“In Praise of Bacteria: No In-Laws, No Funerals, No Fuss”

As a homo sapiens human, you doubtless have closed your mind to the advantages of the original, very successful method of reproduction of the species. You wasted no sleepless nights over the advantages of divide and multiply. Bacteria don’t enter your mind as you go on happily suffering the pain of divorce, broken families, environmental degradation,  biological   waste, funerals and lives cut short. Millions of single cell creatures suffer none of that agony and are essentially immortal.

 I asked AI to weigh in on this debate. Rather than pass off other’s words for my own, I reproduce the following single cell vs. multicell life  by CHAT GPT:

 “ A bacterium lives by a beautifully simple rulebook:

• Reproduction: Split in two (binary fission). No dating apps. No awkward dinners.
• Longevity: In a sense, “immortal”—it divides, passing along its lineage indefinitely.
• Independence: No childhood, no parenting, no tuition bills.
• Environmental footprint: Minimal. No SUVs, no plastic, no late-night Amazon orders.

But here’s the catch:

• No memory
• No awareness
• No love, humor, ambition, regret, or curiosity
• No sense that it even exists

A bacterium doesn’t avoid tragedy—it simply lacks the equipment to experience anything at all.

🧠 The Human Condition: Complicated, Costly… and

• Reproduction: A multi-act opera—courtship, commitment, chaos.
• Longevity: Definitely not immortal. We get one run, and we know it.
• Dependency: Years of helpless infancy, decades of entanglements.
• Environmental impact: Let’s just say bacteria are not attending climate summits.

But in exchange:

• Consciousness – you know you’re here
• Meaning-making – you ask questions like the one you just asked
• Relationships – love, loyalty, heartbreak, reconciliation
• Humor and irony – bacteria have never written a blog post or told a joke
• Legacy – not just genes, but ideas, stories, art, kindness

Why Nobody Wants to Be a Bacterium

Because the very thing that makes human life messy—consciousness—is also what makes it valuable.

If you offered a person this deal:

“You can live forever, but you won’t know it, feel it, or remember it.”

Most would decline.

 Barclay writes a rebuttal

 I cannot agree with your conclusion which takes a relentlessly hostile view of bacteria, and assume they have no clue about anything that’s going on. Since I cannot prove otherwise at this moment, please give me the punchy blog post .”

  CHATGPT REBUTSTAL.    

“Fair enough—you’re defending the underdog (or under-microscope), and I admire the loyalty. Let’s give bacteria their day in court… and still land the punchline.

Humans vs. Bacteria: Who Really Got the Better Deal?

Consider the quiet triumph of the humble bacterium.

No dating. No marriage. No awkward conversations about “where this relationship is going.” A bacterium simply splits in two and calls it a family plan. No diapers, no college tuition, no therapy bills for offspring who later claim, “You never understood me.”

Meanwhile, over in the land of Homo sapiens, we’ve turned reproduction into a Broadway production: romance, commitment, paperwork, childbirth, followed by 25 years of emotional, financial, and logistical gymnastics. Curtain call? Retirement… if we’re lucky.

The bacterium, by contrast, may be onto something.

It doesn’t worry about climate change, rising interest rates, or whether its neighbor’s lawn looks better. It doesn’t read the news. It doesn’t need the news. It is blissfully uninformed, gloriously untroubled, and environmentally impeccable. You could argue it is the original minimalist.

And here’s the kicker: in a sense, it never dies. It simply divides—again and again—passing its essence forward like an eternal relay race with no finish line and no commentator.

Now, I’ve been told (often by people with microscopes and serious expressions) that bacteria have no awareness, no feelings, no clue about anything at all. I remain politely skeptical.

After all, if a creature can thrive for billions of years, survive boiling vents, frozen tundra, and the average kitchen sponge, perhaps it knows something we don’t. Or perhaps it has cleverly avoided knowing anything at all.

Which brings us to the uncomfortable comparison.

Humans possess consciousness—an impressive feature that allows us to appreciate sunsets, compose symphonies, fall in love… and worry incessantly about all three. We know we are here. We know we will not always be here. And we spend a good portion of our allotted time trying to come to terms with that arrangement.

Bacteria, on the other hand, may have solved the problem by declining the invitation altogether.

No awareness, no anxiety. No ambition, no disappointment. No in-laws, no probate court.

Elegant.

And yet—curiously—none of us wakes up wishing to be one.

Why?

Because for all its burdens, consciousness offers something bacteria, enlightened or not, have yet to demonstrate: the ability to experience life, not just persist through it.

To laugh. To remember. To love. To complain about the back pain that arrives every morning like a loyal but unwelcome companion.

In short, to live vividly—even if briefly.

So here we are: the complicated species, envying the simple one, while secretly clinging to our messy, overstuffed, emotionally entangled existence.

The bacterium may have perfected survival.

But we—despite everything—seem stubbornly attached to the experience.

Barclay concludes:

“This may be artificial, but it is so intelligent I couldn’t have said it better myself. “