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Introduction: symbiosis as a living evolving critique.


Different species, interacting in a symbiotic fashion, living together over a prolonged period of time or even co-evolving into new species: this vision on symbiosis has created a strong image—both as a metaphor and a material reality—of species cooperating in the light of difference, of becoming something else and transgressing boundaries. This image has made the concept of symbiosis, in its many guises, a breading ground for amongst others a biologically, posthuman and ecologically informed critique. This living book consists of examples of how symbiosis has been deployed for instance as a critique against the mainstream Darwinian idea of evolution as struggle, against an anthropocentric worldview within the sciences and society at large, and against the idea of organisms or objects as static and isolated entities. Symbiotic processes offer seeds for alternative worldviews and as a tool of critique research on symbiosis has been taken-up as evidence for becoming as an infinite creative process, for the (animal, microbal, machinic, and/or virtual) other as an integral part of the multiple I, and for the integrated cooperation of living and non-living affects.
Otherness, process, multiplicity and cooperation
For the biologist Lynn Margulis, (endo)symbiosis has been the major theme around which she developed her—by some viewed as controversial—evolutionary biological research. Margulis states that in science there are still many (hidden) assumptions that man is the center of things and resides in the middle of the chain of evolution, ‘below god and above rock’.  However, as Margulis has defended in her revolutionary work on the importance of endosymbiosis for evolution, all life forms can be seen to have evolved from microbes, from (the interactions between) bacteria. In some cases symbiosis even evolves into symbiogenesis, when certain forms of long-term living together lead to the appearance of new species or new organs. Organisms merge with other organisms, acquiring their gene sets at the same time.  Margulis main claim, for which she draws amongst others on earlier work by the biologist Ivan Wallin, is thus that in most cases evolutionary novelty arises as a consequence of symbiosis, which goes directly against a Darwinian ‘nucleocentric view of evolution as a bloody struggle of animals.  Margulis claims concerning symbiosis have within mainstream evolutionary biology been seen as controversial and extreme, not only through her insistence on symbiosis and evolutionary cooperation as an alternative theory to Darwinian struggle, but also in her insistence that not only plants an animals evolved from the interaction of microbes , but all life-forms. And as she states ‘the idea that new species arise from symbiotic mergers among members of old ones is still not even discussed in polite scientific society.’ 
Another aspect of Margulis adaptation and use of symbiosis in biological discourse that has been controversial is her connection with James Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis. The gaia hypotheses proposes a holistic view on the earth (Gaia) as a self-regulating system of organic and inorganic matter, through its feedback system operating as a close unity. This idea is visible in many present-day ecosophies. However, the mixing of a near spiritual and religious rhetoric with scientific facts was not claimed serious enough by many biological researchers and it was seen as too harmonious according to the ‘struggle as survival’ evolutionary strand of neo-darwinians.
Evolution, ecology, posthumanism and augmentation
This living book is divided in four sections. The first part looks at symbiosis as an evolutionary process, the second part at the relationship between symbiosis and ecology, the third at the role symbiosis played in discourses on the posthuman. The fourth part then functions as a more speculative glance into a future of augmented and virtual reality and an evolving symbiosis between the virtual and the real.
The first part, on symbiosis and evolution, contains two articles that serve as both an introduction to and an example of symbiosis. The first article, How symbiosis can guide evolution, is an example of the use of the concept of symbiosis to battle (neo)Darwinism inspired theories of evolution. It describes the creation of a computational model that shows how the formation of symbiotic relations in a given ecosystem influences genetic variation. The second article in this section, by Fabio Lucian and Samuel Alizon, looks at the evolution of a virus (Hepatitus C) in a within-host environment, describing the parasitic relationship of the virus with the host-body.
The second set of articles in this part looks at the process of endosymbiosis (symbiosis inside the body/cell) more in particular, where the first article looks at the evolution of symbiotic bacteria in the human intestine and the second article by Wernegreen looks at the interactions (via associations or genetic conflicts) of bacteria within and with insects, and the possibility of genetic manipulation in this evolutionary interaction.
Finally the third section looks at the origin of the theory of symbiogenesis, incorporating the seminal 1927 book by American biologist Ivan Wallin, which made the then very controversial claim that cells evolved by symbionticism, by the formation of microsymbiotic complexes. In this book Wallin describes the emergence of mitochondria as the incorporation of independent bacteria inside of existing cells, which evolved to what we now know as organelles. In an overview article biologist Lynn Margulis goes back to the origin of the theory of symbiogenesis (and to Wallin and his Russian colleagues) and explores her own roots and the development of her groundbreaking Serial Endosymbiosis Theory (SET) at the same time.
The second part of this liquid book looks at the relationship of symbiosis with ecology. In the first section on community ecology, the article The Roles and Interactions of Symbiont, Host and Environment in Defining Coral Fitness, looks at the complex interactions between the coral host, the algal symbiont, and the environment, and the role symbionts play in this community ecology with respect to the community’s (the coral holobiont’s) fitness, also to determine what the effects of global climate change on this ecology might be.
An important aspect of discourses surrounding ecology is the upkeep of the level of biodiversity and complexity of a given system or ecology. The article by Toft, Williams, and Fares, looks at this aspect of biodiversity as a measure of the health of ecosystems and the role symbiosis (especially with respect to the way proteobacteria interact with insects) plays in generating species diversity.
Symbiosis also plays a role in discourses surrounding ecology that go beyond a single community or ecological system but rather focus on the ecosystem that makes up the world as a whole. The idea of the world functioning as one big ecosystem is a thought that can be found to reflect in Timothy Morton’s work and the importance he gives to the idea of interconnectedness. His concept of the Mesh, echoing processes of symbiosis, is set up against nature-culture distinctions, but focuses on the interconnectedness of existence and sees existence as first of all being a co-existence.
