The athiest doesn't assert that claims of divinity are false.The athiest asserts that they do not believe such claims are true.
*Emphasis mine.
How is the assertion of an unfounded and untested belief not a statement of faith in a position?
Note: I do not discriminate against negative assertions.
I don't need evidence to say "I don't think there are ants on the moon".
Of course not, this is a circular statement. You don't believe there are ants on the moon, because you don't believe there are ants on the moon-- but if you want others to understand why you hold this position, you need to be more forthcoming, and explain why. Eg "I don't believe there are ants on the moon because ants require gaseous oxygen and high atmospheric pressures, which are features experimentally verified to not exist there. Any hypothetical moon ants would have to be radically different from earth ants, at which point, why even call them ants at all?" That would be an argument that does not require faith. The former unqualified and circular statement however, does require it.
I do need evidence if I were to say "There are no ants on the moon". Both are two subtly different positions.
Agreed. They are quite different.
The former is not one of faith, the latter is.
I do not believe this is true, because the former relies on self referential conditions that are unfounded/unqualified.
While probably not intended to viewed in such a context, the derision scientists have over multiple reality based string theories which would claim to describe why our universe is the way it is, would axiomatically fall under the bible's definition of "divine".
This is due to the untestable nature of the underlying premises: that there inaccesible, but real parts of the total universe in which real but unobservable processes occur.
This is exactly the kind of thing that the christian bible attempts to explain about "god". That this being is at once a real phenomenon, and at the same time inscrutible.
Well respected particle physicists rightly reject string theories due to the untestible nature of their foundational concepts, much the same way that most scientists reject the foundation of christian faith. The views presented are unfounded, and cannot be tested, only inferred.
This rejection is moot however, to the true believers of both systems. They will continue to hold their opinions, and can still continue to contribute usefully to the body of scientific knowledge. (Eg, Gregor Mendel's contribution to genetics is not diminshed by his having been a devout member of the catholic clergy.)
Conversely, the premise that the testible universe is the only true reality, and that the conjecture of things (of any nature) outside that logical bounding have no value does not fully describe the human condition.
Humans thrive on asking the question "what if", and as such there will always be a "home" for "god", even if unfamiliar to current established memes, and this direction of thought will always be popular with non philosophers and philosphers alike.
(Much like string theory is interesting to non-physicists as well as people that are.)
Unfortunately the precept of occams razor is not absolute.
For instance, the recent reproduction of a work of shapespeare through simumalted random processes.
The precept merely (and rightly) points out that such phenomena are "unlikely". Not that they don't happen, or cannot happen. Due to that unlikeliness, looking in that direction is generally the incorrect approach.
This brings us back to the famous quote from carl sagan: "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."
As such, the original question about the logical stability of the "faith" argument above still holds, even under these conditions.
I can accept that you choose to hold that the existence of a divinity is unlikely, due to the principle of the razor, but à cannot accept a hardliner that flatly stated "there are no gods", as that position is not supportable under prevailing knowledge.
I realize that this is frames with regard to a specific religion, so I will answer from that context. (Said religion being the major offender in this regard. For religions outside the scope of this reply, it would naturally not hold, and should not be construed to do so.)
It is outright stated in the foundational work of that particular religion that mankind has absolutely no power over "the divine" (meaning through direct application of the axiom, that if it can be tested, it is not divine), thus any result tendered by science is an apple to that religion's orange.
Further, that same body asserts (rightly or wrongly is anyone's guess) that the nature of the creator is not only unknown, but also unknowable. From the perspective of a scientist, this poses an intractable situation, because it would be something that no tool or process could validate as either true or fase, and thus of no profit or value to pursue. A total non-starter of an issue, and not worthy of serious discussion, since the discussion would serve no purpose.
From the perspective of the adherent of said religion, the pursuits of scientists should be seen as the direct observation and dedication to the "divine edict" to subdue the "earth". (Earth used metaphorically to describe mundane reality, with its testable and verifiable conditions) Mankind is presumed to have been given power and authority over said creation, and the systematic observation, analysis, and application of such phenomena should naturally follow.
In these contexts, I see no reason for either camp to hold the other in any contempt or animosity. Such animosity appears to arise when religious humans who presume to have "divine knowledge" assert to posess "absolute truth", and claim divine authority as the basis of their assertions. When scientists find contradictory evidence to these claims, the defacto authority wielded by the leaders of these religious groups is fundementally undermined, causing contempt on both sides.
