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America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

theatlantic.com

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Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#31

Post by JabavuAdams »

jessaustin wrote: post #28
fit2rule wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't remember Trump being mentioned in the original article, and it seems more like you had an opportunity to vent on your personal issue, so you went for it. Screwworm removal improved society; members of the hate-Trump cult don't.

Dude it was a joke. Read the thread: I didn't bring him up in the first place. You might find the world more agreeable if you were less intent on your impressions of other people's "personal issues". If you think I'm in a "hate cult" you have no idea what is going on.

This over-deep thread is why jokes are discouraged in HN comments.

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#32

Post by metaphor »

scandox wrote: post #19
conistonwater wrote: post #14

> Scientists now knew, from the horrific consequences of atomic bombs dropped on Japan, that high doses of radiation damage human tissue and cells. When a colleague introduced Knipling to research on the sterilization of other flies by radiation, he wondered: Could radiation sterilize screwworms too? This is wrong, harmful effects of radiation on cells, that it causes mutations and makes things sterile, were known lo…

Well it's a classic journalistic technique. Put two statements adjacent to each other and imply a connection but actually you can see there is no formal conjunction.

I don't follow your logic.

The description "from the horrific consequences of atomic bombs dropped on Japan" is written and reads as nonessential, meaning it goes without saying but is nevertheless helpful in qualifying how "scientists now knew" within context of the article's chronological prose.

I understood the parent's remark as rejecting this factual inaccuracy.

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#33

Post by josephcsible »

someguyorother wrote: post #21
Retric wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Different approach, that attempt was to reduce population sizes not cause extinction. Though it is evidence that Gene Drive is less likely to work than many expect.

Nature thwarts gene drives by modifying their targets, so it's important that whatever is being targeted can't easily change. Surviving instead of being killed off is certainly an evolutionary advantage, after all :-) There's been some research on finding targets that can't be mutated. Here's one example: https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt.4245

While that may be true for general use of the gene drive, doesn't this particular use significantly increase the fitness of the individual organisms (despite being harmful to the species as a whole), resulting in essentially no evolutionary pressure against it?

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#34

Post by throwanem »

I really had no idea the sterile-insect technique worked so well! One wonders, as was chewed over in a thread a few days ago, why it isn't already being used at scale to destroy invasive populations of malaria-bearing mosquitoes in sub-Saharan Africa.

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#35

Post by throwanem »

josephcsible wrote: post #3

I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.

Why don't we start with the thing that we know works, and worry about CRISPR magic later?

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#36

Post by throwanem »

JabavuAdams wrote: post #31
jessaustin wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude it was a joke. Read the thread: I didn't bring him up in the first place. You might find the world more agreeable if you were less intent on your impressions of other people's "personal issues". If you think I'm in a "hate cult" you have no idea what is going on.

This over-deep thread is why jokes are discouraged in HN comments.

It helps if they're funny. This one's just a mess all the way through.

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#37

Post by marcosdumay »

josephcsible wrote: post #33
someguyorother wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nature thwarts gene drives by modifying their targets, so it's important that whatever is being targeted can't easily change. Surviving instead of being killed off is certainly an evolutionary advantage, after all :-) There's been some research on finding targets that can't be mutated. Here's one example: https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt.4245

While that may be true for general use of the gene drive, doesn't this particular use significantly increase the fitness of the individual organisms (despite being harmful to the species as a whole), resulting in essentially no evolutionary pressure against it?

Evolution happens on all levels at the same time. So, while this is the most likely result, it's not impossible that things go in other ways.

Anyway, it's also very unlikely that those actions result in anything worse than resistance against those same actions in the future.

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#38

Post by toyg »

throwanem wrote: post #34

I really had no idea the sterile-insect technique worked so well! One wonders, as was chewed over in a thread a few days ago, why it isn't already being used at scale to destroy invasive populations of malaria-bearing mosquitoes in sub-Saharan Africa.

Maybe mosquitos mate more than once, making this type of program much less effective.

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#39

Post by josephcsible »

throwanem wrote: post #35
josephcsible wrote: post #3

I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.

Why don't we start with the thing that we know works, and worry about CRISPR magic later?

We started this a long time ago. It is "later".

Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms

#40

Post by scandox »

metaphor wrote: post #32
scandox wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well it's a classic journalistic technique. Put two statements adjacent to each other and imply a connection but actually you can see there is no formal conjunction.

I don't follow your logic. The description " from the horrific consequences of atomic bombs dropped on Japan " is written and reads as nonessential, meaning it goes without saying but is nevertheless helpful in qualifying how " scientists now knew " within context of the article's chronological prose. I understood the parent's remark as rejecting this factual inaccuracy.

There's not much logic in my statement just an understanding of what the journalist is trying to do: dramatize something quite ordinary.

They want to establish a historical context where Hiroshima was a recent event and somehow tie this highly dramatic event to the simple fact that scientists knew radiation damaged cells. But there is no particular connection between the two since scientists already knew that prior to Hiroshima.

So what's a hack to do? Well you write one sentence. Then you write another. You don't say "because". You just stick 'em close together. That way you get your cake (drama) and eat it too (can't be called out on a falsehood).

In this case your brain does the work for them and "joins" these two statements together. At which point if you know it's false you're aggrieved - and quite rightly because it is intended as a (mild) deception.

But it passes an editor because you can just say (waving hands) "well you know it was all happening around that time - I'm just filling in the general background..."

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