[Majorityrights News] Trump will ‘arm Ukraine to the teeth’ if Putin won’t negotiate ceasefire Posted by Guessedworker on Tuesday, 12 November 2024 16:20.
[Majorityrights News] Alex Navalny, born 4th June, 1976; died at Yamalo-Nenets penitentiary 16th February, 2024 Posted by Guessedworker on Friday, 16 February 2024 23:43.
[Majorityrights Central] A couple of exchanges on the nature and meaning of Christianity’s origin Posted by Guessedworker on Tuesday, 25 July 2023 22:19.
[Majorityrights News] Is the Ukrainian counter-offensive for Bakhmut the counter-offensive for Ukraine? Posted by Guessedworker on Thursday, 18 May 2023 18:55.
Posted by DanielS on Thursday, 06 February 2020 06:22.
The civet, a mammal in the mongoose family, was a carrier of another coronavirus — SARS. But it turned out in that instance that bats were the original source of the virus.
New Coronavirus ‘Won’t Be The Last’ Outbreak To Move From Animal To Human
The new strain of coronavirus that has killed hundreds of people in China and caused a travel lockdown of some 56 million people has been classified as a “zoonosis” because of the way it spreads from animals to humans.
Science writer David Quammen says the virus, which the World Health Organization last week declared a global health emergency, is just the latest example of how pathogens that start in animals are migrating to humans with increasing frequency — and with deadly consequences.
“When there’s an animal host, then it becomes much, much more difficult to eradicate or even control an infectious virus,” Quammen says. “This novel coronavirus — whether or not it turns out to be a huge catastrophe, or something we can control — one thing we know is that it won’t be the last.”
Quammen’s 2012 book, Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic, traces the rise of different zoonoses around the world, including AIDS, Ebola and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). He says that one of the first questions that arise with any zoonosis pertains to the animal host: How is it being transmitted?
In the case of the new coronavirus, researchers believe that the virus may have originated with horseshoe bats in China and then could have possibly spread to other animals — which people then ate.
Quammen notes that humans are the common link in all zoonoses: “We humans are so abundant and so disruptive on this planet. ... We’re cutting the tropical forests. We’re building work camps in those forests and villages. We’re eating the wildlife,” he says. “You go into a forest and you shake the trees — literally and figuratively — and viruses fall out.”
Quammen says that the new coronavirus should be taken seriously. But he also warns against panic: “Being educated and understanding it and being ready to respond and support government response is very useful. Panicking and putting on your surgical mask every time you go on a subway ride, an airplane, is not nearly as useful.”
Interview highlights
On wild animal “wet” markets where viruses can mix
When I was in southern China researching [Spillover], only briefly, I got to see some of these markets where all forms of wild animals were on sale. ... By the time I got there, [these sorts of markets] had gone underground ... suppressed after the SARS outbreak. But then [the markets] gradually came back ... allowed to continue again and proliferate when this new virus began.
If you go into a live market, you see cages containing bats stacked upon cages containing porcupines, stacked upon cages containing palm civets, stacked upon cages containing chickens. And hygiene is not great, and the animals are defecating on one another. It’s just a natural mixing-bowl situation for viruses. It’s a very, very dangerous situation. And one of the things that it allows is ... the occurrence of “amplifying hosts” [a species that rapidly replicates copies of the virus and spreads them].
On the theory that palm civets were “amplifier hosts” for the 2003 SARS outbreak
The civet is a type of mammal that belongs to the family of mongooses. But it’s a medium-sized animal, and it is both captured from the wild for food and captive-bred and raised for food, and it was the first big suspect in the SARS outbreak. It was found that some of the people who got sick very early on had eaten butchered civet. And they tested some civets, and they found evidence of the virus. They found antibodies or fragments of DNA or RNA in these civets, suggesting that they had been infected with the virus. And that didn’t prove they were the reservoir host, but it made them the No. 1 suspect, until a couple of Chinese scientists did further work and they established that, in fact, the virus was not living permanently in the civet population in the wild or in captivity. It [had] a different reservoir host. It was living in bats and had passed, presumably, at a market somewhere. It had passed from a bat into one or more civets, and they became the amplifier host. ...
