You wanted to know how the world could end, so here ya go

[WASVI]

I think we should really reserve judgement until the paper comes out. Granted it's all ready been accepted, I still think it's irresponsible to be releasing this sort of claim before everyone has had a chance to critically look at their research.

As for thinking that this is the beginning of the end, you also have to realized that what they have done is replicated a virus de novo in 2 weeks. Their major accomplishment was more the time frame rather than being able ot recreate a virus. They have previously published that they were able to create a virus, but that process took ~3 years.

 

[Cat]

Originally posted by: WinstonSmith

Originally posted by: Cat
You're basing that statement on basically a gut feeling. This is just like those morons in Hollywood trying to drive the political process. You need to be well informed before you make a decision.

I have a PhD in cellular biology. How about you?

I was clearly replying to cleo, who stated that the "risk is too great." I never said it wasn't risky. If you have trouble differentiating between replies, perhaps your PhD isn't worth the paper it was printed on. 🙂 In all seriousness, I don't have a post-graduate degree in anything biology-related, although I did take up through cell bio during my CS program. My mother has a Masters in molecular bio, and we talk quite often.

My take on it is, if we don't do our best to thoroughly explore this field, then some virus will eventually come along and do even more damage than a lab-designed one.

If you're opposed to it because you think it will leak out of a controlled lab, consider that if a particular group doesn't do it now, someone else will later, and most likely soon.

If you think that malicious designers will use a virus as a weapon, all of the laws preventing it in our country won't stop it from happening elsewhere, and we'd better be as prepared as possible.

The only argument against that I see merit in is improving our current knowledge through means other than virus creation, until we know enough to create a virus with sufficiently low risk. The problem I see is that I don't think we'll be at that point for a long time, and those who don't care about laws stopping such research will be going ahead and doing it anyway.

 

[vi edit]

For some interesting fiction on this topic...read "Prey" by Michael Crichton. Sort of talks about how good ideas can go horribly bad.