Sunday School

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

That A.I. medical story is going to be the first of many. This kind of drug repurposing will be a game-changer for rare diseases with limited treatment options.

[Unseen]

I now have “a mind-bending virus” if I don’t agree that Israel should “defend” itself by a program of eradicating and ethnically cleansing Palestinians(?).

I don’t disagree that Israel is entitled to respond to Hamas, but their response seems only vaguely aimed at just Hamas.

Anyway, Israel now finds itself in service to Trump’s agenda of creating The Trump Gaza Resort and Casino. With that accomplished, the ethnic cleansing will be complete.

[jakelafort]

Agreed Reg.

Imagine hospice and despair followed by resignation. And then…!

I posted an article about a start up in Israel. The founder has a kid with autism and there were so few medications developed in last few decades he took matters into own hands in what sounds like sci fi.

Ultimately urine cells are converted into neurons on a chip that play pong and are evaluated by AI that is wired into the neurons and based on how the executive functions work with different meds being administered (which in turn is i assume like the process used in the above story) specific meds are taylored to the specific brain chemistry. I probably have that all wrong. But the point is as much as we may dread the unknowns associated with AI there is also reason for optimism.

[TheEncogitationer]

Robert,

Then American sorghum farmers can sell their crops to American ranchers and we can all have cheaper prime rib for the first time in a long while.

It’s quite simple. Foreign aid is a needless grift that subsidizes rich people both at home and abroad at the expense of poor taxpayers at home. Oh, and it’s not and never has been a Constitution role of the Federal Government either.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 2 months ago by TheEncogitationer. Reason: Addendum

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

@jakelafort…… But the point is as much as we may dread the unknowns associated with AI there is also reason for optimism. 

Speedy pattern recognition is a trait of high intelligence. It is seeing the patterns and associations in large data sets that make A.I. what it is. Improved underlying algorithms  and more processing power will make it even more ‘intelligent’. It is anticipated that A.I. will produce new vaccines by end of this year. Source of that statement not to hand but it seems credible. Hope you are back on your hiking trails soon.

[TheEncogitationer]

Jake,

I don’t know if machine learning was involved, but Doctors have discovered that Metformin not only reduces blood sugar, but also has anti-carcinogenic properties and may even be anti-aging.

Anything that can identify multiple genetic interactions or multiple uses for a drug and do it at computing speed would do more to make drugs better than anything done by the presently lumbering, plodding FDA. And if production were AI-driven, it could make those same drugs even cheaper and more available.

It can be a source of manic-depression, though, wondering whether these innovations will come soon enough for many or whether the many ills of the present will stop progress dead.

A cure for horrific, debilitating, inborn conditions can easily halt with appointment of a certain HHS Czar with a brain worm who opposes Genetic Engineering, or because the Chaim Weissmann Institute no longer occupies physical coordinates because it’s blown off the map.

…Must wait and see…and possibly lay in wait.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 2 months ago by TheEncogitationer. Reason: Spelling
• This reply was modified 1 year, 2 months ago by TheEncogitationer. Reason: Crucial addendum

[jakelafort]

It seems we have stumbled on drugs that have been repurposed. By accident as opposed to the targeting of drugs that address other medical issues that AI can achieve. And i assume it is the same with the advantages AI has in radiology as a result of the aforementioned speedy pattern recognition. And apparently there is a new AI assisted medical technology in devising drugs for neurodegenerative conditions. Pretty cool stuff.

I have no idea to what extent Kennedy discussing how the NIH and FDA have a sort of orthodoxy. There was the example of tau proteins being the cause of alzheimer’s and not funding research that explored other areas. If it is true then it needs to be discarded.

Thanks Reg. Out of action for a couple of weeks.

[TheEncogitationer]

Robert,

I agree, accidents happen, but let’s chew on this latest pronouncement for a while.

Trump announces “Anti-Christian Bias Task Force” during the National Prayer Breakfast to “eradicate anti-Christian bias” within the federal government and end the “religious persecution” of Christians in the United States.

Now here is where all Americans need to stand against Trump. Here, he’s treating the Christian religion the same way the Left-Wing Wokesters treat Islam and Muslims, like an oppressed class in need of coddling and reparation. In fact, the term “Woke Right” is now used as a description for Christian Nationalism.

Trump can repeal useless and dangerous regulations and agencies and get rid of gravy train subsidies and featherbed jobs all he wants. That is not Fascism but the exact opposite. But when Trump treats one class of U.S. Citizens as above all others regarding rights and treatment before the law, that’s when Trump is in the realm of Il duce, Generalissimo Franco, and the Concordat of Herr Wickedly Great You-Know-Who-Else.

Any religion that has houses of worship on every corner, books in every library, rituals in public government assemblies, and subsidies from foreign aid and domestic “Faith-Based Initiatives” is not The Wretched of The Earth in need of Affirmative Action or preferences or set-asides on anything.

[Unseen]

TheEncogitationer wrote:

an oppressed class in need of coddling and reparation

What coddling? What reparations?

[_Robert_]

TheEncogitationer wrote:

Robert, Then American sorghum farmers can sell their crops to American ranchers and we can all have cheaper prime rib for the first time in a long while. It’s quite simple. Foreign aid is a needless grift that subsidizes rich people both at home and abroad at the expense of poor taxpayers at home. Oh, and it’s not and never has been a Constitution role of the Federal Government either.

I think rational, foreign aid can easily offer payback tenfold. You never hear about the plague “saves” our aid workers make. Hell, if Covid started someplace with US pandemic experts on call, instead of bum-fuck China, it may have been prevented altogether.

