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Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

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171–180 of 441 posts

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#171
post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"they could go to jail for misallocation of taxpayer funds" can you site a source where this has happened before...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Bell_scandal came to mind in less than 5 seconds; I'm sure there are many others.

That's a case of corrupt officials using funds to pay themselves more money and other misuses not in the interests of the city. This isn't in the same category as using funds inappropriately for something that is in the interests of taxpayers.

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what if the disease that are currently only spread via mosquitoes mutate/evolve themselves to be airborne? Evolution doesn't have an intent. Diseases can't "evolve themselves." Evolution happens through random mutations* and selection of the fittest. If a mutation makes a virus or bacteria or protozoan more likely to survive, then the descendants of the mutant tend to multiply more and become more common. If the mu…

>Evolution doesn't have an intent. Diseases can't "evolve themselves." I know. But when you remove mosquitoes from the picture, aren't you putting selection pressure on the diseases to be airborne? >Evolution happens through random mutations* and selection of the fittest... Yes. Say a virus of a disease x that normally spreads via mosquitos, gain a mutation to be airborne. But since there are an abundance of mosquito…

> aren't you putting selection pressure on the diseases to be airborne?

> an airborne strain does not have an advantage over mosquitoes borne strain

There are hundreds of millions of people today who don't currently have malaria, but would be at risk to get malaria if it went airborne. Airborne malaria wouldn't be competing with mosquitoborne malaria. It'd be competing with running out of people to kill.

There seems to be a startup lesson here: your competition isn't legacy players. It's non-consumption.

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#173
Here's a thought. If the people who developed these things spent their own money to release them worldwide (yep, not just one continent) because they believe in the safety and importance of it... What would happen to them? And what would happen if they are right and it works great? Would the public really allow them to be punished? Would someone not reimburse them? They claim it's safe and are willing to risk the world, but not willing to risk their own livelyhood and reputation apparently.

If you believe in such a cause, and honestly believe the downside was zero, and you have the tool to do the job... What is holding you back? That's an honest question and I'd love to hear their responses.

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#174
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fascinating. Maybe that's the point of the story? It's not as if the ancient Hebrews were unfamiliar with agriculture. Perhaps the meaning is that people should listen to God even if it seems counterintuitive, because you could be more wrong than you (a puny mortal) could possibly understand. That was really interesting. Thanks for that.

The meaning to you or the meaning to the ancient? If the latter, I'm not sure if people back then were so megalomaniac to consider being useful to humans as an advantage. The world was much less developed before steam engines gave us craploads of energy for free.

I'm pretty sure that people back then were rather clear on the idea that if something you put in the ground makes food and seeds you're gonna want to keep the seeds to make more.

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#175
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something like 30 out of the 500 anopheles species are capable of carrying malaria. Of those, only those two matter, because the rest won't bite humans. Eradicating those two would be sufficient and another species (that doesn't bite humans) would take over. "Bites Humans" is furthermore not a strong enough competitive advantage to overcome any attempts to eradicate a successor that picks up the disease-ridden malari…

Look at this problem from different angle. These two species are only abundant in areas where humans live. The malaria annual death toll is about 440000 lives. Maybe it is more worth of an effort to move humans out of there? Since no one is going to eradicate cars worldwide just because the annual human death toll in car accidents is 1.25 million!

Should we also help malaria reestablish in the areas we previously eradicated it? You know, Europe, the US.

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#176
post #5

This is one of those ideas that sounds genius on its face, until it's actually implemented. Kudzu? Grows fast, prevents erosion, let's pay farmers to till it into the top soil. MTBE? Prevents engine knock, makes for cleaner air, let's mandate its use at the federal level. Whoopsie, once it's in the water we can't get it out, and its a carcinogen. Let's kill all of the mosquitos because we find their presence unpleasa…

Chairman Mao thought killing all the sparrows in China (part of his Four Pests Campaign[1]) would be a great idea because they ate laborers' grain seed. But then the population of crop-eating insects ballooned, causing the Great Chinese Famine to get a lot worse. Tens of millions starved to death. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Pests_Campaign

[deleted]

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Evolution doesn't have an intent. Diseases can't "evolve themselves." I know. But when you remove mosquitoes from the picture, aren't you putting selection pressure on the diseases to be airborne? >Evolution happens through random mutations* and selection of the fittest... Yes. Say a virus of a disease x that normally spreads via mosquitos, gain a mutation to be airborne. But since there are an abundance of mosquito…

> aren't you putting selection pressure on the diseases to be airborne? > an airborne strain does not have an advantage over mosquitoes borne strain There are hundreds of millions of people today who don't currently have malaria, but would be at risk to get malaria if it went airborne. Airborne malaria wouldn't be competing with mosquitoborne malaria. It'd be competing with running out of people to kill. There seems…

Sorry. I have no idea what you are talking about.