Symbiosis also plays an important role in the previously mentioned Gaia hypothesis. Here symbiosis, ecology and interconnectedness are taken to a spiritual culmination point where the whole biosphere, the whole planetary ecosystem can be seen as a single complex system consisting of organic and inorganic components. In The systems view of Life, Capra looks at these interrelationships from a systems point of view, seeing living organisms as open systems, functioning in their interactions with others and their environment, on different levels of the overall system. Stephen B. Scharper, in his overview article on Gaia, reviews theories by Lovelock and Margulis and others that have focused on the idea of the earth as a living organism. He focuses amongst others on the way Gaia combined scientific discoveries with a ‘religious imagination’. Timothy Morton, in his podcast on Lynn Margulis and Gaia, notes the differences between her view on symbiosis and the way it was adopted in Gaia Theory.
This part of the book ends with Matthew Fuller’s media ecologies, where he adapts the concept of ecology to media, showing how media as interacting objects, and media systems, function as ecologies. Like different species interacting in symbiotic way to create new species, Fuller shows how a mobile phone can for instance be seen as a ‘media assemblage’.
The third part of the book continues with the influence of symbiosis on thinking about non-organic matter and its interactions with organic matter. Symbiosis played an important role in discourses on the posthuman, for instance in Lickliders seminal speculative paper on the possibilities of man-machine symbiosis. Schalk updates Licklider’s article, using present developments in computing and information processing to show how Licklider’s utopian vision has been not so much utopian as a case of technological improvements. Schalk argues that brain-computer symbiosis or partnerships are a logical step in the course of our evolution.
The next section in this part expands on the possibility of symbiotic intelligence by combining computing with (neural) networks. The first article Forming Neural Networks Through Efficient and Adaptive Coevolution discusses a novel neuroevolutionary approach to mobile robotics, using the Symbiotic Adaptive NeuroEvolution system (SANE). It argues for the benefits of using co-evolutionary algorithms to solve complex control problems. The importance of dynamic or distributed problem-solving, of ‘collective decision making’ or symbiotic intelligence is also discussed in Johnson’s overview on Symbiotic intelligence and human-net interactions.
Another aspect of the importance of symbiosis is discussed in the paper on human-animal symbiosis resulting in chimeras (human-animal hybrids). The paper discusses the importance their development could play in vaccine development, where it not for the strong ethical problems involved in this form of symbiotic evolution.
The last section in this part looks at machine-nature interactions, where Schhuppli’s article describes the coevolution of machine’s with living matter through the example of Hopper’s bug, arguing that mutations, chaos and viral infections are necessary for systems to survive and evolve. Jussi Parikka, in his article on digital monsters and binary aliens, goes deeper into this discourse of the viral as a negative control-issue in the present capitalist system. He shows how on the other hand capitalism itself is integrally viral. Parikka explores these contradictory themes of the viral as the enemy of capitalism and at the same time integral to its logic of expansion, as two intertwined discourses.
The last part of the book looks at possibilities of both augmenting man with machinic prosthetic tools via neural networks and reality with overlaid or augmented virtual worlds or realities. The last two papers describe media art works which look at the augmentation of the real with a virtual layer and what humanity might evolve to in the future, not only looking at the way we can computers smarter but can enhance our own brains and bodies with computer intelligence. Kevin Warwick’s article describes a brain-computer interface (BCI), in which control of a computer through the recording of neurological activity can be a helpful tool to assist patients with motor movement disabilities in gaining more control over their environment. The article by Sanchez et.al. looks at the incorporation of neuro-prosthetic tools through neurological networks via the brain and can be seen as an example of human-tool symbiosis, where through the cognitive space of the brain, tools can be used as extensions of the body.
This part ends with two descriptions of media art that experiments with symbiosis between the real and the virtual. Carrier becoming symborg, the piece and text by Melinda Rackham looks at the viral merging of biological code and source code. Her electronic literature piece about the Hepatitis C virus describes life as well as literature, as an infectious viral agent. Mitchell Whitelaw describes the work of Any Gracie and other examples of the bio/tech hybrid in media art and talks about the importance of symbiosis in Gracie’s work, for instance when he creates augmented worlds in which real and virtual bacteria interact(in Autoinducer_Ph-1).
Epilogue
This living book is also a symbiotic book. It is a merging and co-habitation of different media-species, a mash-up of text and video, sound and images, pixels and living, material tissue. The digital medium has in many ways made it possible for the book to become increasingly infected with foreign (non-textual) elements, as it is evolving into something different, into a becoming in which the book might even mean the disappearance of the book as we know it and the rise of a new symbiotic book-evolved hybrid species.
The symbiotic book in this context also forms a tool for critique, a critique targeted at visions of the book as a static, stable entity, a lifeless thing, a death tree. The symbiotic book as a concept argues for the book as becoming, as infinitely transforming and interacting and crossing over into other books and other discourses. In this vision these networked, liquid books form an ecology of information, growing stronger and more consistent in mutual cooperation. Cooperation as books, as ‘lifeless entities’, or non-organic matter, also takes places with and via the living, with the human assemblages that create the books, feed into them, and make them part of the networks through which they algorithmically spread over the web, keeping the book alive, keeping it social.
The symbiotic book crosses boundaries. Boundaries between the life sciences and the humanities, boundaries between the scholarly world and society at large, making the book open for infection, for re-use, remixing and change. The symbiotic book has borders though. Evolution is a slow process, heavily influenced by environmental and cultural barriers. But maybe some genetic modification might be beneficial in this respect.

