Would you be surprised to know that the “original internet” is actually 1.3 billion years old? That’s right. The world wide web mimics the very first organism on earth – fungi.
Mycelium, or the branching, threadlike vegetative portion of fungi, is like the internet under our feet. Its network is like a superhighway of vital information between the natural world, transferring the right nutrients to the right plants to ensure optimal vitality and nutrient density. It also helps detoxify, purify and recycle soil to ensure plants can grow in the most nutrient-rich conditions. It links the natural world as the internet links humanity at a speed and accuracy that defies man.
We can see this expression of biomimicry all around us. The internet as a symbolic expression of the mycelium network is just one example. Many things in nature are reflected in man-made creations, sometimes unconsciously.
We’d love to hear your thoughts on the subject.
Where else can we see such a striking example of biomimicry? Leave your responses and ideas below in the comments section.
Your examples may be included in our film!
Share, Comment, Win
We have a fantastic fun give-away for you (internet related, of course).
1. Share this blog post (our share buttons make it ridiculously easy);
2. Leave a comment below letting us know you shared (“I shared!”);
3. We’ll announce the winner on our Facebook Fan Page Thursday, September 18, 2pm (PST)
4. Jump up and down with excitement
Ready, set, … share!
I shared!
I shared!
I shared. What an appropriate topic to put out over the Internet.
I shared
I shared.
I shared!!
Mycelium is a network Using these words to describe this net. Building, Catering, changing, choosing, consuming, developing, designing, dividing, educating, exchanging, evolving, gathering, generating, introducing, optimizing, organizing, reconnecting, responding, restoring, repairing, stimulating, streaming,reconnecting, reacting, resounding, restoring, repairing and teaching,
The man made internet can be described using these same words:
What the man made internet lacks in comparison is: Life, a nurturing, creating, growing, adapting, gathering, healing, decomposing, dying, reusing, neutralizing, digesting, rotting, germinating, inoculating, producing, sequestering, breaking down, rewarding, blending, mixing turning and so on.
totally shared anything to help this network grow and grow and grow
Shared to FB! There is a cool documentary (also on Netflix) that talks a bit about this as well called “What Plants Talk About”: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/what-plants-talk-about/video-full-episode/8243/
Yup. I shared.
i just found this blog few days ago and i cant stop reading thanks so much for all the info
shared the post looking forward to many more
” I Shared”
So are you saying fungi are like a surrogate parent caring for plants and soil, but also in tandem, co harmonious exsitence ? I can’t seem to find the right words to explain what I mean. Benefactors for each other, including People?
The mycelium networks are amazing!
I shared. It’s delightful to think about our connectedness and how the fungi web links our individual microbiological webs!
I shared
I shared this on Facebook and now I have qualified for something fungal.
I shared it!
I shared it!
I shared via Twitter
Interesting stuff. I shared!
Humans copy Nature !! :))
I shared!!
i shared the fungi fun fact 🙂
Just realized you have partnered with paul.fab.yes we walk on the gorgpeous spongy web(network)that is so intricately woven.i would like to implement a project here on gulf coast for petro and chemical remediation caused by the big spill.keeping my eyes open for emerging fungi.thanks.
I’ve shared! And we thought we were the superior brains on the planet with our WWW which is 25 years old this year! And there is a celebration and series of events planned in London on the 27th & 28th September to mark the occasion!
See: http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/whatson/festivals-series/web-we-want – for more details!
Has been shared, woven into my branch of the network 🙂
I shared! Love your posts….:)
Sharing and jumping with joy!
I always think about the connection between the trees, when I look at them and see the branches and imagine the roots, how they both lead on as invisible antennas exchanging information trough air and ground and also exchanging with other networks 8))
Wishing you lots of success with your project and thank you from my heart for your beautiful work.
Daniela
chuffed to bits to share this!
I shared too! Mycelia rock!
i shared
I shared with my fungal hunting friends
Sha re d!
I shared !
(of course I did, such a great post…)
Thrilled to receive this email very first thing today! Can’t wait for this film!! Shared on FB and with my email list. What else is possible?!?
Shared on those “other” interwebs!
I shared!
…sure did!
Want to learn edible vs. deadly
3M Post-it mimicked the glu used by spider to make their web. Another web mimicked!
I shared!
I shared!
Shared on all four!! FUNGI!!!! 😀 xx
I shared. Actually, the world wide web mimics mycelium 🙂 Love what you all are doing!
I shared!
Fungi is are past and future.
Fungi is are past and future
I shared. I also wanted to share a cool article I found on Mycotecture
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/02/moma-hy-fi-_n_5549107.html
Woah! What a cool article! Thank you so much for posting!
