NO HARM, NO FOUL!

Nature has its own balance, looking around one can easily see that all the creatures are living together in great harmony, simply because nature and everything in it share a wonderful balance. This balance wouldn't have succeeded without the unconditional cooperation of all its members. Although there is no written contract or rules to govern this cooperation, there is an unspoken word of honor that nobody breaks, or at least, they are not supposed to, if they want to coexist together.

Without the mutual respect and the mutual care for each other's existence, this cooperation would have failed!

Despite there are no "legally binding written contracts" every creature keeps his end of the deal. Nevertheless, when this unspoken word of honor is disrespected or somehow overridden....the fight starts!

The rules of cooperation in nature are set once and it never change, not even when stressful conditions or open-arms opportunities present itself.

Let's discuss some examples;

First, logically a tree + a lot of ants =Disaster!

However, here in Africa, it works sometimes in a different way!

Here grows a special type of plant - namely "Acacia" - that produces a special chemical to attract ants. Yes, it attracts a special type ants - namely "Crematogaster" - for protection!

Actually Acacia hire the Crematogaster as guards, and it provides the ants with food. In return, the crematogaster ants fight away any animal that tries to harm or eat the acacia plant, simply by crawling all over the attackers, but not the bees or any insect that pollinate the tree!

Amazing!

Another example is within our own body, in 1885 Theodor Escherich, described a commensal (non-harmful) bacteria that lived in the human colon, he first called Bacterium Coli, i.e. bacteria of the colon, then later it was named after him Escherichia Coli (aka E Coli). E Coli is one of the bacteria flora that lives in our colon, we provide it with food and it helps us in digestion, actually it is essential to our food processing mechanisms, in fact, some scientists call the bacteria flora "the forgotten organ".

You see, a tight bond of mutual interest is built between our bodies and E Coli. These bacteria colonize our colon within the first few days of our life and this agreement continues forever!?!

As long as both parties respect each other!!!

Years after E Coli was considered completely harmless, it was proved that it could cause serious sickness in children and also adults!

So, what happened?

One of the two parties decided to be selfish and gain more access to fresher food in the small intestine or may be even gaining access to the best served energy supply in our body "the blood". Obviously, our body will not just stand watching E Coli wander around and let it steal its sole energy source, so our body declares WAR against this traitor, and only then our immune cells fights the E Coli and we get sick in the process. Meanwhile the E Coli that are still present in our colon are not touched!?!

So, it is a fight with a cost and casualties on both sides, but rules are rules and everyone has to respect those rules!!!

E Coli actually started this feud, only by disrespecting this cooperation agreement and becoming greedy!

All the examples of cooperation in nature are always positive, beneficial and peaceful. I like this mutual respect and mutual benefit, what a wonderful cooperation!

NO HARM, NO FOUL

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Image Credit: by lumaxart via Wikimedia Commons