organism
Sign in to saveAn organism is any living thing that functions as an individual. Such a definition raises more problems than it solves, not least because the concept of an individual is also difficult. Several criteria, few of which are widely accepted, have been proposed to define what constitutes an organism. Among the most common is that an organism has autonomous reproduction, growth, and metabolism. This would exclude viruses, even though they evolve like organisms.
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An organism is any living thing that functions as an individual unit, though scientists disagree on exactly what qualifies as one. The most common criteria include autonomous reproduction, growth, and metabolism, though these definitions have limitations—for example, they would exclude viruses despite their ability to evolve.
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Article
10 sectionsContents
- Etymology
- Whether criteria exist, or are needed
- Organisms at differing levels of biological organisation
- Boundary cases
- Viruses
- Evolutionary emergence of organisms
- Organism-like colonies
- Synthetic organisms
- References
- External links
An organism is any living thing that functions as an individual. Such a definition raises more problems than it solves, not least because the concept of an individual is also difficult. Several criteria, few of which are widely accepted, have been proposed to define what constitutes an organism. Among the most common is that an organism has autonomous reproduction, growth, and metabolism. This would exclude viruses, even though they evolve like organisms.
Other problematic cases include colonial organisms; a colony of eusocial insects is organised adaptively, and has germ-soma specialisation, with some insects reproducing, others not, like cells in an animal's body. The body of a siphonophore, a jelly-like marine animal, is composed of organism-like zooids, but the whole structure looks and functions much like an animal such as a jellyfish, the parts collaborating to provide the functions of the colonial organism.