As far as the strictures of this specific religion are concerned, the truthfulness of any proclamation of divine knowledge is indeed empirical testing. (Specifically, when asked how to tell if a prophet is a true prophet, the described answer was to verify the prophecies of said prophet. If even ONE assertion is found to be false, ALL assertions are to be viewed as such, because there is no truth in them, by virtue of such testing, QED.) Further, latter doctrine in this religious faith asserts that one should adhere only to scripture, and vetted prophets, and to otherwise shun the doctrines of men. (Eg, "every sperm is sacred", "the earth is only 6000 years old", "jesus needs you to give me your money" et al.)
The issue would then appear not to be with the specific religion fundementally, but rather with specific methods associated with that religion. The religion itself, as written, appears perfectly adaptable to anything science can discover.
I see this argument often, but it is a nonsequitor to me:
The assertion, without demonstration thereof, of the falsehood of claims of divinity is every bit an assertion of faith as is the assertion that such claims of divinity are true, due to the lack of empirical evidence in both positions.
Without such evidence, the opinion becomes one of faith; faith in the assertion itself.
Sadly the 1950s style jiffy pop always seems to burn the popcorn.
Toaster ovens burn the bag.
That leaves hot air poppers, but they spew rf noise worse than microwave ovens do. (The momentary contacters in the hot air blower act like spark gap transmitters, and blanket a large spectrum. Same with hair driers btw.)
A graphene sheet could arguably be created using vapor deposition and big ass hydraulic press rollers. (Regularity and uniformity of the carbon lattice might be an issue at such thin material scales.)
A nanotube making machine that makes use of sheet stock would need to have:
1) very high quality sheet stock, free from any defects. 2) be able to cut this sheet into a thin (12 to 20 atoms wide) strip, and then seamlessly curl this molecular width sheet into a tube with exacting precision, and then apply some form of energy to bind the sheet edges together seamlessly, and without disrupting the configuration of the other carbon atoms in the tube wall.
That is a helluva lot of caveats to industrual long tube synth from sheet stock.
More likely, the graphene sheets will be used in aviation as prepreg material for strong and light skins for high velocity craft, like fighter jets.
Getting the graphene sheet to properly seal in such a perfectly uniform way without disrupting the orderliness of the parent sheet in the process would be a pretty fancy trick.
Developing sheets is fairly easy, as they can be produced using ordinary vapor deposition.
Rolling up that sheet into uniform and regular tubes is a whole different kettle of fish.
The outstanding thing that comes to mind for me, is that such epigenetic influence could alter embryological development.
Subtle changes in gene expression can mean the difference between being born with a penis or not. (Activation of a specific horome causes atrophy of the mulerian ducts in mammalian embryos, causing them to develop as males. Disruption of this signal during a critical period of development can cause the formation of female or ambiguous genitals, despite having a male genotype. This is just an example; there are a whole lot of time specific cellular signalling mechanisms at work in embyos. This is why thalidamide causes deformities, for instance.)
Influence from diet during gestation would have long lasting effects, even if changes to expression are temporary.
If this already happens, then the approach could be used as a diagnostic tool to catch sweetheart whitelists.
Something real spammers would pay money to know. (Email header spoofing is old news, but a list of 'always succeeds' addresses would be worth money... not that I am suggesting engaging with such filth, mind, but having such sweetheart deals abused in this way would force the deal to be dissolved rather quickly.)
Knowing that your email provider always lets, say, dell.com emails through and knowing it empirically through testing would open up some 'entertaining' lines of inquiry at the very least.
I was going to ask how this url got blacklisted by the spam filter, but it it was unsolicited and mass mailed, then by definition it WAS spam, and the black listing happened automagically when users flagged it as such.
This scenario makes me wonder if a crowdsourced disruption campaign could disrupt email from major corporations intended for end user inboxes ("special offers" ahem...) simply by having the participants mass email each other a bulk list of urls relating to the target, then have them all report the chain letter as spam.
That would get a large number of corporate urls blacklisted for suspicious activity. (Assuming there aren't any sweetheart deals in place to specifically whitelist such web addresses, of course.)
As originally implemented, social security was meant to be a private trust, not a government slush fund.
