Virus's: Life or non life?

[billvon]

Please educate me about the hard limitations in posting pertinent information.

Because you get an idea in your head and then for the next six months that idea is responsible for EVERYTHING. Microtubules cause consciousness. Quorum sensing is responsible for everything else. And if anyone disagrees, they are ignorant and wrong.

 

[DaveC426913]

Is intra-species communication of importance in the determination of what constitutes a living being?

No. There is no such requirement for life.

And now you know what's off -topic here too.

 

[Write4U]

Because you get an idea in your head and then for the next six months that idea is responsible for EVERYTHING. Microtubules cause consciousness. Quorum sensing is responsible for everything else. And if anyone disagrees, they are ignorant and wrong.

Where did I say that? That is dishonest posting and does not belong in a science forum.
Please stop that.

 

[Write4U]

Because you get an idea in your head and then for the next six months that idea is responsible for EVERYTHING. Microtubules cause consciousness. Quorum sensing is responsible for everything else. And if anyone disagrees, they are ignorant and wrong.

Another falsehood contained in that post! When have I ever criticized a poster for posting mainstream science? I don't call people names unless in response to an insult.
You are projecting your behavior on me. My posts are being called wrong and ignorant, primarily as kneejerk responses to new and unfamiliar scientific developments.
You're the one being the hypocrite, not I.

 

[James R]

Please educate me about the hard limitations in posting pertinent information.

The message here is: try to post on topic. That's all.

What is wrong with that piece of knowledge about the question of viruses are alive or not? I submit that this fact is very much a consideration of the OP question. Is intra-species communication of importance in the determination of what constitutes a living being?

No. Intra-species communication has nothing to do with the question of whether something is living. That question is necessarily prior the one that asks something about communication.

Do you really want to stay that superficial in probing the mysteries of life?

There are other threads where you're talking about quorum sensing etc. There's no need to inject that topic into yet another thread in an off-topic way.

You have a habit of doing this - constantly inserting your pet topics in wherever you believe there's an opportunity to divert the conversation off topic and into one of your preferred discussion streams.

Shall we stay at Trump's level of understanding life and what constitutes living?

Discussing quorum sensing does nothing to help us understand what constitutes living, which is what this thread is about.

 

[Write4U]

Discussing quorum sensing does nothing to help us understand what constitutes living, which is what this thread is about.

Thank you James for your patience. I understand your concern and I respect your observation.

Let me assure you that my posts are made in good faith and a sincere desire to contribute to a discussion about life and living things, and at what point an organism may qualify for the title "living thing". Allow me to explain the possible importance of "quorum sensing" in the "life" of a virus.

After mulling this over, it seems that we can restrict the question of "life and non-life" to single celled, very small (nano-scale) size, bio-chemical patterns. (this realization actually prompted my spontaneous segue)

Bacteria are extremely versatile in their adaptive abilities and feeding range. Bacteria hunt and talk to themselves. Bateria are "alive". Communication seems to be qualifier for a living organism.

A social bacterium with versatile habits

Many living systems share a fundamental capacity for cooperation. Plants and animals are made up of billions of cells that communicate with one another, carry out specific tasks and share their resources. Many single-celled microorganisms cooperate in similarly versatile ways: they form communities and exchange useful genes and resources among one other.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/03/190322105725.htm

OTOH, Viruses are very limited in what they can do, due to their, because the are unable to self-replicate and always need a host. Yet they are extremely versatile in their ability to control the host's homeostasis and immunological defenses.

My reference to quorum sensing was only as it applies to viruses (not bacteria).

The secret social lives of viruses .
Scientists are listening in on the ways viruses communicate and cooperate. Decoding what the microbes are saying could be a boon to human health.

Geneticist Rotem Sorek could see that his bacteria were sick — so far, so good. He had deliberately infected them with a virus to test whether each ailing microbe soldiered on alone or communicated with its allies to fight the attack.

But when he and his team at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, looked into the contents of their flasks, they saw something completely unexpected: the bacteria were silent, and it was the viruses that were chattering away, passing notes to each other in a molecular language only they could understand. They were deciding together when to lie low in the host cell and when to replicate and burst out, in search of new victims.

It was an accidental discovery that would fundamentally change scientists’ understanding of how viruses behave.

Viruses that infect bacteria — spiky lollipop-like creatures known as bacteriophages (or phages) — have surveillance mechanisms that bring them intel on whether to stay dormant or attack, depending on the availability of fresh victims. But researchers long thought these processes were passive; the phages seemed to just sit back and listen in, waiting for bacterial distress signals to reach fever pitch before taking action.