Thousands of civets in captivity were butchered and electrocuted and smothered and drowned in this first, panicked blind reaction in China to the SARS outbreak.
On why bats are often hosts for viruses
Bats are implicated in what seems to be more than their share [of zoonoses]. There are a lot of different species of bats. One-quarter of all mammal species are bats. But there are other things [special] about them — including aspects of their immune system. There have been some discoveries lately that bat immune systems are “downregulated” in a certain way that allows for the metabolic stresses of being a mammal that flies. And the downregulating of the immune system to avoid overreaction to those stresses seems, perhaps, also to create an environment in which viruses are more tolerated in bats than in other mammals.
On how coronaviruses have evolved through different species
One of the reasons SARS could adapt from bat to civet to human is the fact that it is a coronavirus, which is a group of viruses that are very readily adaptable. Experts call that intrinsic evolvability. Their rate of mutation is very high when they copy themselves. Their genome contains a lot of mistakes, and that represents mutations that are sort of the random raw material for Darwinian evolution. So viruses that have high mutation rates are able to evolve quickly and adapt quickly. And coronaviruses ... have that characteristic.
The much-derided and controversial discipline of using DNA to prove one’s race, religion and nationality has been upheld by the Israeli High Court following a legal challenge to its use in the determination of Jewishness. A panel of High Court justices rejected a petition against the Chief Rabbinate and the rabbinical court’s ruling that DNA testing to prove one’s Judaism should be allowed.
In the legal challenge, which according to Haaretz was filed by Yisrael Beitenu’s Avigdor Lieberman and several private petitioners, the judges dismissed their case that the rabbinate acted in a discriminatory manner by demanding DNA tests to prove one’s Judaism.
The case re-opens an ongoing feud over conducting genetic tests to determine who is and isn’t a Jew. With Israel electing to define itself in racial terms by declaring itself to be a “Jewish state”, conception of race as something existing in the blood, crushed civic notions of race and nationality, upon which modern democratic states are established.
Israel’s matrimonial law which is religious, not civil, has also meant that couples are required to prove their Jewishness through DNA testing if their heritage is in doubt. In Israel Jews can marry Jews, but intermarriage with Muslims or Christians is not permitted. This means that when a Jewish couple want to tie the knot, they are required by law to prove their Jewishness to the Rabbinate according to Orthodox tradition, which defines Jewish ancestry as being passed down through the mother.
According to the court’s decision DNA, “testing can only benefit the person being tested, whether he accepts the testing or refuses to undergo the test”. The judges debated the need for compiling a set of written rules around DNA testing, which they claimed would avert disagreements over its use.
During the hearing, the representative of the rabbinical court agreed to bring the matter of setting the rules in writing before the Chief Rabbinical Council.
LONDON, ENGLAND: Anti-Brexit campaigner Steve Bray protesting outside of the Houses of Parliament on January 30, 2020 in London, United Kingdom. At 11.00pm on Friday 31st January the UK and Northern Ireland will exit the European Union 188 weeks after the referendum on June 23rd 2016.
In 2016, Britain voted for Brexit. On Friday—four years, three prime ministers and two general elections later—the country will leave the European Union. Officially stepping out into the world is a major moment for a country that has driven itself mad on the tortuous path to the exit door. And yet, even the buildup to this historic event typified the silliest aspects of the years between the “leave” vote and the actual leaving.
Two quarrels about how Britain would mark the occasion broke out in recent weeks, one about a bell, the other about a coin. First came the fuss about whether Big Ben would ring out to mark the moment of independence. This Brexiteer wish was complicated by the fact that the bell, and the tower that houses it, are undergoing renovations, meaning a single bong would come with a $700,000 price tag. After Parliament refused to fund the move, and an online fundraising campaign failed to fill the gap, there will be no Big Ben bongs. “If Big Ben doesn’t bong, the world will see us as a joke,” lamented Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage.
