Evolution: the newly-found bacterial role: (Evolution)

by David Turell , Sunday, August 11, 2019, 15:35 (1929 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: Bacteria have always been round and are found to have a very expanded role, well beyond what was previously thought. They make tiny proteins that have been missed before:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/08/190808152543.htm

QUOTE: "...there's mounting evidence that many aspects of our health are closely intertwined with the composition and hardiness of our microscopic compatriots, though exactly how is still mostly unclear.

DAVID: Bacteria have been obviously kept around since the beginning of life since they are seen to contribute to so many beneficial functions. It looks like a very well-designed plan to me. […]

dhw: They also contribute to multiple diseases. All part of the well-designed plan? But of far more significance to me is the fact that all multicellular organisms consist of communities that work together. This is Lynn Margulis’s theory of cooperation as being the crucial factor in evolution. We must remember that every single bacterium is concerned with its survival – whether we judge its methods to be fair or foul. Each of us is a community of communities, and it is not difficult to envisage how this may have arisen through individual intelligences combining to form every combination known to us, whether extant or extinct. And this has nothing whatsoever to do with the existence or otherwise of God, because it is the process that constitutes Chapter Two of life, not Chapter One. Chapter One deals with the origin, and has everything to do with the existence or otherwise of God.

But it is in Chapter One that bacteria appear at the start of life along with a proliferation of other one-celled forms. Note they compete and fight with each other from the beginning, which means Darwin's point about continuous competition always plays a major role, and human diseases are a result. But at the same time bacteria are very importantly beneficial. So why can't it all part of God's planning?