Ss became a ponzi scheme when it (the federal goverment) raided the social security assets and replaced them with IOUs, while still presenting social security as a safe, solvent way to save money for retirement.
Also, ss was originally intended to be opt in, and not voluntary, like it is now.
Never underestimate the reach of big money and multinationals.
(Yes, I know TPB "violated" copyright, not patent laws, but as both are "intellectual property" of the real movers and shakers of the modern world--the multinationals-- the distinction becomes grey at best, and moot at worst. If your project causes them consternation, they will reach out and touch you. Touch you like an angry TSA agent with dermatitis. We are talking full, repeated cavity search here.)
In the cases of receptor blocking medications, there were sticky issues involving elevated liver enzymes, iirc. This caused the fda to reject. (Essentially the blockers are large protiens that bind to the receptor and plug it up like a cork, so the virus cannot dock. The body has to break down these foreign bodies in the liver to eliminate them, which causes elevated liver enzymes. A condition known to induce liver failure. Yes, several distinct medications were blocked by this decision.)
The gene therapy trials were halted, because of issues involving reliability of the gene therapy's proper integration into the host genome in a reliable way. (EG, that the vector was consistent in how it integrated the new gene, and that the process did not increase risks for cancers in already immunosuppressed patients with aids.)
Overshadowing both thorny issues was the question of if the actual deactivation of CCR5 (the mutation deletes a good portion of the gene that produces this receptor, making the cell produce nonfunctional versions) would itself be safe over the long run. Several studies have been comissioned to address this very subject, and initial results indicate that the delta32 CCR5 mutation increases risks of several nasty infectious agents, such as west nile.
Until these issues are addressed, it is unlikey that the US FDA will approve any CCR5 blocking/disrupting medications.
This is why I said that it is likey to be approved in Europe, and not the US.
What I am getting at, is that this mechanism has been the subject of clinical trial medications in the past, and refused acceptance every time.
While the delta CCR5 mutation appears benign in humans under most circumstances, the burden of proving such benality imposed by the FDA will likely be insurmountable, and as such, even if this stuff kills off HIV infection in 24 hours of application, it will probably never get approval in the US.
The delta CCR5 mutation was already well known, and the subject of several (at least 4) different experimental receptor blocking and gene therapy medications, all of which were blocked by the FDA citing safety concerns.
This is not meant to be a conspiracy theorist bottom feeding post, but simply intended to inform. There have been many studies of this mutation for thereputic uses conducted in Europe over the past decade, including seeveral promising phase 2 trials.
Like most life saving medications though, any prospective cure for HIV will probably be developed in the US, and approved in Europe. (Then approved in the US after decades of routine use overseas.)
While this particular gene therapy might be new, the mechanism is not novel.
However, if the artificially sensitized T cells programmed to eliminate B cells stick around, the patient would not be able to properly recover. Any freshly produced B cells would be marked for elimination immediately after production.
Perhaps the population could be coaxed into premature senesence (sp? I am tired...) by carefully regulated injections of refined trigger protein? The idea is to get the memory population to spike and exhaust the longevity of the population.
Hey, I thought I was doing good dredging up information I was exposed to more than 20 years ago. (And at midnight, no less.):)
I did not know T cells underwent mitosis. I thought they were produced as needed by their progenitor cells in the bone marrow, similarly to red cells.
Admittedly, I did not read tfa, (paywall, LONG out of university.) so I did knot read that it directly targets B cells. The issue of runaway autoimmune reactions is still relavent. Indescriminate destruction of B cells is a very bad thing and would make the patient extremely immune suppressed following the initial "thermonuclear" immune response, as the patient's immune system would effectively be given a lobotomy and would forget every pathogen it had encountered, and would remain that way until new B cells are produced.
This treatment could be adapted for other types of cancer besides this flavor of leukemia, just as long as there is a reasonably reliable target for the t cells to go after.
When b cells are not THE target, then their implication in the immune response would be more in line with what I had said earlier.
Sorry about the histamine bit. A quick google refresher points out that it is used to help white cells navigate capillaries. For some reason I erroneously recalled that it triggered b cell activation.
I am not a cellular biologist, and I don't work with this stuff every day, so naturally I will defer to somebody that is/does.
