Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2014 November 29

= November 29 =

"Great chain of being"
In the great chain of being, can a living thing climb up and down the great chain of being? Or is it supposed to stay fixed and permanent? Is the scala naturae more like a ladder, staircase, or an escalator? 71.79.234.132 (talk) 08:01, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Definitely fixed and permanent.  Uhlan  talk  09:06, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Has anyone raised the question, if Plato et al had known about microbes, where would they have stood on that ladder? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 12:33, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
 * If "microbes" are divided into animals and plants (which we don't these days), the animals go with "beasts that creepeth" (above serpents), and the plants go near the bottom of the plant list (probably between moss and fungi). Lamarck (not really an advocate of the Chain of Being, although his work is often interpreted that way) placed Infusoria at the start of his list (see Philosophie Zoologique). Tevildo (talk) 14:42, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
 * I think Bugs meant bacteria ( No wonder Bugs is interested in bacteria! ). "Animals" and plants are eukaryotes. Bacteria are prokaryotes, so more primitive than either. Then there's archaea. And how about viruses, prions, proteins, smaller molecules, atoms, ..., quarks. Go ahead. Speculate away. Contact  Basemetal   here  15:06, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
 * It's just that I once heard a scientist say that, contrary to the biblical thing about humans being given dominion over the planet earth, it is actually microbes that have dominion. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 21:02, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Actually, it's rats. And tardigrades. And giant pandas (see above). (Or mice, according to the fiction of Douglas Adams.) --Demiurge1000 (talk) 21:26, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Beetles, actually, so you're all wrong "God has an inordinate fondness for beetles." -- J. B. S. Haldane. -- Jayron  32  01:56, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, but the Beatles are more popular than Jesus. μηδείς (talk) 20:30, 30 November 2014 (UTC)