A Thought for the Week  

Offered by David Apollo

Preface

Skip to The Thought

These Thoughts of the Week are intended to put forth a more creative topic than what one might normally encounter, while at the same time being significant. The generally intended objective is that an insight one hasn't lately considered might be offered that would be both interesting to think about and credible.

As a consequence I get to think "outside-the-box" for a moment while I let my muse work. Then something that I might be inspired to look into and write about "occurs" to me. Whatever that actually means.

Sometimes thinking outside-the-box, if it is truly intended to be an "anything goes so long as it is real" creative enterprise means that I need to be willing also to think "inside-the-box." Since within the box all sorts of things are real and interesting as well.

And, if both outside and inside the box is OK for inspiration, then "just the box" should be OK too.

And thus, I began thinking about cellulose. And lignin. And it occurred to me that these might be way more important to life persisting on this planet than I had realized.

Important → What life ultimately does is Persists. ← Important   So far on Planet Earth, it has persisted here for over 3.5 billion years.

You see, whatever it is that Life Is actually doesn't die. (Until it does. Then, it isn't.) And it hasn't died yet for over 3.5 billion years. Sure, the "individual steps along the way" have all been temporary, so to speak. As sentient individuals, they may consider themselves as living and then dying. But there is another wholly credible way to look at it. And that is that what is "alive" has not actually died yet, even if the individual steps along the way have come and gone as they fulfill their role of keeping what is alive, The Lineage, alive.

Put another way, what is alive keeps moving forward. Alive.

Reproduction, then, could be considered as NOT the creation of a new life which someday will die, but as something else. In Plain Sight. Rather, reproduction could be considered as the way that that which is alive, The Lineage, continues to remain alive. The individual is simply the step-wise means by which that happens. And so, the reproductive path, if it is to keep what is alive alive apparently has a few features which have been indispensable for maintaining what is alive alive for all this time.

• Heritability. What is alive is so in a cooperative way with the non-living environment that it finds itself in. That requires certain features that don't just "happen randomly" very often, so if we want what that which is alive ("The Lineage") to continue being alive once reproduction occurs, then you have to have a way that advantageous traits can be passed along... from one individual to the next along the living lineage. That is taken care of by the heritable nature of the reproductive process. The individual that is reproduced is almost exactly like the individual that was a part of the living lineage before.
  
  
  
• Variation. Since the environment that individuals find themselves in change with time, reproduction itself must generate variation. Why? because what is required to keep living within a changing environment changes. Thus variation helps ensure that what we call "adaptation" occurs appropriately.
  
  Of course, inappropriate adaptation also occurs, and individuals inappropriately adapted cease to be a part of the living lineage sooner than those more appropriately adapted. Ultimately, the actual living process is not concerned with that which dies early. Selection simply happens, and that which is best adapted, even if it wound up that way randomly, outlasts that which is not as well adapted. Even if that also happened randomly.
  
  
• Selection. The persistence of that which can survive. Either because the environment is not inconsistent with the Lineage remaining alive in association with the individual within it, or because the individual eliminates that which threatens to terminate it. This process has also been referred to as evolution.
  
  Persistence. I often meet people who ponder the "purpose of life", believing that if they understood that then they would more easily find a greater harmony in their "life journey." Of course, the understanding of that issue, like many things, is In Plain Sight. And of course, much of what is In Plain Sight is so, and yet unseen. Primarily, I suppose, because certain understandings are not the Understandings we are looking for. However, for the living Lineage, the objective appears to be really simple, and the same since the Big Bang, at least. And that is, actually, simply to exist. And thus, persist.

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The Thought

For the most part, without cellulose and lignin, much of what we see around us, would not be here today without them helping a significant portion of it (e.g. plants) to persist throughout much of the evolutionary history of The Lineage for at least the last 300-400 million years. More accurately, to Resist:

• Resisting degradation.
• Resisting digestion, as a food source.
• Making sure that whatever it is wrapped around is not consumed easily by whatever hasn't already been consumed.

Consider what all organisms which make up the living Lineage do. Consume. Digest. Remake. Adapt. Persist.

Importantly, many seeds have developed hulls that also utilize cellulose and lignin when protection from digestion is important in order that a seed can remain functional through the time and environmental circumstances appropriate for its germination.

For an interesting evolutionary discussion, see Plant cell walls throughout evolution, J Exp Bot (2009) 60 (13): 3615-3635; 17 August 2009

In short, a significant reason why anything that is a part of the living Lineage on this earth is here, living, at all is a result of its resistance to being consumed by whatever hasn't already been consumed. Or, degraded otherwise. And for much of the plant world, you can chalk that up in significant part to cellulose and lignin.

Individually and/or together, they are so resistant to degradation, both biologically (e.g. catabolism as a food source) and non-biologically chemically (normal environmental exposures) that materials containing cellulose and lignin are also useful as pulp for paper, boxes, structural building materials, etc. Anything that needs to last for a while.

Check into it further yourself. Think.

And remember, ConserveLiberty

Thus endeth the Thought for the Week!!!

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