Ho Chi Minh was looking for a little friendly help from US. In hindsight, would that have been a good investment? He went elsewhere are we know how that turned out.

A blanket statement rejecting all international aid as “bad” seems like yet another “absolutism” without factual basis.

Without the Marshall Plan, which provided significant economic aid to Western Europe after World War II, there’s a strong possibility that many European countries would have been more susceptible to communist influence due to widespread poverty, economic instability, and social unrest, potentially leading to a larger communist presence across the continent.

Of course there are gonna be some bad investments too.

[TheEncogitationer]

Robert,

Uh, the U.S. had a taxpayer-funded gain-of-function lab in Wuhan, after decades of open relations with Red China since the time of Nixon! Fat lot of good that foreign aid did us with the global Wu-Flu pandemic!

NIH official finally admits taxpayers funded gain-of-function research in Wuhan — after years of denials
Story by Josh Christenson • 8mo
https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/nih-official-finally-admits-taxpayers-funded-gain-of-function-research-in-wuhan-after-years-of-denials/ar-BB1mwcLr

And Ho Chi Minh was a Communist since at least 1920, so fat lot of good foreign aid to him would have done us! And fat lot of good foreign aid did with South Vietnam!

Ho Chi Minh–Wikipedia
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ho_Chi_Minh

In fact, the whole global Communist movement plus Russia from the time of the Czars on back to the Huns was all propped up by plunder and willful extension of money and credit from the West and the U.S. Werner Keller documented it all in East Minus West Equals Zero:Russia’s Debt to the Western World 862-1962.

With no Communist movement propped up by the West, there would have been no call for a Marshall Plan, no Cold War, plus no Non-Aggression Pact between Stalin and Hitler to stoke the Nazi war machine, no Soviets funding terror in the Middle East and the Third World. All of history would have been very different without us trying to spread taxdollars worldwide to buy friends.

A blanket statement rejecting all international aid as “bad” seems like yet another “absolutism” without factual basis.

Looks to me like opposing foreign aid as a way to advance our interests has great factual basis. Really Israel and Ukraine are harmed by foreign aid because enemies in Congress and the State Department dangle foreign aid to keep Israel and Ukraine restrained from fighting their respective enemies.

True good investments are willfully paid by private individuals and firms, they reward and incentivize productive behavior, and render a desired return on investment.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 2 months ago by TheEncogitationer. Reason: Grsmmar and addendum

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

The author of that article on the gain-of-function research does not understand what gain-of-function research is.

“It depends on your definition of gain-of-function research,” (Dr) Tabak answered. “If you’re speaking about the generic term, yes, we did.”

This is how penicillin was developed. The same is true of much of the genetic work done to cure major illnesses. Scientists modify a protein in the gene and see if it will “gain a function” to fight an infection. It is not “about the controversial research practice that modifies viruses to make them more infectious”, whatever that is.

The author of that article does not understand what gain-of-function research is. But then the question was being asked by a medically unqualified Rep. and Trump endorsed supporter.

[_Robert_]

Right from the Wiki article you referenced:

The group petitioned for recognition of the civil rights of the Vietnamese people in French Indochina to the Western powers at the Versailles peace talks, but they were ignored. Citing the principle of self-determination outlined before the peace accords, they requested the allied powers to end French colonial rule of Vietnam and ensure the formation of an independent government.

Ho Chi Minh adopted socialism right after this missed opportunity, yes.

Before the conference, the group sent their letter to allied leaders, including French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau and United States President Woodrow Wilson. They were unable to obtain consideration at Versailles, but the episode would later help establish the future Hồ Chí Minh as the symbolic leader of the anti-colonial movement at home in Vietnam.

There’s your isolationism at work, right there. You can pretend the US is an island all you want and that international relations are of no consequence. We also missed an opportunity when the Iron Curtain fell. And now this….

China surpassed the US in 2009 to become Africa’s largest trading partner. Bilateral trade agreements have been signed between China and 40 countries of the continent. In 2000, China Africa Trade amounted to $10 billion and by 2014, it had grown to $220 billion.

My point about the what is termed as a “low-confidence Covid lab leak” by the CIA, is that the CCP was busy obscuring. There was no US team of pandemic experts on-site. Now I will grant you that financing risky ‘gain-of-function’ research in China would be a mistake. There is much partisan disagreement (Rand Paul vs Fauci) if this actually happened. Regardless, we should not be funding risky research in a place where we have no control. Make only smart, goodwill investments

Oh, and prepare to start bailing out farmers again. They operate on slim margins, and the economy is no “free market”. Unless we walk back child labor laws, environmental protections, safety laws (OSHA).

Oh, wait…we are doing that now. Tanker trucks will be dumping toxin all throughout the land. I remember guys in the hood where I grew up used to change the oil in their ’57 chevy by parking over a storm drain. We have to relearn shit over and over.

 

[TheEncogitationer]

Reg,

The point is that we had a taxpayer funded presence in China that did neither the U.S nor the entire world any good against the Wu-Flu. A screen door on a submarine for every one affected by it.

And since when can only Doctors ask questions of other Doctors? Is getting a second opinion now considered traffiking in Disinformation?

• This reply was modified 1 year, 2 months ago by TheEncogitationer. Reason: Spelling

[_Robert_]

CNN did a story on one of Musk’s DOGE hackers, a 19-year-old who went by the online name “Big Balls”. He’s got electrolytes.

[Author]

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