#and scientist are not immune to this either

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Robert Tracinski for The UnPopulist:

The Covid-19 pandemic has produced a startling paradox. In response to the outbreak of a deadly disease, scientists developed an effective vaccine in record time. It is estimated to have saved three million lives in the U.S.—many more than the 1.2 million lives Covid claimed—and tens of millions of lives globally. Yet the immediate result is that resistance to vaccines increased. Those who oppose vaccines progressed rapidly from the fringe to the mainstream, and now, President Trump has appointed prominent vaccine skeptics to run the nation���s top health agencies: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at Health and Human Services and Dave Weldon at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. How did we arrive at such a perverse result? Why are people turning against a lifesaving technology precisely at the moment when it has demonstrated its value?

A Pandemic Interrupted

The effectiveness of the vaccine is well supported by facts and evidence. For instance, a 2022 study in the New England Journal of Medicine (see a summary here) found that Covid vaccines were “52.2% effective at preventing infection and 66.8% effective at preventing hospitalization.” In other words, if you were vaccinated, you were half as likely to get the disease, and if you did get it, you were a third as likely to suffer a serious case. The effectiveness of the vaccine fades over time—but then again, so does the natural immunity conferred by getting full-blown Covid.

You can see the result in this chart of Covid death rates for the vaccinated versus the unvaccinated. The differential has narrowed in recent years as the pandemic recedes and far fewer people are getting Covid in the first place. But notice the giant spike in January of 2022, when the unvaccinated were dying at a rate 10 times as high as the vaccinated. That is how we know this was a successful vaccine, and that’s when a lot of lives were saved. A flurry of bad arguments has attempted to bury these facts in the public mind. Consider the complaint that the Covid vaccines are not “real” vaccines because they don’t provide “sterilizing immunity”—that is, they don’t completely prevent transmission of the disease. But this is based on ignorance about how “real” vaccines work. For example, Jonas Salk’s famous polio vaccine didn’t provide sterilizing immunity, either. Yet it kept the polio virus from attacking the nervous system, preventing paralysis and death.

But this issue is a red herring, because other vaccines such as the HPV vaccine do provide sterilizing immunity—and more than that, a 2020 study showed that the HPV vaccine’s adoption resulted in a 90% decrease in cervical cancer. Yet this vaccine was also targeted by a misinformation campaign. It briefly became an issue in the 2012 Republican primaries, when anti-vaccine talking points were promoted by Sarah Palin and others in the populist faction of the party that has since become dominant. Other objections, such as complaints about inconsistent or inaccurate early CDC recommendations about, for example, masking, are also red herrings—because the people who tout these arguments then tend to credulously accept the assertions of vaccine skeptics who have been wrong far, far more often than the experts. The success of the Covid vaccine can be seen in the degree to which we no longer worry about the disease. That in itself is not too remarkable. All pandemics eventually fade. What was really different this time is that the Covid vaccine cut the progress of the disease short. Before Covid, the fastest time for developing and deploying a vaccine was four years. At that pace, we would just have gotten our first Covid shots in 2024. But the new vaccines were deployed in less than a year, before the end of 2020.

[...]

Industrial Amnesia

This forgotten history suggests one of the main drivers of the current vaccine paradox. People turned against vaccines after Covid simply because the pandemic required them to think about vaccines, which they haven’t done for a long time. And because they haven’t done it for such a long time, they have forgotten—or never learned in the first place—why vaccines existed, what problem they solved. You may have heard the famous story about church bells ringing in 1953 when the successful test of the polio vaccine was announced. This is because most people had actually witnessed the horrible effects of the disease—it peaked in the U.S. in 1952—and many still remembered an era when children routinely died from infectious diseases.

This UnPopulist column nails it on why the rise of anti-vaxxer extremism has spread.

[shxdesofchaos]

"Ah. I believe only Deity and god have similar definitions, elemental is usually something different." Umbra starts off with, "Though stating you do not have any particular preference would have worked as an answer as well if you truly don't."

The ebony hedgehog paused as he heard the rest of it, an ear twitching. Right, if he didn't know about Chaos Drives, he likely didn't know about Gerald either. He took a slower, deeper breath as this would be a bit more of a sound bite than he normally was.

"...I was created, not born. G.U.N... the Guardian Units of Nations which are a military group... funded the project which led to my creation and also those of the chaos drives, which were made in conjunction with myself as they were a part of the project's process. Essentially, I'm an artificially created lifeform. An experiment."

"I'm considered the solution for those of whom the answer to their prayer is 'no'. I was created by Gerald to be the cure for all diseases and illnesses by making sure upon my creation that I was immune to them." Umbra began to explain the core idea of the project that had created him in incredibly rudimentary, bare bones skeletal details so that the base idea of what was meant to be accomplished would be understood.

"They utilized alien DNA... that which causes things like these wings that I have already explained regarding the Black Arms, and then Mobian hedgehog DNA in order to give me a form that resembles a mural on Angel Island, a floating island that is where the Echidnas lived and the Master Emerald is kept. As well as in order to make sure that I was stable for the level of raw chaos energy they put in my system through those drives, which enables me to utilize Chaos Energy the way I do." Umbra stated.

His voice tone is detached as he explained it, as it's not the first time that he's talked about it. He'd done so on the ARK when gathering the emeralds back then for the Eclipse Cannon. It's not difficult to talk about, at least, not in the level of detail that he is purposefully leaving out since Mephiles had not asked for an in-depth explanation. Even if there are a great many implications of just how Gerald and the other scientists who would have been helping the professor would have made sure that Shadow was actually immune to all diseases and illnesses. Not that he had ever gotten to the part where he was used as a cure. The ARK raid had seen to that.

A preferred name for his kind? The knee-jerk response would have been that Mephiles was fond of them being called gods, as the implications that had in almost any language were the same. And it was fairly accurate as far as he was concerned.

Neither did he think it very important, but…

“It matters not. As you would say, at the end of the day, I am what I am, and words do not change that. Deity, god, elemental — they all, more or less, mean the same thing.”

 He stared momentarily at the other. Mephiles couldn’t help himself.

“You keep talking about… things and people, talking about them as though they are common knowledge. Gerald was… your creator?” A pause; he noted mentally that he might be asking about something that the other may not want to talk about, but if that were the case, then why did he keep mentioning bits of it?

“I’m afraid I am a little lost.”

[porto-rosso]

there is so much aggressive misinfo abt toxic shock syndrome out there its a nightmare

[jaeger-tech]

Pacific Rim Dashboard Simulator

🙇‍♀️ alphamycherno Follow

i don't know about this "let's build a wall" thing like. where's the sexiness? the vibes? what's the point of war if we don't even have hot people in big fuckass robots anymore

🎴 coyote-t Follow

there are so many legitimate, important reasons to protest the wall of life, but whatever it takes i guess. sure. it's not fuckable enough

5,345 notes

🐉 exxxtraterrestrial Follow

happy kaiju blue monday!!

#happy kaiju blue monday

137,294 notes

🦅 ppdc-confessions

Anonymous asked:

I'm a janitor at the HK shatterdome and certain two german scientists should either fuck or finally kill each other at this point, I don't care. They're always in the lab no matter the time of day so I can't avoid them and so they try to get me (the janitor) to choose sides in their domestics!! I refuse to step in that lab again and involve myself in whatever the fuck they've got going on. They'll just have to clean that shit themselves

#this is the third confession about these scientists this week are you guys okay

306 notes

🍱 scissure

are we forgetting that PPDC is literally military like you people are not immune to propaganda

☠ buena-guy Follow

You are right. The kaiju are here to bring us to justice, there's no sense in fighting them. If you also feel like this, you can find out more on my blog ❤

🍱 scissure

SILENCE, CULTIST

870 notes

💃 shatterdo-me Follow

what if we kissed in the drift 🥺👉👈 and we were both girls 😳

#ok but for real what do you mean i have to go get into the MILITARY to become a JAEGER PILOT if i want to find my SOULMATE this is so fucked up #release the tech #for the gays

38,563 notes

[reasonsforhope]

"People living with diabetes might have a new hope. Scientists have tested a new drug therapy in diabetic mice, and found that it boosted insulin-producing cells by 700% over three months, effectively reversing their disease.

Beta cells in the pancreas have the important job of producing insulin in response to blood sugar levels, but a hallmark of diabetes is that these cells are either destroyed or can’t produce enough insulin. The most common treatment is regular injections of insulin to manage blood sugar levels.

But a recent avenue of research has involved restoring the function of these beta cells. In some cases that’s started with stem cells being coaxed into new beta cells, which are then transplanted into patients with diabetes. Researchers behind this kind of work have described it as a “functional diabetes cure.”