Revision as of 08:33, 2 October 2011

Introduction: symbiosis as a living evolving critique.


Different species, interacting in a symbiotic fashion, living together over a prolonged period of time or even co-evolving into new species: this vision on symbiosis has created a strong image—both as a metaphor and a material reality—of species cooperating in the light of difference, of becoming something else and transgressing boundaries. This image has made the concept of symbiosis, in its many guises, a breading ground for amongst others a biologically, posthuman and ecologically informed critique. This living book consists of examples of how symbiosis has been deployed for instance as a critique against the mainstream Darwinian idea of evolution as struggle, against an anthropocentric worldview within the sciences and society at large, and against the idea of organisms or objects as static and isolated entities. Symbiotic processes offer seeds for alternative worldviews and as a tool of critique research on symbiosis has been taken-up as evidence for becoming as an infinite creative process, for the (animal, microbal, machinic, and/or virtual) other as an integral part of the multiple I, and for the integrated cooperation of living and non-living affects.

Otherness, process, multiplicity and cooperation

For the biologist Lynn Margulis, (endo)symbiosis has been the major theme around which she developed her—by some viewed as controversial—evolutionary biological research. Margulis states that in science there are still many (hidden) assumptions that man is the center of things and resides in the middle of the chain of evolution, ‘below god and above rock’. However, as Margulis has defended in her revolutionary work on the importance of endosymbiosis for evolution, all life forms can be seen to have evolved from microbes, from (the interactions between) bacteria. In some cases symbiosis even evolves into symbiogenesis, when certain forms of long-term living together lead to the appearance of new species or new organs. Organisms merge with other organisms, acquiring their gene sets at the same time. Margulis main claim, for which she draws amongst others on earlier work by the biologist Ivan Wallin, is thus that in most cases evolutionary novelty arises as a consequence of symbiosis, which goes directly against a Darwinian ‘nucleocentric view of evolution as a bloody struggle of animals. Margulis claims concerning symbiosis have within mainstream evolutionary biology been seen as controversial and extreme, not only through her insistence on symbiosis and evolutionary cooperation as an alternative theory to Darwinian struggle, but also in her insistence that not only plants an animals evolved from the interaction of microbes , but all life-forms. And as she states ‘the idea that new species arise from symbiotic mergers among members of old ones is still not even discussed in polite scientific society.’ Another aspect of Margulis adaptation and use of symbiosis in biological discourse that has been controversial is her connection with James Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis. The gaia hypotheses proposes a holistic view on the earth (Gaia) as a self-regulating system of organic and inorganic matter, through its feedback system operating as a close unity. This idea is visible in many present-day ecosophies. However, the mixing of a near spiritual and religious rhetoric with scientific facts was not claimed serious enough by many biological researchers and it was seen as too harmonious according to the ‘struggle as survival’ evolutionary strand of neo-darwinians.