A second brouhaha broke out over a commemorative 50 pence coin issued to mark the occasion. The coins, which read, “Peace, prosperity and friendship with all nations,” soon drew the ire of disbelieving Remainers. Otherwise serious and self-respecting members of the British establishment said they would refuse to use the coins or would deface any that came into their possession. (The novelist Philip Pullman also complained that the coin “is missing an Oxford comma and should be boycotted by all literate people.”)
Britain’s talent for turning these trivial rows into front-page stories illustrates how much the Brexit debate has become a negative-sum culture war, with Leavers and Remainers each compelled to take a side. Yet these dust-ups also obscure some of the more interesting, and important, divides over what Britain does with its newfound freedom. So far, much of the conversation has been backward looking, focused on whether the country would give effect to the 2016 vote with a viable version of Brexit, or whether that vote should be ignored. As Britain leaves the EU, and finally casts an eye forward, there are as many disputes as ever, with global implications, and the fault lines are more complicated than just Leave vs. Remain.
When Prime Minister Boris Johnson triumphed in last month’s election with a promise to “get Brexit done,” his opponents argued that after the sun rises on February 1, Britain’s future relationship with the EU, and a host of related questions, would remain unresolved. In a narrow sense, that claim is irrefutable. But it also misses the bigger picture.
The case for Brexit was built on possibilities. Among other things, exiting the EU allows Britain to decide for itself what trade relationships it should pursue with the rest of the world, the criteria it should set for its immigration system and how to regulate a host of areas that have been the competence of the EU for decades. These are big, difficult decisions in and of themselves. They aren’t part of a Brexit process that will ever be finished. Britain will not one day declare mission accomplished and no longer give any thought to, for example, trade policy—something that, as Americans will know, is an ongoing consideration in the politics of sovereign countries.
Understand that fact, and the divide between Leave and Remain starts to look less significant. On trade, for example, there is a split among Leavers. An image of buccaneering “Global Britain” striking trade deals with fast-growing economies around the world was a big part of the case pro-Brexit politicians made. There is little enthusiasm for this vision among Leave voters. According to one poll, Leave voters were more likely to support protectionist trade policies than Remainers. In fact, whether someone voted Leave was the single best predictor of a person’s support for barriers to trade. Politicians eager to use Brexit as an opportunity for liberalizing UK trade will have to think carefully about which voters they can rely on.
Posted by DanielS on Thursday, 30 January 2020 02:36.
Coronavirus Updater:
First cases in Finland, India and the Philippines; death toll reaches 170
Moodie David Report: 30 Jan 2020:
Coronavirus Update: First cases in India, Finland, the Philippines; death toll reaches 170
Finland
The coronavirus outbreak has spread to Finland with the first confirmed case. Finnish media Uutiset said that the individual is a Chinese tourist from Wuhan. The 32-year-old woman is being treated in Lapland Central Hospital in Rovaniemi.
Philippines
The first case in the Philippines has been announced by the World Health Organization.
Today, the Department of Health announced the first confirmed case of the 2019 novel #coronavirus in the Philippines. The patient is 38 years old from China.
UAE
The first cases in the Middle East have been confirmed, with the Ministry of Health & Protection in the UAE announcing that a family of four has been infected. The statement added that the general health situation “is not a cause for concern” and that the Ministry advises “all citizens and residents to adhere to the general health guidelines”.
UK
British Airways has suspended flights to and from Mainland China as the coronavirus outbreak worsens. This comes as the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office advised against all travel to Hubei Province and all but essential travel to the rest of Mainland China.
China
China is likely to have a vaccine for the novel coronavirus for public use within three months. That will include a month and a half of development and a similar period of testing, according to Li Lanjuan, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, Global Times reports.
1,459 new cases of coronavirus and 3,248 suspected cases, including one in Tibet, were reported across China yesterday alone as the spread of the virus accelerates. The total number of confirmed infections reached 5,974, with 1,239 patients in critical condition. The death toll has reached 132 while 103 patients have recovered. [Source: Global Times]
International
A scientific race to find a vaccine for the virus is underway, writes The Moodie Davitt Report Senior Research & Commercial Analyst Min Jon Jung. Here is a roundup of key breakthroughs so far.