Now, scientists at Mount Sinai and City of Hope have demonstrated a new breakthrough. Previous studies have mostly involved growing new beta cells in a lab dish, then transplanting them into mice or a small device in humans. But this new study has been able to grow the insulin-producing cells right there in the body, in a matter of months.

The therapy involved a combination of two drugs: one is harmine, a natural molecule found in certain plants, which works to inhibit an enzyme called DYRK1A found in beta cells. The second is a GLP1 receptor agonist. The latter is a class of diabetes drug that includes Ozempic, which is gaining attention lately for its side effect of weight loss.

The researchers tested the therapy in mouse models of type 1 and 2 diabetes. First they implanted a small amount of human beta cells into the mice, then treated them with harmine and GLP1 receptor agonists. Sure enough, the beta cells increased in number by 700% within three months of the treatment. The signs of the disease quickly reversed, and stayed that way even a month after stopping the treatment.

“This is the first time scientists have developed a drug treatment that is proven to increase adult human beta cell numbers in vivo,” said Dr. Adolfo Garcia-Ocaña, corresponding author of the study. “This research brings hope for the use of future regenerative therapies to potentially treat the hundreds of millions of people with diabetes.”

The results are intriguing, but of course being an animal study means there’s still much more work to be done before it could find clinical use. So far, harmine alone has recently undergone a phase 1 clinical trial in humans to test its safety and tolerability, while other DYRK1A inhibitors are planned for trials in humans next year.

Perhaps most importantly, the team will soon experiment with combining beta-cell-regenerating drugs with others that modulate the immune system. Ideally this should help overcome a major hurdle: the immune system will continue attacking new beta cells as they’re produced.

The research was published in the journal Science Translational Medicine."

-via New Atlas, July 14, 2024

[improbable-outset]

I hath a steamy scientist Miguel suggestion

Imagine he’s working on an aphrodisiac and is being as careful as he possibly can be. However he didn’t consider how his spider biology makes him immune in certain doses. So he keeps the cap on the bottle off for just a few moments. Enough for you to walk in and immediately get a whiff.

But you don’t notice at first and take it as some horniness, however the drug comes in waves. And as Miguel goes in to hug you. You can help but hump him. The rest you decide :3

I love this idea omg- I know I posted saying I was gonna post this on Friday but I got too impatient lol

📄 𝐒𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐮𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐭

Miguel O’Hara x Fem!Reader

𝐀𝐎3 | 𝐌𝐲 𝐖𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐭𝐬 | 𝐒𝐩𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐞 𝐌𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

𝐒𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐇𝐮𝐬𝐛𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐌𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1.6k

𝐓𝐖 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐂𝐖: Wife!Reader, Aphrodisiac influences, dry humping, innuendos. Reader just being extra horny lmao

𝐀/𝐍: You know, in my two and a half years of writing smut, I’ve only written a dry humping fic once (forest sex lmao a clusterfuck bc I stepped out of my comfort zone for that one) so it’s not the best 😭 but I guess practice makes progress

𝐒𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: It’s a routine for you to come into Miguel’s lab every once in a while, but this time you feel a strong sense of arousal out of nowhere

You could see him through the big glass window that offered a wide view of his lab’s interior. He had his back facing you, perched on the swivel chair, but you noticed him tinkering with some test tubes on the bench in front of him.

Nothing new; he would always be working on something whenever you came here. He still hadn’t noticed you were just a few feet away from him, too engrossed in whatever it was he was working on.

You stepped towards the doors, clutching the paper bag in your hand with food you were planning to share with him. The lab doors opened with a hydraulic hiss, finally catching Miguel’s attention.

He craned his neck towards your direction. He held a hard gaze, obviously annoyed with whoever just barged into his lab, but that immediately morphed into a tender smile once he saw it was you.

As you stepped further into his lab, the sterile smell got stronger— a scent you were all too familiar with. But this time there was another faint underlying scent that you couldn’t fully capture.

It tingled your senses but you brushed it off as just another compound he was probably synthesising. Again, nothing new.

“Hey you…” he said, his voice rich like honey.

He peeled off his latex gloves and stood up from his chair abruptly in jubilant, the swivel chair squeaked from the sudden absence of his weight.

Your lips tugged up in a shy smile. “Hey there stranger,”

He had his lab coat on that shrouded the digital spider suit underneath. A testament of his dual life as a superhero and a scientist.

You’ve always seen him like this whenever you would visit him on the clock, but for some reason as he stepped closer towards you with long strides, you felt your heart rate increase and a sudden heat rushing to your core.

“Sorry about the mess, I didn’t expect you to come so early,” he finished his sentence by dumping the gloves in a nearby bin.

Your senses were tingling more prominently now and the new scent you smelt earlier was getting more apparent. There was a sudden alluring shift in the air and you couldn’t tell if it was the smell that was getting to your head or your husband's sudden accelerated sex appeal. Either way you could feel your mind slowly turn into mush.

“Are those for me?” Miguel asked, pointing to the bag. His question quickly forced you back into the present, away from your chain of thoughts.

You nodded quickly, too afraid to open your mouth. Instead you thrust your hand out with the bag for him to take.

He took the bag from you and peeked inside. “Tres leches cake?”

You could feel your heart almost leap out of your chest the way his face lit up. A sight you would forever burn into your psyche. He placed the bag down on the nearest bench and cupped your cheeks.

The coldness of the platinum from the wedding band brushed against your flushed skin as he held your face in his hands. His touches felt like fire to you, making you jolt ever so slightly.

“You're really spoiling me here, mi alma. Really helping me forget about how terrible today was going,” he uttered, slowly leaning his face closer to yours.

His words would’ve tugged your heartstrings but right now, you couldn’t fully focus on what he was saying. The tingling feeling was too strong for you to ignore now, and his gaze he had on you wasn’t helping either.

He kissed your lips, soft and tender, yet you felt like you were going to combust. Those few seconds his lips were on yours felt like a lifetime before he pulled away, but his broad arms now enveloped around your waist, keeping you in his warmth.

The close proximity between the two of you was making you dizzy. You were hyper aware of how his body was pressed against yours, and you could almost feel your clit brush over his crotch.

If you were to grind your hips right now, you could probably rub the sensitive bud just right.

You really didn’t want to ruin a sweet moment. He was just showing his appreciation to you but you couldn’t help yourself from rolling your hips against his crotch just once.

You weren’t surprised when you got no response. He probably just saw it as a mishap. Reluctantly, you did it again, a little rougher this time.

It definitely didn’t go unnoticed by him now because you heard a stifled groan against your neck. He pulled his face away just enough so you could see him.

“Mig…” you whispered. His eyes were searching yours, trying to figure out what was going through your head. If only he knew.

There were several reasons why this wasn’t the best time to be doing this, in his workplace more specifically, but your mind was too hazy to even come up with one.

Your senses were thrown out the window and you started to grind against his lower half, desperate for some sort of friction.

“Easy…I’m-” Miguel's words were cut off when you felt a sudden jab between his legs. He was getting aroused just as you were. You angled yourself so you had better access to his hips, with your arms wrapped around his neck. His hardened dick gave the perfect pressure you needed.

“So, is this what you wanted? You missed me this much, hm?” The words escaped in a breathy tone, and you could see his fangs emerging from his canine as he opened his mouth to talk. You could sense the underlying teasing in his voice that had your wetness pool your panties.

You didn’t know where this sudden urge came from. You were actually fully intending on spending this time sharing the cake you made. But the euphoria was coming in strong waves and you couldn’t resist anymore.

Your clit was starting to throb as you felt his dick grind against your clothed cunt. Even if he only had a digital suit on that could easily disappear with a few taps of his watch, it still felt painfully restricted.

Your walls were clutching onto nothing, desperate to feel him inside you and reach every crevice.

You didn’t expect him to start grinding his hips onto you too. You had to bite back your desperate moan from the sudden shift in dynamics. The way he was rubbing on you made your panties press onto your slick folds as more of your wetness was spilling out of your cunt.

Your arms reached to his waist to pull his hips further against yours, a desperate attempt to get more friction out of him. Your knees were about to give in and you could only just about hold yourself up. A staggered moan was heard from him before he halted suddenly.

“The window.” He managed to spatter out. Your line of vision quickly turned to where he was looking.

The window, the first thing you would see before you would come into the lab. All the moisture dried up from your mouth and it was not just from your breathless moans.

There was a momentary pause in your arousal that was quickly replaced with frustration. You were so caught up in trying to chase your high, you weren’t focusing on your surroundings.

