The article is submitted by "anonymous reader" claiming to be the technology manager for the Justice Party, yet links to a web site that identifies the National Technology Manager by name.
In fact, this very problem is why there is a US government program that lets certain emergency personnel/offices have priority over normal telephone traffic.
This is also why we don't normally see phone numbers in the 710 area code.
It is blatantly obvious that if only we had $Politically_Impossible_Ineffective_Action_Advocated_for_Unrelated_Reasons, this tragedy would have been avoided.
Those who are blaming $Different_Reason_For_Different_Unrelated_Reasons, are just cynically using the current crisis for their own political gain!
It sounds like quite a number of the people answering are quite happy to see those they like go extinct in order to revel in the anticipation of the extinction of those they don't like.
*shrug* To steal the title of Dan Ariely's book: Predictably Irrational.
It's a perverse modification of the judgement of Solomon with the mother saying "That's fine, as long as I can be sure her half of the child is truly dead."
Yes, Celera was able to do more with less. But that was due to the technology advancing during the 8 years the public project had already been running. Venter was able to use the experience gained from that time.
Also, Venter was using a shotgun approach that hadn't been fully vetted at the time on genomes that large. It turned out it worked well, but for this first time, you still needed the public project data to check it.
This is much like when Eckert and Mauchly were building the Eniac. Partway thru building it, they had learned enough that they would have done it differently. But, you have to get started somewhere and start building to learn. For the genome project, the public project was that start.
This is a little like criticizing someone in the 1920s for using a Model T rather than a modern hybrid like a Prius. The one was part of the development that led to the modern method.
"expert panels have concluded that there is no need for intrusive monitoring of microbiologists engaged in unclassified research."
For good reason.
First, the knowledge is more widespread.
We have large numbers of researchers/lab workers/hospital lab techs that could do the neccesary techniques for much of biological work.
We have to have them in large numbers to keep us safer from the NATURAL bioweapons we face every day.
Such well known killers as malaria, bacterial pneumonia, a whole range of virii, the various strains of antibiotic resistant bacteria we keep a running treadmill race going with, etc, etc.
Putting all of these lab/hospital workers (Yes, they are working with pathogens. Why else do you think they're doing culturing of that throat swab your doctor took?) under a magnifying glass is needless, discouraging to those who might enter the field, and actively disruptive to trying to fight disease.
Second, nature completely outclasses us.
Someone in a lab can do one experiment every few days/weeks, maybe. Mother nature can and does do billions to trillions of experiments all in parallel.
The bioweapon arms race has been going on in nature for billions of years (yes, billions. Single cell life has been around that long and competing. Multicelled life and armor/teeth is a latecomer at 600 million or so). Every nasty trick you're likely to think of to put into your superbug has been tried multiple times naturally.
The metallo-beta-lactamases that are the hot new nasty in antibiotic resistance? They aren't new. They were old genetic material that were present in a minority of bacteria, and then spread due to it being an advantage for some bacteria in some cases. None of the antibiotic resistance we see is "new". It's all relics in the bacterial genomes that have become useful again. Why? Because Mom Nature already tried those tricks.
And,it's the same for virii or any other one you can think of.
"That's what I meant by "the effect is so sudden," yes."
Yeah, I figured you knew with your bio background. Just wasn't as clear to the general reader that there are good reasons for using cocaine over other less regulated substances.
I ran into this one here on Slashdot before when there was a lot of laughter over a study giving cocaine to bees and watching their dance behavior.
It sounds kinda silly, but for what they were doing, it was a pretty direct route to what they wanted which was modulating some of the dopamine related pathways, and using the directly observable dance behavior of the bees to gauge the results without have to do all kinds of complicated chemical monitoring.
It's more than just the political reasons. Cocaine is a pretty direct and uncomplicated way to manipulate a dopamine pathway like the reward system. Heroin and alcohol have more complex modes of action to hit the reward system. When you're still trying to work out the pathway and its dynamics you want to avoid complicating effects.
I was asked to help out someone at the university I work at deal with a large number of drives both working and nonworking that were being trashed or sent to surplus. (Old outdated ones mostly. But, the computer I'm writing this on is cobbled together from parts from our surplus, so they do get reused when possible.)
Was rather amazed at the prices charged by Garner. $9K should have a lot more pyrotechnics. At least like a Michael Bay movie, not just a quiet humming and no pieces flying
In the end, we opted for proper use of DBAN on the working ones and taking the nonworking ones down to my shop and driving a heavy punch through the platters with an arbor press. (Note to our department safety droid who might be reading this: Safety glasses were used.:)
Problem solved cheaply, and great stress relief for the person. His eyes lit up at the good old fashioned blue collar destructiveness of it.
Slashdot Mirror
"proper respect for all living things"
How many brussel sprouts have you callously murdered and stolen the nutrients from to selfishly keep your self alive to post things on slashdot?
(Every good idea can be taken to a silly extent.)
You'd prefer "Visigothise"?
"Nontoxic radioactive Listeria is a highly effective therapy against metastatic pancreatic cancer"
So, we're saying that we wasted lots of tumor cells via something nontoxic?
Is that like saying nontoxic botox because we only let it get to the tissues we wanted paralyzed?
"why is this on slashdot ???"
To annoy loser anonymous cowards.
That's pretty much where I'm at. Everyone alive at the end of the day.
And, it's not just that.
There are still a lot of things to find out. Who knows. He may decide to talk.
Even if he isn't cooperating or is lying, that will be easier than if he's dead as you can check and correlate the things he says.
The article is submitted by "anonymous reader" claiming to be the technology manager for the Justice Party, yet links to a web site that identifies the National Technology Manager by name.
Just one of those little daily oddities I notice.
"Max Planck. Get him for your party. That would be one hell of a party."
