> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On
> Behalf Of Andrew Crystall
[snip]
> AHA! Well..
>
> Your gut bacteria are NOT entirely benign tho. Like your normal
> skin flora, if yu immune system is depressed for some reason,
> then you can have an opportunistic infection from them.
>
> So it's not really symbiotic (neither side hurts the other), it's
> mutralistic..if they have the chance, they WILL infect you...
But isn't that just the way it is in any partnership? A spouse who doesn't
assert him or herself will inevitably be taken advantage of by the other.
Again, perhaps not intentionally, but that is the nature of things.
> As to mitochondia (and indeed chloroplasts in plants), this is the
> BIG symbiotic relationship, which must have arrisen *millions* of
> years ago. We are totallt dependent on them, and they on us - it's
> not really selfish or altrustic though, as they are essentially a part
> of ourselves.
But isn't endosymbiosis as clear an example of collaboration in nature as
one could hope for? It is a relationship that has so much mutual benefit
that the two things became one.
Nick
