INTERVIEW

Rutgers University Television Network
2004, 26 min 57 sec 

In this interview with biologist Lynn Margulis (1938–2011), conducted in 2004 by Jay A. Tischfield of the Department of Genetics at Rutgers University, she articulates the idea of symbionts, the basic entities of symbiogenesis. Her 1967 paper “On the Origin of Mitosing Cells” describes endosymbiosis, a whole new history of biology, and the focus of this field, which Margulis championed, is the evolution of symbiotic systems that generate holobionts rather than the gradual evolutionary mutation of individuating organisms. Take the human digestive system, which is key to our metabolism, for an example: it depends on bacteria that are separate organisms from us to function. On some level, an organism can only exist as a holobiont. In a concise conversation, Margulis speaks of some of those who developed the understanding of life as symbiogenesis and symbionticism, from Ivan Wallin to Konstantin Sergeevich Mereschkowski and from Boris Kozo-Polyansky to Liya Nikolaevna Khakhina. Being together precedes being.

The interview was made available online at Artandeducation.net