Any Spider Person could walk past here and catch you both. The last thing you wanted was your husband, a leader that had so many people relying on him, to be caught red handed in a predicament from something you initiated.

He withdrew himself away from you, taking all the warmth with him to pull up the sleeve of his lab coat. It was an easy fix, all he had to do was tap on his watch, turning the glass opaque and giving the privacy you both needed.

Just when he was about to pull you in again, he froze. Something else was on his mind. He turned his face to his bench where he was working before you came in. You frowned from his lack of attention.

“What now?” You huffed, your torment evident in your voice. Was he going to go back to work? Did he not want you here anymore? His sudden dismissal made you feel ill with unease.

“Shock, the aphrodisiac was uncapped.” He said as he swiftly moved to the bench. You blinked, trying to process if you heard him right.

“What?”

“The aphrodisiac, it was an oversight. Explains why you were acting so…needy just now,” he placed the cap back onto the vial, the scent from earlier slowly fading away. You cocked your brow inquisitively.

“Why are you messing around with an aphrodisiac in the first place?” You didn’t think he would need a sex enhancing substance as a geneticist.

Even after he secured the cap back onto the aphrodisiac, your clit was still throbbing and you were still desperate for some sort of release.

“It’s not what it looks like. I was working on an experimental chemical compound for a project. I guess I underestimated how strong the reaction could get,” he said sheepishly, turning back to face you again.

“My God, Miguel…” you sighed. It was all making sense now. You wouldn’t be feeling this turned on without some sort of stimuli.

“But we don’t have to stop. I could pause my work for a little longer for some ‘us-time’” he said before lifting you and placing you on a clearer bench. A smirk crept on his lips and you could see the lust swirling in his eyes.

Despite the air being charged along with your flared libido, you still didn’t forget the main reason you came in here.

“What about the cake?” You gestured to the bag that was still sitting on the other end of the bench.

“The cake can wait, we might as well finish what you started without any unintended side effects,” he ended his sentence with a tap on his watch, disengaging his suit.

Precum was already leaking from the tip…

Eager and pent up.

I hope I did you justice here lol. A wise women (one of my fave fic writers) once said, your clit throbbing is your second heartbeat ;)

𝐓𝐚𝐠𝐬: @mybvalentine @yougavemeyourheartyouknow @monarchberrysblog @lazyjellyfish300 @miguelbaby @safixiovi @midnight-the-shadow-wolf @rosegnome @ghost-lantern @famouscattale @maomaimao @ultravioletrayz

𝐒𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐇𝐮𝐬𝐛𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐓𝐚𝐠𝐬: @club-danger-zone @lauraolar14 @beckberin-xo

Made it this far? Help families in 🍉 here!! (Might as well use my platform here for something good)

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Hello! First of all, thank you for the wonderful content! It's a real joy, and an enrichment, food for both the brain and the heart! I was wondering if through your treasures, you could find some writing notes/words/concepts/vocabulary relating to genetic engineering? Like...creating a virus, and a vaccine for it, modifying the virus so it has certain specific effects.... Thank you in advance!

Writing Notes: Virus & Vaccine

References How Viruses Work; Replication Cycle; Mutation, Variants, Strains, Genetically Engineering Viruses; Writing Tips; Creating your Fictional Virus & Vaccine

Virus - an infectious microbe consisting of a segment of nucleic acid (either DNA or RNA) surrounded by a protein coat.

It is a tiny lifeform that is a collection of genes inside a protective shell. Viruses can invade body cells where they multiply, causing illnesses.

It cannot replicate alone; instead, it must infect cells and use components of the host cell to make copies of itself. Often, a virus ends up killing the host cell in the process, causing damage to the host organism.

Well-known examples of viruses causing human disease include AIDS, COVID-19, measles and smallpox. Examples of viruses:

Viruses are even smaller than bacteria and can invade living cells—including bacteria. They may interfere with the host genes, and when they move from host to host, they may take host genes with them.

Bacteriophages (also known as phages)—viruses that infect and kill bacteria.

Size differential between virus and bacterium

Viruses are measured in nanometers (nm).

They lack the cellular structure of bacteria, being just particles of protein and genetic material.

How Viruses Work

Viruses use an organism’s cells to survive and reproduce.

They travel from one organism to another.

Viruses can make themselves into a particle called a virion.

This allows the virus to survive temporarily outside of a host organism. When it enters the host, it attaches to a cell. A virus then takes over the cell’s reproductive mechanisms for its own use and creates more virions.

The virions destroy the cell as they burst out of it to infect more cells.

Viral shedding - when an infected person releases the virus into the environment by coughing, speaking, touching a surface, or shedding skin.

Viruses also can be shed through blood, feces, or bodily fluids.

Virus Replication Cycle

While the replication cycle of viruses can vary from virus to virus, there is a general pattern that can be described, consisting of 5 steps:

Attachment – the virion attaches to the correct host cell.

Penetration or Viral Entry – the virus or viral nucleic acid gains entrance into the cell.

Synthesis – the viral proteins and nucleic acid copies are manufactured by the cells’ machinery.

Assembly – viruses are produced from the viral components.

Release – newly formed virions are released from the cell.

Mutations, Variants, and Strains

Not all mutations cause variants and strains. Below are definitions that explain how mutations, variants, and strains differ.

Mutation - errors in the replication of the virus’s genetic code; can be beneficial to the virus, deleterious to the virus, or neutral

Variants - viruses with these mutations are called variants; the Delta and Omicron variants are examples of coronavirus mutations that cause different symptoms from the original infection

Strains - variants that have different physical properties are called strains; these strains may have different behaviors or mechanisms for infection or reproduction

Genetically Engineering Viruses

Using reverse genetics, the sequence of a viral genome can be identified, including that of its different strains and variants.

This enables scientists to identify sequences of the virus that enable it to bind to a receptor, as well as those regions that cause it to be so virulent.

Vaccine - a special preparation of substances that stimulate an immune response, used for inoculation

Vaccines & Fighting Viruses with Viruses

Common pathogenic viruses can be genetically modified to make them less pathogenic, such that their virulent properties are diminished but can still be recognized by the immune system to produce a robust immune response against. They are described as live attenuated.

This is the basis of many successful vaccines and is a better alternative than traditional vaccine development which typically includes heat-mediated disabling of viruses that tend to be poorer in terms of immunogenicity.

Viruses can also be genetically modified to ‘fight viruses’ by boosting immune cells to make more effective antibodies, especially where vaccines fail. Where vaccines fail, it is often due to the impaired antibody production by B-cells, even though antibodies can be raised against such viruses – including HIV, EBV, RSV & cold-viruses.

Related Articles: Modified virus used to kill cancer cells ⚜ Genetic Engineering ⚜ Engineering Bacterial Viruses ⚜ Benefits of Viruses

A Few Writing Tips

As more writers look to incorporate infectious diseases into their work, there are quite a few things writers should keep in mind:

Don’t anthropomorphize. Really easy to do, but scientifically wrong. Viruses don’t want to kill you; bacteria don’t want to infect you; parasites don’t want to make your blood curdle. None of these things are big enough to be sentient to want to do anything. They just do it (or don’t do it).

Personal protective equipment. This includes wearing gloves, lab coats, safety glasses, and tying your hair back if it’s long. It is the same as Edna Mode’s “no capes.” Flowing hair looks cool all the way to the explosive ball of flames that engulfs someone’s head.

Viruses are small. You can’t see viruses down a normal microscope—they need a special microscope called an electron microscope. These are highly specialized and take a long time to make the preparations to be able to see the virus. Normally viruses are detected by inference—measuring part of them using an assay that can amplify tiny amounts of material, for example PCR.

Viruses don’t really cause zombie apocalypses. 

Vaccines work. But they take time. The best vaccine in the world will still only prevent infections two weeks after it is given. Drugs are quicker, but still take some time. But the good news is an infection is not going to kill you (or turn you into a zombie) quickly, so they both have time to work.

Scientists use viruses as a vector to introduce healthy genes into a patient’s cells:

Your Fictional Virus & Vaccine

When creating your own fictional virus, research further on the topic and consider choosing a specific one as your basis/inspiration.

Here's one resource. For some of them, you'll need a subscription to access, but those that are available give you a good overview of the virus, as well as treatment options.

You can do the same for creating your fictional vaccine:

Here's one resource. And here's one on vaccine developments.

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 ⚜ Writing Notes & References

Lastly, here's an interesting article on how science fiction can be a valuable tool to communicate widely around pandemic, whilst also acting as a creative space in which to anticipate how we may handle similar future events.

