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1. Maybe, I still haven't clicked on the article to be honest. 2. Yeah, since my first take before reading replies to point out it was exaggerated I reckon we don't fundamentally disagree. It has occurred to me since, the reason I probably saw this comment as useful is because while things are really way, way more complex as you've mentioned, when we seek to understand it, we usually do simplify things back down as far as possible while still capturing the essence of whatever aspect of the complexity. For example, simply calculating mean trophic level and simplifying organisms to a single number based on the average trophic level of what they eat [1] which enables modelling key aspects of the system [2]. Then you can do something like.. compare commonalities between a soil ecosystem, which may indeed have a three levels of consumers, to an African savannah. But you are right that it is important to consider a web and not a chain as the fundamental topology, but again if you want to look at one aspect, max lengths of the web, there's a good reason to pull out a single chain. For someone that can drown in complexity, I feel a debt of gratitude for people that have demonstrated when highly simplified models can capture aspects of trophic ecology. Regarding point three, that's an interesting point. You might be interested in this recent study [3] that suggests that the purpose of gills was originally electrolyte balance, not gas exchange for respiration. If that's the case, terrestrial animals might not have the impetus to 're-evolve' gills. There's no right way to make a living in the ocean though, I reckon as soon as your lifecycle has no obligate terrestrial phases, you've made it. Until next time, 10 y.o. 'throwaway' account! [1] https://doi.org/10.1006/jmsc.1997.0280
[2] https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsr062
[3] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05331-7 |