Sorek and his colleagues had found phages actively discussing their choices. They realized that as a phage infects a cell, it releases a tiny protein — a peptide just six amino acids long — that serves as a message to its brethren: “I’ve taken a victim”. As the phages infect more cells, the message gets louder, signalling that uninfected hosts are becoming scarce. Phages then put a halt to lysis — the process of replicating and breaking out of their hosts — instead staying hidden in a sluggish state called lysogeny.

The viruses, it turns out, did not depend on bacterial cues to make their decisions. They controlled their own destiny. “This finding was a big, important, revolutionary concept in virology,” says Wei Cheng, a structural microbiologist at Sichuan University in Chengdu, China.

Sorek named this viral peptide ‘arbitrium’, after the Latin word for decision. It seemed to work much like the communication system used by bacteria — quorum sensing — to share information about cell density and adjust the population accordingly. Yet it was the first time anyone had demonstrated molecular messaging of this kind in viruses.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01880-6 (PDF version)

Seems like bacteriophages (or phages) practise "horticulture" and exert "communal" control over the host cell's mitotic machinery.

Did the discovery of viruses' functional behaviors shift the definition of "life" any ? Should we consider ability to communicate as part of the general definition of a 'living organism?
By that modified standard a virus would be a "living" organism, no?

And that brings my argument full cycle.

p.s. I'll refrain from any further posts in this thread lest I interfere with different perspectives from other posters.

 

[Hipparchia]

Yeah, I think the ultimate answer - especially as we start exploring exobiology - is that there is a continuum, with a pretty fuzzy line between life and non-life.

Precisely, but I would add this: it is unproductive and unscientific to worry about what is nothing more than a human definition to which viruses (and all other forms of life and non-life) are quite indifferent.

What we learn about viruses through studying them will not change by one iota because we have described them as living rather than non-living, of vice versa. I will add the caveat that this might not be the case if a researcher allows himself to be mislead by a bias towards expecting certain behaviour from a living over a non-living entity. But then, that wouldn't be good science.

 

[billvon]

Where did I say that?

In hundreds of posts you have made on both topics.

 

[Write4U]

In hundreds of posts you have made on both topics.

You are prone to hysterical overstatement. Please do not sensationalize your observation. It's demeaning to both of us.

How many posts on a topic do you find appropriate and acceptable?

Do you accuse a scientist, who spends a lifetime proving his/her hypothesis and writing several books on the subject, of spending too much time on that topic? I am not entitled to such freedom? Or do you just want to shut me up, because you do not agree with me?

Why don't you prove me wrong, instead of telling everybody that I am wrong without offering proof, which always prompts me to respond with more information supporting my proposition. Do you expect me to slink away like a beaten dog? (to sensationalize my emotion....)

I'll gratefully accept any and all pertinent information, including verifiable "correction" on the substance of my posts.

 

[Write4U]

Microtubules cause consciousness.

A blatantly false statement. I posed the question (along with supporting data) based on the published research by Stuart Hameroff, who spent years in researching the idea.

Quorum sensing is responsible for everything else

A blatantly false statement. I posed the question (along with supporting data) based on the published research by Bonnie Bassler, who spent years in researching the idea.

What do you want from me, a formal dissertation?
Are you even qualified to peer review such papers when written by "knowledgeable" scientists?
If so, show me the falsification.
If not, why do you bother commenting at all ? My presentation style? Please..................

AND ONCE AGAIN YOU HAVE MANAGED TO TAKE THIS THREAD OFF-TOPIC!

 

[Write4U]

Discussing quorum sensing does nothing to help us understand what constitutes living, which is what this thread is about

And what has been presented that sheds any light other than what is on record as an acceptable but outdated concept of what constitutes a living organisms?

If we know all there is to know, why does this thread exist? A regurgitation of what has been discussed ad nauseam, without any new evidence?

I don't introduce these things unless I believe they are directly related to the OP and may help shed some light on the question by introducing a newly discovered aspect of the very oldest and simplest living things, like bacteria.

Instead of instant rejection, why is this remarkable ability of communication (a common denominator of all living things), not even considered as an item of interest?

 

[Write4U]

No. There is no such requirement for life.

The scientific study of communication can be divided into:

• Information theory which studies the quantification, storage, and communication of information in general;
• Communication studies which concerns human communication;
• Biosemiotics which examines communication in and between living organisms in general.
• Biocommunication which exemplifies sign-mediated interactions in and between organisms of all domains of life, including viruses.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication

 

[Michael 345]

ability of communication (a common denominator of all living things), not even considered as an item of interest?

So its a common denominator of all living things

So what

You could envision viruses with mobile phones chatting to each other

Being a common denominator does not make it a

REQUIREMENT

 

[Write4U]

So its a common denominator of all living things
So what
You could envision viruses with mobile phones chatting to each other

No I cannot, nor can you!

