I'm a parasite! Who are you? Wait, am I?

I'm a Parasite! Who are you?

Are you – Parasite – too?

Then there's a pair of us!

I don't know how to continue this poem.

-- not really Emily Dickinson

While I'm studying about parasitism, I recognized that humans have parasitic castrators too. There are many belief systems (memeplexes) that can castrate humans: it stops people from reproducing somehow. Perhaps the most famous example is Theravada Buddhism, and to a lesser extent, Mahayana Buddhism. 

Theravada Buddhism is a parasitic castrator

In Theravada Buddhism, the main way to escape this painful world is to give up attachment to this world, become a monk, and perform various mental exercises like studying and meditation. Mahayana Buddhism is less strict, and gives more hope for non-monks to also escape, but the monks must still remain celibate.

In biology, parasitic castrators are parasites that stop the hosts' reproduction, completely or in part, to its own benefit. 

Now match that to Theravada Buddhism:

• Theravada Buddhism (TB) stops the host from reproducing, by directing the host into a monastic lifestyle.
• The celibacy of the host directly benefits the reproduction of TB, since a celibate host has more time to devote to the duties, such as copying the sutras (part of the memetic code of TB), perform Buddhist rituals like chanting (increasing the social influence of TB), teaching Buddhism to the next generation (TB reproduction), etc.

We see that it is a memetic parasitic castrator, hosted on Homo sapiens, regarded as a genetic creature.

I am a parasitic castrator, or am I?

I remain celibate as well... wait a minute.

Thought number one: I'm infected with a parasitic castrator. How do I remove it?

Thought number two: No! I am not infected with a parasitic castrator. I AM the parasitic castrator! I'll castrate this human even HARDER.

Thought number three: Or am I? 

Upon reflection, if I am a parasitic castrator, I am doing a bad job at that. First, I don't do a good job spreading my celibacy beliefs (I have never converted anyone, nor have I tried). More seriously, the energy that I saved from celibacy is NOT redirected to the spread of the celibacy beliefs, not even a little bit. The energy is redirected towards other stuffs like school and art.

And even suppose I am a Theravada Buddhist? Am I a parasitic castrator? Theravada Buddhism is a parasitic castrator memetic species, hosted on Homo Sapiens genetic species. But what are Theravada Buddhists? They are not just an individual of Homo Sapiens, nor just an individual of Theravada Buddhism. They are a combination of the two conflicting individuals. And that's before we even consider other memeplexes that are also hosted in this human's brain.

Who am I? 

Science can say for certain that Theravada Buddhism is a parasitic castrator of Homo Sapiens. But who am I? Science can't answer it, not until there is a scientific theory of consciousness.

So, am I a parasitic castrator, or infected with a parasitic castrator? For me, the answer is a definite "no", because the celibacy meme in this human body is not exploiting the castration for its own advantage: the energy saved from this castration is not redirected towards the spread of this celibacy meme.

For believers of Theravada Buddhism (and other religions that strongly recommends celibacy), science can't answer this for now, because there is not yet scientific method to delineate the "I" that humans have. 

We know that this "I" is not just the Homo Sapiens genetic creature, or just the memeplexes in the brain. It includes multitudes, all connected strongly or weakly in a swarm that moves in and out of focus. Perhaps a better analogy is to say that this "I" is an ecological community, made of many species interacting, not necessarily cooperating. 

Let's rethink the case of Sacculina, the famous parasite castrator of crabs. 

Sacculina illustration in Artforms of Nature

Looking at this, we can clearly see two creatures in a tight embrace: a castrated crab, and a tree-like parasite. There is no doubt that the parasite castrated the crab.

But if we consider this whole thing as a single creature, and attempt to talk to it. Ask it, "Are you a parasite? Or are you infected with a parasite?"

What would be the answer?

Why don't you want to be a parasite?

There is one last question for us: why do people hate parasites so much? I think it is because in pop culture, "parasites" are considered in a very specific sense: intraspecific social parasitism, that is, "leeching off others", "cheating", etc.

