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S05.E17: CRISPR and gene splicing 2018.07.01


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(edited)

This will be a new episode. With [American] Independence Day falling on Wednesday, a lot of my fave series are taking the week off . . . but Johnny will no doubt celebrate in his own way: disrespecting the White House, bringing our attention to stuff we don't think about, and throwing in ridiculous stuff. Hopefully, no Bobby Moynihan-as-Santa talking about his masturbatory habits.

ETA: Something something something genetic alterations, deserved disrespect to the president, horror animals in Florida, and Canadian curlers. More importantly, a short yet intricate story from John that ends with a large tick fucking a lovesick mouse.

Edited by Lantern7
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Coincidentally, yesterday on the radio I heard a story about genetically altering mosquitos. The results sounded different from what John described. Instead of making females sterile, after they mate with the gene-altered males, the larvae that result die. Maybe technically that's the same as infertile. Anyway, when I heard that story I was thinking that while it sounds great to get rid of deadly mosquitos, what would happen to the ecosystem? This would probably impact animals that feed on the mosquitos. It's an interesting subject.

I got a chuckle out of referring to Dwayne Johnson as Rock "The Dwayne" Johnson.

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While I am certainly concerned about Roe, it's not like the court can just automatically overturn a previous decision, which is what the people in the clips were kind of making it out to be. 

John also seems to be selling the fact that the nominee might get rejected by the senate short. For one, McCain is out, so it's only a 50-49 majority. Yes, every Democrat must vote against, but I'm not sure if that's totally impossible. Of course, it's not like they can do that forever, but it has happened in the past. 

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I'd also be interested to hear more about how any potential SC nominees could affect the Mueller investigation going forward. "Cause if Trump and his buddies are putting forth people that could prove beneficial to him in any rulings related to that investigation, that's equally as worrying in its own right. I think that's something the news in general should be talking about a LOT more. That may have to be the next issue the public protests and calls members of Congress over. 

As for the gene splicing thing, oh, my god, that one "do-it-yourself" guy. He seriously asked why your average citizen shouldn't be allowed to that kind of thing despite not fully understanding how it works. Wow. Just...wow. What an idiot. 

But yeah, it's an interesting situation all the way around. I can only hope that countries continue to properly regulate that stuff, so we can enjoy the benefits of this scientific breakthrough without having to worry about the downsides. 

Shame John will be off the next few weeks. Watch, this'll be the time when a bunch of stuff happens in the news :p. Hopefully if that happens, it'll be good stuff overall, though. 

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22 minutes ago, Annber03 said:

"Cause if Trump and his buddies are putting forth people that could prove beneficial to him in any rulings related to that investigation, that's equally as worrying in its own right. I think that's something the news in general should be talking about a LOT more. That may have to be the next issue the public protests and calls members of Congress over. 

That seems more pressing to me, especially if scotus has to rule on whether a sitting president can be indicted. Because that would go right to the court like it did when they ruled Nixon had to turn over the tapes. 

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2 hours ago, Annber03 said:

As for the gene splicing thing, oh, my god, that one "do-it-yourself" guy. He seriously asked why your average citizen shouldn't be allowed to that kind of thing despite not fully understanding how it works. Wow. Just...wow. What an idiot. 

I forgot about that part. Yeah. Hard to believe he's serious. Maybe it's just his spiel to sell the kits. BTW, how do those kits work?

John made a joke about the guy filming himself with his iPhone vertically. Why is that a bad thing?


 

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Shame John will be off the next few weeks. Watch, this'll be the time when a bunch of stuff happens in the news :p. Hopefully if that happens, it'll be good stuff overall, though. 

 

Aww. How cute. I'm trying to imagine good stuff happening.

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3 hours ago, ganesh said:

John also seems to be selling the fact that the nominee might get rejected by the senate short. For one, McCain is out, so it's only a 50-49 majority.

50-49 is still a majority.  And rumor has it at least three Democratic senators will protect their seats by voting for Drumpf's nominee.

I liked the idea of the cardboard box time machine, but my cardboard box time machine also includes the times that John felt the need to point out pointedly that Hillary was a very flawed candidate.

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2 hours ago, meowmommy said:

I liked the idea of the cardboard box time machine, but my cardboard box time machine also includes the times that John felt the need to point out pointedly that Hillary was a very flawed candidate.

Yeah, but John called her a cookie with a few too many raisins. To illustrate her opponent, he got showered by raisins for at least a minute. And who knows how long it took to clean that up. He also took the third-party candidates to task.

Kinda surprised John didn’t demand that any and all CRISPR treatments would need Crispin Glover as their spokesman. Or is the joke too obvious?

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Did the Marlon Bundo artist do the mouse/tick illustrations? They were amazing. 

 

14 hours ago, peeayebee said:

Coincidentally, yesterday on the radio I heard a story about genetically altering mosquitos. The results sounded different from what John described. Instead of making females sterile, after they mate with the gene-altered males, the larvae that result die. Maybe technically that's the same as infertile. Anyway, when I heard that story I was thinking that while it sounds great to get rid of deadly mosquitos, what would happen to the ecosystem? This would probably impact animals that feed on the mosquitos. It's an interesting subject.

Radiolab just covered this topic, too, but they went into the environmental impact. In short, mosquitos are so small they don't really provide much food for birds or bats. But the upshot of the story was that it would be best to eradicate the mosquitos in cities where they are propagating a cycle of disease in people, but leave them alone in the wild because we don't know everything about their impact.

https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/damn-bugs/

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On 7/2/2018 at 10:02 AM, peeayebee said:

This would probably impact animals that feed on the mosquitos.

Clearly, they are not doing their job. It would be better to genetically design an army of "mosquito only" predators.... 

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