Thanks so much for your kind words, you're so lovely! Hope this helps with your writing. Would love to read your work if it does :)

[oh-no-its-bird]

Ok, so. Smashing together my recent posts (stoner Itama / the secret Senju weed empire money / co-dependent twins Itama and Tobirama) to make a cohesive narrative:

So, Itama survives AU.

In this, Itama and Tobirama are twins. They're very close, arguably closer to each other than Hashi is to either of them.

Growing up, after Kawarama died, Hashirama found a new friend in his boy by the river. Meaning the twins were sort of left to mourn on their own, their older brother no longer as interested in playing with them. They got to be almost dangerously codependent, and their father only encouraged it bc they were also training to fight as a duo, and the codependency made the team synergy go crazy hard.

On that note, they're absolutely terrifying in battle together for sure. They're nightmares on their own already, but together?? Let's say that as long as they're fighting side by side, they're on the same level as Hashirama himself.

Itama grows up to be a scientist like Tobirama, but in a different field of science— ✨️plants✨️

Itama is like, a bioengineer for plants. He's crossbreeding the fuck out of these bad boys, finding ways to amplify certain traits in some plants, erase them altogether in others, or mixing them up for the best of both worlds. Full doctor Frankenstein plant edition

It's fun bc he often gets help from both of his brothers, and he's also able to help the both of them in turn!

Hashirama helps with growing plants, meaning Itama doesn't have to wait the years this research would usually take. He can go from nothing to having his final product in days flat when it should have taken a fucking lifetime to do. If he fucks up it's no stress bc as long as he has the seeds, Hashirama can just grow him a new plant to start from! All he needs is one single seed and an entire world of new possibilities is unlocked.

On top of all that, the mokuton can affect the plants in ways growing by regular time doesn't, so Itama also gets to play with special mokuton plants too

Then Itama can give Hashirama all sorts of new plants to potentially use in battle, tho Hashirama doesn't seem to want to use want against the Uchiha. But like. He has them!! And it's fucking terrifying!!! Plus they can just in general bond over being plant enthusiasts. If Hashi finds a cool new plant or vice versa they can get excited about it together

Tobirama understands all to most of Itama's research, at least in theory, and will often help with his experiments. Likewise, Itama also understands all to most of Tobirama's own research (at least in theory) and can help him in return. Having their own specific fields of interest, they're often bringing a fresh pair of eyes and different thought process to the others experiments, and it's great for them both. SO many results.

Itama is let in on most of Tobirama's projects, and even if he's not helping he generally knows what he's working on and vice versa. They have few secrets and its actually just in general very good for Tobirama specifically. Like, mentally and support wise.

Because Itama never died to serve as that final push over the edge, and was instead there to offer emotional support, Tobirama didn't turn to necromancy. (If he had tho, Itama would have been fully on board— sorry Hashirama) Instead, maybe he's spending that time being even more focused on cool time/space jutsu or something.

So like, all grown up he's a poison specialist with a major wind chakra attribute and minor fire attribute. His main weapon is a pipe, which he just smokes normally on top of using its smoke as a weapon. He can put so much pressure into the smoke that it becomes physical, and can then be used as a blunt force weapon (on top of ofc the smoke being used as just smoke, and having different effects on its own)

He's immune to a lot of his smokes effects, but has special extra powerful versions of most of his go to weaponized smokes that are so strong they work even on him. Obviously, he doesn't usually use these in battle, but they're there as a last resort

Fun sort of chain reaction attack where he disperses some super flammable powder or smoke then tosses in a single spark and it goes up like fucking fireworks. Or a cool combo attack where Tobirama provides hella fog with whatever water is nearby, and Itama condenses it so thickly that it chokes out their enemies without having to lift a single finger.

He can make like, platforms of smoke to stand on or use as shields, and he's especially good at deflecting and redirecting enemy attacks with carefully condensed smoke shields summoned up at just the right angles. Like, imagine you throw a kunai and it bounces off some invisible platform, then off ANOTHER invisible platform, and somehow its still gaining momentum (propelled by summoned winds or wrapped in a slightly solidified veil of smoke thats moving it on its own) and hits you right in the eyes

He absolutely fucks around with making all SORTS of custom effects with whatever he's smoking, which also brings us to the idea that got me here in the first place ->

Ok so the joke about the Senju having a secret weed empire where they sell ultra special mokuton weed, but it happens fr in this AU bc of Itama.

Stoner Itama deciding he can make the weed even better and forgetting what the word self-control means and making objectively the best weed in the naruto world. Ultra delux genetically modified mokuton grown senju weed.

Tobirama kind of gets on him for it at first (not liking the idea of mind-altering substances) but then tries some and stares dead silent at a wall for 10 hours then silently gets up, makes several scientific breakthroughs, then passes out dead on the floor.

They get Hashirama in on it and start mass producing, then start selling it and very quickly and mostly accidentally create a secret senju weed empire (oops?) which also gives them hella funds or the war and other things

No one can even reproduce their weed bc they need the Mokuton to grow it right, they have no competition in the market. AND their product safety/quality is insane bc Tobirama's perfectionist ass helps oversee it

Bc of Itama's interference, Izuna lives, and when they make Konoha the weed money means the first shinobi war doesn't happen bc they can afford to bribe officials they couldn't before (and probably have a uhh. Much more relaxed Kage meeting that year.)

You can't go to war with Konoha !!! That's where all the best ninja weed comes from !!!

Itama and Izuna get along really well actually. Izuna's cringe fail ass does NOT know how to smoke and refuses to admit it, he also becomes Itama's favorite test subjects for new product bc he and his brothers tolerance levels are insane so they need like, a normal guy to try shit on

As a person, Itama is one of those really friendly, charming, easy to get along with guys who seem to have a ton of friends— but when you look a bit closer you quickly notice that while many of those friends share their woes with him, he doesn't really with them. He has lots of friends but isn't really close to any.

He's a pretty good mix of his brothers, seeming friendly and cheerful like Hashirama but much more down to earth, and with the same ruthless streak as Tobirama underneath all the gentle mannerisms. He might be more ruthless than either of his brothers when it really comes down to it, but he's very slow to strike or anger, and virtually no one but his brothers and Touka really know he even has that side to him.

He's Konoha's lead poisons expert, is 100% aware and helping Tobirama with all of his especially fucked up experiments, and honestly that should tell you enough— but most tend to get distracted by the soft smiles and sleepy expression.

Art interlude ->

Anyways uhhh. All of this only exists bc I started thinking ab stoner Itama getting dumped face first into modern Konoha with Izuna, the two of them having been hiding after pissing off Madara for unimportant reasons. They don't realize they're not in their Konoha, and proceed to run from Madara (who they still think is mad at them)

Meanwhile Madara is losing his fucking MIND trying to chase down the ghost of his brother, and also some guy...? Who is that actually? He doesnt really give a shit tbh, Izuna oh god please come back here— ARE YOU FUCKING HIGH RIGHT NOW?

@fashionredalert : Zetsu lived in fear of Itama because itama would have made him into an edible That's why zetsu is two colors, itama smoked one half of him before zetsu managed to escape. One half intact the other half charred black

Please?? The closest hes been to death in years.

Itama was put on this earth to smoke everything he physically can, he hasnt been sober since he was 13, he no longer knows the meaning of fear or sanity. If it can burn he can smoke it

Hes holding one of those tiny Zetsu's going "Hey look at this fucked up plant I found :DD" then taking it straight into the weed lab

Zetsu specifically had him killed in canon bc he knew he'd grow to be too powerful pass it on

[evilminji]

I... am haunted? By my Midi-chlorian theory?

Cause they are PROBABLY? Some sort of Symbiotic Bacteria?

Which was my theory. Cause "micro-organisms" is vague af? And doesn't exactly tell us what KIND? But it's probably not a mammal or some sort of fish? So like... helpful blood bacteria. Got it! No different then a good gut biome. Makes perfect sense!

Yeah, THIS one has? For some reason? A hyper sensitivity to fundamental forces of reality? But I mean? Monkeys with type writers, right? Something, somewhere, was bound to get it. Some organisms get better smell to survive, some get sensitive whiskers. The blood bacteria got jacked in to Reality's newsreel. Some low ranking admin privileges.

Still? Needs a HOST to survive though. Doesn't, itself, even really HAVE a brain.

Cause it's a Bacteria.

A Bacteria and... and Bacteria can be multiplied. Grown. Obviously? Midi-chlorians refuse to do so outside of a living body. Or the Sith and various other researchers, bother ethical and UNETHICAL, would have figured out how to crack Midi-chlorian development.