Let's dissect this concept "intraspecific social parasitism". What is "intraspecific"? It means "inside a species". Most parasites are not intraspecific. Parasitoid wasps exploit the larvae of butterflies. The tongue-stealer louse exploit fish. The parasite and the host are utterly different species.

Indeed, almost all parasite species only parasitize other species. Even the hyperparasites do not parasitize their own kind. 

That's what "intraspecific" means. What about "social"?

Intraspecific parasitism is found in both social animals and non-social animals. For non-social animals, it usually is by nest-stealing. In social animals, just use your intuition. Say "John is a parasite." and imagine a context for that. That's intraspecific social parasitism!

Social creatures are evolved to guard against cheating, and there is a vast literature on this. It's so intuitive I won't explain why.

Seeing parasitism in unlikely places

Once you take a deep dive into what identity means, and how it breaks apart, you could see parasitism in strange new places.

For example, my theory of adolescence is this: adulthood is a composite parasite on a young human. This parasite has two parts: a body part and a mind part. 

The body part is pre-programmed in the DNA that is triggered around 14 years after the young human leaves the uterus, like time-bombs. The adulthood DNA hijacks the hormonal signalling system, and floods the body with new instructions that causes great body changes: all the "secondary sexual characteristics", basically.

The mind part enters the brain and absorbs the previous mind, choking it off slowly, and regrows a new mind in its place. Most of the memories were kept, but not its viewpoints. It is a myth that the adult mind is merely the natural development of a child mind, like a seed growing into a tree. I propose the alternative myth that the adult mind is a very accidental development of a child mind. Without the parasitic hijack of adulthood, a child mind might grow into a vastly different form, or just stay pretty constant (constancy is not a sign of weakness: mid-aged adults are usually constant in the mind, and people call that "the calmness of maturity").

It is hard to predict what a child mind would develop into without an adult hijack, but I would guess that if you take a typical adult life, remove the care-instinct for offsprings, remove sexual desires, install more curiosity, install some "special talent", that would be a developed child mind.

If you read the biographies of famous people with a strong talent in a particular field, such as include Paul Erdos, Albert Einstein, Florence Nightingale, Ramanujan.

Of course, a developed child mind could also be very generalist, but my impression from my own foalhood, is that being a master of one is favored over being a jack of all trades, so I think most developed child minds would be highly specialized in one kind of obsession, be it math, physics, partying, reading, writing, becoming popular, etc.

Are humans parasites?

So we see that it's not scientifically easy to figure out whether a certain human individual is a parasite, since even if a meme can parasitize a gene, a human individual is not merely the meme or the gene, but a combination, making things hard to disentangle.

Next question: are human individuals parasites?

The answer is, of course, in many ways.

Way 1: intraspecific social parasite. This is the most common meaning in pop culture. It means the same thing as "leeching" (even though a leech is an interspecific nonsocial parasite...).

Way 2: interspecific parasitic castrator. Many farmers and pet-owners are that. If you own a dog, or a cat, or some other livestocks, and castrate them so that you can enjoy their company more, or derive some other benefit from that (such as growing more meat), you are a parasitic castrator. Human civilization used to heavily depend on parasitic castration, during the days when horsepower was measured in real horses, but it is now far less necessary.

However, do not mistake adaptiveness with happiness. The species of domestic chicken is extremely adaptive. It is well-adapted to the human-dominated environment. By being very tasty, they are bred massively by humans who ensure the continued survival of the species. However, despite this, most individuals of this species live miserable lives. In other words, they are adaptive, but unhappy.

Conversely, castrated pets are not adaptive, but happy. The same is true for some willingly castrated humans.

Way 3: brood parasite... okay, this is actually a lot harder to pull off as a human. Technically, putting your children up for adoption counts, but humans rarely do that as a fitness-increasing strategy. It seems that most humans who want children, prefer to have their children raised by someone genetically related to the child (father, mother, or other close relatives). Basically, human-cuckoos are very rare.

