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The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

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Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#161

Post by radu_floricica »

ImaCake wrote: post #67
radu_floricica wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How on earth is wanting to know why I was locked in my house for months with men with guns patrolling the streets.... "misplaced"? This is what 50 years of postmodernism and cultural relativism broughts us. "Why" doesn't matter, don't search beyond what the consensus is telling you.

It is valid to disagree with the parent comment about wanting to know why this all happened. But you carry a lot of ideological baggage along with it. "men with guns patrolling the streets" is the police and was routine before the pandemic. "50 years of postmodernism and cultural relativism" has nothing to do with what caused the pandemic and no one is saying that it does.

In my country is was the literal army - first time in 30 years.

As for dismissing "why for the sake of why" being the fault of cultural relativism... shrug to me it has the same smell.

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#162

Post by radu_floricica »

halfmatthalfcat wrote: post #83
AmericanChopper wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Why" ultimately doesn't matter because viruses can just spontaneously evolve in carrier animals, in a lab or by whatever other means causes a mutation where it is now infectious to us. People are going to die in traffic accidents whether i drive home drunk tonight or not, so it probably doesn't matter what I do, right? Understanding why something happened is also a pretty important step in trying to prevent it fro…

I understand the need to understand why but if we can't mount a response to any virus, it again, ultimately doesn't matter. We've instituted safeguards against car accidents (seatbelts, speed limits, harsh penalties for driving drunk, etc). What have we done for wide-spread, novel disease response?

This line of thought supports my connection to postmodernism. Or at least, to today's culture of... I don't even know what to call it.

You're suggesting we put barriers in our minds as to what questions should be asked. No more open ended inquiry, no more search for truth. Truth should be a tool in the service of a goal, nothing more. Searching for it without a good reason is to be discouraged as a waste of effort.

This is not harmless. Beside being wrong, this kind of logic is one step away from the problem of who's deciding what are the worthy questions. Next step you have maufacturing consen... hey, wasn't a book with this name?

Yeah.

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#163

Post by alanfranz »

EGreg wrote: post #158
ModernMech wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s your definition of “recent”? Some of us remember when HIV starting infecting our friends. It doesn’t seem that long ago to me.

I mentioned HIV in my comment, speaking about recent. The reply mentioned all kinds of viruses besides HIV that weren’t recent — so it was a strawman.

… and yet hiv doesn’t spread by simple being close to somebody. How can you say it’s as much as contagious as covid?

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#164

Post by techbio »

IAmGraydon wrote: post #92
m0llusk wrote: post #57

The article notes that a lab leak or gain of function research or both are suspected because research with cultivated influenza strains was common at that time. In contrast, attempts by researchers at Wuhan to consistently cultivate coronavirus were unsuccessful. That is why they decided to work with chimeras instead of pursuing gain of function research. All of this focus on the point of origin is misplaced. We know…

Your logic is absolutely drenched in bias. It makes me curious what you do for a living and where you’re from. You’re argument is like saying that instead of controlling the use of firearms, everyone should just walk around in bulletproof vests. It’s completely and utterly backwards. It is far more efficient to stop these events at the source.

Your point of opposition to OP is noted, but your analogy misses on almost every point of comparison but that they are two things among many that contribute to untimely deaths. Live fire isn't exactly contagious, and people who interact with live fire with any frequency do wear vests. You might do better comparing firearms (begun with gunpowder in China a thousand years ago) to measles which also began[1] a thousand years ago.

[1] https://www.cdc.gov/measles/about/history.html

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#165

Post by taeric »

varelse wrote: post #119
rossdavidh wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whatever one thinks the optimal response to a pandemic should be, the fact that several nations of western Europe (e.g. France) with much different policies, have per capita mortality the same or higher, suggests that the policies used were not a major determinant of the outcome. If you plot per capita mortality for France and Sweden, they are almost identical, swapping places five times so far. Currently Sweden is s…

Why not focus instead on countries that did get this under control then? Some of them are even western.

Are there good patterns here? Last I looked, it seemed more that there were nations that just hadn't been hit, yet.

Especially as more of the heavy hit nations get it under control with vaccines, unless full isolation is the plan for the other nations, I'm not seeing an end game.

