Chloroplasts do the photosynthesising. There's a sea slug that has managed to acquire DNA so that the green food that it eats has migrated under its skin to turn it green and gain energy from sunlight! The author makes the claim that viruses are able to transfer DNA from one organism to another. This is in direct contrast to the Darwinian view that genetic mutation is the only mechanism for natural selection. It's big stuff.
I wasn't being totally serious. It's the concept in general..
You got a problem with that statement? I'll get the exact quote from the book, if you wish. Or do you think you're more of an expert than Frank Ryan?
Apparently I am. Teach yourself.
Viruses don't generally insert DNA into your sperm or eggs, so any genetic changes that you acquired from them wouldn't be passed on.
Read the book. I'm not the expert, by a long shot. I'll try and get an answer for that tomorrow.
A ballpark figure for human energy consumption is 100W. Adults have about 2 square meters of skin, and the average solar flux on the earth's surface is about 160W/m^2. So theoretically you could get more than enough energy (assuming you were outside all the time and were naked). But I believe even the best photosynthesizing organisms are only able to achieve something like 10% light-to-chemical energy efficiency, so in practice you would probably have a very hard time coming up with a photosystem that was efficient enough.
I'm no biologist or geneticist. I found it quite hard to follow and skim read most of it. The examples of fish (wrasse) changing sex from female to male is quite memorable though. It's a whole new language, even for biologists I imagine.
