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There are mechanisms that alter mutation rate. But consciousness does not play into it. Though we do not understand the concept of consciousness, it is generally accepted that some level of complex structures are involved (e.g. brains) and certainly does not extend to the cellular level. They are referring to observed mutation bias. I.e. that certain areas (which are critical to survival) seem to be more protected from mutations. The paradigm they refer to is that these areas would expect to mutate at the same rate as the rest of the genome, but if we look at subsequent generations, those mutants would not survive and we would see differences in mutation rate because of selection. In this paper they argue that those areas are protected via epigenetic functions, where for example repair enzymes are directed preferentially to those critical regions. Again, at no level consciousness plays a role. You also have to read the full paper. You cannot just take a sentence and imagine what it might mean.

Yes, so individually it is highly unlikely to be traced back to a specific source in this case. Exposure-related cancer is generally based on larger association studies, i.e. looking at groups that for whatever reasons have higher than normal exposure to the agent in question (an outbreak in Kenya was one of those studies providing much evidence for liver cancer) and/or in vitro or animal studies. Even with viral causes the discovery is often (at least intiially) based on associations (e.g. rate of a given form of cancer among infected vs non-infected folks), rather than tracking back the cause within a given individual.

It's called 'pragmatism' and having an awareness of our species, and others, fragility in having all our eggs in one basket, Earth. You may feel a sense of permanence in Earth being, even naturally, hospitable for all time without human effects, but that is a bit naive. As for unrealistic, I sense a bit of conservative Ludditism in your approach. There was a time that learned people thought that if you went over 20mph, you wouldn't be able to breathe.

It is also the result of propaganda.. If you prevent people from openly sharing extremist ideas, it doesn't mean that those people will automatically disappear.. They still have their worldview, but hidden underground, sharing it only with people similar to themselves.. Spreading to children and family..

Am I really in danger of poisoning from the NHS website as well as the Russian embassy ? More seriously, sorry to be a sourpuss, especially when my comment is sweet. One thing I discovered when island hopping in the Greek Isles some years ago. That was how much better cold rice pudding keeps than ice cream in warm weather or cold. A note to the OP, If you ever read manufacturer's instructions you will have noted that you are not supposed to put hot or even warm food straight into a fridge or (perish the thought) the freezer. So it is clearly OK to cool it off somewhere else. Of course the food concerned should be covered. The old fashioned practice of serving food in containers with lids and keeping them lidded after serving, bear witness to this. I find a good place to allow things to coolis in the oven they were cooked in. This will be a sterile cooling environment.

This seems a bit of a strange question. Of course it depends on the food item. Think about it. You probably have a whole cupboard full of dry groceries that keep almost indefinitely at room temperature. You can leave a freshly cooked stew overnight, if you keep the lid on so it stays sterile. It all depends on, first, whether the item is a good medium for growing bacteria, yeasts etc., and second, whether or not it already has some on it or starts from a sterile position and picks them up from the air. So fresh meat and fish goes off fast, as it is an excellent medium and already has plenty of micro-organisms on it. Fresh fruit and vegetables are a less good medium (having a natural protective layer on them, i.e. skin) and will last for several days, usually. Your teabag is quite a good growth medium but starts off sterile. So that's like the stew. If you leave it exposed it will pick up spores and go mouldy after a bit but you have some time in hand before it does that - and you will re-sterilise it when you re-use it. I should have thought a teabag would be still OK after leaving overnight. (But I must say reusing teabags is not something I would do as the tea will taste pretty awful.) What is definitely a bad idea is leaving food and drink at a temperature close to blood temperature (say 30-40C) for any protracted length of time, as that is the perfect temperature for micro-organisms to multiply rapidly.

Thank you once again to those who sent me responses and links to research. I assure you that I read every link that comes up with an original research article and I carefully go through the reference lists for what I am looking for. I do not follow up references to books or second hand popular journal interpretations. I uploaded a graph of publications on climate sensitivity in my last post. It demonstrated the various figures calculated by many reearch groups over the last 20 years for predicted near-surface temperatures if the CO2 concentration was doubled in the atmosphere. This is labelled ‘Climate Sensitivity’. There is a 25-fold difference (not 25%; 25-fold) between their calculations of what the near-surface average global temperature rise would be. Because there is such a wide variation in these predictions, I began to suspect that there is something wrong with the basic science on climate change. There are other reasons as well of course, but that one example is enough in its own right for me to become curious about the basics. I apologize to anybody if such a search makes them feel uncomfortable about their own belief systems in what they choose to accept. I’m personally curious as to why, after 160-odd years, we have not yet achieved anywhere near conformity in agreement as to what our near-surface temperature would be if we doubled carbon dioxide concentrations. A one-fold difference may be acceptable, but a 25-fold range from top to bottom??? I assume the results were from peer-reviewed journals. So getting on with Callendar (1938), thanks to exchemist, it’s a good paper, and I can understand why it was listed by the Wikipedia researcher as one of the significant papers in the history of Climate Change science. Callendar has produced a graph of temperature anomalies associated with varying concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere. His graph indicates that a change from 300 to 400 ppm (dry air) would result in an increase of 1 degree C or so, which is about what happened over the last 100 years. But his results once again were mostly calculations, based, as he said, on the work of Rubens and Aschkinass (1898), Rubens and Hettner (1918) and Fowle (1918). I will try to follow them up, but I’m pessimistic that such old papers will be available. I’m getting the impression now that the science of Climate Change has developed piecemeal, with a sort of trial and error nature based on hypotheses and counter-hypotheses coupled with countless papers on atmospheric measurements of all kinds over a long period. Following my search so far, my expectation now is that I’ll find that the only basic laboratory-controlled experiment in the field was that of Tyndall’s in the 1860s. He used a can of hot water, a tube and a galvanometer to quantitatively assess the absorption (and radiation) of ‘heat’ by a variety of gases. It doesn’t look at this stage as if anybody has repeated his work using infrared lamps and spectrophotometers with a glass or perspex tube designed to hold a variety of pure or mixed gases at various temperatures and simulated atmospheric conditions, along with inserted thermometers and gas gauges. The design and manufacture of such a tube would probably be the biggest technical problem in a machine designed like an Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometer. Special thanks to you exchemist. I realize that you had to go out of your way to obtain that Callender (1938) reference for me.

