The deadly viruses that vanished without trace:
Scientists are only just starting to unravel why some viruses disappear, while others can linger and cause disease for centuries.
It was the year 1002. The English king Ethelred II – not-so-fondly remembered as "Æthelred the unready" – was at war. For over a century, Viking armies had been scoping out the land as a potential new home, under the command of leaders with well-groomed facial hair and evocative names, such as Swein Forkbeard.
So far, the Vikings had found the English resistance enticingly weak. But Ethelred had decided to make a stand. On 13 November, he ordered for every Danish man in the country to be rounded up and killed. Hundreds perished, and the incident went down in history as the St Brice's Day massacre. Ethelred's brutal act proved to be in vain, and eventually most of England was ruled by Forkbeard's son.
But what was a bad day to be a Viking in England was a gift for modern archaeologists. Over a thousand years later, 37 skeletons – thought to belong to some of the executed victims – were discovered on the grounds of St John's College in Oxford. Buried with them was a secret.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @01:52AM (13 children)
... but I can't complain, was to lazy to do it at the time
Some of the main points that I picked from this:
- the Chinese reaction this time was pretty fucked - too long delays in making the matter public an react accordingly
- many countries (e.g. Europe) totally unprepared for epidemics
- Trump's administration cutting into CDC resources before covid hit made US-es reaction totally fucked up the reaction in early stages. Everything went batshit crazy afterwards.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by legont on Sunday October 25 2020, @02:26AM (3 children)
Let's sum even shorter: West, as usual, was unprepared. East, which used to be prepared, have westernized.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @02:42AM
Interesting, but inexact and potentially misleading in re "lessons for the future". If I'll have time, I'll elaborate later.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @03:30AM (1 child)
Everybody loves JIT, until one thing goes wrong and you get cascading failures...
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @04:32AM
But, I love the Cascades! The mountains, the falls, the park, I love 'em all!
But, yeah, modded up, because JIT never fails at one specific point. Any failure ripples on, and on, and on. Doesn't the same apply to compilers?
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @02:53AM (5 children)
Could have included the money shot, then I wouldn't have had to read TFA:
Those were the next two paragraphs from TFA after the quoted stuff in TFS.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @03:45AM (4 children)
I'm quite sure that many viruses when extinct multiple times. It didn't come as a surprise to me, I'm quite sure we know a lot less than what we don't/we'll never know.
My selection of relevancy was based on what can we do with what we can know now or the near future - the next pandemic is not a matter of if, just one of when. And with humans extending into wild habitats, I'm afraid that "when" will be sooner [cdc.gov] than we'd like.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by legont on Sunday October 25 2020, @09:31AM (3 children)
The deadliest ones have the highest chances to go extinct - obviously - along with the hosts.
The real question is if we are separated enough to survive once the really bad one hits.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 3, Informative) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @09:55AM (2 children)
Unfortunately, it may wipe us out and still not go extinct (not that we will care). It may survive quite well with the species that are hosting it without troubles.
Here's another [wikipedia.org] - must pass from flying foxes through horses to kill humans, but one can die 14 months after being infected. Needd to have contact with body fluids of the infected while shedding the virus (same as Ebola), so it won't be this one to extinct us.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Interesting) by legont on Sunday October 25 2020, @02:55PM (1 child)
My understanding is that to jump to humans and sustain in human population a virus typically needs a significant change. For example, it may need a better transmission mechanism or a cell penetration one. What usually happens is some host animal gets multiple virus infections at the same time and the viruses infect the same cell and exchange needed genome while a human happens to be nearby. This obviously has a low probability and that's why real killers are rare.
However once happened, the bug would devastate the human population and if virulent enough it will die off. I'd consider it a different virus - a relative of the original mix, but still a separate species. It would die off and for it to emerge again it would have to be created again by another mix. It may stay in the original animal host species, but for that the mix has to be adapted for this as well - another orders of magnitude lower probability.
