surrounded by their clones - with whom they 
>cooperate in order to perpetuate themselves.
>
>ISTM that they should be counted among the cooperators - rather than
>as among the "free livers".
>
>True, they once worked for the other side - but allegiances can change...

Tim, I am afraid the facts indicate that prokaryotes really do
outweigh everything else.  The PNAS paper by Whitman, Coleman, and
Wiebe which was cited above
   (http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/95/12/6578
does indicate that the total carbon fixed in prokaryotes was of the
same order of magnitude, but somewhat less, than the carbon fixed in
plants.  That is as you say.  But carbon and total biomass is a poor
measure of biological abundance.  Virtually all the carbon content of
plants is inert cellulose in the cell wall.  If you look at functional
material, the proteins as measured by the nitrogen content or nucleic
acids (plus many other active metabolites) as measured by phosphorous
content, then prokaryotes overwhelm the plants.  Yes, trees are nice,
but the oceanic bigger and richer and the soil even more so.  And all
this doesn't even begin to count the enormous mass of archaea that
were discovered since that paper.  You don't mention that the title of
that paper is "Prokaryotes: the unseen majority".

You say that prokaryotes are "but now they are excluded from many
large and significant niches by competition from plants".  Perhaps you
don't realize that the only reason plants can grow in these "large and
significant niches" is that they are supported (both physically and
metabolically) by the soil which is totally dependent on the microbes
living there.  Yes, the terrestrial world we live in is dominated by
eukaryotes.  But we live in only a small fraction of the earth.
Several people have repeatedly pointed out to you that aquatic and
soil/substrate ecology is dominated by microbes and that these form by
far the largest component of the biosphere.

I'll accept your argument that counting mitochondria and plastids as
part of the "prokaryotic" side is a bit of a stretch. But given that
these organelles are a small fraction of the biomass in eukaryotes
(although they outnumber the eukaryotic cells) and that the eukaryotic
biomass is a small fraction of the total prokaryotic biomass, it
really doesn't make that much of a difference.
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