I have seen the problem addressed by the usual divisions, the material and the living and the sentient and the divine. Nomenclature and classification run into the usual problems, to perfectly describe reality there is no recourse but to treat each individual as the special case, but at this extreme the utility of of the system comes into question. Meanwhile down the paths of futility forged daily by the materialist reductionists, it is all reduced to some single principle, there is no division between the quick and the dead. We can dismiss this view as being self-evidently false, but viruses and even wierder beasts like prions call it into question. So it remains: might the earth be an organism?
I say why not. There's no point trying to apply the principles of conventional species centric evolutionary biology in any but the vaguest sense. Nomenclature is no use: in this case we're compelled to address the single individual because as yet it's all we've got to study. There follows the sticky question of whether or not the ability to reproduce (at least in theory) is a prerequisite to the definition. It's a valid point, considering that reproduction is sufficiently basic function of the living that we allow viruses and prions and the rest to come under consideration solely on the basis of their prodigous abilities for self-replication. I think that, in theory at least, a planet could reproduce, using it's sentient species as the germ cells... It could probably happen with our planet if we weren't all such a bunch of selfish, troublesome, violent, hateful, ignorant, short-sighted, small-minded, lazy and uninvolved assholes.
klik if you demand tedious explanations of every little thing.
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