Abstract: Bacteria have existed for approximately 3.8 billion years, predating all multicellular life and establishing the foundational biochemical relationships upon which every subsequent living system depends. They produce roughly half of Earth’s atmospheric oxygen, fix the nitrogen that makes all terrestrial food webs possible, regulate mammalian immune function, synthesise neurologically active compounds, and constitute the majority of genetic material in every human body. Yet the dominant medical and cultural framework of the past century has treated bacteria primarily as pathogens to be eliminated.
This paper applies the Care primitive—the directional impetus for the singular to exist in harmony with the whole that allows it to exist [1]—as an analytical lens to reframe bacterial relationships across scales: from the molecular to the planetary. We argue that the dysfunction model of the Care primitive provides a unified explanatory framework for the cluster of conditions that have risen sharply in industrialised populations over the past century: allergic disease, autoimmune disorders, inflammatory bowel disease, metabolic syndrome, and certain psychiatric conditions. These are not unrelated epidemics. They are expressions of the same underlying disruption: the severing of ancient Care-oriented relationships between bacteria and their hosts.
The Old Friends Hypothesis [2], the Gut–Brain Axis [3], helminth therapy research [4], faecal microbiome transplantation [5], and cross-species allergy studies [6] all converge on the same conclusion the Care primitive predicts: systems calibrated by ancient cooperative relationships dysfunction when those relationships are removed. Wild animals do not get allergies. Domestic animals increasingly do. Humans living in the most thoroughly sanitised environments carry the highest burden of inflammatory disease in recorded history.
We conclude that the most significant medical advances of the coming century may not be new weapons in the war on bacteria. They may be carefully targeted restorations of the relationships the war destroyed.
Keywords: Care primitive, microbiome, Old Friends Hypothesis, allergy, autoimmunity, gut–brain axis, biocentric stewardship, dysbiosis, helminth therapy, faecal microbiome transplantation, Care vs. War series.
Title: The Relational Bacterium: From Pathogen to Planetary Partner
Author: Andrew Philps
International Journal of Computer Science and Information Technology Research
ISSN 2348-1196 (print), ISSN 2348-120X (online)
Vol. 14, Issue 2, April 2026 - June 2026
Page No: 149-158
Research Publish Journals
Website: www.researchpublish.com
Published Date: 27-May-2026
