Is the Earth, a living being?

Answer 1

Depends on your definition of "living".

In the strictest sense, the answer is no, because the earth doesn't fit the standard biological definition of life as we apply it to individual living creatures.

However, if one defines life more broadly one can regard the earth as alive. The idea was first articulated by the biologist James Lovelock and published in a book called _Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth_. The idea has since been called "the Gaia Hypothesis".

The basic ideas of the hypothesis that the ecology of the earth as a whole can be best thought of as a single living organism. While it doesn't fit all the standard criteria for life (it doesn't make baby planets) it shares some important qualities of life, including the capacity to regulate itself to maintain a dynamic equilibrium.

An important aspect of the idea is a holistic view of life on earth. The biological systems and environment don't simply co-exist as independent things that just happen to sit on the same planet, but actually are interacting, even interdependent, and rather than looking at individual creatures or ecologies the planets is best studied as an interacting planet-wide whole.

For more information, google the phrase "gaia hypothesis" or pick up James Lovelock's book.

Answer 2

No. It is a molten rock that is hurtling blindly through space.

However, this depends entirely on what you define as a living being. As a system, Earth could be considered alive because it is covered in life that alters earth in many ways and reacts to outside intrustions on that system (meteors, sunflares, etc..) by attempting to maintain an equilibrium, or homeostasis if you will, of the planet.

However, this is just poetic personification of a lifeless body to help humans understand their impact on the planet they live on. Don't take it too seriously. To be "alive" most people agree you have to have the ability to "die," but the worst thing that could happen is that the Earth breaks into many pieces, melts due to falling into the sun, etc... but it has nothing we would consider important to life, which is the ability to grow, undergo reactions to convert "food" into energy, and the ability to reproduce. Earth is a rock and does none of these things.

But that doesn't mean you shouldn't protect our Earth and take care of it!

Answer 3

Yes many believe that and her name is Gaia ,there is a lot of evidence that an intelligence directs Nature or the total body of water in all its forms
all live is dimensional differences living on top of onr another
we would be god for the microbes that live in us ,,andit stands to reason if a rule applies into one direction it also aplies in the other direction
so we could be the bugs that live on the bigger animal

Answer 4

life has to fit several criteria.
two of which are consumption of matter, growth, and propriation

since the earth does not eat, stays the relative same size, and there are no baby earth's floating about. i would have to say no.

the earth however does fit a few other criteria of life,
it does have a border between outside and inside, and it does regulate its inside (weather regulates temperature, nature regulates the climate)

Answer 5

no. it is a rock with water and has a heat core in the middle and is held together by gravity at a constant of 9.8meters/second squared that is light enough that life lives on earth.

Answer 6

no, its a rock. living beings are on the earth.

Answer 7

That depends on who you talk to.Native peoples and Many Pagans will say yes. That all life springs from the earth.
It just depends on your world view.

Answer 8

Nope.

Answer 9

yes