Are you a biologist/ecologist or someone knowledgeable in the field?

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what if the disease that are currently only spread via mosquitoes mutate/evolve themselves to be airborne? Evolution doesn't have an intent. Diseases can't "evolve themselves." Evolution happens through random mutations* and selection of the fittest. If a mutation makes a virus or bacteria or protozoan more likely to survive, then the descendants of the mutant tend to multiply more and become more common. If the mu…

>Evolution doesn't have an intent. Diseases can't "evolve themselves." I know. But when you remove mosquitoes from the picture, aren't you putting selection pressure on the diseases to be airborne? >Evolution happens through random mutations* and selection of the fittest... Yes. Say a virus of a disease x that normally spreads via mosquitos, gain a mutation to be airborne. But since there are an abundance of mosquito…

(I'm a layperson, too, for the record.)

"I know. But when you remove mosquitoes from the picture, aren't you putting selection pressure on the diseases to be airborne?"

Not necessarily that specific pressure. Except in carefully controlled laboratory situations, we can't specify the selection pressure being applied. There are too many potential pressures at work, and the mutation outcomes are too stochastic. At best we can force pressure in general. The outcome of that pressure might be entirely different from what we expect it to be.

Let's say we eradicate mosquitos. What other vectors of transmission does a virus like Zika have? What other hosts? It's possible the virus finds a new insect-borne transmission pathway: say, ticks instead of mosquitos. It's possible the virus 'focuses' (to use the term very very loosely) on other hosts, and effectively ceases to be a human concern. I'd wager that either of these outcomes is the more likely adaptation case than a leap to airborne transmission.

Evolving an entirely new means of infectious transmission seems to be a much rarer adaptation than adapting through other means (increased infectious potential; severity of infection; adaptation to new host types; etc.). It's popular in TV and movies to speak about a virus "going airborne," but in actual record, that's usually not what happens. Evolution doesn't have any agency or self-direction; it usually arrives at the 'laziest' and least costly alternative in response to imposed pressures. In this scenario, evolving airborne survivability and transmissibility is probably more costly than adapting to whatever enzyme prevents fleas and ticks from being carriers.

Source: http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/news/141003_ebola

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#179
This author clearly twists the words from that 2010 Nature report[1], as

1) That quote "Life would continue as before — or even better." is not even the conclusion in the Nature report. It's in the fifth paragraph of the first part out of the three part report. I guess this author just stopped here and failed to read the rest parts of the report for his conclusion?

2) The other two parts of the reports talk about the mosquito biomass and its impact to arctic tundra ecosystem, food chains and even cacao pollination.

3) The original author Janet Fang actually concluded the report by quoting entomologist Joe Conlon "If we eradicated them tomorrow, the ecosystems where they are active will hiccup and then get on with life." And the more important part is the next sentence: "Something better or worse would take over."

The key is that there is a high probability something worse would take over when you tried to mess Nature's arrangement in the past 100 million years abruptly. As noted by other HN user, Chairman Mao also thought getting rid of sparrows was really a good idea.

[1] http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html

Re: Let's Kill All the Mosquitoes

#180

We've done this lots[1] of[2] times[3] when it threatens agriculture, but when it threatens the lives of poor people in third world countries, suddenly we're worried about the ecosystem? There will be an environmental impact, but it will be from hundreds of millions of humans not getting malaria and climbing their way out of property, not from the lack of mosquitoes in the ecosystem. It's still a significant problem,…

As someone who suffered the wrath of both malaria and dengue, I can't agree enough.

I'm in East Java with my wife and 1 year old daughter. The rainy season was supposed to end a few weeks ago, but we still have rain, and mosquitos. I wish they would eliminate the two Zika vectors, and the Malaria vector mosquito as well. I am vegetarian for over two years nos, and feel compassion for all living things, except the mosquito. The article made me laugh as well.
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