We live in a microbial world, not a planet of animals
In short: While we often focus on charismatic megafauna like polar bears, the true engine of Earth is much smaller. From the deep-sea vents to our own bodies, the real story of our planet lies in the invisible biomass that sustains all complex life.
When we look at the distribution of life on Earth, the most striking realization is that humans and large animals are outliers. While we focus on the visible, global surveys reveal that Earth's biomass is dominated by plants, bacteria, and archaea. Even within the animal kingdom, the most significant portion of mass belongs to insects, rather than the mammals we typically prioritize.
The scale of human influence is most visible in the sheer mass of our presence. Data from a 2018 paper by Bar-On et al. highlights a startling imbalance: the total mass of humans on Earth is ten times greater than the mass of all wild mammals combined. Furthermore, the mass of our domestic livestock, including animals like cows, pigs, and sheep, actually exceeds the total mass of the human population.
This shift toward large-scale domesticated life represents a fundamental change in our planetary system. However, our survival remains tethered to the microscopic. We possess a deep biochemical dependence on microbes; for instance, we rely on them for essential nutrients like vitamin B12. These single-celled organisms perform vital biochemical functions that multi-cellular organisms simply cannot execute alone.
Beyond the microscopic, larger organisms still play critical roles in shaping the physical world. Consider the parrotfish, a tropical species with teeth made of the stiffest material known in the animal kingdom. By rasping away at algae and coral, these fish grind up hard coral to produce sand, demonstrating how individual biological tasks weave into the broader planetary engine.
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Sources
- Summary by Intellect · source: A Living Planet - Helen Czerski
- Also: A Living Planet
- Also: podcast.gresham.ac.uk — A Living Planet - Helen Czerski - Gresham College Lectures
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