The article also provides an interesting revelation in the admission that, “The conflicting aspect of the true morphology of the bacterium in natural environment and observed morphology in laboratory conditions always posed questions to microbiologists.”

This is ideal in reliable conditions, but it can mean a species lacks the resilience it needs to survive any changes. So while the best-adapted organisms may be the strongest during normal conditions, they may struggle to survive volatility. Generalist species are far more resilient than specialists. A rat or a cockroach can survive almost anywhere

Science’s leaps forward are most often not solutions to well-established problems. They come from discovering that the problem was ill posed. This is why it is so hard to make sense of scientific evolution as a well-defined problem.