Evolution, ecology, posthumanism and augmentation

This living book is divided in four sections. The first part looks at symbiosis as an evolutionary process, the second part at the relationship between symbiosis and ecology, the third at the role symbiosis played in discourses on the posthuman. The fourth part then functions as a more speculative glance into a future of augmented and virtual reality and an evolving symbiosis between the virtual and the real.

The first part, on symbiosis and evolution, contains two articles that serve as both an introduction to and an example of symbiosis. The first article, How symbiosis can guide evolution, is an example of the use of the concept of symbiosis to battle (neo)Darwinism inspired theories of evolution. It describes the creation of a computational model that shows how the formation of symbiotic relations in a given ecosystem influences genetic variation. The second article in this section, by Fabio Lucian and Samuel Alizon, looks at the evolution of a virus (Hepatitus C) in a within-host environment, describing the parasitic relationship of the virus with the host-body. The second set of articles in this part looks at the process of endosymbiosis (symbiosis inside the body/cell) more in particular, where the first article looks at the evolution of symbiotic bacteria in the human intestine and the second article by Wernegreen looks at the interactions (via associations or genetic conflicts) of bacteria within and with insects, and the possibility of genetic manipulation in this evolutionary interaction. Finally the third section looks at the origin of the theory of symbiogenesis, incorporating the seminal 1927 book by American biologist Ivan Wallin, which made the then very controversial claim that cells evolved by symbionticism, by the formation of microsymbiotic complexes. In this book Wallin describes the emergence of mitochondria as the incorporation of independent bacteria inside of existing cells, which evolved to what we now know as organelles. In an overview article biologist Lynn Margulis goes back to the origin of the theory of symbiogenesis (and to Wallin and his Russian colleagues) and explores her own roots and the development of her groundbreaking Serial Endosymbiosis Theory (SET) at the same time.

The second part of this liquid book looks at the relationship of symbiosis with ecology. In the first section on community ecology, the article The Roles and Interactions of Symbiont, Host and Environment in Defining Coral Fitness, looks at the complex interactions between the coral host, the algal symbiont, and the environment, and the role symbionts play in this community ecology with respect to the community’s (the coral holobiont’s) fitness, also to determine what the effects of global climate change on this ecology might be. An important aspect of discourses surrounding ecology is the upkeep of the level of biodiversity and complexity of a given system or ecology. The article by Toft, Williams, and Fares, looks at this aspect of biodiversity as a measure of the health of ecosystems and the role symbiosis (especially with respect to the way proteobacteria interact with insects) plays in generating species diversity. Symbiosis also plays a role in discourses surrounding ecology that go beyond a single community or ecological system but rather focus on the ecosystem that makes up the world as a whole. The idea of the world functioning as one big ecosystem is a thought that can be found to reflect in Timothy Morton’s work and the importance he gives to the idea of interconnectedness. His concept of the Mesh, echoing processes of symbiosis, is set up against nature-culture distinctions, but focuses on the interconnectedness of existence and sees existence as first of all being a co-existence. Symbiosis also plays an important role in the previously mentioned Gaia hypothesis. Here symbiosis, ecology and interconnectedness are taken to a spiritual culmination point where the whole biosphere, the whole planetary ecosystem can be seen as a single complex system consisting of organic and inorganic components. In The systems view of Life, Capra looks at these interrelationships from a systems point of view, seeing living organisms as open systems, functioning in their interactions with others and their environment, on different levels of the overall system. Stephen B. Scharper, in his overview article on Gaia, reviews theories by Lovelock and Margulis and others that have focused on the idea of the earth as a living organism. He focuses amongst others on the way Gaia combined scientific discoveries with a ‘religious imagination’. Timothy Morton, in his podcast on Lynn Margulis and Gaia, notes the differences between her view on symbiosis and the way it was adopted in Gaia Theory. This part of the book ends with Matthew Fuller’s media ecologies, where he adapts the concept of ecology to media, showing how media as interacting objects, and media systems, function as ecologies. Like different species interacting in symbiotic way to create new species, Fuller shows how a mobile phone can for instance be seen as a ‘media assemblage’.