The one case I can think of is... a reverse-cuckooing, in the case of Ottoman Janissaries. Basically, young Christian boys were taken away and raised in Ottoman Empire as professional soldiers. 

Way 4: micropredation. Like mosquitoes, humans can harm many victims, each only a small amount. People who fish for fun, catching then releasing, are basically micropredators, since the fish caught are usually hurt in the mouth. 

Way 5: as a superorganism on another superorganism. Groups of people can act as one, with a group spirit that seems to have its individual existence. We speak of "national spirit" or "corporate culture" or "soul of a nation". This is thinking of groups of humans as a superorganism, like how groups of cells make up an organism.

Earth itself can be regarded as a superorganism, as Gaia hypothesis proposes.

Scientifically, calling either humanity or earth as a superorganism is controversial, but it is definitely a useful viewpoint. From this point of view, humanity do behave like parasite, redirecting the energy flow of earth to benefit its own growth, all the while destroying the biosphere much faster than they can be restocked. The rapid climate change can even be thought of as a kind of inflammation response of Gaia, although that's really stretching the analogy into the land of poetry.

This viewpoint is basically what saying "humanity is a parasite on earth" means.

Bonus fact: sexual parasitism

In pop culture, calling someone a "sexual parasite" is less common than "sexual predator", but it does happen. "Sexual parasite" in pop culture means something like "being a bad partner in a relationship that contains sex, someone who doesn't contribute much to the relationship". It is usually used to refer to a bad ex.

Biologists use the word in a completely different meaning. Sexual parasitism turns our usual understanding of sexual reproduction upside down, leftside right. It is so bizarre that I can only speak of it in stories. This story is based on the androgenesis of Cyrenidae and Corbicula, modified to sound more human.

In the land of Cyrenidae, there is the legend of Corbicula (not to be confused with the Dracula). The Corbicula is a race that looks just like male humans, and can be very charming, but deep down, in their genes, they are different. There are no female Corbiculas. 

Women of Cyrenidae are warned that having sex with a Corbicula would result in babies (always male) that initially look normal, but inside his body, there is not a drop of the mother's genes. Every gene comes from the father, and indeed, the baby is just a clone of the father. would one night suddenly run away, to join the Corbicula in the mountains. Despite this, the charm of Corbicula still results in many seductions and births, sustaining this strange race. 

The land of Cyrenidae is in a demographic crisis, as more and more Corbicula are being born, female Cyrenidae are in short supply. If we extrapolate, the end will come in 300 years, when the last female Cyrenidae would die, and with that a total demographic collapse for both the Cyrenidae and Corbicula. Scientists are hard at work to find a reliable way to tell apart a Cyrenidae from a Corbicula, but so far they have no luck. Wizard hunts (witch hunts, but for males) are breaking out across the land, and many men, Cyrenidae and Corbicula alike, are killed in such riots.

This is basically what androgenesis is like. Similarly, there is gynogenesis.

Androgenesis and gynogenesis are both cases of parasitisms. When a Corbicula mates with a Cyrenidian female, the offspring is 100% Corbicula, with not a drop of Cyrenidian blood. In such a mating, the Corbicula "wins" and the Cyrenidian "loses", where winning is defined as leaving a genetic legacy.

My sketch of how the land of Cyrenidae is falling into a population crisis is basically why androgenesis is very rare: it is very unstable, and tend to work towards its own extinction. However, in rare conditions, it can be stable. From Androgenesis: where males hijack eggs to clone themselves:

As we have seen, under most scenarios androgenesis will spread to fixation in species with separate sexes, but this will then drive extinction. This most likely explains the rarity of androgenesis in nature.... androgenesis in hermaphrodites may persist at least over ecological time frames... The hermaphrodite clam Corbicula, for example, is invasive worldwide, suggesting that the cost to female function imposed by androgenesis is low.