Having said this, I believe that the emergence of the right virus that would kill us all has 100% probability similar to a killer asteroid strike. The only way out is similar as well - we have to separate. I believe that racial segregation and hate is our biological mechanism to achieve this insurance.
It's my pure amateur speculation mostly based on talks I had with my university buddy who was doing flu simulation statistical project back in 80s. BTW, flu is amazing. It spreads way faster than any model she would try. It appeared for her that the same strain of flu would be created multiple times during the same season, which is obviously impossible unless an unknown mechanism was at work.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 4, Informative) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @03:52PM
I don't think that's the main way for a virus to get to infect humans. The probability is too low.
Bats (flying mammals i general) seem like the largest reservoir of viruses able to infect humans without "genome mixing". Stirring old guano in dry caves may resurrect ancient strains too.
Nipah virus - multiple outbreaks, flying foxes as natural reservoir. This one is quite nasty - respiratory transmission, high fatality rate. A strain of this may become a real killer. [wikipedia.org]
SARS-CoV 2003 [who.int] likely bats
Lyssa virus - rabies [cdc.gov] most of the modern cases, bats are the source.
Ebola and Marburg viruses [nature.com] - bats again. And Ebola outbreaks are quite frequent, can't be a very low probability way to cross into infecting humans.
To be noted that bats aren't the only species that harbour viruses able to infect humans [nature.com] - rodent and birds come next. There is a reason for which rodents (mice, Guinea pigs, rats) are used in medical research - not only they reproduce fast (so are the fruit flies), but their metabolism is close enough to humans to allow a good likelihood of translating the research results to humans (unlike the fruit flies).
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:31PM (2 children)
》 the Chinese reaction this time was pretty fucked - too long delays in making the matter public an react...
Man, I am sooo sick of this bollocks. We knew about this virus faster from the Chinese than the fucking Spanish, Italians, English and Brazilians - all of which had this virus before China. (In the case of Spain, traced back to Barcelona sewage system March 24 2019 - look up "sentinel surveillance"). Both the UK and France had deaths before it even goddamn appeared in China. Did they figure it out? Did they tell anyone?
No.
We should be thankful that China figured it out, and we all knew what was going on a couple of weeks later. It's not like they knew about it beforehand.
Thankyou, China. If it weren't for your much faster, more scientifically accurate and open communications, we'd have 10s of millions dead right now.
In fact, now that I remember, Oz USA and UK (both politicians and citizens) were flinging shit at the Chinese at the time for "overreacting", the hospitals were "concentration camps" and the lockdowns were a "disgrace" and a "breach of human rights".
Anyone who saw those Wuhan videos and didn't see what was coming is a fucking idiot. Even if the Chinese delayed until they were *certain of their science*, we pay our politicians to be on top of this shit. Look at Australia...two months before doing anything about it. What do you pay those fucks for?
Meanwhile, your politicians are *still* allowing
international arrivals....
But nah...fucking "China China China". Do I get my US/Oz citizenship now?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @11:12PM (1 child)
No citations? GTFO.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Informative) by ChrisMaple on Monday October 26 2020, @02:35AM
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.06.13.20129627v1.full.pdf [medrxiv.org]
I suppose there is some chance that the identification of the virus was defective or that the older samples were similar to but not identical to the cause of COVID-19.
It's an interesting challenge to the "conventional wisdom" and leads to the question "Well, where the hell did it come from?"
(Score: 3, Funny) by Zinnia Zirconium on Sunday October 25 2020, @01:59AM (3 children)
Beware the dreaded chroma virus. It changes your colors so you're white on the right side and black on the wrong side.
Blue haired lives matter. Don't let chroma virus turn your hair green.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @02:04AM (2 children)
1. Novel Coronavirus. Vanished in the United States in November of 2020.
2. HIV. Vanished in California on January 1, 2018.
(Score: 2) by Zinnia Zirconium on Sunday October 25 2020, @02:14AM
Anticipating sexy songs about the Summer of 21.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @02:50AM
Yep [npr.org]. Like a miracle [wsj.com], it will just disappear [usatoday.com]!
