Virions and memes
Five weeks to go until I hand in my complete PhD draft. Thought I’d celebrate by posting some of the fun virus bits I found online
On Nov 13, USA Today (anyone have a better reference on this?) reported that "geonomics pioneer" Craig Venter’s research group created a synthetic bacteriophage (a virus that infects bacteria) – an artifical virus – in two weeks.
"When researchers created a synthetic genome (genetic map) of the virus and implanted it into a cell, the virus became ‘biologically active,’ meaning it went to work reproducing itself."
The project was funded in part by the Department of Energy, which says that it "hopes to create microbes that would capture carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, produce hydrogen or clean the environment." Hmmm. The Department of Energy has been so concerned about these issues…
Not to be alarmist or anything, but the article just happens to note that the human genome project was completed in April." Venter notes the synthetic bacteriophage has 5,000 base pairs in its genome. The human genome has 3 billion, so similar work in human form probably won’t happen in this decade, he says." In this…decade they are planning to move from a bacteriophage to "work in human form"???
You may have heard of the "Aoccdrnig to rsereach…" meme – I got a few copies of it myself from friends.
David Harris did a little experiment to see how the example paragraph propagated in blogspace in different versions.
Here is a test to determine which memes (contagious ideas) have "infected" you. Each page of the scanner contains a grid of simple gray images, and you simply highlight the images you recognise by clicking on them. Your exposure to "known memetic viruses" will be assessed, and remedial actions suggested.
Here’s my diagnosis:
Viruses you suffer from:
Junkfood
Eat some real food. Something which you can identify the source of every ingredient, not the point of manufacture.
Religion
Read "God’s Debris" by Scott Adams (yes, the Dilbert guy)
Politics
Stop caring!
Brand Names
Having a well-known name doesn’t make it good.
Hippyism
Free love is passe and potentially dangerous, and patchouli smells like cat piss.
Conspiracy Theory
Face it, the elected government is in control. Actually that’s quite scary.
Environmentalism
Consume more stuff! It’s easier to buy new stuff than to recycle.
Viruses you might suffer from:
Discordia (90%)
Buy a suit. Invest your money. Eat hotdog buns on a friday.
Free BSD (90%)
The GPL isn’t that bad really. Adopt a penguin at the zoo.
Prog Rock (80%)
Long hair looks dumb with a bald spot. Listen to CD’s they don’t crackle.
What virus are you? One of those little quiz things.
What computer virus would you be?
Polymorphous Virus
Your destructive powers vary widely as you constantly change trying to hide from everything.