79

Just thought this after the made of worms post.

What are the worms full of? Bacteria. Our gut bacteria is vital so are we eating so they can process it for us or are we eating to feed them?

Lots of these bacteria probably exist without us. We can't exist without them but we do make a very nice house where they can live. So they keep us around.

Hopefully our bacterial overlords won't rise up against us any time soon.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] otter@lemmy.ca 3 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago)

Our gut bacteria is vital so are we eating so they can process it for us or are we eating to feed them?

Commensalism :)

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

Lots of these bacteria probably exist without us. We can't exist without them but we do make a very nice house where they can live.

While some bacteria definitely can, there are others that are so adapted to building colonies inside of us that they can't really survive outside of a mammal or human host. You can carefully create the lab environments to allow for it, but that is against the spirit of the question. My gut says ( ;) ) that anaerobic bacteria that evolved for mucosal colonization are likely to fit into this group.

Meanwhile it is possible to survive without much of a microbiome, but you end up having trouble with digestion and you are susceptible to infections since the surfaces don't have any residents and are "available". Newborns have low microbiome diversity and build it up rapidly after birth, and people on sustained antibiotic treatments tend to lose a lot of their microbiome.

So they keep us around.

Here is another fun one, the symbiogenesis theory.

The mitochondria was likely an independent prokaryote (bacteria) that was taken into eukaryotic (plants / animals / etc) cells.

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

Even now, the mitochondria has its own genetic material and replicates somewhat independently. So if you went in and removed all of the mitochondria from a cell, it wouldn't be able to make a new one. That is also why your mitochondria will match the mitochondria from your mother, since the egg cells come with mitochondria while the sperm cells don't.

this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2026
79 points (92.5% liked)

Showerthoughts

42550 readers
656 users here now

A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

Rules

  1. All posts must be showerthoughts
  2. The entire showerthought must be in the title
  3. No politics
    • If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
    • A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
  4. Posts must be original/unique
  5. Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS

If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.

Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS