Originally posted by mikromarius
If biological life produced rather than reduced themselves, wouldn't the Earth have been much bigger now then, after billions of years with more or
less advanced creatures and plants etc.?
Firstly, evolution does not go from simple to complex - that's a myth. Evolution goes for whatever survives best. But when we start off with the
simplest of organisms, there's only one way to go. That's why the geologic record shows a progression from simple to complex.
Secondly, no - the Earth wouldn't need to grow at all. Populations cannot outgrow their resources for long. Nature keeps them under control nicely.
In fact, this is essential to evolution. In any given generation, more offspring are produced than will be able to survive and reproduce. So the
fittest survive and pass on their genes. If all organisms could survive, there would be no evolution.
The way I see it, life transforms energy in order to walk and talk and do the thing
Indeed. The earth takes in useful energy from the Sun, uses it to do work, then rejects useless heat to space. In essence, the Earth is one big heat
engine. This is why anti-evolution arguments based on the second law of thermodynamics fail, incidentally.
It's a circle
More like an odd-looking spiral.
Man eats fruit, gets energy, then poops, and the poop gives life to the seed inside it, which grows up and yields fruits which the man eats
again and the whole thing starts again. It's like magic. An eternity machine
Obviously that's not the case. Look at the growing population, or the countless extinct species. If there's one thing nature
isn't, it's
static.