They ALSO? We can only assume? DO NOT mix. As in? Any Midi-chlorian's? Removed from the Original Host™ die off pretty promptly. (In time with the blood rotting or new body assimilating the fresh, donated, blood.) So you presumably, couldn't take from, say, Skywalker and give to an average farmer, and have that farmer become mildly force sensitive.

Even THOUGH? The BLOOD? Is where his Midi-chlorians are! So PRESUMABLY? So long as he and the farmer had compatible blood types? That SHOULD happen! Because Anikin his a SHIT TON of Midi-chlorian bacteria in his blood and the farmer would be receiving some of that High Production Strain.

Not saying the farmer would ever become a powerhouse. But? There should? Be a difference? Even if it was only temporarily.

Yet? It seems? Like Midi-chlorian strains? Just don't MIX. They split off, during development of a child, begin cultivation of their own unique colony, and never again! Shall the stains blend. I'd go so far? As to say? They probably ATTACK other Midi-chlorians in THEIR space.

Like part of the immune system. Disease, poison, parasites, and of course? Those filthy, FILTHY Other Midi-chlorian Colonies trying to encroach upon THEIR resources. Get! GET!

Which is where? All past attempts have FAILED. Because they? Had an END GOAL first, and they worked their way backwards. Approached it all with either preconceived notions or complete derision of the subject matter. Ignoring countless culture's collective MILLENNIUMS of knowledge on the subject. The observations. The notes. The folk remedies and early sciences.

Arrogant. Forgetting or outright dismissing. Because THEY were better. THEY were SMARTER. Surely, THEY would crack the code! Unlock the SECRETS of this MYSTICAL building block of the Force!

Achieve... POWER.

But? The thing IS? Primitive? Does not and HAS not? Ever meant stupid. It means young. New. Doctors and scientists, doing the best they could, with what they had. To help as many as they could. The Force? It was a mysterious thing. They knew the shape of it. The edges, but not it's depths. They could observe.

If they did X... Y occurred. Medicine A? Brought about B and C side effects, avoid it going forward. Use Medicine D. So forth and so on. Building upon the knowledge of the past.

But OH, THEY? Didn't have fancy modern medical technology! Didn't know the modern terms! So obviously they were superstitious idiots!

Thus, attempt after attempt. Failed. Usually with innocent people, paying the price. Because Power. Because Fame. Because they could rule the galaxy and go down in history books... if only these simple little bacteria would COOPERATE. But.... they don't. Do they?

Because you lack understanding.

You. Can Not. Remove Them. From The. HOST.

They DIE.

They can exsist in exactly ONE(1) environment. Their NATIVE environment. Where you found them? That's where they need to STAY. If you found them in a tree? The need to stay in THAT specific tree. Dirt? Well then! Dirt from THAT specific region of THAT specific PLANET. No moving! Cease! Desist!

Are the Midi-chlorians in a baby? The start up strains were donated! Congrats! THEY LIVE THERE NOW. They are now NATIVE to the BABY. Can not exsist OUTSIDE the baby! In fact, will immediately begin to die! Outside that baby!

This is WHY Sith Alchemy is so fucked up. Lots of live experimentation and forcing Midi-chlorians into statis. Body horror everywhere. No mas! It DOES NOT SPARK JOY.

Which?! That leads me to my point! The part of all this THAT FUCKING HAUNTS ME!!!

Bacteria can be multiplied if you give it the right food. Fuck, it WANTS to multiple. WANTS to go gangbusters. Just? Absolutely apeshit. Thick enough in the blood to turn it all into PASTE. It doesn't have a brain. It can't look around and think to itself "hey, maybe we should slow down, we're straining the environment".

It's bacteria. Ultimately, in the end, JUST Bacteria.

Yes, it may be the medium by which we connect to The Force... but IT itself? Has no intelligence to negotiate with. Just like the cells in your body. And JUST like the cells in your body? It can be a cancer. Could kill you, if something went wrong.

If SOMEONE, deliberately, made things go wrong.

All in the name of "Science".

Yes, once again, I consider the SI-OC, even as I consider Midi-chlorians themselves. What "feeds" such a bacteria? A healthy body, presumably. Connection to the Force? Kyber, most likely. Force powerful items. We know they "call" to those who are Sensitive. But! As we know? The part of your body that can actually FEEL that call? Is the Midi-chlorians in your blood, which then transfers the information to it's host.

It is the Midi-chlorians that want that specific Force object. In all likelihood, because it benefits them. That it benefits you? Is a lovely side effect. That is can be used for things? Neat! Good on you for figuring that out! It would still call you to collect pretty, shining, rocks, even if you couldn't use Kyber for SHIT. You would be COMPELLED.

NEED it.

It makes the Midi-chlorians inside you go Brrrrr. Mmm, yes, happy chemicals. Positive reinforcement! You should continue to do OTHER things that help the Midi-chlorians! Like meditation, eating well, and being around others! Go on! Hug that baby! Yeeeeeah, good energy makes LOTS of Midi-chlorian food! (Bad energy too. We are not picky. But that Does Not Feel Nice. So like.... why tho?)

So! Consider!

You have yourself an UNETHICAL AF scientist. The Board does NOT UNDERSTAND THEIR GENIUS etc etc. They have completely lost their shit. Unfortunately, they have money. And Slavery and desperation abound. There are ugly, UGLY pockets of darkness in this galaxy.

They? Have An Idea™! (It is a terrible, horrifying idea)

This scientist? Is going to crack the Secrets of The Midi-chlorian! Become Famous! It is a plot heard many times before, sadly. Just as sadly? SI-OC's parents, who were on their way to the temple, never make it there. Make no mistake! Good people. Upset, of course, that they will be losing their daughter. But? As all good parents do?

They made the decision they thought was best for their baby girl. A lifetime of being understood. Supported. Of stable food and safe beds. A good, quality education they would never be able to afford. Being able to help people someday. They love their daughter. Weep for losing her. But sometimes? Loving your child? Means letting them go.

Not forgotten. NEVER forgotten. But somewhere better then they could ever give her. Safe from those who would see their child in chains.

They do not make it.

But they do not go quietly. When those bastards come for their little girl. They make it cost dearly. Not dearly enough. Never, ever, enough. But one of the other passengers is able to get off the emergency beacon. So the Jedi will know. They will come.

It... it has to be... enough...

And it is.

And they do.

But it is not just a pirate attack. Not JUST slavers. No... no this is far more horrifying. Far worse indeed. The Shadow sent to rescue the child? Stumbles into a festering shitshow. The sort that takes a TEAM to unravel. The not-pirates are mercenaries, are closing in fast. He send his data in full, in one big lump as an emergency download.

Capture likely eminent. They're experimenting on Force Sensitives. Need Back Up.

Help.

The Doctor is, of course, DELIGHTED! An adult specimen AND a child! Comparisons and contrasts! They ramble on, unhinged, to the horror of the Shadow. Who's eyes are locked on the Crecheling in a cage. He knows help will come... but will it come fast enough?

No. Not really.

But what keeps HIM from falling? Is the Crecheling that needs to be taught. Ironic, in a way, that the very thing their capture demands and demands? Is what helps them escape, however temporarily, their cages. Meditate. They are told. Or else.

Surrounded by stolen artifacts of Light.

Meditate.

Meditate.

Imagine, if you will, a dialysis machine. It filters the blood, yes? Pumps it outside the body? A terrible process. Trial and error. How far is too far? At what distance, do the midi-chlorians begin to die? The doctor kills... so, SO many innocent. Not their prize specimens. Jedi are hard to get! But slaves? Easy enough.

The Shadow can not Fall, he reminds himself. Can not give in to his grief or rage. His horror, his sorrow. It... it is so hard. To remember the Light. In this dark place. But the Crechling helps. The kyber, the artifacts. When... not... Not IF! But WHEN he gets out of here? He thinks... he thinks he should retire. Being a Creche Master sounds lovely, to be honest.

Bright. Peaceful.

The doctor completes their horror machine. He can not stop them from putting on SI-OC. After all... HE is done growing. It filters the blood, you see. Nice and close to the body. Through and around Force rich materials, in medical grade tubing. Exposing the Midi-chlorians directly to the energy they feed off of. Filter in a mineral solution to use as building blocks.

It WORKS.

The midi-chlorians in SI-OC blood start multiplying far faster and too far greater concentration then ever before. Slowly but surely boosting their Force Sensitivity as they go. What a rousing success.

If it weren't slowly killing SI-OC.

Ever imagine? What would happen if someone reached over and slowly started turning up the sensitivity on your eyesight? Your hearing? Your taste, touch, the FEELING OF YOUR BONES? If every breath was sandpaper, and every thought an adrenaline rush?

