"Of course I've seen an elephant. They're like badgers with tiny ears and giant fangs."
"Elephant? Oh! You mean the ones without ears and a nose like a stethoscope? The ones that are always wearing a sweater with squiggle on it?"
"Ah, yes, elephants. Or as we called them growing up 'long faced horses' with wells in their backs."
"Sure, I can draw a perfect elephant. But he's going to have to have safety steps installed on his trunk, for OSHA reasons."
"I mean, all the elephants *we* had growing up were angry because they had tornadoes coming out of their faces. It's not my fault if you never met those kinds of elephants."
"Elephant? Yeah, gotcha, just goats with fangs and a tube worm on its face."
• • •
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In case you don't know molecular biology, PCR detects DNA or cDNA (made from RNA).
It can't detect proteins, and imagining that *every biomarker* is *always detectable* in *every sample* is a fundamental misunderstanding demonstrating lack of understanding in this field.
We're careful to say we detected viral *RNA*in a nasopharyngeal sample, which correlates to infectious virus most, but not all of the time.
Same with protein antigen or antibody: you never get a full picture, just strong clues.
My MAGA family members are posting pictures of their gun collections, draped in Trump flags, so how about a nice relaxing thread of Mini Highland Cows?
In 1993, a new hantavirus was discovered with a focal point near 'Canyon de Muerto' on the Navajo reservation adjacent to the Four Corners region, where UT, NM, AZ, CO touch at a single point.
It had a case fatality rate of 67%.
I'll skip some detective work, though it's a fascinating story. The disease resulted from exposure to infected deer mouse droppings.
Once the outbreak was under control, the question of naming became a sticking point.
Prior convention would have been to call it "Hantavirus Muerto Canyon", classing it with Hantaviruses 'Puumala' (Finland) and 'Hantaan' (Korea) and 'Dobrava' (Slovenia)
The Navajo people of Muerto Canyon objected to being associated with a deadly cardiopulmonary disease.
British Justices & barristers still wear the wig (also called peruke) popularized in 17th century by the sudden spread of syphilis in Europe that resulted in hair loss.
Syphilis was likely carried back to Europe from the New World by Columbus, resulting in ~5M European deaths.
Clarification: Sailors on Columbus' expeditions are believed to have joined the army of King Charles VIII in his invasion of Italy in 1495, which is when the disease was 1st documented in Europe.
The naive European population suffered horrible symptoms and death rates.
An uncommon sign of secondary syphilis includes "moth eaten alopecia", hair loss characterized by patchy, intermittent loss; or a diffuse pattern that manifests as hair thinning. The prevalence among patients with history of syphilis is between 2.5 -- 7% ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…
Let's talk about the Shmoo, and how it's become part of multiple fields of science & medicine as well as being a global cultural phenomenon.
It was a creature invented in 1948 by cartoonist Al Capp for his Li'l Abner comic strip. They lived in the "Valley of the Shmoon".
These little blobby bowling pins were a perfect animal: they reproduced asexually rapidly (like tribbles!), produced eggs and milk, tasted delicious, provided entertainment & companionship.
They were essentially a endlessly renewable, perfect resource animal.
Their escape into the world created immediate economic havoc: scant resources suddenly became free and infinite. The military hunted them down to near extinction.
It was satirical commentary on utopia, which would be bad for business and political stability.