A killer T cell is an end product cell type. It does not divide. As such introduction of the cells shouldn't cause lasting immunological issues, unless the synthetically activated cells initiate a cascade autoimmune reaction.
(T cells destroy pathogens, but they also pass antigen information on to B cells, which "remember" previous infectious agents, and mass replicate antibodies in the hystamine cycle. This mechanism is how vaccination works. Deactivated virus is introduced, white cells engage, destroy, and then present the debris to B cells, which produce antibodies. When the real virus comes along, the immine system reacts with a flood of antibody production, which greatly inhibits proliferation of the pathogen. In this case, researchers would have to be VERY careful what cellular membrane cues they program their new mutant superhero T cells to go after, or else the body may become sensitized against its own cellular membranes, resulting in runaway autoimmune reactions.)
Assuming that everything goes well, then the modified T cell culture will natually self-terminate like normal T cells do, and then all traces of the manipulation would be gone from the host.
This means that there shouldn't be a need for long term antirejection meds, like with a bone marrow transplant.
It's a mutant turtle. It was only a teenager in the mid 80s. Its almost 30 now, and it lived in the newyork sewers in it's rat-like parent's basement, getting morbidly obeise on stale pizza crusts.
Since its acting career dried up shortly after the first motion picture, I am just trying to be merciful.
Death in the desert is far better for it than the unlife that is comic cons and newyork after dark.
I don't hate the turtle, I only want to ease its suffering!
That is why you put the switch box in the filter box.
You know, one of those ugly metal enclosures with a big rocker switch on it, used to switch which PC your keyboard, mouse, and monitor are hooked to?
You simply leave it stuck in one position, and use the port ends on the back creatively so your expensive AV and HID cables arent hanging out of the mineral oil, and as such, dont wick any up.
Slashdot Mirror
The athiest doesn't assert that claims of divinity are false.The athiest asserts that they do not believe such claims are true.
*Emphasis mine.
How is the assertion of an unfounded and untested belief not a statement of faith in a position?
Note: I do not discriminate against negative assertions.
I don't need evidence to say "I don't think there are ants on the moon".
Of course not, this is a circular statement. You don't believe there are ants on the moon, because you don't believe there are ants on the moon-- but if you want others to understand why you hold this position, you need to be more forthcoming, and explain why. Eg "I don't believe there are ants on the moon because ants require gaseous oxygen and high atmospheric pressures, which are features experimentally verified to not exist there. Any hypothetical moon ants would have to be radically different from earth ants, at which point, why even call them ants at all?" That would be an argument that does not require faith. The former unqualified and circular statement however, does require it.
I do need evidence if I were to say "There are no ants on the moon". Both are two subtly different positions.
Agreed. They are quite different.
The former is not one of faith, the latter is.
I do not believe this is true, because the former relies on self referential conditions that are unfounded/unqualified.
While probably not intended to viewed in such a context, the derision scientists have over multiple reality based string theories which would claim to describe why our universe is the way it is, would axiomatically fall under the bible's definition of "divine".
This is due to the untestable nature of the underlying premises: that there inaccesible, but real parts of the total universe in which real but unobservable processes occur.
This is exactly the kind of thing that the christian bible attempts to explain about "god". That this being is at once a real phenomenon, and at the same time inscrutible.
Well respected particle physicists rightly reject string theories due to the untestible nature of their foundational concepts, much the same way that most scientists reject the foundation of christian faith. The views presented are unfounded, and cannot be tested, only inferred.
This rejection is moot however, to the true believers of both systems. They will continue to hold their opinions, and can still continue to contribute usefully to the body of scientific knowledge. (Eg, Gregor Mendel's contribution to genetics is not diminshed by his having been a devout member of the catholic clergy.)
Conversely, the premise that the testible universe is the only true reality, and that the conjecture of things (of any nature) outside that logical bounding have no value does not fully describe the human condition.
Humans thrive on asking the question "what if", and as such there will always be a "home" for "god", even if unfamiliar to current established memes, and this direction of thought will always be popular with non philosophers and philosphers alike.
(Much like string theory is interesting to non-physicists as well as people that are.)
Unfortunately the precept of occams razor is not absolute.
For instance, the recent reproduction of a work of shapespeare through simumalted random processes.
The precept merely (and rightly) points out that such phenomena are "unlikely". Not that they don't happen, or cannot happen. Due to that unlikeliness, looking in that direction is generally the incorrect approach.