Could you imagine? FEELING the galaxy BREATHE? Knowing for a fact that your body had been specially designed for a certain level of sensitivity? And you had been broken? Because someone wanted to see if you could handle HIGHER?

Power without the support structure? Burns everything down.

Just because something CAN be done? Doesn't mean it will work the way you fantasize it will. Reality is not a story book. Where Power comes in pretty little packages, to be bought or sold or stolen. Midi-chlorians were always Bacteria. And trying to fuck with your own micro-biomes for more power? Was always destined to end in death and disease.

For you. For someone else. For every innocent you dragged into it.

They scoffed at the "primitive" scholars who warned not to fuck with it, yet still treat it like its a mystical power to be seized.

The Shadows that finally track down the lab? BURN it wil a VENGEANCE. It is a place of horrors. And initiate SI-OC is very, VERY sick. They aren't even sure they can risk taking her to Coruscant. Too many people. Jedha? Probably safer. Luckily their library has something that...? MIGHT? Be able to help treat this?

SI-OC probably never stops Tasting Time™ and seeing the Pretty Colors™ but? At least she becomes? Largely functional? Probably needs a disability animal. One that's mildly force sensitive, so it knows when she's ~~drifting~~ again. Keep her from walking into traffic or off a landing platform.

The random bouts of prophecy and mind reading are a bit disconcerting, but like? Lay off! It's not SI-OC fault! Be nice! She can't help it! Don't be rude! D:< she basicly has tiny Force Nexus in HER BLOOD. So WHAT if she occasionally stops to admire a sunrise that hasn't existed for thousands of years? It's probably pretty!

The younglings? Very understanding. Adults are a bit creeped out. But like? Eh. Just EXTRA Jedi-y Jedi... they guess? (No, no not really. This one had a serious Force Incident. But like FUCK we're breaking rank to tell outsiders that sooooo..... Sure? Yeah. Let's go with that!)

Ironically? I bet? Anikin gets along great with her? They're team "WHY YES, THE FORCE IS VERY LOUD. WHY ARE WE SHOUTING? SO YOU CAN HEAR US! OVER THE FORCE! WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT'S NOT THAT LOU-?". He got it naturally, she got it by getting fucked over. But? They can both go?

"Hey, you feel that thingy in the-?" *vague hand motion* and get a "oh YEAH! Wonder what's THAT'S about?". Does anyone else feel it? No. Is it obvious to THEM? Yes.

Will Anikin punch your lights out, if you mock his disabled friend? *boss music starts playing* R U N. Padme would help. Tag team, fuckeeeeer! *from the highbar with a steel chair*

Community is EVERYTHING. And sometimes? It's you, your secret wife, your brother-mentor-dad, the Clone army you adopted, and the perpetually Force High/Vaguely Brain Damaged jedi you call your best friend! And the droids. And your secret wife's body gaurd squad. And the younglings your friend-... actually? You know what? Your family's kinda big.

Awesome :)

@legitimatesatanspawn @babbling-babull @spidori @hdgnj @hypewinter @leftnotright @the-witchhunter @lolottes @mayfay

[astupidweeb69]

You know x-virus don’t get enough love…. Do you have any head cannons regular or nsfw (maybe both)??

I've been thinking about this guy a lot lately for some reason. Also I've never written for Cody before so hopefully this came out okay.

I was going to work on Toby's but.... I have more inspiration for Cody at the moment. He absolutely doesn't get enough love!

X-Virus Headcannons

SFW

Isn't related to Toby at all. In fact doesn't really look like him either. Sure, he's got the brown hair, but he looks waaay more dorky than Toby does. While Toby has kind of a boy-next-door-from-hell look to him, Cody is more slender and works out less. He looks like your typical STEM student (sickly complexion, poor nutrition, etc.). His whole schtick requires him to stay indoors most of the time, in a make-shift lab.

Has a refrigerated van, which he paid to be converted to safely transport whatever science experiments he's got going on in a temperature-controlled environment.

He tries to stay in one place. He's less of a drifter than most of the other creeps but sometimes... the things he does requires him to uproot his life and start over in another town. (No Cody you can't just infect your landlord with a mutated form of tuberculosis when they raise your rent! There will be consequences!)

Has kind of a nasally voice. I feel like he always has a bit of a cold too.

Ironically has a shitty immune system, and probably drinks those Airborne Immune Support drink mixes like it's his job. Also a germaphobe, wearing medical gloves all the time, and his hands are dry and cracked from overusing sanitizer.

LOVES Re-animator. He's rewatched that movie more times than he can count. But he has a love for science fiction movies in general, with horror elements to them. Like Alien.

Also loves zombie apocalypse movies, but that's an obvious one. Specifically 28 Days Later and World War Z.

Sometimes he's like... should I try to make a zombie virus? nah.... unless...?

I also think he was raised by a single father, who worked for a large pharmaceutical company.

Antisocial. I know Toby and him are compared a lot and people give them similar 'hyperactive' personalities, but I don't see that for Cody at all.

Cody's more focused, and is less inclined to interact with others. He doesn't really get lonely?

I'd say he'd get along okay with someone like EJ (both like science, ya know?).

Toby and him hang out a bit - they'll stay in and watch movies together. Or Cody will tag along with him to a bar and watch as Toby fails to pick up anybody. Cody wouldn't say it to his face, but it makes him feel better about his own social skills to see Toby strike out like that.

NSFW (Under the cut!)

I don't know how he'd find himself in this situation - but if he DID have a partner.... the sex would be kind of bland at first?

He doesn't know what he wants and frankly is too much of a germaphobe to get up close and personal with someone he doesn't know well.

You'd have to spend months getting to know him for him to feel comfortable to engage in anything sexual.

I think at the start of the relationship, he'd want to experiment with voyeurism.

He'd be across the room watching you touch yourself, giving you directions while he slowly strokes his cock, loving the feeling of ordering you around.

But as things escalate, of course, he'd give in to his urges. However, the voyeurism would become how he likes to foreplay.

Out of all the creeps (most of whom I view as being dominant) he's actually pretty tame.

He whimpers a lot, and it sounds almost pathetic when he moans. He's been holding out for so long for the right person, and when he finally gets to fuck he's absolutely drunk off of you.

That said, his sex drive is about average.

One of his roleplay fantasies is him being the experienced scientist, and you being his lovely little assistant.

Probably started after the first time you helped him in his lab.

He just kept thinking of you in a tiny little lab coat, bent over his desk - papers and test tubes falling to the ground while his hips piston into you.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Im doing a project about disinformation (specifically pseudoscience) and I've found a great paper that is trying to define pseudoscience by one common characteristic.

"Boudry and Braeckman (2011) have distinguished between ‘immunizing strategies’ and ‘epistemic defense mechanisms’, documenting how these appear in various guises in practically every pseudoscience (the relationship with Popper’s “conventionalist stratagems” will be discussed in 4.1). Immunizing strategies are defined as generic arguments or tactics that serve to protect a belief system from critical scrutiny and adverse evidence, while defense mechanisms refer to the special cases in which the immunizing tactics form an integral part of the belief system itself. (...) In many pseudoscience, core concepts are either ambiguous and amenable to a range of interpretations, or they are retrospectively redefined whenever threatened with refutation. Such strategic vagueness is characteristic of creationism and Intelligent Design theory, astrology, Freudian psychoanalysis, graphology, homeopathy, and various forms of alternative medicine." - Diagnosing Pseudoscience – by Getting Rid of the Demarcation Problem, Maarten Boudry

I just thought it might be relevant in your fight against astrology/anti-science crowd. Science doesn't try to immunize itself against scrutiny, only pseudo-science does.

I want to be so clear here that I do pretty vigorously disagree with the notion that everyone working in the sciences is a noble intellectual who's always open to new data and loves being proven wrong. anyone can be a shithead and I never made the claim that every psychologist in the world is a beacon of perfect, unbiased research and is above reproach. of COURSE some scientists try to immunize themselves against scrutiny, for any number of reasons including biased ones because people in any field can be real shitheads who 100% let their own bigotries color their work. that of course includes psychologists, given that psychologists are human and therefore fallible.

my stance is not and has never been "psychology is superior to astrology because it's an academically unblemished field of study," it's "psychology is more credible than astrology because it's a.) a field of study that is at least held to some standards and b.) dedicated to studying something that demonstrably has an effect on human behavior, unlike planetary movements."