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @03:01AM (13 children)
For COVID-19 to magically and mysteriously vanish, since it was never real in the first place.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 25 2020, @03:31AM (7 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @03:51AM (6 children)
Tsk-tsk... Skipping again the medication against your sarcasm deficit, khallow?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Sunday October 25 2020, @04:30AM (3 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @10:15PM (2 children)
An example of imaginary disease with even more reported cases:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hysteria [wikipedia.org]
This below list also may be enlightening:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_hysteria_cases [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by pipedwho on Monday October 26 2020, @12:48AM (1 child)
So basically millions of tested and verified cases around the world, with hundreds of thousands of deaths versus...
a bunch of tiny mass hysteria clusters in the hundreds each, some of which turned out to be real to some degree, but related to something unexpected like food poisoning (eg. ergot).
Hmm. Let me think if this applies to COVID19.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 26 2020, @02:26AM
A friendly reminder: once upon a time, around this same world, there were millions of tested and verified cases of witchcraft. In some countries, there still are.
As long as it is not you nor your friends doing testing and verifying, you have not "cases" but words and numbers on a screen. Based on other words you read on a screen, you choose which sources of words and numbers from which countries you believe unquestioningly, and which you automatically ignore.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 25 2020, @04:34AM (1 child)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:32AM
Good boy. See? Take your medication and all's good.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by driverless on Sunday October 25 2020, @04:20AM (3 children)
No, it really will. Trump promised us this in February. And March. Again in March. In April. Again in April. Again in April. In May. Again in May. Yet again in May. Another time in May. Then in June. Again in June. And yet again...
You might have noticed a pattern emerging here.
(Score: 3, Funny) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:34AM
There's no pattern, we're just taking the corner. Upwards.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @05:22PM
He loves America, what can I say?
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Sunday October 25 2020, @09:41PM
If he keeps it up, he will eventually be right...
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Monday October 26 2020, @09:30PM
Where is the -5 Fucking Stupid mod?
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @04:44AM (19 children)
It would be nice if the virus were more selective. A shame that it has killed a couple hundred thousand, seemingly at random. Think of all the good it could have done, if it were more selective. If the virus were attracted to large estates, expensive jewelry, expensive cars, and rich furnishings, and killed the same number of people, all of our lives would have improved, at least incrementally. Bezos, Gates, and a couple dozen other tech figures. 3, 4, maybe 5 hundred very famous politicians. Governors. Hollywood would be decimated, if not devastated. Bankers, chief executive officers, members of boards, maybe some highly placed academic management types. Top officials of "intelligence" agencies. Various "rights holders".
Damn. We need better virus planning!
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by fakefuck39 on Sunday October 25 2020, @05:07AM (6 children)
The virus is incredibly selective, and in absolutely a good way. I wear a 3m n95 - had a bunch left over from doing my own drywall. I wear that instead of the tshirt cloth mask or useless-to-protect-yourself surgical mask, or the "fu" sheer mask, or mask not covering nose. I stay a few feet away from people in line, I spray my hands with isopropanol. I don't go sing in fucking church choirs. I don't go "protesting" in dense crowds on the street.
This virus is perfect, and "killing off the right people"-wise, I'm glad it's killing who it's killing.
You see, if you kill off those bad people high up, there's about a million bad people from the general population who will just take their place. The people who are your enemy is your asshole neighbor in the pickup truck, the dumb fat bitch and her pussy-litter of raccoons from across the street, and the nigger +blackup stealing your wallet at the point of an ice pick.
and about 200k of those are dead, and it's not random at all - it's all the people I don't want to deal with. here's hoping for some more.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @05:51AM (4 children)
Hmmmm. I have no difficulty in dealing with small predators. It's the apex predators that pose dangers. I can scoot and/or scare raccoons, skunks, even bobcat out of my way when they get between me and my destination. Grizzly bears, now, I can't scoot, or scare, or easily kill. I would much rather have the real super predators thinned out, than the little nuisance predators.