January 10: Chinese scientists posted a complete genome of the coronavirus.
January 28: Hong Kong University Professor Yuen Kwok-yung was successful in producing a vaccine but testing on animals will take months and clinical trials at least another year.
January 29: Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity in Australia successful in recreating virus outside of China.
The joint global effort may help to shorten the time required to develop a successful vaccine, but the development is both expensive and time-consuming. The vaccine for the SARS virus was developed 20 months after the viral genome was released and the outbreak was contained with public health measures before the vaccine was ready.
Dr Paul Stoffels, Johnson & Johnson’s chief scientific officer, estimated it could take eight to 12 months before his company’s vaccines reach human clinical trials.
Posted by DanielS on Friday, 06 December 2019 05:06.
Yoram Hazony, in Conversation with Ben Shapiro, tries to vilify the benign, eminently valid means to defend the biological European species by means of The DNA Nations Concept: The attack begins at 10:00
Posted by DanielS on Friday, 29 November 2019 18:16.
Negotiating Moral Orders, European Post Modernity and DNA Nations
Daniel Sienkiewicz
In this stream, I will indulge in a literal stream of consciousness in order to cover the platform of European peoples advocacy that I have cultivated over the years, not particularly concerned with order of the material, as it is of a complete enough system that cris-crossing it from various angles as they emerge to my consciousness will invariably flesh out its stable reference points to provide understanding for those who can be reasoned with.
A more formal presentation can wait for another time.
I do not want to undertake a formal presentation or a pretext of rigorously ordered priority of discussion at this point as that will delay the unfolding and imparting of ideas that already have verifiable systemic coherence beneath and important messages thereby, especially for persons concerned for the defense and well being of European peoples.
...
Comments:
1) I’ll start to note some things that I’d forgotten to mention, one of them being Heidegger’s attendance to our “emergent qualities” - as individuals (and as a genetic group, by inference); which is also an anti Cartesian notion, but looked at from this angle not so much a concern for taking us out of Cartesian estrangement by directing us into interaction through Dasein (there being) but rather an emphasis on resisting Cartesian estrangement by holding fast to our inborn trajectory and following its teleological path for us rather than getting drawn into the inauthentic calling from our path by “the they” ...it would be a correction thus, to an over emphasis on social concern to the detriment of our inherited biological nature. I must credit Guessedworker for taking me to task and holding me to proper account to Heidegger’s concern for emergentism.
2) The next thing that I believe that I forgot to mention - and when you forget something in a situation like this, it tends to be something that you take for granted because its so obviously important - is the marketing campaign circa 2008 that was the Alt Right and Alt lite, as a Gottfried/Regnery NPI Spencer loosely formed political perspective/ angle / agenda - Spencer being a useful right wing elitist reactionary to front the re-branding of “Paleoconservatism”, a Paleoconservatism 2.0, to direct not just a big tent but a tent of tents (a tentosphere) of broader based and younger reactionaries against political correctness (Frankfurt School) whose commonality was some kind of anti-social stigma.
The father of Paleoconservatism was Frank Meyer, a Jewish man, originally a Marxist, whose “paleoconservative concept” was “fusionism”, a fusion of ideas that don’t really go together, that is to say enlightenment/modernist objectivism and Judeo/Christianity. Despite the fact that these ideas don’t really go together, it was a tension of conflicting concerns that was familiar to mainstream America from the onset of the United States and was seen as a life raft for those with conservative values. Frank Meyer became the mentor of sorts to President Ronald Reagan, the first prominent paleo-con, who was joined in this ideology by Pat Buchanan, Paul Gottfried, Joe Sobran and Sam Francis.