[pixeldolly]

The Survivors, part 5

(the last batch)

☢️Erwin Pries (by @frauhupfner )

Erwin knows what nobody else seems to - that it wasn't a government experiment gone wrong or an enemy bomb which destroyed that secret lab and unleashed the zombie virus - it was the ALIENS! That's right - wake up, people!

Erwin may look and sound like a kook, but his ideas are surprisingly persuasive - or maybe people are just desperate for an explanation.

☢️Todd Estrella (Sim & bio by @moyokeansimblr)

Todd is rather arrogant but he's a sweetheart deep down. He's not malicious, just big headed and bad at reading social cues to know when he's out of line. He thinks he's tough, so expect him to go into this experience EXTREMELY over-confident before realizing he knows nothing about simanity, let alone apocalyptic simanity. IE volunteering to do things he can't, being places he shouldn't. But he's an excellent hype man. I imagine this experience to be very humbling for him and bring him closer to simkind.

Todd's sexuality should the opportunity present itself, is everybody. But he does have a preference for whatever big strong man is actually the one in charge of everything.

Todd is afraid of everything but masks it with curiosity. His biggest fear is the dark and his bedroom in the UFO he arrived in had six nightlights but don't tell anyone that.

Todd thinks that because he's an alien he's immune to sim germs and grime. But he very much is not.

☢️Hernesto & Nicolas Esposito (Sims & bios by @gvaudoiin-tricou )

Hernesto was one of the scientists in charge of a failed experiment that cost him an eye. When he found Nicolas, he knew the boy was special, but what truly caught his attention was his bright red eyes...and not the fact that the boy was covered in blood, surrounded by corpses. In that moment, he knew neither of them would be alone anymore.

Nicolas never knew who his parents were, or at least doesn't remember their faces. When people started killing each other and resources became scarce everywhere, Nicolas was just a kid hiding in an alley among corpses. Maybe he killed them, maybe he didn't...he doesn't remember either way.

☢️Anne Cleves (by @clouseplayssims)

Anne was a rich, sheltered girl whose family wanted her to marry a much older, several-times divorced man for money.

If not for society collapsing, Anne would probably have gone along with it like a good, dutiful daughter, but now she doesn't have to. If anything good could be said to have come out of the disaster, it is her freedom. Anne would rather take her chances with the zombies, honestly.

(This is my take on a post-apocalyptic Anne of Cleves, lol)

☢️Almalexia Goth (Sim & concept by @veronadragon)

They were the fruit of an affair between a rich Pleasantview socialite and a local man, and as a result she has grown up with many complicated feelings regarding their family.

On the one hand, they are away from all of that now - on the other, ruins are awfully cold and uncomfortable to sleep in compared to the cushy Goth manor, to say nothing of rampaging zombies...

☣️Hoppie AKA Patient Zero (by @andrevasims )☣️

When Hoppie drifted into Fallow Shores, she wasn't feeling very well, so she steered clear of the other survivors.

She'd seen what happened to the others!

That was not going to happen to her - she just needed to sleep, she'd feel better in the morning...

[radykalny-feminizm]

Don't you realize that male and female are social constructs? They're ideas. Scientists don't even believe biological sex is a thing anymore, we're all just people. Gender is almost like religion, it can change, some people are really sure on theirs and others aren't, forcing someone into one is always wrong. Do you know why you're cis? Do you ever think about the possibility that you're not, about what it would be like to be something other then what you were born as. Would you still feel like a woman if you didn't have a womb, if you didn't have breasts or genitals or estrogen? It was a combination of contemplating these things, and mystical experiences with the goddess Hel that got me to realize I was agender. I thought I would lose certain things when becoming nonbinary and genderless, but I didn't. I don't know about you, but know you can be happy as an enby or a boy, you can be loved, and cherished and comforted as an enby or as a boy. I don't know if you're nonbinary like I am. You might find you really do identify with womanhood, but if you do really want to be a woman, then know that that's the same feeling amab women have. I know what it's like to think the way you do, I used to think that way, and I've had bad experiences with men and with the expectations society has for people with bodies like mine. But you don't have to take your pain and call it womanhood.

I'm not cis.

I didn't choose to be a woman.

I don't identify as a woman.

I don't feel like a woman.

I simply am a woman.

And being a woman isn't a social construct or an idea.

Being a woman is a biological reality.

I was born with a female body. That's a fact. It's not something I can change.

Saying that scientists don't believe in biological sex is a blatant lie. I can't believe that it needs to be said, but male and female bodies differ not only on the outside. We get affected by different conditions & illnesses. We have different immune systems. We have different pain levels. We have different hormones & health issues related to them. We respond differently to drugs and their dosages. Not to mention our reproductive systems and everything related to them. Our bodies are far away from being just a concept.

Being a woman in itself doesn't make me happy or unhappy. Just like being white & Polish doesn't make me happy or unhappy. Those are just facts about me.

And being a woman doesn't mean that I have to look or act in a specific way. What is womanhood for you if you think that males can identify with it? Is it about wearing dresses and makeup and acting silly? If a man does that then he's a woman? And if a woman doesn't do that then she's not a woman? It's absurd.

If you claimed that one can identify with a specific race by acting & looking in a specific way, everyone would (rightfully) say that it's offensive. Racial stereotypes are not okay, but gender stereotypes are fine & valid? Both sex and race are in the same category of material reality.

Being a woman doesn't determine who I am as a person. Being a woman is not a personality trait, just as race isn't. I don't have to do certain things so I can call myself a woman. There are no certain things one can do in order to "become" a woman.

But being a woman does shape my position in society and it also shapes yours, whether you like it or not. You can identify as whatever you want. It doesn't change the fact that society sees you as a woman. You can't identify out of oppression. You can't stop identifying with pay gap. You can't stop identifying with your reproductive rights being taken away. You can't stop identifying with the fact that women are being raped and killed by men everywhere, everyday. Women in Afghanistan can't stop identifying with the education ban.

Goddess Hel won't help you once men decide to take your rights away. Identifying as agender won't either. Stop being delusional for your own sake before reality slaps you in the face.

[mortalityplays]

This is a very good illustration of the increasing susceptibility to conspiratorial thought patterns I've been seeing on the left lately. Just because you don't believe there are space marines on Mars doesn't mean you're immune to building imaginary connections between aesthetic or emotional data points and mistaking them for evidence. A lot of well meaning people in my circles have been sharing this story, buying uncritically into the first narrative they encountered. I want to break down why:

Jones' twitter thread was extremely emotional and extremely urgent. The idea of a child being ripped away from his frantic mother and a ticking clock to decide his fate both helped the story to bypass analytical scrutiny. It sends the message 'act now, before it's too late, it's the only compassionate thing to do'.

Her connection to an existing conspiracy (a concerted effort by the state to cover up Covid statistics) creates a strengthening association with the idea that this is also a conspiracy. The thread offers no positive evidence that her son's arrest was a conspiracy, and no positive evidence that his arrest has any connection to her prior experiences.

Jones' allegation that the arrest was retribution for her actions as a whistleblower implicitly identifies her in the reader's mind. A lot could be unpacked about her dispute with the DOH but it doesn't really matter because I don't think most people who circulated this story knew much about it either way. The point is that it anchors her identity in a few key concepts: 'whistleblower', 'covid scientist', 'concerned citizen'. None of these qualities are relevant to the events detailed in the thread (or evidenced in the thread, if we're being really rigorous), but they unconsciously prejudice the reader's assessment of whether to trust or side with her. Simply put, if you are concerned about how covid was handled and/or inclined to support whistleblowers, you are more likely to assume she's credible.

If you dislike and distrust cops, you are primed to accept a narrative in which they are doing something straightforwardly evil. Don't get me wrong, fuck 12, but I say that armed with an enormous preponderance of cases in which we have positive evidence of police acting out of self interest, cruelty, corruption, racism, misogyny, etc. Allowing ourselves to be seduced by the fantasy that they are always always without fail breaking rules and fashing it up in broad daylight only makes us easier to delude and manipulate.

She repeatedly made the point that her son is autistic. Again, if you are autistic or sympathetic to autistic people, you are more likely to be 'warmed up' by this detail and inclined to take her side. I'm not going to say it's irrelevant to the idea that he was being unfairly targeted, but it is overwhelmingly emotionally weighted. And again, it is not evidence that he was unfairly targeted. It's another weight on the scale that tips you to judge the truth value of her story without reality checking.