Did you say "nigger"? Hmmmm. Personally, I've met a lot more pale predators than I've met dark ones. The dark skinned people are a minority in this country, after all.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 3, Interesting) by fakefuck39 on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:27PM (3 children)
correct, you have met more pale predators, and it seems you know the reason - the pale pool is bigger. however if you meet 10 dark animals, they are 7.5x more likely to be violent predators than 10 pale animals. As in blacks per capita commit 7.5x the murders than whites. What you're saying is wolves are less dangerous than dogs, because there are more dogs. That's just stupidity. They are only less dangerous quantitatively, if you completely stay out of the forest. Guess what sherlock - wolves don't have a right to declare the forest a "don't enter or you get shot" zone.
You also seem to be missing my point completely, as expected, since it's you. You are talking about removing a few thousand of the bad people who are high up - top corrupt bankers and CEOs. That's not a person, that's a position/job. Which gets filled by the same exact type of person. Once that bad CEO dies, a corrupt director becomes CEO. It's more efficient to just get rid of the whole pool being selected from, whether or not someone from that pool is a CEO currently. If you do that, the next CEO gets picked from a different pool. What you suggest fixes the problem for about 2 days while the promotion paperwork is being put through HR.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:49PM (2 children)
Yeah, you make a bit of a point, in that CEOs get replaced. You've kinda missed the bit about inheritances. When Rupert Murdoch bites the dust, what happens to his wealth? Maybe more importantly, what happens to his control over his organizations? I suspect that his shit gets watered down a lot, amidst a lot of competitive scrambling for power and wealth.
As for darker colored predators being more dangerous that lighter colored predators? I don't buy that. I've repeatedly called for police reform, shutting down the school-to-prison pipeline, decriminalize most if not all drugs, shut down the whole prison-for-profit scheme, eliminate almost all the "benefits" of qualified immunity, as well as the repeal of restrictions on our second amendment rights. And, oh yeah - eliminating, or drastically changing, how the welfare system works.
Put adult and mature black males back into the neighborhoods, and back into the homes, and "black culture" will change drastically. Give black boys and young black men the role models that are missing in their lives, and they won't be so apt to follow the role models they look up to, today.
But, you go on believing that blacks are somehow inherently less civilized than whites if you insist.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Monday October 26 2020, @03:43PM
"When Rupert Murdoch bites the dust, what happens to his wealth?"
it's funny you think that if he dies of covid, as in your scenario, something different will happen to his wealth. funny as in pointing a finger and laughing at adult clown, who doesn't do it for a living, but just does it because he doesn't know he's a clown.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday October 27 2020, @03:20PM
James is not keen to say the least, he quit [cnn.com]
Lachlan seems more fatherly, more commercialy oriented, less inclined towards political influence [smh.com.au]
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by ChrisMaple on Monday October 26 2020, @02:47AM
It killed all those innocent people in New York State nursing homes that the murderer Andrew Cuomo brought into contact with known carriers -- but didn't kill Cuomo or his idiot brother.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:37AM (6 children)
Oh, boy. Runaway's extreme left personality just surfaced again, ranting against private property and all that.
Meh, this too shall come to pass.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @06:47PM (5 children)
Condemnation of gluttony and greed is hardly a leftist idea, is it? It seems that the Bible, as well as a number of other Holy Books condemn gluttony and greed, and all of that predates the concept of right or left.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:23PM (4 children)
What's that Bible and other Holy Books you are talking about?
Are you against freedom? Do you put Bible and other Holy Books higher than The American Constitution? Or do you attempt to fly a banner of righteousness under which to hide your envy on the wealth of others? Maybe you have an access of cognitive dissonance? What?
Looky here [cato.org] what your orthodox conservative brothers say:
Sorry mate, you can't eat your cake and have it too.