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#166

Post by perardi »

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #134
rossdavidh wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whatever one thinks the optimal response to a pandemic should be, the fact that several nations of western Europe (e.g. France) with much different policies, have per capita mortality the same or higher, suggests that the policies used were not a major determinant of the outcome. If you plot per capita mortality for France and Sweden, they are almost identical, swapping places five times so far. Currently Sweden is s…

Your France vs Sweden statistic disturbed me so I looked into it and Sweden seems to have by far the highest Covid deaths in the Nordic countries. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1113834/cumulative-coron... I’d like a per capita chart but I can’t find one. Norway has about half the population of Sweden and has 18x less Covid deaths though. Maybe France and Sweden are too different to compare directly? https://bmc…

A per capita chart? Our World In Data is great for that.

https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=USA~GBR~CAN~...

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#167

Post by paulmd »

nradov wrote: post #71
Icathian wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because this one was a lab leak doesn't mean the next one has to be. I think origin would be worth knowing just for the historical record, but ultimately it doesn't matter in the slightest.

It matters. Zoonotic viruses that jump to humans naturally tend to be less well adapted to human biology, and thus less contagious. That potentially gives us more time to respond before they evolve really dangerous human adapted variants. Whereas GoF research using human tissue or transgenic animals can produce viruses that are perfectly adapted to humans right out of the gate.

hey, aren't you the "kids without comorbid conditions are not at serious risk from covid" guy? how's it going with that? And sheesh, to think you were the one calling others ignorant…

still giving out medical advice I see! ;)

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#168

Post by tomohawk »

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #134
rossdavidh wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whatever one thinks the optimal response to a pandemic should be, the fact that several nations of western Europe (e.g. France) with much different policies, have per capita mortality the same or higher, suggests that the policies used were not a major determinant of the outcome. If you plot per capita mortality for France and Sweden, they are almost identical, swapping places five times so far. Currently Sweden is s…

Your France vs Sweden statistic disturbed me so I looked into it and Sweden seems to have by far the highest Covid deaths in the Nordic countries. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1113834/cumulative-coron... I’d like a per capita chart but I can’t find one. Norway has about half the population of Sweden and has 18x less Covid deaths though. Maybe France and Sweden are too different to compare directly? https://bmc…

Yah, because you must only compare Sweden to "other nordic countries"

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#169

Post by yjftsjthsd-h »

IAmGraydon wrote: post #92
m0llusk wrote: post #57

The article notes that a lab leak or gain of function research or both are suspected because research with cultivated influenza strains was common at that time. In contrast, attempts by researchers at Wuhan to consistently cultivate coronavirus were unsuccessful. That is why they decided to work with chimeras instead of pursuing gain of function research. All of this focus on the point of origin is misplaced. We know…

Your logic is absolutely drenched in bias. It makes me curious what you do for a living and where you’re from. You’re argument is like saying that instead of controlling the use of firearms, everyone should just walk around in bulletproof vests. It’s completely and utterly backwards. It is far more efficient to stop these events at the source.

> Your logic is absolutely drenched in bias. It makes me curious what you do for a living and where you’re from.

... Yes, let's do talk about bias.

Re: The Reemergent 1977 H1N1 Strain and the Gain-of-Function Debate (2015)

#170

Post by sixstringtheory »

indymike wrote: post #148
goolulusaurs wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure that makes sense, but you could crank their pay way up to compensate, build places for their family to stay if they desired like the families of the scientist working on the Manhattan project, present at conferences through teleconferencing. There are scientist who stay in Antarctica for months and the international space station. Yes it would be inconvenient, but look at what (maybe) happens if you don't.

> Sure that makes sense, but you could crank their pay way up to compensate, Some things aren't for sale. I'm not going to take a job that makes it impossible to see my family on short notice at any price.

> I'm not going to take a job that makes it impossible to see my family

Literally addressed in the very next part of that same sentence you quoted:

> build places for their family to stay if they desired

Cool for you though if you aren’t for sale. There are many people in this world with quite varied interests and motivations. I wouldn’t do it either in my current position in life, but might have considered it when I was younger.

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