The third part of the book continues with the influence of symbiosis on thinking about non-organic matter and its interactions with organic matter. Symbiosis played an important role in discourses on the posthuman, for instance in Lickliders seminal speculative paper on the possibilities of man-machine symbiosis. Schalk updates Licklider’s article, using present developments in computing and information processing to show how Licklider’s utopian vision has been not so much utopian as a case of technological improvements. Schalk argues that brain-computer symbiosis or partnerships are a logical step in the course of our evolution. The next section in this part expands on the possibility of symbiotic intelligence by combining computing with (neural) networks. The first article Forming Neural Networks Through Efficient and Adaptive Coevolution discusses a novel neuroevolutionary approach to mobile robotics, using the Symbiotic Adaptive NeuroEvolution system (SANE). It argues for the benefits of using co-evolutionary algorithms to solve complex control problems. The importance of dynamic or distributed problem-solving, of ‘collective decision making’ or symbiotic intelligence is also discussed in Johnson’s overview on Symbiotic intelligence and human-net interactions. Another aspect of the importance of symbiosis is discussed in the paper on human-animal symbiosis resulting in chimeras (human-animal hybrids). The paper discusses the importance their development could play in vaccine development, where it not for the strong ethical problems involved in this form of symbiotic evolution. The last section in this part looks at machine-nature interactions, where Schhuppli’s article describes the coevolution of machine’s with living matter through the example of Hopper’s bug, arguing that mutations, chaos and viral infections are necessary for systems to survive and evolve. Jussi Parikka, in his article on digital monsters and binary aliens, goes deeper into this discourse of the viral as a negative control-issue in the present capitalist system. He shows how on the other hand capitalism itself is integrally viral. Parikka explores these contradictory themes of the viral as the enemy of capitalism and at the same time integral to its logic of expansion, as two intertwined discourses.

The last part of the book looks at possibilities of both augmenting man with machinic prosthetic tools via neural networks and reality with overlaid or augmented virtual worlds or realities. The last two papers describe media art works which look at the augmentation of the real with a virtual layer and what humanity might evolve to in the future, not only looking at the way we can computers smarter but can enhance our own brains and bodies with computer intelligence. Kevin Warwick’s article describes a brain-computer interface (BCI), in which control of a computer through the recording of neurological activity can be a helpful tool to assist patients with motor movement disabilities in gaining more control over their environment. The article by Sanchez et.al. looks at the incorporation of neuro-prosthetic tools through neurological networks via the brain and can be seen as an example of human-tool symbiosis, where through the cognitive space of the brain, tools can be used as extensions of the body. This part ends with two descriptions of media art that experiments with symbiosis between the real and the virtual. Carrier becoming symborg, the piece and text by Melinda Rackham looks at the viral merging of biological code and source code. Her electronic literature piece about the Hepatitis C virus describes life as well as literature, as an infectious viral agent. Mitchell Whitelaw describes the work of Any Gracie and other examples of the bio/tech hybrid in media art and talks about the importance of symbiosis in Gracie’s work, for instance when he creates augmented worlds in which real and virtual bacteria interact(in Autoinducer_Ph-1).

Epilogue

This living book is also a symbiotic book. It is a merging and co-habitation of different media-species, a mash-up of text and video, sound and images, pixels and living, material tissue. The digital medium has in many ways made it possible for the book to become increasingly infected with foreign (non-textual) elements, as it is evolving into something different, into a becoming in which the book might even mean the disappearance of the book as we know it and the rise of a new symbiotic book-evolved hybrid species. The symbiotic book in this context also forms a tool for critique, a critique targeted at visions of the book as a static, stable entity, a lifeless thing, a death tree. The symbiotic book as a concept argues for the book as becoming, as infinitely transforming and interacting and crossing over into other books and other discourses. In this vision these networked, liquid books form an ecology of information, growing stronger and more consistent in mutual cooperation. Cooperation as books, as ‘lifeless entities’, or non-organic matter, also takes places with and via the living, with the human assemblages that create the books, feed into them, and make them part of the networks through which they algorithmically spread over the web, keeping the book alive, keeping it social. The symbiotic book crosses boundaries. Boundaries between the life sciences and the humanities, boundaries between the scholarly world and society at large, making the book open for infection, for re-use, remixing and change. The symbiotic book has borders though. Evolution is a slow process, heavily influenced by environmental and cultural barriers. But maybe some genetic modification might be beneficial in this respect.