This brings us back to the famous quote from carl sagan: "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."
As such, the original question about the logical stability of the "faith" argument above still holds, even under these conditions.
I can accept that you choose to hold that the existence of a divinity is unlikely, due to the principle of the razor, but à cannot accept a hardliner that flatly stated "there are no gods", as that position is not supportable under prevailing knowledge.
I realize that this is frames with regard to a specific religion, so I will answer from that context. (Said religion being the major offender in this regard. For religions outside the scope of this reply, it would naturally not hold, and should not be construed to do so.)
It is outright stated in the foundational work of that particular religion that mankind has absolutely no power over "the divine" (meaning through direct application of the axiom, that if it can be tested, it is not divine), thus any result tendered by science is an apple to that religion's orange.
Further, that same body asserts (rightly or wrongly is anyone's guess) that the nature of the creator is not only unknown, but also unknowable. From the perspective of a scientist, this poses an intractable situation, because it would be something that no tool or process could validate as either true or fase, and thus of no profit or value to pursue. A total non-starter of an issue, and not worthy of serious discussion, since the discussion would serve no purpose.
From the perspective of the adherent of said religion, the pursuits of scientists should be seen as the direct observation and dedication to the "divine edict" to subdue the "earth". (Earth used metaphorically to describe mundane reality, with its testable and verifiable conditions) Mankind is presumed to have been given power and authority over said creation, and the systematic observation, analysis, and application of such phenomena should naturally follow.
In these contexts, I see no reason for either camp to hold the other in any contempt or animosity. Such animosity appears to arise when religious humans who presume to have "divine knowledge" assert to posess "absolute truth", and claim divine authority as the basis of their assertions. When scientists find contradictory evidence to these claims, the defacto authority wielded by the leaders of these religious groups is fundementally undermined, causing contempt on both sides.
As far as the strictures of this specific religion are concerned, the truthfulness of any proclamation of divine knowledge is indeed empirical testing. (Specifically, when asked how to tell if a prophet is a true prophet, the described answer was to verify the prophecies of said prophet. If even ONE assertion is found to be false, ALL assertions are to be viewed as such, because there is no truth in them, by virtue of such testing, QED.) Further, latter doctrine in this religious faith asserts that one should adhere only to scripture, and vetted prophets, and to otherwise shun the doctrines of men. (Eg, "every sperm is sacred", "the earth is only 6000 years old", "jesus needs you to give me your money" et al.)
The issue would then appear not to be with the specific religion fundementally, but rather with specific methods associated with that religion. The religion itself, as written, appears perfectly adaptable to anything science can discover.
I see this argument often, but it is a nonsequitor to me:
The assertion, without demonstration thereof, of the falsehood of claims of divinity is every bit an assertion of faith as is the assertion that such claims of divinity are true, due to the lack of empirical evidence in both positions.
Without such evidence, the opinion becomes one of faith; faith in the assertion itself.
Sadly the 1950s style jiffy pop always seems to burn the popcorn.
Toaster ovens burn the bag.
That leaves hot air poppers, but they spew rf noise worse than microwave ovens do. (The momentary contacters in the hot air blower act like spark gap transmitters, and blanket a large spectrum. Same with hair driers btw.)
So, how am I supposed to make popcorn, eh?
The difference is one of manufacturing process.
A graphene sheet could arguably be created using vapor deposition and big ass hydraulic press rollers. (Regularity and uniformity of the carbon lattice might be an issue at such thin material scales.)
A nanotube making machine that makes use of sheet stock would need to have:
1) very high quality sheet stock, free from any defects.
2) be able to cut this sheet into a thin (12 to 20 atoms wide) strip, and then seamlessly curl this molecular width sheet into a tube with exacting precision, and then apply some form of energy to bind the sheet edges together seamlessly, and without disrupting the configuration of the other carbon atoms in the tube wall.
That is a helluva lot of caveats to industrual long tube synth from sheet stock.
More likely, the graphene sheets will be used in aviation as prepreg material for strong and light skins for high velocity craft, like fighter jets.
The devil is in the details.
Getting the graphene sheet to properly seal in such a perfectly uniform way without disrupting the orderliness of the parent sheet in the process would be a pretty fancy trick.
Developing sheets is fairly easy, as they can be produced using ordinary vapor deposition.
