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Bees

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First you're told all life depends on the sun, then you find out everyone's known for a long time that not ALL life depends on the sun.
First they tell you ALL plants are photosynthetic (you even think it's a requirement to be a plant), then you see indian pipe flowers (white flowers coming out of the ground) and think you've discovered a new species, knowing how fungi don't have flowers and plants NEED to photosynthesize... then you go to your teacher and he says not ALL plants are autotrophic and that's just one plant of hundreds that is completely heterotrophic.
You are told whole eggs are a single cell, then you go and find out that they only consist of one cell (at first)
First you're told roaches, mantids, and grasshoppers are all in the same order (orthoptera), then you go find out that they can be classified in three different orders (orthoptera would be just grasshoppers, crickets, kaytidids)
Remember the bee thread where I (and others) said that bees have barbed stingers and only sting once? that that's one difference between bees and wasps?
well what do you know, like every darn thing you think you know, you find out it's wrong.
Oh sure, HONEYBEES have barbed stingers and only sting once, but there are plenty of other bees that can sting multiple times.
I had also said somewhere else that bees aren't parasitic.
Well, what do you know, some of them are. They go lay eggs on other bee nests.
Is it REALLY so hard to say "MOST life depends on the sun" or "MOST plants are autotrophs" or "HONEYBEES have barbed stingers and only sting once", etc?
sure, discovering a new thing that defies conventional wisdom is exciting and fun, but when you find out everyone has known that for decades it gets really, REALLY annoying.
anyway, just wanted to set the record straight
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as soon as you set rules you will discover something that smashes through them
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Labels are unnatural... the universe doesn't cater to them too well.
 
Well all life does depend on the sun. Without it, we would all be frozen solid. At least on this planet anyway
 
I read that that honeybee one you stated was not true...that if the stinger is stabbed into another insect such as a hornet that it can still be pulled out...in mammals the stinger will get stuck.
 
There would be no plants if there is no sun. No plants means no oxygen, which even those deep sea creatures need (The deep sea ultimately depends on plants for oxygen). Anaerobic organisms would still eventually perhish due to the lack of stuff to ferment or eventually consume all the phosphate available.

In addition, the earth would freeze over.

Edit: You know there is an orchid which lives and even flowers undergound. I think it doesn't photosynthesize, pretty cool :p . Zongyi
 
well there's a happy medium to this discusion!
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chemosynthetic bacteria don't depend on the sun. Their warmth comes from the inside of the earth (hydrothermic vents.. they're not warmed by the sun).
And there are some cave creatures somewhere (the cave didn't have any streams or anything going into it) including fish and others that don't need sunlight (maybe they do need the warmth though?)
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]eventually consume all the phosphate available.
well, eventually the sun will die
 
  • #10
The chemosynthetic bacteria still need oxygen to create carbohydates (and sulferic acid). Again, the cave creatures still need oxygen. Ultimately, all these organisms will need plants which depends on the sun.

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]
eventually consume all the phosphate available.

Well, my point was that even anaerobic bacteria will run out of a food source and die.

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]
well, eventually the sun will die

And once it does, all life on earth would die with it, proving my point if I'm still around :p . Zongyi
 
  • #11
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]And once it does, all life on earth would die with it, proving my point if I'm still around :p . Zongyi
my point was that "eventually" doesn't matter, that while the phosphate is still there, they wouldn't need the sun.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]The chemosynthetic bacteria still need oxygen to create carbohydates (and sulferic acid). Again, the cave creatures still need oxygen. Ultimately, all these organisms will need plants which depends on the sun.
are all chemosynthetic bacteria aerobic?
 
  • #12
Again, if the sun was to just dissappear, these bacteria will run out of a food source, maybe not in one day, and maybe not in a few years, but eventually they will all perish becuase they converted all that can be converted in the absence of sunlight. So, yes, they would be able to live without light for a periode of time, but there life would be limited by the amount of chemicals they need that are at hand for them to use.

Chemosynthetic bacteria need oxygen as a part of their cycle to produce carbohydrates. I know that some of this oxygen will come from vents, but without plants carbon dioxide will also become limiting. So the last bit of oxygen will be converted into C02 by the last aerobic organisms. The Co2 will then be used by these chemosynthetic bacteria, who can be aeobic or as you suggested anaeobic. Unfortunately,the C02 can be used up since their waste will be in sulfer (not more C02 or more oxygen). So where will their CO2 eventually come from without aerobic organisms (since there is no oxygen)?

The earth is not a perpetual motion machine, so without outside interferance (energy from sunlight) the biological cycle will slow down and eventually hault. Zongyi
 
  • #13
Volcanoes emit plenty of CO2 and life was quite successful before photosynthesis and oxygen.  In fact, free oxygen was the pollutant that caused one of the earth's great ecological crises.
 
  • #14
yeah and I'm guessing hydrothermal vents release a lot too, so the CO2 is readily available down there.
 
  • #15
Sorry, I frogot about other gases the vents emit.

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Volcanoes emit plenty of CO2 and life was quite successful before photosynthesis and oxygen. In fact, free oxygen was the pollutant that caused one of the earth's great ecological crises.

Wern't the first few cynanobacteria photosynthetic life forms who depended on sunlight?

I'm really knowledgeable about what various bacteria need for proper biological function, but without sunlight whatever they use will eventually become limiting. As I said before, the earth is not a perpetual motion machine. Zongyi
 
  • #16
Photosynthesis is a very advanced biological process and a lot of life processes were worked out before photosynthesis.

