Life-form, Lebensform (DE)
[ˈlaɪf ˌfɔːrm], [le:bənsfɔɐ̯m]
Related terms: Assembly, Becoming-with, Community, Composition, Holobiont, Terraformers
In German, the term Lebensform (the direct transliteration of »life-form«) primarily describes »a way of living« (eine alternative Lebensweise) – a series of conscious decisions which form the habits of our everyday lives.
In English, »life-form« is understood as a form in which life is organized, which means that we ourselves are life-forms. Historically, humans have created a taxonomic hierarchy of life-forms, at which we have placed ourselves at the top. Yet, in the words of Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan, we are only »one of the many weedy components of an enormous living system dominated by microbes.« [*]
By understanding ourselves as a single life-form among and including many others, we recognize that we do not (and cannot) exist independently from these other life-forms, with which we are also in existential dependence.
How could this realization lead to an influence on our »way of living«?