Rolling up that sheet into uniform and regular tubes is a whole different kettle of fish.
The outstanding thing that comes to mind for me, is that such epigenetic influence could alter embryological development.
Subtle changes in gene expression can mean the difference between being born with a penis or not. (Activation of a specific horome causes atrophy of the mulerian ducts in mammalian embryos, causing them to develop as males. Disruption of this signal during a critical period of development can cause the formation of female or ambiguous genitals, despite having a male genotype. This is just an example; there are a whole lot of time specific cellular signalling mechanisms at work in embyos. This is why thalidamide causes deformities, for instance.)
Influence from diet during gestation would have long lasting effects, even if changes to expression are temporary.
If this already happens, then the approach could be used as a diagnostic tool to catch sweetheart whitelists.
Something real spammers would pay money to know. (Email header spoofing is old news, but a list of 'always succeeds' addresses would be worth money... not that I am suggesting engaging with such filth, mind, but having such sweetheart deals abused in this way would force the deal to be dissolved rather quickly.)
Knowing that your email provider always lets, say, dell.com emails through and knowing it empirically through testing would open up some 'entertaining' lines of inquiry at the very least.
I was going to ask how this url got blacklisted by the spam filter, but it it was unsolicited and mass mailed, then by definition it WAS spam, and the black listing happened automagically when users flagged it as such.
This scenario makes me wonder if a crowdsourced disruption campaign could disrupt email from major corporations intended for end user inboxes ("special offers" ahem...) simply by having the participants mass email each other a bulk list of urls relating to the target, then have them all report the chain letter as spam.
That would get a large number of corporate urls blacklisted for suspicious activity. (Assuming there aren't any sweetheart deals in place to specifically whitelist such web addresses, of course.)
Not entirely true.
As originally implemented, social security was meant to be a private trust, not a government slush fund.
Ss became a ponzi scheme when it (the federal goverment) raided the social security assets and replaced them with IOUs, while still presenting social security as a safe, solvent way to save money for retirement.
Also, ss was originally intended to be opt in, and not voluntary, like it is now.
The pirate bay founders felt the same way...
Never underestimate the reach of big money and multinationals.
(Yes, I know TPB "violated" copyright, not patent laws, but as both are "intellectual property" of the real movers and shakers of the modern world--the multinationals-- the distinction becomes grey at best, and moot at worst. If your project causes them consternation, they will reach out and touch you. Touch you like an angry TSA agent with dermatitis. We are talking full, repeated cavity search here.)
MS: "We own FAT! Pay up or else!"
Linux: "No, you own VFAT, not FAT itself. VFAT is an optional extension to FAT."
USPO: "MS's VFAT patent applies broadly to all use of long filenames on a limited filesystem."
Linux: "That's BULLSHIT."
Total fail.
Balks on something as simple as:
DIM Foo AS INTEGER
Further, requires all commands to be in all caps, while real qbasic doesn't give a squat.
Attempted a builtin graphics function, but the interpreter has no idea about how to do the LINE operation.
Kids would be MUCH better off with real qbasic in dosbox.
Wouldnt that be a normal transistor?
In the cases of receptor blocking medications, there were sticky issues involving elevated liver enzymes, iirc. This caused the fda to reject. (Essentially the blockers are large protiens that bind to the receptor and plug it up like a cork, so the virus cannot dock. The body has to break down these foreign bodies in the liver to eliminate them, which causes elevated liver enzymes. A condition known to induce liver failure. Yes, several distinct medications were blocked by this decision.)
The gene therapy trials were halted, because of issues involving reliability of the gene therapy's proper integration into the host genome in a reliable way. (EG, that the vector was consistent in how it integrated the new gene, and that the process did not increase risks for cancers in already immunosuppressed patients with aids.)
Overshadowing both thorny issues was the question of if the actual deactivation of CCR5 (the mutation deletes a good portion of the gene that produces this receptor, making the cell produce nonfunctional versions) would itself be safe over the long run. Several studies have been comissioned to address this very subject, and initial results indicate that the delta32 CCR5 mutation increases risks of several nasty infectious agents, such as west nile.
Until these issues are addressed, it is unlikey that the US FDA will approve any CCR5 blocking/disrupting medications.
This is why I said that it is likey to be approved in Europe, and not the US.
