You may not be aware of this, but there are more bacteria on
the planet than other species. As far as can be figured there are 5 nonillion
bacteria on earth, which is 1, followed by 30 zeroes. This odd thought came to
me while I was reading Vandana Shiva’s article “What is Biodiversity and Why is
it Important?” The article itself was widely informative on the topic of the
diversity of our plant and animal life, and the steps mankind has taken to
cause their lack of diversity. We grow crops that will survive in order to make
a profit; one type of corn doesn’t grow very well, or is prone to disease that
would eat into profit margins: don’t grow that corn- grow a safer market proven
one. This is also occurring with animal species. There was a time where pork
was taken from numerous breeds of pig, but currently we only receive our pork
from 4 different breeds (Shiva 49).
Even though we as a people keep forcing the world to adapt
to our view, all is not lost. Jane Goodall in her book “Hope for Animals and
Their World” which I had the pleasure to read some excerpts talks about numerous
individuals who are making it their goal to turn the devastation around successfully.
The most intriguing anecdotes was actually about Goodall herself, in which she
helps the Tanzanian people enrich their lives which in turn helps protect the
Gombe Chimpanzees.
So whether you think we as a species have doomed ourselves
and our world to extinction, or have merely placed a tiny setback that nature
will overcome, ponder on the microscopic. Shiva speaks on a group of scientists
from Denmark who scooped up one cubic meter of earth from a forest. Within this
sample was found fifty-thousand earthworms, fifty-thousand insects and mites,
and twelve million roundworms, yet one gram, one gram (restatement and
emphasis mine), yielded billions of individual bacteria of four-thousand
unknown species.
Image credit to: http://hopeful-ink.blogspot.com/2011/01/wonders-of-bacteria-and-viruses-civic.html
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