Either you are:
- a conservative and you don't get to grumble because others have more money or
- you are a pinky red leftie and allowed to think that the needs of society take precedence over TMB's boat and bankers' money, so let's take some, TMB's boat first (grin)
Any mix between the two will make a hypocrite outta you.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:34PM (3 children)
The above quote is not a quote of our founding fathers. Instead, it is commentary, offered by some "orthodox conservative brother", as you call him.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:35PM
Oooops - didn't close the quote properly - you can make sense of it, or not.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday October 25 2020, @11:11PM (1 child)
Nope, you are not. You're decrepit idiot. Glad we got to the bottom of it.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @11:16PM
Empty headed flapping of the sort I might expect from one of our more ancient members. Thanks anyway.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by legont on Sunday October 25 2020, @09:40AM
Well, this bug is close to your specs as it mostly spares Chinese, Russians, and other creative and working nations, but hits lazy Americans the most.
It'd be nice to research how it is actually distributed among Americans based on social and racial stereotypes. I am afraid it does it very politically incorrect.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 1, Troll) by VLM on Sunday October 25 2020, @06:20PM (3 children)
Well.. you're not wrong. But consider how one political party seems to have the vast majority of pedos and pedo supporters and pedo-adjacents.
And 99.9999 percent of kids who are infected with covid are asymptomatic or at least not fatal, elderly folks over 70 who catch covid have like 1/3 odds of painful death, and the "biggest threat" seems to be the elderly pedos with power.
I can see why the left is freaking out about covid, its like a tailored biological weapon against them. Biden's always sniffing young girl's hair, his kid's doing god knows what with underage relatives on his laptop, Bill Clinton and that British royal family guy spent a lot of time on Epstein's pedo island inside young girls.... Epstein Weinstein all those guys with names ending in -stein or precious metals....
Lets face it, covid is a anti-leftist tailored biological weapon.
What's happening to 8 year old girls by one faction of our political leadership is incredibly disgusting, but the girls kinda have the last laugh when covid is mostly fatal to horny elderly men and youngsters are unaffected carriers.
White haired dude with power having sex with a girl a tenth of his age is a leftist thing, not right wing at all. COVID is a political bioweapon...
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 25 2020, @06:44PM (2 children)
Heh - interesting idea. I wonder though, how many pedos there are in each party. We've had some interesting stories in years past, about homosexual Republicans, after all. It seems that the Rs were just more discreet than the Ds then, and the same may be true now.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by ChrisMaple on Monday October 26 2020, @03:29AM
The most commonly accepted theory these days is that most homosexuals are that way because of genetic or chemical factors, not conscious choice. If so, their homosexuality is outside the realm of morality because it is not voluntary. If the actions of homosexuals are between consenting adults and does not cause actual harm, it should not be considered immoral.
The same cannot be said of pedophiles. There is no research that I'm aware of that even hints that pedophilia is inherent in a person. Furthermore, by abusing a child, the pedophile is forcing a person legally incapable of giving consent.
Pedophilia occurs among people with a lot of power, if only because people without power are quickly slapped down by people who know better. Since leftists tend to seek power so that they can abuse it, it should come as no surprise that much pedophilia and other perversions are found in powerful leftists. When you see pedophilia publicized about people who are likely to be assumed to be conservative, it's religious leaders or youth group leaders that have power over some youngsters.
(Score: 1, Troll) by VLM on Monday October 26 2020, @12:22PM
The disparity seems to shrink with age such that there's a lot of twenty-something interns getting pounded in D.C., but its their choice...
I was mostly referencing little kids like 8 to 12, where the ratio must be something like 20 left wing to 1 right wing. And the phenomena of "RINO" Republican in name only is probably not excluded from pedo activity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @11:44AM (1 child)
ah so. i think i understand now why people in s.e.asia bosticht old newspaper around ripening fruit, say mangoes xor papayas in their garden. to keep 'em bats from chewing on 'em?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 25 2020, @07:39PM
To keep all kinds of blemishes off, bugs, birds, bats, anything that damages the skin cuts your profit. Appearance is very important in produce.