Biological analogies

A. I have analogized language mixture to the mating of a horse and a mule, but this implies that language mixture is exceptional and that its results are somehow deficient. But another biological analogy is more appropriate. Lynn Margulis and other biologists have called attention to the fact that symbiosis—communal, co-dependent living between different species—is central to the existence of life as we know it. Plants derive crucial nutrients via the fungi in their roots that process nitrogen for them; cows could not digest their food without the bacteria filling their stomachs; and even the organelles within cells, such as mitochondria in animals, began as independent bacteria.

B. As Margulis has it:

In reality the tree of life often grows in on itself. Species come together, fuse, and make new beings, who start again. Biologists call the coming together of branches—whether blood vessels, roots, or fungal threads—anastomosis…. Anastomosis, although less frequent, is as important as branching. Symbiosis, like sex, brings previously evolved beings together into new partnerships.

In broad view, the world’s languages comprise tens of thousands of dialects harboring evidence of symbiotic matings in the past. Margulis describes anastomosis as “branches forming nets,” and this analogy is so useful that it can replace the one of the flowering bush.