What is primitive life?

[Burning Petard]

I am reading a book by Eben Alexander, who is a brain surgeon. It is a book aimed at the general reader about his own experience before, during, after being in a coma for about a week. In the second chapter he recounts the events in the emergency room where they sampled his spinal fluid. He describes the possibility of meningitis and the difference between viral and bacterial. He writes: " Bacteria, being more primitive than viruses, can be a more dangerous foe." But he doesn't go into any further detail about the difference.

Huh? in this context, what does 'primitive' mean? I thought virus was a simpler life form--that some experts don't even like to call it a life form. There is general agreement that bacteria are simple, single cell living organisms. What does it mean to say bacteria are more primitive than a virus?

Once upon a time I called myself a bug farmer. Most of my crop was good old Escherichia coli. But there was a time when I was working with live virus suspected of causing AIDS. That was fun. It was in a class IV isolation facility, one of the very few at that time run by a for-profit corporation. At that time Aids was considered an untreatable death sentence. Once we had alarms go off for an air leak. The local First Responders showed up and refused to even come into the building. I agree with that prudence.

But what does it mean to say bacteria are more primitive than a virus?

snailgate.

[BoSoxGal]

According to AI:

Bacteria are generally considered more "primitive" than viruses because bacteria are fully functional, self-replicating cells capable of independent life, while viruses are essentially genetic material that require a host cell to replicate, meaning they lack the necessary machinery to survive on their own and are considered more dependent and simplified in their structure and function; in essence, they are considered to have evolved from more complex organisms, possibly ancient bacteria, by losing cellular components over time.

[liberty]

I am reading a book by Eben Alexander, who is a brain surgeon. It is a book aimed at the general reader about his own experience before, during, after being in a coma for about a week. In the second chapter he recounts the events in the emergency room where they sampled his spinal fluid. He describes the possibility of meningitis and the difference between viral and bacterial. He writes: " Bacteria, being more primitive than viruses, can be a more dangerous foe." But he doesn't go into any further detail about the difference.

Huh? in this context, what does 'primitive' mean? I thought virus was a simpler life form--that some experts don't even like to call it a life form. There is general agreement that bacteria are simple, single cell living organisms. What does it mean to say bacteria are more primitive than a virus?

Once upon a time I called myself a bug farmer. Most of my crop was good old Escherichia coli. But there was a time when I was working with live virus suspected of causing AIDS. That was fun. It was in a class IV isolation facility, one of the very few at that time run by a for-profit corporation. At that time Aids was considered an untreatable death sentence. Once we had alarms go off for an air leak. The local First Responders showed up and refused to even come into the building. I agree with that prudence.

But what does it mean to say bacteria are more primitive than a virus?

snailgate.

A virus does not have the ability to reproduce on its own it must invade and take over the reproductive ability of another organism.

[Burning Petard]

So by this scientific cant, does that make homo sapien more primitive than a virus?

snailgate

[MajGenl.Meade]

Only these two

[BoSoxGal]

So by this scientific cant, does that make homo sapien more primitive than a virus?

snailgate

Obviously not since we are composed of about 30 trillion cells and we are capable of surviving - most of us - without a host organism.

Incidentally, in recent years medical research has determined that we carry about 38 trillion bacteria in and on our bodies at any given time in our lives and those bacteria are the microbiome on which we are also learning much of our mental and physical health is dependent. Happy gut bugs, happy human.

[Burning Petard]

E coli doesn't need a host either. That's where my hard head keeps banging against the dictionary. Why is a virus, that does need a host to survive and multiply, LESS primitive? It seems primitive simply means older. If that is so, why are 'older' bacteria obviously more dangerous, as the author quoted at the head of this thread implied?? A 'modern' M16 is surely more dangerous than a 15th century arquebus

snailgate.

[MajGenl.Meade]

E coli doesn't need a host either. That's where my hard head keeps banging against the dictionary. Why is a virus, that does need a host to survive and multiply, LESS primitive? It seems primitive simply means older. If that is so, why are 'older' bacteria obviously more dangerous, as the author quoted at the head of this thread implied?? A 'modern' M16 is surely more dangerous than a 15th century arquebus

snailgate.

You speak of dictionaries? (I did not)

I think this has some bearing:

adjective: primitive

1. relating to, denoting, or preserving the character of an early stage in the evolutionary or historical development of something.