Being a common denominator does not make it a

REQUIREMENT

OK, justify that to me. Are you telling me that living things do not need to communicate? Name me one living thing that does not communicate in one form or another.

Are you proposing that communication does not provide an evolutionary survival advantage for living organisms?

Natural Selection made a mistake by producing an unnecessary complex ability over a few billion years?
Think this through, Michael.

 

[Write4U]

Communication as the Main Characteristic of Life
Abstract and Figures

What does „communication“ mean in the context of life? This article will clarify that physical and chemical investigations of living organisms assemble important attributes, but if we remove communication from all interactions of living organisms, nothing would remain as living.

i.e. communication is a requirement for life....

This contribution will outline that life results out of three complementary interacting levels of communication, cell-cell communication, RNA stem-loop communication and virus communication.

The biocommunication approach complements former molecular biology, genetics, and evolutionary theory and offers an integrative method to understand the most recent available empirical knowledge about natural communication and natural languages and codes. This opens a better chance of more efficient investigations based on an integrative understanding of all levels of all domains and finally leads to a new understanding of life.

4.1 The biocommunication approach identified four levels in which cellular organisms are involved since the start of their life until death.

https://www.researchgate.net/figure...n-which-cellular-organisms-are_fig1_329486372

 

[Michael 345]

Think this through, Michael.

Thought though

I'm out

 

[paddoboy]

Precisely, but I would add this: it is unproductive and unscientific to worry about what is nothing more than a human definition to which viruses (and all other forms of life and non-life) are quite indifferent.

What we learn about viruses through studying them will not change by one iota because we have described them as living rather than non-living, of vice versa. I will add the caveat that this might not be the case if a researcher allows himself to be mislead by a bias towards expecting certain behaviour from a living over a non-living entity. But then, that wouldn't be good science.

I'm inclined to go with you and Dave on this.

 

[Write4U]

Hipparchia said: ↑
Precisely, but I would add this: it is unproductive and unscientific to worry about what is nothing more than a human definition to which viruses (and all other forms of life and non-life) are quite indifferent.

What we learn about viruses through studying them will not change by one iota because we have described them as living rather than non-living, of vice versa. I will add the caveat that this might not be the case if a researcher allows himself to be mislead by a bias towards expecting certain behaviour from a living over a non-living entity. But then, that wouldn't be good science.

I'm inclined to go with you and Dave on this.

Of course you can go with that argument. It's a meaningless deepity.

By that silly argument all of science is meaningless and unproductive. The universe itself is quite indifferent to what humans do or think or even if they exist.

To whom is the OP question directed? To humans or to viruses?

continued in; Corona Virus 2019-nCoV in World Events subforum.

 

[Write4U]

Additional context for the examination of "life" and what constitutes a living object.

Properties of Life

All living organisms share several key characteristics or functions: order, sensitivity or response to the environment, reproduction, growth and development, regulation, homeostasis, and energy processing. When viewed together, these characteristics serve to define life.

Sensitivity or Response to Stimuli
Organisms respond to diverse stimuli. For example, plants can bend toward a source of light, climb on fences and walls, or respond to touch (Figure 2).

Figure 2.The leaves of this sensitive plant (Mimosa pudica) will instantly droop and fold when touched. After a few minutes, the plant returns to normal. (credit: Alex Lomas)

Even tiny bacteria can move toward or away from chemicals (a process called chemotaxis) or light (phototaxis). Movement toward a stimulus is considered a positive response, while movement away from a stimulus is considered a negative response.

And now it has been established that bacteria (and recently "discovered", viruses) can communicate with each other and engage in concerted action.
Why this is important is the fact that a single bacterium or virus cannot overwhelm a large organism. Single celled bacteria and viruses are much too small to attack a host and require time to multiply to a sufficient number in order to overwhelm the organism's defenses. This "key survival strategy" is triggered via an intraspecies chemical communication, dubbed "quorum sensing" .

Reproduction
Single-celled organisms reproduce by first duplicating their DNA, and then dividing it equally as the cell prepares to divide to form two new cells. Multicellular organisms often produce specialized reproductive germline cells that will form new individuals. When reproduction occurs, genes containing DNA are passed along to an organism’s offspring. These genes ensure that the offspring will belong to the same species and will have similar characteristics, such as size and shape.

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-wmopen-biology1/chapter/the-characteristics-of-life/

A virus uses the host's mitotic mechanism to duplicate. It does so by attaching its own DNA to the host's DNA and induces the cell to start the duplication process and in that process the host's cell also duplicates the virus. A very clever parasitic ability.

Watch the Bonnie Bassler video !

 

[Write4U]

deleted for duplication