241–250 of 305 posts
I remember hearing people arguing that the Covid lab leak hypothesis was implausible because of stringent safety measures.
The Covid lab leak hypothesis is primarily implausible because of Occam's razor.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The word "prion" is actually a contraction of the words "protein" and "infection". (edit: although I agree it's not what one might conventionally think of as an "infection")
Contraction or portmanteau?
A portmanteau word is similar to a contraction, but contractions are formed from words that would otherwise appear together in sequence, such as do and not to make don't, whereas a portmanteau is formed by combining two or more existing words that all relate to a single concept.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portmanteau
"Motel" and "fog" are portmanteaus, because you wouldn't put "motor hotel" or "smoke fog" in sentences that accept the accretions, whereas you could swap "prion" for "protein infection".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
“Never been shown to” is the kind of false speak I keep hearing from the government and media. Just because you’ve never tried it doesn’t mean you have shown something.
There is a difference between "never been shown to" and "shown to never".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
“Never been shown to” is the kind of false speak I keep hearing from the government and media. Just because you’ve never tried it doesn’t mean you have shown something.
"There is no evidence that..." is my recent favorite.
Hm: "long period of uncertainty began on 31 May 2010, when she stabbed her left thumb with a curved forceps while cleaning a cryostat—a machine that can cut tissues at very low temperatures—that she used to slice brain sections from transgenic mice infected with a sheep-adapted form of BSE . She pierced two layers of latex gloves and drew blood" Later in the article: ""We conduct research only on mouse-adapted sheep…
A human has a fully developed adult brain around age 25, but for some people it is not until age 30 [1].
[1] https://bigthink.com/mind-brain/adult-brain?rebelltitem=1#re...
Hm: "long period of uncertainty began on 31 May 2010, when she stabbed her left thumb with a curved forceps while cleaning a cryostat—a machine that can cut tissues at very low temperatures—that she used to slice brain sections from transgenic mice infected with a sheep-adapted form of BSE . She pierced two layers of latex gloves and drew blood" Later in the article: ""We conduct research only on mouse-adapted sheep…
The full section with the Aguzzi quote adds context, including his declining to comment on the French case. > The scientific community has long recognized that handling prions is dangerous and an occupational risk for neuropathologists, says neuropathologist Adriano Aguzzi of the University of Zurich. Aguzzi declined to comment on the French CJD cases, but told Science his lab never handles human or bovine prions for…
Take a look at this: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_inflammatory_neu...
This disease was discovered due to an alert translator (most likely translating from Spanish to English) recalling that he had seen patients’ records before that had the nearly the same exact history.
After investigation, it was discovered the patients worked in a slaughterhouse near the pig brain section, where the brains were being aerosolized. Many ended up developing a progressive inflammatory neuropathy.
Prions are weird. I was at UCSF during the time they went from a fringe theory to an established fact and a nobel prize. The professor who studied them (Prusiner) had to overcome tons of resistance and the experiments were heroic (often waiting months for mice to die). It's really funny that everybody resisted it until somebody mentioned that there was a plausible physical mechanism of refolding catalysis.
This is a good instinct IMO. Experiments by one person can easily be nonsense, especially if you don't already know and trust that person. Without a physical mechanism, given extraordinary results, I would certainly remain skeptical.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know, but it's a poor choice of word since it's nothing like viruses or bacteria.
Viruses are nothing like bacteria, so it doesn’t make any sense to restrict the term of “infection” to those two.
Is the difference between an infection and poisoning replication?
Kinda a morbid question but could you just sever the finger moments after the prick? Or would the blood pump so fast that the prion(s) is already in your body.
They mention in the article that normal protocol is to immediately soak the thumb in bleach. Not sure if that’s actually effective though, or just hopeful.