• 1 Post
  • 17 Comments
Joined 2 months ago
cake
Cake day: September 17th, 2025

help-circle



  • When I was in third grade I had an argument with my teacher who told me that insects were not animals. I was really into nature documentaries and books at the time and I knew that insects were in the animal kingdom. I remember going home and being really mad about it. That really soured me on school for the rest of my life. I’m still bitter about it!












  • “Maybe we should describe bacteria by their individual features and give that group a name”

    We already do that. The function and genes of bacteria are what defines a bacterial species (or genus, family, or order). I do agree that the Wikipedia definition of “species” doesn’t strictly apply to bacteria due to asexual reproduction and HGT. But it is still a useful tool for classifying bacteria.

    Giving it a name makes talking about the organism easier. If I know that a person is infected with Staphylococcus aureus I know that the characteristics and treatment are going to be very different than if they were infected with Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Giving it a species name is a lot easier than saying they are infected with a coagulase positive, gram positive coccus.