If the earth weren't geologically active, life would have ended long ago, sun or no sun.  Geologic activity causes a flow of heat from the interior and the uplift & subduction of plates, recycling and releasing all kinds of important materials.   It might be enough to sustain life even without a sun.  But only as long as such spectacular geologic activity continues.  So not forever, but for a time measured in billions of years.  Life independent of the sun won't be advanced enough to appreciate the Boston Red Sox.  Perhaps "simple" anaerobic organisms could cling to deep sea vents and maybe even live deep underground on the continents.  Probably wearing pinstripes.
 
  • #17
Thats one way of looking at it, but without the sun actually dissappearing its hard to tell if life can or cannot live. Geological activites can help sustain life for a small periode of time, but with such a large and fairly stable earth, the amount of chemicals released would not benifit the organisms much (again just my guess. My thinking is that the effects of volcanos and techtonic plate movements will get diluted in such a big earth). Deep sea vents may be an exeption, but my initial idea was that there would not be enough chemicals, food, etc. for the organisms that are left that cannot be produced in ample amounts without biological activity (where will the oxygen come from? etc). The temperature shock should wipe the majority out anyways, leaveing a vast population of perhaps the same few species that will compete for food and gases.

The other ultimate scenario is that these creatures will live and thrive, but eventually produce so much pollution that they will eventually wipe themselves out (ie. ocean of sulfer), which may be converted into other chemicals when bacteria evolve to use it but the cycle will eventually run into a road block where the chemical can't be used any further, like the iron in the core of the sun). Of course, this may take billions of years, but my idea was that the earth will remain in its same state in our models.

Evolution has surprised us and maybe some electronic creatures will be made to munch on rocks, but thats a bit far fetched
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. Zongyi
 
  • #18
Some bacterial species can subsist on metals and rocks. Many Sub-benthos creatures far below the floor of the ocean simotaniously are creating methane while others in the same habitat are consuming it.

Earth is unstable and our geology is unique in the solar system. If the sun ended now experts theorize life can exist for 30 billion years off the earth heat and chemicals. Oxygen is not necessary for all photosynthetic life either, nor does just photosynthetic life  give off oxygen as a byproduct. Nor does all life need oxygen, as it was the poison of earths earliest life forms and relegated them to oxygen-free environments. Gasses escaping from hot vents replaces oxygen in the immediate area, just as large emissions of carbon dioxide from lakes and hot springs is known to suffocate life forms in the area if a large resovor of co2 is released at once.

Alpha: so my theory (well, guess) on solitary bee stingers was correct?! Wow. It feels good to be right.

Also I want to speak to you sometimes on someone who I think you would be very interested in, as his similarity to you is striking,> Ever heard of Richard Dawkins, the foremost preeminent think tank on evolution today? Perhaps you’ve heard of one of his early works: THE SELFISH GENE?

Known by some as “Darwin’s Rottweiler”, he loves debates, especially on evolution, as he is one of THE experts. He “exhibits scorched earth vocabulary on religion the evangelical right, and faith-based political philosophy” He apparently feels the need to be both precise and right. I disagree with both him and you on the suggestion that evolution and religion are inherently incompatible... you to are similar. I suggest you read one of his books. You might further your knowledge base on evolution for those debates which you are so fond of. Some new ammo, prehaps?

I like this quote on him and you might be wise to remember it as well- “You can be the world’s greatest apostle of scientific rationalism, but if you come across as a....Rottweiler,  its very difficult to make a sale.”
 
  • #19
Endparenthesis was right when he said that labels are manmade and the universe does not cater well them. What we are looking at with the bees and so forth is just this. Taxonomists (people who define species) are constantly in debate as they are trying to force a manmade arrangement on nature: nature fits, just not 100%, the definitions we assign.

Finch, if you want some good stuff to argue about evolution on you should come see my data in the lab--it is never consistant--constantly defying all the theories. Lol!!
 
  • #20
Bah, I'm being overpowered here, lol.

What I'm saying is that eventually without outside imput, there would be a lack of one of the essential ingredients that life needs. I am no expert, but examples I gave were oxygen and such, but definantly not limited to the examples I gave. There are many other chemicals that are constantly required. Without sunlight as a energy imput, eventually a roadblock would occur around a element or compound that can't be used any further by biological processes. Now if the bacteria thrives, than in a few billion years, the needed chemicals would be consumed and their waste would not be converted any further to produce energy for biological funcions. I do know the earth is constantly changeing and has some capability of recycling some of these unusable chemicals, but it is slow compared to the rate of chemical conversion created by liveing organisms.

Bacteria may produce a cycle, like what you have described with methane, but as I have argued, and simular to friction, there would be an ultimate waste or lack of something that would eventually kill off life.

And as far as I know (so don't quote me on this
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) oxygen came only when uv rays broke up particles to free oxygen, but once this oxygen built up an ozone layer, biological function had to take over. But since the sun is now gone, then there would be no uv rays and therefor no oxygen. If vents produced oxygen then early earth would contain higher traces of oxgygen amoung the H2O, CO2, etc. Now I'm not saying there there cant be life without oxygen, but the sunless earth would be a planet devoide of oxygen.

But of course, its easier argueing than something is possible that argueing that something is impossible
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. Zongyi
 
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