Imagine how dystopian that would sound in humans, like some science fiction horror.
"All the leaders are secretly infected by parasites".
Sounds like interesting sci fi movie premise.
"All the leaders are secretly infected by parasites".
Sounds like interesting sci fi movie premise.
What people might find unpalatable is the idea that parasitic infection could determine so fundamentally political beliefs and ideology, but consider that the idea of not cleaning your hands directly led to disease was considered literal insanity (see the tragic history of Ignaz Semmelweis) prior to germ theory. Sometimes it's the smallest catalysts that cause the largest changes. For the want of a nail...
Correlation or causation?
> Wolves infected with a common parasite are more likely than uninfected animals to lead a pack, according to an analysis of more than 200 North American wolves1. Infected animals are also more likely to leave their home packs and strike out on their own.
From Wikipedia, Toxoplasmosis Gondii ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxoplasma_gondii ):
> Although under-studied, penguin populations, especially those that share an environment with the human population, are at-risk due to parasite infections, mainly Toxoplasmosis gondii. The main subspecies of penguins found to be infected by T. gondii include wild Magellanic and Galapagos penguins, as well as blue and African penguins in captivity.[78] In one study, 57 (43.2%) of 132 serum samples of Magellanic penguins were found to have T. gondii. The island that the penguin is located, Magdalena Island, is known to have no cat populations, but a very frequent human population, indicating the possibility of transmission.
From Werner Herzog's Encounters at the End of the Earth ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7kdDeGXUjI ):
HERZOG: Dr. Ainley, is there such thing as insanity among penguins? I try to
avoid the definition of insanity or derangement. I don't mean that a penguin
might believe he or she is Lenin or Napoleon Bonaparte, but could they just go
crazy because they've had enough of their colony?
AINLEY: Well, I've never seen a penguin bashing its head against a rock. They
do get disoriented. They end up in places they shouldn't be, a long way from
the ocean.
HERZOG: These penguins are all heading to the open water to the right.
But one of them caught our eye, the one in the center.
He would neither go towards the feeding grounds at the edge of the ice,
nor return to the colony. Shortly afterwards, we saw him heading straight
towards the mountains, some 70 kilometers away. Dr. Ainley explained
that even if he caught him and brought him back to the colony, he would
immediately head right back for the mountains. But why?
One of these disoriented, or deranged, penguins showed up at the New Harbor
diving camp, already some 80 kilometers away from where it should be.
The rules for the humans are do not disturb or hold up the penguin. Stand still
and let him go on his way. And here, he's heading off into the interior of the
vast continent.
With 5, 000 kilometers ahead of him, he's heading towards certain death.I was under the impression that it wasn't so much that people considered the idea insane, as that they hated Semmelweis and were therefore strenuously opposed to anything associated with him.
The short answer is there is no perfect model, people will always be people.
Why would you want someone who does not want to do a job do that job?
If you are interviewing someone and that person said “I don’t want to do this job” would you hire that person?
I've been told several times that I become scarily competent at anything I hate, far in excess of those things that make me happy or bring me joy.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't discount disgust or aversion to something or it's lack as a disqualification to manage that thing. Quite to the contrary, they may be just the person aware enough of the thing in question to reliably manage it. I'll take a candidate who can explain at length why they hate that job over the most eager "this'll be great" candidate ever.
I'll just be realistic about my assessment of their tenure, and the compensation offered, and try really hard to figure out what they actually want before pulling the trigger on the hire.
Which is why it's helpful to have as many (what I refer to as…) "power traps" in a society as possible: coaching, teaching, leading an HOA, leading a PTA, etc.
I have nothing against these endeavors, you must understand, but my view is that a person spending time acting as a judge for a dog show is less likely to pursue becoming an actual judge.
In my view whether or not that makes you "smart" or "dumb" depends on what you do with the insight. As Ira Glass writes: "Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through."
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So the analogy is very forced and doesn't really work.
Cell colonies are cultures & this is on the topic of infection.
edit: and as the one below me already alluded to, your statement exists on a physical substrate whilst culture exists abstractly thus invalid
Listen, you! I was born here. I raised a cloud of children here. My ancestors came over here on the sandwich.
One of my favorite episodes.
> :s/reptiloids/parasites/g
Well, their field of work is called poly-ticks...