Saint Guinefort
Verified User
I think it is a safer generalization given what we saw transpire during COVID. But by the same token there are plenty of Lefties who are bad with science as well. A lot of the anti-vaxers seem to skew left it seems.
Dinosaurs From Space!
- Thread starter signalmankenneth
- Start date
I think it is a safer generalization given what we saw transpire during COVID. But by the same token there are plenty of Lefties who are bad with science as well. A lot of the anti-vaxers seem to skew left it seems.
Tinkerpeach
New member
I don't think being anti-vax can be categorized into political parties.
I'm extreme right and I am one.
Saint Guinefort
Verified User
I am speaking in generalities. Yes I understand there are anti-science folks on both sides.
So why do you distrust one of the most effective armaments against the kinds of diseases that commonly killed our grandparents but have almost no impact on us today?
Tinkerpeach
New member
Vaccines ultimately lower your immune system to the disease which means you end up relying on the vaccine to fight off the disease instead of your own body.
It's ironic that vaccines actually contain the disease they are there to prevent in order to boost your immune system to it.
It's the same thing your body does naturally without the risk of side effects.
However, it is a personal choice, I have no issue with others who wish to get them.
I can tell you though that I've never been sick a single day in my life, never got Covid, nothing.
I worked in hospitality for a long time meaning I was exposed to probably every sort of disease out there and my body became resistant to it all.
Saint Guinefort
Verified User
Where did you get that from?
Not really. It's kind of basic biology. The body creates antibodies for certain stressors which it needs to base those antibodies on.
Your body doesn't do it naturally for many things. And in many cases the way your body does it is by contracting a mild version of the disease. That isn't usually a statistical option for particularly aggressive high mortality diseases. That's why humans didn't develop a significant degree of natural immunity to smallpox.
Well, it's kind of not a personal choice. Communicable diseases need a population with enough people who are unprotected to continue to exist. If you decide you don't want to get a vaccine for a communicable disease but you want to remain part of society then have a bit of a pickle. You are free to leave society but you are not free to put society at risk because of your personal distrust of science.
I will withhold my skepticism of this claim and just say "So what?" YOU are not the only person on earth. You are part of society and as such you can be asked to help maintain the security of that society.
Look, I'm not going to say that vaccines have never harmed anyone, that's absurd. But the risks are greatly outweighed by the benefits and the benefits don't just devolve to you. They sometimes devolve to people around you whom you may be able to infect.
Guess you can always hope!
Tinkerpeach
New member
The Europeans developed a significant immunity to smallpox.
As they developed their immunity they passed it on to further generations, this is the most effective way to control a disease.
Sure, the death toll may be higher to start with but the results in the end can end up saving more lives.
You lower that natural immunity and then realize you don't have a vaccine to rely on your basically screwed.
If we become a society based on vaccines that means that eventually even a little germ could wipe us out.
Saint Guinefort
Verified User
Is that why it wasn't eradicated in the wild until the 1970's with the use of vaccines?
Is that why we still had to invent the vaccine?
I'm assuming you are not 200 years old so you are just like me and the product of a society VERY MUCH made better with vaccines.
Tinkerpeach
New member
No, it means that's why the entire population wasn't wiped out from it.
Same with the black plague.
People develop immunity to it from exposure, some better than others.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Some people develop immunity. About 30-60% of the Euro population died from the plague.
Related to this, here is Dutch's solution to global warming: develop a virus that is 98% fatal to the unvaccinated. It would kill off all the world's stupid people within a few months.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Death
Into Тhe Night
Banned Spoof Account
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
You're free to fill me in on your vast knowledge of astronomy, America.
Meanwhile, for the sane and sober, a more accurate figure may be 50 light years: https://arxiv.org/abs/1702.04365 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30034016/
A supernova at 50 pc: Effects on the Earth's atmosphere and biota
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
For those interested: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30034016/
The 20 page paper: https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1702/1702.04365.pdf
Another, older article: https://www.astronomy.com/science/what-will-happen-on-earth-when-betelgeuse-goes-supernova/
What will happen on Earth when Betelgeuse goes supernova?
The 20 page paper: https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1702/1702.04365.pdf
Another, older article: https://www.astronomy.com/science/what-will-happen-on-earth-when-betelgeuse-goes-supernova/
What will happen on Earth when Betelgeuse goes supernova?
Betelgeuse, shown here in a Hubble Space Telescope image, is a red supergiant about 500 light-years away in the constellation Orion the Hunter. Although astronomers predict this massive star will end its life as a supernova soon — at least in cosmic terms — the effects of such an explosion won’t pose a problem for life on Earth.
Andrea Dupree (Harvard-Smithsonian CfA), Ronald Gilliland (STScI), NASA and ESA
Good article.
I guessing pc may stand for parsec, and 1 parsec is something like 3.2 light years.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Agreed on pc: https://www.translatorscafe.com/unit-converter/en-US/length/22-21/light-year-parsec/
It amazes me that a supernova could be that far away and still cause a mass extinction event. The good news is that there are no candidates for a supernova within 25 light years. I'm not so sure about 50 to 100 light years much less 300+.
Seemingly another of the perfect storm conditions which have allowed life to evolve and thrive on Earth for billions of years: our star is supposedly in a very sparsely populated, minor tributary outer arm of the Milky Way disk. As one gets closer to the galactic center the stars tend to be packed together, closely and densely.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
An excellent point and agreed. It would explain why life may only exist in the sparsely populated areas of the galaxy.
ThatOwlWoman
Leftist Vermin
An old sci fi favorite.
West of Eden
The seeding theory makes no sense. Conditions would have to be such that any alien life hitching a ride would 1) have to be able to survive in the conditions found in interstellar space, and 2) hospitable once the life forms arrived here.
My understanding of the Panspermia hypothesis is not that cellular life was hitching rides on asteroids. But amino acids and other organic compounds were. This has been scientifically verified.
But that still leaves a big hole in the hypothesis: how did amino acids and inert organic compounds delivered from space organize themselves into complex self sustaining cellular life?
Tinkerpeach
New member
We eradicated the black plague by developing immunity to it without relying on a vaccine.
There is one today although it's not available in many nations such as the US.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Up to 2/3s died of the Black Death. What history books are you reading?
https://www.britannica.com/event/Black-Death
Black Death, pandemic that ravaged Europe between 1347 and 1351, taking a proportionately greater toll of life than any other known epidemic or war up to that time....
...Anti-Semitism greatly intensified throughout Europe as Jews were blamed for the spread of the Black Death. A wave of violent pogroms ensued, and entire Jewish communities were killed by mobs or burned at the stake en masse....
...The study of contemporary archives suggests a mortality varying in the different regions between one-eighth and two-thirds of the population, and the French chronicler Jean Froissart’s statement that about one-third of Europe’s population died in the epidemic may be fairly accurate. The population in England in 1400 was perhaps half what it had been 100 years earlier; in that country alone, the Black Death certainly caused the depopulation or total disappearance of about 1,000 villages. A rough estimate is that 25 million people in Europe died from plague during the Black Death. The population of western Europe did not again reach its pre-1348 level until the beginning of the 16th century.