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[scriver]

At least we don't live in Scrotland

[Caz]

At least we don't live in Scrotland

HEY

[Rolan7]

It could be worse, we could live in TERF Island.

[Arx]

At least we don't live in Scrotland

HEY

I walked past a guy wearing a kilt and sporran this afternoon. I'm not in Scotland. Weirdly topical oddity of the day.

[Enemy post]

Apparently, OneDrive has a Facebook memories feature now. Thank you, OneDrive, for reminding me of the time I backed up some files on July 22nd, 2019.

[Grim Portent]

It occurred to me today while talking with my SiL that the only dog I've ever met and had genuinely positive feelings towards is a geriatric chihuahua with neurological issues and severe anxiety. I find it strange.

[Kagus]

An old friend of the family had to cancel a tour he was planning on guiding through Madagascar, because the local skepticism towards vaccines means that the majority of the population is unprotected and there's been a high death toll.


I, having played some earlier versions of Plague Inc., realized that I am a terrible person for how humorously ironic I happen to find that.

[MrRoboto75]

I, having played some earlier versions of Plague Inc., realized that I am a terrible person for how humorously ironic I happen to find that.

Meanwhile, the Olympics.

[dragdeler]

a

[McTraveller]

I always thought it was dumb that Plague, Inc. had total extermination as the winning condition.  The true winning condition should be perpetuation of the viral genome, not eradication of all hosts.  Basically you want to be like "the common cold": annoying, but not so annoying that humans try to create a vaccine and not so virulent that you kill all hosts.

[dragdeler]

a

[Mathel]

I always thought it was dumb that Plague, Inc. had total extermination as the winning condition.  The true winning condition should be perpetuation of the viral genome, not eradication of all hosts.  Basically you want to be like "the common cold": annoying, but not so annoying that humans try to create a vaccine and not so virulent that you kill all hosts.

You are absolutely correct about wrong goals.

I think a succesful disease does not even need to be annoying. A virus that did not damage the host other than cause a slight resource drain and remained undetected within them would be even more succesful than one that causes slight damage and gets eradicated easily by the immunity system.

[Rolan7]

There are some relatively unharmful viruses which stay in circulation that way, some of which are STDs which only cause symptoms occasionally or conditionally.

But the smartest play is to be a bacterial infection that causes so little harm that you actually help your host.  Becoming gut flora is the best option for everyone involved.  Symbiotic organisms like lichen or human beings are wonderful.

[Egan_BW]

Sure, symbiotic bacteria get a good deal, but they're very different organisms from viruses. I haven't heard of any symbiotic viruses, and I'd find it very interesting if they existed!

[Rolan7]

I was thinking the same thing as I wrote that.  Viruses are kinda parasites, it's just that they're literally simpler than actual parasites.