I think it is possible for life to evolve on a planet with only plants and fungus.
That's kinda circular, given that plants and fungi are examples of evolved life :)
You are correct that plants don't strictly need help with pollination (they simply release their spores to the wind/current and hope they land on a receptive partner), however the odds of a succesful pollination decrease sharply as the number of competing plants in an area increase.
In my (uneducated) view, in a scenario where all life is stationary (rooted to the ground, hur hur), you are much more likely to find monocultures -- where most plants can interbreed -- or more species using asexual reproduction.
Re:What is the real reason we sleep?
by ComputerGuru on Monday March 21, 2016 @08:10AM
(#11327491)
Flowers don't necessarily need animal life either, though it does help. Wind can pollinate.
Re:What is the real reason we sleep?
by saalweachter on Monday March 21, 2016 @01:21PM
(#11329796)
More importantly, plants evolved in the context of animals; if animals didn't exist, plants wouldn't have evolved seed dispersal or pollination strategies relying on them. They might have even evolved strategies we've never seen, that don't work well when there are animals running around eating everything.
I think it is possible for life to evolve on a planet with only plants and fungus.
Plants have been pretty successful down here on Earth, and I think most of them don't need animals for their survival (except flowers?).