How much has pond scum evolved?

It’s a difficult question to answer because the conditions for meaningful fossilization of soft vegetative matter in a liquid are so rare, but one doubts there has been much, if any, significant change in water-borne algae. What would the pressure have been?

@dpworkin: What would the pressure have been?

Typically from their mothers. “Stand up straight, for heaven’s sake.”

Thanks for giving a serious answer @dpworkin…

Because the guidelines clearly state:
“If you want to make a joke in an answer, wait until at least one helpful response has been given.”

So now, may I repeat…

So when people call me “The Scum of the Earth”, I should take it as a compliment?

beware @gailcalled… your first answer may be yanked… oh, but maybe you were being serious.

@dpworkin “What would the pressure have been?”

It certainly would have been under the same (random) radiation pressures that all other life forms were subject to.

“What can we learn from our earliest relatives about how to adapt to changing conditions on Earth?”

That a pressure free life is the cure for evolution?

Here’s an interesting article on static evolution that talks about how very little pond scum has changed through the ages. Of the 300 stains found in fossils, 90 have modern day counterparts.

Simply float on calm waters and don’t make waves and your species will live for ever.

@Cruiser- But where’s the fun in that?

If in the end the human species is going to have a shorter collective life span than that of pond scum, it’s probably going to be because pond scum never figured out how to split the atom and use that knowledge to destroy other pond scum on the other side of the world.

By all means, though, if you want humanity to have a long life in which nothing ever freaking happens, model yourself on pond scum.
But if instead you want to seize the day, if you want to thrive, excel, fight the odds, defeat your limitations, conquer the unknown, achieve the unimaginable, make the impossible your bitch, and still know where your towel is, then model yourself on Homo Sapiens, because they’re doing a far better job.

@Fyrius for President! Inspiration we can believe in! And after you’re done fixing America, you can reform the Catholic church! =P

Fyrius for president? I’m still an atheist.
Without the support of both the left wing and the right wing, for someone as down to earth as I am, that idea ain’t gonna fly.

Incidentally, have a feeling that my atheism is going to be a bigger obstacle to getting people to take me seriously as the president of a world power than the fact that I’m a golden retriever in a suit.

@AstroChuck Most of the reason I am glad I am not pond scum and willingly pay taxes…I like to have fun and lots of it!

@Fyrius That is so true and so sad.

Saying that pond scum that did not evolve further is therefore better than the pond scum that did is ridiculous.

From the perspective of the pond scum that was around 4.5 billion years ago, we are all descendants, the result of that same scum. We’re all therefore just as successful.

Homo sapiens is just pond scum version 1641946192836412831923401243.2, while the scum in our ponds may still be at version 1.b.

@dpworkin Thanks for a great answer and for providing cover so @RealEyesRealizeRealLies could retell his joke, which I thoroughly appreciated. Had you not given him cover, I would have been forever wondering what he could possibly have said to get moderated. :-)

@gailcalled Ha! Probably so. Is that what got your first response moderated? :-)

@PandoraBoxx Great reference. Thanks so much.

@Cruiser Great point. :-)

@whitenoise Our relationship is part of what’s humbling. I believe we still carry some of the same DNA. Pretty successful sequences, I’d say.

@ETpro: I suggested that pond scum had evolved into Rove, Cheney, Palin and Ann Coulter, among others. Too early in the answer queue, and probably not funny enough

@gailcalled
I chuckled anyway.
It’s true, conservatives have a lot in common with pond scum. If it’s up to them, they will both to live the exact same lives for centuries on end without any progress or development.

@gailcalled Ha! Great bon mot.