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US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

nature.com

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Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#81

Post by learc83 »

dqpb wrote: post #15
learc83 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right now we're indiscriminately spraying pesticides that definitely have a harmful effect on the environment. All the evidence points to this being a better solution.

It's important to keep these two questions separate: 1. Is it probably better than the current solution 2. What could go wrong The first being (probably) true does not negate the need to ask the second. The new option may have a completely different risk profile

2 is necessary to answer 1 though, so they aren't really separate.

If the cost benefit analysis of the new solution is worse because it has greater risks, then it can't be better than the current solution.

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#82

Post by toreply99887766 »

ftxrcc wrote: post #43

I heavily disagree with this decision from the US gov't. It's incredibly arrogant and selfish for a species to try and modify nature for an evolutionary advantage.

“Modifying nature” is the evolutionary advantage that has allowed the human species to develop.

Drawing a line in the sand seems impossible given our footprint on the globe. Instead, some educated analysis of the benefits and consequences of our decisions seems like the best we can do.

Do you suspect that isn’t being done here?

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#83

Post by learc83 »

briga wrote: post #75
napa15 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's fine being careful but this argument devolves all too often into some kind of religious nature worship. We are the dominant species on this planet. Animals and plant life - nature - have to conform to our wishes. Not the other way around.

The only reason we are the dominant species is because we have resources and ecosystems that can support us. The dominant species won't be so dominant anymore when ecosystems collapse.

I don't think the OP would argue against that point.

Harming nature to the point that it harms humans wouldn't fit into that philosophy.

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#84

Post by learc83 »

sametmax wrote: post #80
saulrh wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have malaria, money, and first-world medical support. Very different thing. Kill the fuckers.

So the problem is the state of the third world. No mosquitoes. Let's fix that instead of killing things. Especially since we are mostly responsible.

Why should we eradicate malaria? Or small pox? Surely they've had just as much impact on the world's ecosystem as mosquitoes.

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#85

Post by badminton1 »

DigitalJack wrote: post #45
badminton1 wrote: post #28

Mao started a campaign to kill all sparrows because they eat the "grain of the people". Well, right after that, insects started proliferating, so then they had to exterminate all of them. Among the insects killed, pollinators died. So that region now looks completely Marsformed and now all agriculture required pollination by hand . Killing a species can start a slippery slope.

I've heard this story before. I think it was on a documentary about the source of General Tso's Chicken (and I'm not making a joke), but I don't recall for sure... Do you have a reference?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Pests_Campaign

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#86

Post by saulrh »

sametmax wrote: post #80
saulrh wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have malaria, money, and first-world medical support. Very different thing. Kill the fuckers.

So the problem is the state of the third world. No mosquitoes. Let's fix that instead of killing things. Especially since we are mostly responsible.

If you know of a proposal for solving the third world that's as cheap, fast, effective, reliable, and safe as - that has comparable expected value to - killing human-biting malaria-carrying mosquitoes, that's great! Please, PLEASE share it and work toward its execution!

Me, I say kill the mosquitoes.

(Although, honestly, even if you did have such a plan, I'd still say kill the mosquitoes in addition: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15665373)

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#87

Post by learc83 »

anonacct37 wrote: post #22
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://www.who.int/whr/1996/media_centre/executive_summary1/... Mosquitoes are responsible for millions of deaths every year, and hundreds of millions of infections often with severe disability. We understand stuff pretty deeply now. According to https://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html eliminating mosquitoes would not cause major ecological issues. So when you have millions of people dying every yea…

How many planets do we have? By my count it's one. What's our track record on changing ecosystems to fix problems without creating worse problems? Zero out of how many? I hate mosquito too, and they are probably useless, but no good engineer makes changes without a backup and a tested rollback strategy, where's our backup?

We have a rollback mechanism. This system requires the continuous introduction of new infected males.

If we find that eliminating this particular mosquito species is harmful. We can just reintroduce them from somewhere else.

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#88

Post by sametmax »

learc83 wrote: post #84
sametmax wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the problem is the state of the third world. No mosquitoes. Let's fix that instead of killing things. Especially since we are mostly responsible.

Why should we eradicate malaria? Or small pox? Surely they've had just as much impact on the world's ecosystem as mosquitoes.

We don't eradicate them. We just prevent us from being sick, it's a local action. We are not actively mass killing it.

If you can't see the difference between defence and offence, local area of effect and genocide...

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#89

Post by junkcollector »

fhood wrote: post #70
mikeash wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Smallpox was made extinct (aside from samples in labs) and as far a I know there haven't been any problems from that.

Sure, but the only possible side affect of eliminating smallpox was increased population growth. Different than introducing an organism who's evolution we don't control into the wild.

These mosquitoes have undergone induced sterilization. By definition their evolution is completely controlled.

Re: US government approves 'killer' mosquitoes to fight disease

#90

Post by learc83 »

sametmax wrote: post #88
learc83 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should we eradicate malaria? Or small pox? Surely they've had just as much impact on the world's ecosystem as mosquitoes.

We don't eradicate them. We just prevent us from being sick, it's a local action. We are not actively mass killing it. If you can't see the difference between defence and offence, local area of effect and genocide...

>We are not actively killing it.

What do you think a person's immune system does to smallpox when they have been inoculated against smallpox and they are exposed to it?

We're not actively killing mosquitoes just preventing them from breeding.

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