[BoSoxGal]

Maybe better to think of complete and incomplete life. Virus is incomplete, bacteria is complete - and it happens that bacteria is one of the most primitive complete life forms on earth as we understand, 3+ billion years old.

[ex-khobar Andy]

'Primitive' in this sense does not mean 'less developed' but merely 'prior' - many viruses are thought to have derived from bacteria - so although the virus may be less 'developed' than the bacterium - it may have only RNA, for example and no DNA - the bacterium is more primitive.

[Big RR]

Going back to the OP, I don't understand why bacterial meningitis is more dangerous than the viral kind. Depending the the disease, some bacterial forms are more dangerous than the viral ones, while others, like viral pneumonia, are more dangerous than the bacterial ones. I guess it is piossible that the bacteria for meningitis, because it is older, has developed an antibiotic resistant form, but then our antiviral arsenal is nowhere near as broad as our antibiotic one. The generalization makes no sense to me.

[Burning Petard]

Thank you Big RR. You seem to share at least some of my confusion when none of the other posters do.

Snailgate.

[BoSoxGal]

Thank you Big RR. You seem to share at least some of my confusion when none of the other posters do.

Snailgate.

Sorry, I don’t because I completed 80% of a zoology degree including microbiology and virology courses and I’ve been an avid science reader for decades. Blame Rachel Carson who I first read in HS.

[Big RR]

BSG--any insight you can provide would be appreciated; I have degrees in biochemistry and chemistry and have worked in the life sciences/pharma/diagnostics area for decades, but the statement " " Bacteria, being more primitive than viruses, can be a more dangerous foe" eludes me. Certainly some (but clearly not all) bacterial diseases (including meningitis) can be more dangerous than viral ones, but I see no tie between how primitive the bacterium is and its danger. Indeed, I would believe that more recent bacteria, especially those which have been genetically engineered for use as weapons, could be more dangerous than older ones; also, most bacterial infections can be treated by antibiotics (of course some more recently evolved bacteria have developed antibiotic resistance), while viruses cannot, and our antiviral arsenal is hardly as developed as our antibiotic one (although scientists are working to expand it). But perhaps you have some insight into the statement from a zoological perspective (I have had basic and intermediate level zoology and microbiology courses in college, but not many more advanced ones (unless you believe, as some some scientists do, molecular biology is encompassed within microbiology) and my interests moved elsewhere).

FWIW, I read Silent Spring at a young age (probably 6th or 7th grade0) and it, along with Mr Wizard ( ), sparked my interest in science pretty early on.

[BoSoxGal]

"Bacteria, being more primitive than viruses, can be a more dangerous foe."

To my understanding the meaning of this sentence is that bacteria, which by being primitive are complete life forms capable of reproducing without a host unlike viruses which are not alive and need a host cell to replicate, can be a more dangerous foe. I think the conclusion is a straightforward one; the bacteria can very readily reproduce while the virus requires a more complicated pathway. That doesn't mean that they both can't kill you, but one is more potentially deadly in many cases than the other.

Sepsis is the cause of 20% of deaths globally every year, so a leading killer - in the USA I believe sepsis is the 3rd leading cause of death in any given year for patients who are hospitalized. Sepsis is more often caused by bacteria than any other cause, although it can be triggered by fungi or viruses or parasites those are less commonly the cause.

[Burning Petard]

And I thank you BSG as well, I think we managed in this thread, to argue, find an acceptable answer, and remain civil about it.

Now if only a bacterial infection would make it into Elon's brain . . . . .

snailgate.

[BoSoxGal]

I have been thinking about bacteria a very great deal for the last couple of years as I educated myself on the micro biome and how I could transform my health by prioritizing the health of my 38 trillion travelers, my bacteria.

We are learning in a great many ways how the health of our bacteria are affected by our modern diets and other environmental exposures and how when our bacteria become unwell or out of balance - a great many more of the bad kind than the good kind - it can lead to a host of autoimmune disorders that cause so much of the chronic illness in our society, including potentially the dreaded dementias and even some cancers.

It is fascinating to consider that we are often more them - 38 trillion travelers- than we are us - typically 30 trillion cells of us. It is the most amazing symbiotic relationship, it really is. This very thin layer of our guts that separates them and us, that stands between homeostasis and catastrophic breakdown.

Fascinating!

I think it’s time to re read Lewis Thomas’s Lives of a Cell.

[Big RR]

Thanks BSG.