I shared
I love this. Mushrooms and Internet intrtwined. I have an old semi-underground mushroom book that suggest that mushrooms are interstellar travelers as the spores (seeds) are resistant to cold and vacuum and spores have been found in the at the top of the atmosphere. Fun!
I shared. So thankful for the work Paul Stamets has done and continues to do. I shared the post on my facebook page.
Shared 🙂
I shared!
I shared
I shared!
Give thanks! AppreciLOVE it 🙂
Shared it i did!
I shared
I shared! Hope the O’Regime doesn’t try to regulate the original internet! Not invented by Al Gore!!?
I shared! Cannot wait for the film.
I shared!
I shared.
One of my favorite examples of biomimicry has to be the new “artificial leaf” solar panels scientists are developing. If we can derive energy from the sun with the same efficiency that plants do, our energy problems will be over.
I shared
just like my name i’m sharin this on face-book
I shared! Fantastic, Amazing Fungi!! 😀
I shared.
“I shared” of course! Jumping up and down with excitement….even the keyboard is moving….
Isn’t fungus fantastic, cant wait to learn more about it…
Love this article. It is proof that there is a organising intellectual in the universe that is evident in the animal and plant world and beyond to planets etc.
I shared with my shroom lover pals!
I shared!
Share and Share alike!
Fascinating stuff there…keep up the great work. Shared three out of four, but Pinterest image too small.
I shared!
I shared!
I shared your blog post and took a journey back to when I lived in Alaska and taught high school students about fungi at the beginning of the year as a way of easing them into a new school year and showing them just one more amazing thing about our environment. One year I had a group of artistic students that drew beautiful and amazing field sketches. Those drawings hung in my classroom for many years. When I left teaching, I brought those drawings with me.
What a beautiful story, Robin!
I shared! Really looking forward to the film.
Like the internet, yes, I get it. But can you watch videos of mushroom kittens doing adorable things on it?
Ha ha! That would be hilarious!
have shared with my ecological design group from Schumacher college
I shared!
I shared!
I share, I will jump, up and down, if I am lucky….
It’s remarkable that this web-like structure is reflected in so many areas of nature and the cosmos as well as in the makings of humans. It’s everywhere: brain neural networks, electrical grids, root systems, highway systems, cell structures, blood vessels, and even the universe itself. Recent news about the mapping of the universe and the “Laniakea” supercluster of galaxies in which the Milky Way resides shows that even galaxies are connected to and interact with each other through this same web-like structure (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rENyyRwxpHo)
I share all the time. I have become fascinated with mushrooms and actually incorporating more in my diet.
I love them! I am 57 and never tried other varieties. I only ate the white type in salads.
Thank you!
What a beautifully conceived webpage! It has an organic feeling to it, and I love how opening up each page, like the ‘fractal’ dried riverbed , has surprises along the way!
I will always remember hiking in Harriman State Park one fine spring day, after much rain, and being astounded at the plethora of fungi sprouting up at every bend, in every color of the rainbow! It was truly a fairly-land, what with small streams that ran across the many enormous rock faces, previously dry, and these fungi everywhere. I did not consume any, however, for lack of knowledge about their potential toxins.
I am aware of the enormity of the underground fungal bodies, whose fruiting extensions are the sprouted mushrooms…..for miles and miles, I have been told. No doubt you will be sharing more of that information in posts in the weeks and months, to come!
Thank you for the spiritual nourishment your website offers….l have shared your site with my circle, and look forward to participating and learning more, each day!
Blessings!
I Shared it! I love what you guys are up to! I am so excited for the film!!!
the rains are coming and the interweb is busy with the promise of magic.
“Fungi-first organism on earth” is misleading.
This article is misleading at best and horribly inaccurate and anthropomorphizing at worst.
What do you mean ‘first organism on Earth’? Because it sounds like you actually mean ‘first organism on Earth’.
Which would be… incorrect, to say the least.
The way that nutrients are redistributed is not a way to “ensure optimal vitality and nutrient density”.
It may have those effects, but the way that these patterns of regulation emerge in natural ecosystems
is much messier, more complicated, and dynamic. There are circumstances in which mycorrhizal associations
may swing more towards parasitism. Symbiotic associations exist on a continuum, not as discrete categories.
As for “It links the natural world as the internet links humanity at a speed and accuracy that defies man.”
This is the kind of vague, meaningless jargon that I expect on CNN or FOX.
What does this mean?
Make it clear.
Think critically (ie. after making a statement, ask yourself, am I correct in making this statement? What biases may be leading me to phrase things this way and not another, perhaps contradictory way)?
All I would like to know is how can I pick wild mushroom s? How can I safely pick a good mushrooms from a toxic one. Is there a rule to learn? Are mushrooms kosher?
Thank you for answering my question.
Jeanne Domigan