Party Motto: Be discrete, not continuous!
"You and yours must go away. Me and mine can stay."
Fixed that for you so it reflects what many feel emotionally.
In fact, this very problem is why there is a US government program that lets certain emergency personnel/offices have priority over normal telephone traffic.
This is also why we don't normally see phone numbers in the 710 area code.
See: http://gets.ncs.gov/program_info.html for an overview.
(Wow, I feel like I'm back on comp.dcom.telecom)
It is blatantly obvious that if only we had $Politically_Impossible_Ineffective_Action_Advocated_for_Unrelated_Reasons, this tragedy would have been avoided.
Those who are blaming $Different_Reason_For_Different_Unrelated_Reasons, are just cynically using the current crisis for their own political gain!
Or, he could be a witness who saw something/knows something that puts him at risk and the guard is for protection.
So far this is all rumors and speculation. It's the old saying "Those who know aren't talking, and those who are talking don't know."
The Feds are saying he's not yet a suspect.
This is too early and confused for any conclusions to be drawn.
Remember how Richard Jewel got falsely identified by the press as a suspect in the Olympic bombing.
Never trust anyone with a user-id under a hundred thousand, either.
"It's 11, not 7"
Must be those senior moments that started about age 12.
"Dem dirty communist hippi anarchs?"
Or is that "7 long haired friends of Jesus in a chartreuse microbus"?
Remember: Never trust anyone with a user-id over a hundred thousand.
It sounds like quite a number of the people answering are quite happy to see those they like go extinct in order to revel in the anticipation of the extinction of those they don't like.
*shrug* To steal the title of Dan Ariely's book: Predictably Irrational.
It's a perverse modification of the judgement of Solomon with the mother saying "That's fine, as long as I can be sure her half of the child is truly dead."
Purple or green?
Yes, Celera was able to do more with less. But that was due to the technology advancing during the 8 years the public project had already been running. Venter was able to use the experience gained from that time.
Also, Venter was using a shotgun approach that hadn't been fully vetted at the time on genomes that large. It turned out it worked well, but for this first time, you still needed the public project data to check it.
This is much like when Eckert and Mauchly were building the Eniac. Partway thru building it, they had learned enough that they would have done it differently. But, you have to get started somewhere and start building to learn. For the genome project, the public project was that start.
This is a little like criticizing someone in the 1920s for using a Model T rather than a modern hybrid like a Prius. The one was part of the development that led to the modern method.
Sig Hansen has to replace the Northwestern with an Arleigh Burke class destroyer.
"She turned me into a newt!"
"....I got better"
"expert panels have concluded that there is no need for intrusive monitoring of microbiologists engaged in unclassified research."
For good reason.
First, the knowledge is more widespread.
We have large numbers of researchers/lab workers/hospital lab techs that could do the neccesary techniques for much of biological work.
We have to have them in large numbers to keep us safer from the NATURAL bioweapons we face every day.
Such well known killers as malaria, bacterial pneumonia, a whole range of virii, the various strains of antibiotic resistant bacteria we keep a running treadmill race going with, etc, etc.
Putting all of these lab/hospital workers (Yes, they are working with pathogens. Why else do you think they're doing culturing of that throat swab your doctor took?) under a magnifying glass is needless, discouraging to those who might enter the field, and actively disruptive to trying to fight disease.
Second, nature completely outclasses us.
Someone in a lab can do one experiment every few days/weeks, maybe. Mother nature can and does do billions to trillions of experiments all in parallel.
The bioweapon arms race has been going on in nature for billions of years (yes, billions. Single cell life has been around that long and competing. Multicelled life and armor/teeth is a latecomer at 600 million or so). Every nasty trick you're likely to think of to put into your superbug has been tried multiple times naturally.
The metallo-beta-lactamases that are the hot new nasty in antibiotic resistance? They aren't new. They were old genetic material that were present in a minority of bacteria, and then spread due to it being an advantage for some bacteria in some cases. None of the antibiotic resistance we see is "new". It's all relics in the bacterial genomes that have become useful again. Why? Because Mom Nature already tried those tricks.
And,it's the same for virii or any other one you can think of.
"That's what I meant by "the effect is so sudden," yes."
Yeah, I figured you knew with your bio background. Just wasn't as clear to the general reader that there are good reasons for using cocaine over other less regulated substances.
I ran into this one here on Slashdot before when there was a lot of laughter over a study giving cocaine to bees and watching their dance behavior.
It sounds kinda silly, but for what they were doing, it was a pretty direct route to what they wanted which was modulating some of the dopamine related pathways, and using the directly observable dance behavior of the bees to gauge the results without have to do all kinds of complicated chemical monitoring.
It's more than just the political reasons. Cocaine is a pretty direct and uncomplicated way to manipulate a dopamine pathway like the reward system.
Heroin and alcohol have more complex modes of action to hit the reward system. When you're still trying to work out the pathway and its dynamics you want to avoid complicating effects.
It's sort of the lab rat of addictions to study.
I was asked to help out someone at the university I work at deal with a large number of drives both working and nonworking that were being trashed or sent to surplus. (Old outdated ones mostly. But, the computer I'm writing this on is cobbled together from parts from our surplus, so they do get reused when possible.)
Was rather amazed at the prices charged by Garner. $9K should have a lot more pyrotechnics. At least like a Michael Bay movie, not just a quiet humming and no pieces flying
In the end, we opted for proper use of DBAN on the working ones and taking the nonworking ones down to my shop and driving a heavy punch through the platters with an arbor press. (Note to our department safety droid who might be reading this: Safety glasses were used. :)
Problem solved cheaply, and great stress relief for the person. His eyes lit up at the good old fashioned blue collar destructiveness of it.
"Humans don't "own" their own genes"
Can we repossess them from Soulskill and Cowboy Neal? :)