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> But they don't consume the entire earth in a couple of days, because "the right conditions" can't be sustained. They run out of energy. They drown in their own waste.

Maybe, but not necessarily, and even if they do "drown in their own waste" they might take a lot of others with them. When cyanobacteria appeared, the oxygen they produced killed off most other species on the planet at the time [1]. The cyanobacteria themselves are still around and doing fine.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxygenation_Event




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