The example of a meme that she shared is characteristic of a type of online humour that is at least familiar to most of us. If you or your friends make edgy jokes and share tasteless irony memes, or if you've been online for more than like a week, you understand that they're mostly harmless. The idea that this meme could be used as evidence by law enforcement to detain you is ideologically threatening in an immediately relatable way. It evokes a reflex defensive impulse — that's not fair, the cops are wrong, the kid is innocent — bypassing the process of verification. Is this meme the reason he was arrested? Is it the only one he posted? Is it the only reason he was arrested?

All of these factors create a gut-led constellation of information that quickly forms a picture. Because it is being pieced together from multiple subconscious feelings and prejudices, it feels as if it has been evidenced. Because the thread was highly emotional and highly urgent, readers were pressured to jump to rapid conclusions and ask "what can I do to help?" (and the answer, as it almost always is, was 'donate money, quick').

I want to be really clear that I am not saying Jones manufactured any of these effects on purpose. It would be completely within reason that having a young child arrested would send anyone into an emotional tailspin, grasping for reasons this might have happened, leaping to his defense, rallying resources to fight on his behalf. I am not in any way ascribing malice to her actions.

What I'm interested in is the effect that this emotive kneejerk appeal had on people who were unknowingly predisposed to believe that the state of Florida would kidnap a child to punish a scientist for disagreeing with the department of health about covid statistics. That is a baseless conspiracy theory, and a huge number of people in my immediate circles reflexively amplified it.

Personally, I think arrest is a godawful way to respond to a child having a mental health crisis, even if they are seen to pose a violent threat. That still doesn't mean the cops did it at the bidding of a mad dictator in waiting. In the hypothetical parallel universe where it turns out Jones was right and this was all a conspiracy to punish her, it still would not have served the situation to jump to that conclusion on a gut feeling.

Pausing to identify relevant, verifiable facts before sharing a story like this is always warranted, even if you think the person telling it is 'on your side'. The more you worry that questioning the narrative wastes precious time or makes you a bad person, the more you should scrutinise why you are being made to feel that way. Accepting unfounded conspiracies into your worldview is not benign, even if you think the 'targets' deserve it. It erodes your critical perspective and turns you into a vector for the people around you.

tl;dr: you are not immune to baseless conspiratorial thought

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved in our archive (Daily updates!)

Under 1s account for 64 per cent of all childhood hospital admissions with Covid, study finds

By Tom Bawden

Under 1s account for 64 per cent of all childhood hospital admissions with Covid, study finds

Covid is almost as bad for babies now as it was in the early days of the pandemic, while the risk of serious illness among all other age groups has sharply reduced over time, a study has found.

Researchers found that 6,300 babies less than a year old were admitted to hospital, either wholly or partially because of Covid, in the year to August 2023.

As such, infants accounted for 64 per cent of all child admissions for Covid for that year, according to the new study, published in the Journal of Pediatrics.

The study shows the rate of hospital admissions among infants has hardly changed as the pandemic has progressed, with a total of 19,790 under-ones admitted between August 2020 and August 2023 (an average of 6,596 a year) – representing 43 per cent of all child admissions over that time.

Meanwhile, during the period when Delta was the dominant variant, from May to December 2021, infants made up less than 30 per cent of children’s admissions.

Taken together, these figures show that while serious cases fell sharply among children aged one and older, they are little changed among the under-ones.

The continuing high rate of hospitalisations among babies is largely because babies are born with no immunity to Covid and weak immune systems more generally.

This is in contrast to many older children, who have built some immunity from Covid infections and vaccines.

Most infants are only in hospital for a short time – about two days – but about 5 per cent needed intensive care.

“The pandemic is as bad as it ever was for babies. Under-ones are the only age group where admissions have not gone down over time,” said Professor Christina Pagel, of University College London.

“As children over one year old gained some immunity from infection or were vaccinated (with vaccination mostly in teens), their risk of needing hospital fell. But this doesn’t help infants in their first encounter with the virus.”

She expects the picture among infants to have been “about the same” in the year to August 2024 as they were the previous year, “as we’ve continued to see waves of Covid and immunity in newborns remains low”.

This is the first study to show that UK Covid hospitalisations among babies have hardly fallen during the pandemic.

Although a vaccine has been developed for children aged six months to four years, these are only given to those who are clinically vulnerable.

As such, the best protection a baby can get is if the mother is vaccinated during pregnancy – ideally in the third trimester, scientists say.

The baby builds up some protection from the mother’s vaccination “in utero” and boosts this further after birth from breastfeeding, when antibodies are passed on through breast milk. The vaccine also reduces the risk of the mother catching Covid and passing it to her baby.

Professor Pagel points out that vaccine uptake in pregnancy is quite low, at about 40 per cent, and urges more pregnant women to get vaccinated.

“Not enough infants are being offering the protection of a vaccine – from six months – and the benefits of maternal vaccinations aren’t be promoted enough,” she said.

A study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that a vaccination during pregnancy reduced risk of hospitalisation for Covid among infants under the age of six by 61 per cent.

Analysis by the US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has shown that Covid hospitalisations in babies under 6 months old are higher than any other age group apart from over-75s – although the difference is that hospital admissions among that age group have fallen sharply over the course of the pandemic, even if they are still higher than for babies.

Dr Simon Williams, lecturer at Swansea University, who was not involved in the research, said: “The findings of this new study are very concerning and help to debunk the myth that Covid is harmless in children. Although a majority of children will not be seriously ill from Covid, this study shows that in some cases it can be serious, and particularly in babies, who are vulnerable and with low immunity.”

Sheena Cruickshank, professor of public engagement and biomedical science at the University of Manchester, who was also not involved in the study, said: “Young babies are exceptionally vulnerable to Covid as their immune systems are still developing.

“This paper shows that even while older children are being hospitalised less, this is not the case for younger children. If mothers are able to breastfeed and have been vaccinated during their later pregnancy, then their maternal antibodies can protect the baby.”

“However, takeup of these vaccines has not been quite as good as it could be leaving a lot of mums and their babies vulnerable,” she said.

Dr Mary Ramsay, director of immunisation at UK Health Security Agency, said: “The Covid vaccine for pregnant women is offered during a relatively short window during Autumn [October to December], so we advise them to take it up when it’s offered this year and not delay.

“This way the vaccine can protect more pregnant women and newborn babies, whatever stage of pregnancy they might be in and if they were to deliver prematurely.

“The Covid-19 vaccine is already offered to ‘babies over 6 months of age and children who have certain long-term conditions’, who are among those most at risk of severe illness.

“For other babies and children, Covid-19 will generally be a mild illness. Our surveillance shows that whilst infants under 6 months of age currently have the highest rates of hospitalisations, the number requiring intensive treatment remains relatively low.”

“As with all vaccination programmes, the JCVI keeps the Covid-19 vaccination programme under review and informed by best available evidence.”

Study: www.jpeds.com/article/S0022-3476(24)00473-6/fulltext

[crazycatgirl420]

Not Magic, it's Science

DpxDc Au: Danny is Tim's Clone, Jazz is Barbara's Clone, Bad Parents!Fenton, Good Scientists!Fenton, Dead!Fenton Parents, Dad Who Tries!Bruce,

This is just an idea right now. I'm struggling a lot to write anything recently sorry it's not great!

Danny always knew he was a homebirth. It was in his medical records and everything. Both he and Jazz had been born at home. He had assumed that meant Maddie Fenton had actually...birthed them. But turns out that no, Maddie hadn't birthed either of them. They were created in the lab.

"This is so criminal," Jazz said, flipping through the experiment files.

Danny wasn't sure what to think. Jazz was cloned from a little girl who the Doctors' Fenton had labeled 'Clever, kind, resistance to Ecto' and created Jazz to find out if the girl's resistance to Ectoplasam was biological or not.

Little Barbara Gordon and her future children could be assured that it was biological restistance and Ecto Contamination would not be an issue for them during their lifetime.

Jazz's resistance to Ectoplasam had evolved to immunity as she got older. The mutation was documented throughly in the Fentons' research papers.

Where Jazz was born to be an experiment, as hands off as it had been, and hidden under yearly check ups, Danny had been born for a different purpose.

"The inheritor of their research, and the Fenton Works bussiness, is Daniel Fenton," the Lawyer had said.

The research on Danmy's birth, a clone from a genuis kid the Doctors' Fenton had met, showed Danny was created for this very situation. Where the Doctors Fenton died, and their research was left unfinished, Danny was to continue it.

He could say no except he was fiffteen. Jazz had been left with nothing in the will, Danny even got the house. Jazz was seventeen, in her last year of High School, if Danny turned down his inheritance they'd be homeless and be put into the foster system, Vlad would get involved, he might never see Jazz again.

"Guess I'm gonna be an ecto-scientist,"

At least he could close the Portal now, and keep it closed.