What I am getting at, is that this mechanism has been the subject of clinical trial medications in the past, and refused acceptance every time.
While the delta CCR5 mutation appears benign in humans under most circumstances, the burden of proving such benality imposed by the FDA will likely be insurmountable, and as such, even if this stuff kills off HIV infection in 24 hours of application, it will probably never get approval in the US.
The delta CCR5 mutation was already well known, and the subject of several (at least 4) different experimental receptor blocking and gene therapy medications, all of which were blocked by the FDA citing safety concerns.
This is not meant to be a conspiracy theorist bottom feeding post, but simply intended to inform. There have been many studies of this mutation for thereputic uses conducted in Europe over the past decade, including seeveral promising phase 2 trials.
Like most life saving medications though, any prospective cure for HIV will probably be developed in the US, and approved in Europe. (Then approved in the US after decades of routine use overseas.)
While this particular gene therapy might be new, the mechanism is not novel.
I dont suppose you could explain Alex, the infamously descriptive grey parrot?
You learn something new everyday. :)
However, if the artificially sensitized T cells programmed to eliminate B cells stick around, the patient would not be able to properly recover. Any freshly produced B cells would be marked for elimination immediately after production.
Perhaps the population could be coaxed into premature senesence (sp? I am tired...) by carefully regulated injections of refined trigger protein? The idea is to get the memory population to spike and exhaust the longevity of the population.
After that the patient could begin to recover.
Hey, I thought I was doing good dredging up information I was exposed to more than 20 years ago. (And at midnight, no less.) :)
I did not know T cells underwent mitosis. I thought they were produced as needed by their progenitor cells in the bone marrow, similarly to red cells.
Admittedly, I did not read tfa, (paywall, LONG out of university.) so I did knot read that it directly targets B cells. The issue of runaway autoimmune reactions is still relavent. Indescriminate destruction of B cells is a very bad thing and would make the patient extremely immune suppressed following the initial "thermonuclear" immune response, as the patient's immune system would effectively be given a lobotomy and would forget every pathogen it had encountered, and would remain that way until new B cells are produced.
This treatment could be adapted for other types of cancer besides this flavor of leukemia, just as long as there is a reasonably reliable target for the t cells to go after.
When b cells are not THE target, then their implication in the immune response would be more in line with what I had said earlier.
Sorry about the histamine bit. A quick google refresher points out that it is used to help white cells navigate capillaries. For some reason I erroneously recalled that it triggered b cell activation.
I am not a cellular biologist, and I don't work with this stuff every day, so naturally I will defer to somebody that is/does.
A killer T cell is an end product cell type. It does not divide. As such introduction of the cells shouldn't cause lasting immunological issues, unless the synthetically activated cells initiate a cascade autoimmune reaction.
(T cells destroy pathogens, but they also pass antigen information on to B cells, which "remember" previous infectious agents, and mass replicate antibodies in the hystamine cycle. This mechanism is how vaccination works. Deactivated virus is introduced, white cells engage, destroy, and then present the debris to B cells, which produce antibodies. When the real virus comes along, the immine system reacts with a flood of antibody production, which greatly inhibits proliferation of the pathogen. In this case, researchers would have to be VERY careful what cellular membrane cues they program their new mutant superhero T cells to go after, or else the body may become sensitized against its own cellular membranes, resulting in runaway autoimmune reactions.)
Assuming that everything goes well, then the modified T cell culture will natually self-terminate like normal T cells do, and then all traces of the manipulation would be gone from the host.
This means that there shouldn't be a need for long term antirejection meds, like with a bone marrow transplant.
It's a mutant turtle. It was only a teenager in the mid 80s. Its almost 30 now, and it lived in the newyork sewers in it's rat-like parent's basement, getting morbidly obeise on stale pizza crusts.
Since its acting career dried up shortly after the first motion picture, I am just trying to be merciful.
Death in the desert is far better for it than the unlife that is comic cons and newyork after dark.
I don't hate the turtle, I only want to ease its suffering!
That is why you put the switch box in the filter box.
You know, one of those ugly metal enclosures with a big rocker switch on it, used to switch which PC your keyboard, mouse, and monitor are hooked to?
You simply leave it stuck in one position, and use the port ends on the back creatively so your expensive AV and HID cables arent hanging out of the mineral oil, and as such, dont wick any up.