By the 1990’s this opportunistic controlled opposition that was Paleoconservatism was out maneuvered by the other side of controlled opposition that is the Neoconservates, to make way for Israeli operation clean break to secure the realm around Israel using American military might - to create Israel friendly regimes starting with ousting Saddam Hussein in Iraq. But I digress.
By 2008 when objectivist “invisible hand” economic program by Randian devote and Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan had run the boom bust cycle to the greatest bust (theft) ever with the mortage and securities meltdown, that was when Gottfried, Horowitz et al recognized a dangerous intersectionality with the Cultural Marxism that their tribesman had been promoting through academia: They needed to make sure that European peoples didn’t make proper use of social organizing strategies via properly understood post modern and leftist socially conscientious ideas to organize as a European ethnonational left, to unionize as a bounded discreet people (forming in and out groups, the opposite of the promoted confusion of left/liberalism, and rather to conserve and and hold accountable what is within the “union”) who would then, in holding members to account, look at elites and see who was betraying them by opening their would be union bounds to scabbery (so to speak) and they would see YKW in tandem with right wing sell outs, encouraged to a no account objectivism, socially unconscientious ‘that’s just the way it is-ness’, along with liberals, incentivized in much the same way to take license to betray “union”, conservative interests, on the basis of no account pseudo objectivist, “that’s just the way it isness.”
As YKW had greater hegemony, power and influence than ever with the 2008 melt down/theft, they sought to get European reactionaries to not only identify as right, far right objectivist Cartesian reactionaries as always, but to identify as an Alternative Right, which would specialize in criticizing “THE Left”, and a characterology thereof (a character with unnatural concepts, such as the call for universal equality that it seeks to apply to nature) that is to say, to chase after the red capes of distorted and just out right anti European political correctness as it had been marshaled to this intersection by YKW interests. - Oh, “those social justice warriors” how unrealistic, we don’t want any of that social justice now that the YKW, right wing sell outs and licentious liberals have more unjust and destructive power and influence than ever!
3) Another red cape (straw man misrepresentation of a good, social organization idea for us to chase after antagonistically, against our own organizational, homeostatic interests) that I’d forgotten to mention in this discussion, is false polemic against the concept of social justice and equality with a disingenuous rebut in the form of a misrepresentative concept of “human bio diversity”, misrepresented as a lateral matter of I.Q. (how convenient for elite betrayal, just the way it is) as opposed to human bio diversity being a horizontal matter of qualitative niche evolutionary differences that ought to be respected as ecologically fitting circumstances and systems, accountable as such, and not subject to false comparisons - rather, by contrast, utilizing the concept of commensurate and incommensurate paradigms, niches that are to be respected within a paradigm as integral part of the system, not to be disparaged as unequal by false comparison on an identical functional criteria. The refrain of “incommensurabilty” would also apply between peoples/paradigms in order to show respect for niche evolutionary differences of peoples, avoiding hubris and antagonism of false comparisons.
4) Yin Yang Scorpion
Sorry I fell asleep during the last part of the stream. It was 3:30 am where I am. Very interesting stream.
Reply from Daniel Sienkiewicz
No Problem Yin Yang ) Glad you found it interesting.
5) Another paradoxic rule of modernity’s performance requirement to value the new: “be different so that you can fit in.”
6) I also should have done a better job of answering Citizen Reporter’s request to clarify what is meant by hermeneutics. It is not merely narrative form, but an interactively engaged process of inquiry which allows participants to move back and forth from broad, more imaginative, historical and systemic perspectives - not only to generate enjoyable, useful and meaningful narrative, but also to generate hypotheses which may then be moved by the circulating process of hermeneutics to more rigorous and focused verification as need be. ..but as a process of inquiry, it allows one to re engage dasein from the Cartesian estrangement.
TheWesternWall.jpg?r=1580366359)
The West Wall at night (fragment) Wayne Mclean (jgritz) CC
A Union Jack flag flutters in front of Big Ben as workers inspect one of its clocks, in London on Sept 11. (Reuters photo)
The civet, a mammal in the mongoose family, was a carrier of another coronavirus — SARS. But it turned out in that instance that bats were the original source of the virus.