Another interesting article. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jan/18/health-department-warning-over-vaccine-mandate-for-nhs-england-staff Excerpt: Ministers have been issued with a stark warning over mandatory Covid vaccines for NHS workers in England, with a leaked document saying growing evidence on the Omicron variant casts doubts over the new law’s “rationality” and “proportionality”. On Tuesday the Royal College of Nursing said the leaked memo should prompt ministers to call a halt to the imposition of compulsory jabs, which it called “reckless”. “The government should now instigate a major rethink”, said Patricia Marquis, the RCN’s England director. “Mandation is not the answer and sacking valued nursing staff during a workforce crisis is reckless.” “The low VE [vaccine effectiveness] against infection (and consequently effect on transmission) plus the lower risk posed by Omicron brings into question both the rationality of the VCOD2 policy and its proportionality and makes the case for vaccination requirement weaker than when [ministers] decided on the policy. “The evidence base on which MPs voted on VCOD2 has now changed and we may see more objections from MPs, increased media interest and higher likelihood of judicial review.” “Now we’ve learned more about both vaccine efficacy against Omicron transmission and its severity, it looks increasingly foolish. “Ministers would be wise to rethink the policy and avoid putting even more pressure on our NHS by sacking tens of thousands of health and social care workers in the next few weeks. When you know something won’t work, it’s right to change course.” Hospital bosses have voiced rising concerns that they may have to close entire units and send patients elsewhere for treatment because the enforced dismissal of unvaccinated staff means they cannot run safely. There is particular concern about maternity units as hospitals are already 2,500 midwives short. Matthew Trainer, the chief executive of Barking, Havering and Redbridge NHS trust in London, said last week that the loss of unvaccinated midwives, coupled with the fact that it already had a 10% vacancy rate among those specialists, “would put us in quite a serious position”. Recent data on deaths caused by Covid -19 (in the UK) from the Office of National Statistics calls this into question. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UHvwWWcjYw&t=57s

Are they uninformed? I question that. I think these healthcare workers are actually hyperaware of the data surrounding the vaccine (AZ in particular, since we're focusing on the UK). While the majority of the general public doesn't focus on the small chance they will be fatally impacted by a thrombotic event, these employees would likely be quite cognizant that there's a real chance such consequences could impact them directly. As I mentioned previously, the fact that these events happen and are viewed as acceptable collateral damage, with no effort to improve the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, can't be too encouraging. They're weighing this risk against the possibility of being seriously impacted by Covid, and determining the vaccine isn't worth it. Patricia Marquis, from RCN England made that same point (see my post above). Now, you can call these workers "uninformed" if you want to. It's reassuring to wield self righteous anger at a chosen out-group that you can collectively ostracize. But the fact is in a free society with free access to information, these workers have a choice to interpret the data and risk as they see fit, and act accordingly. Which brings us to the question of the effect on the NHS as a system, and whether the mandate is actually worth it from a systems perspective. Many in the NHS feel the harm done to the patients would be measurably greater with these impending staff shortages than if employees are allowed to work unvaccinated. Just how far is this crusade to forcibly vaccinate everyone prepared to go and at what immediate cost? Do the ends really justify the means? I don't think they do, and neither do many others.

There are countless observations of natural selection in so called "higher organisms". Many feature as model organisms for natural selection - stickleback fish, toads, anoles, killifish, guppies, monkeyflowers, grasshoppers, Drosophila, jellyfish, lycophytes, to name a few. There are dozens of well known manipulative experiments that have comprehensively demonstrated natural selection in populations of relatively long lived, multicellular organisms, and thousands of population genetic studies on natural populations which do the same. Natural selection in modern humans is also directly observed. The best example that immediately comes to mind is the Framingham Heart Study. I think the concept that you're missing is that selection is dependent on population size. In small populations, genetic drift can overwhelm selection, leading to the loss of beneficial alleles and the fixation of deleterious ones. Conversely, the larger the population size, the lower the selection coefficient required to lead to fixation or extinction of a given mutation. https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/natural-selection-genetic-drift-and-gene-flow-15186648/

I’m not seeing evidence that loss of staff from resignations due to vaccine mandate will cause more deaths than unvaccinated staff being around vulnerable patients.

R0 of the SARS COV 2 Omicron variant: 10 Risk of thromboembolism as a result of COVID infection: one in 5 Risk of thromboembolism as a result of AZ vaccine: one in 50,000 Uninformed/undereducated is one possibility. Phenomenally bad at math is another. To be blunt you're wrong and so are "they". Like not in a philosophical, "lesser evil. two sides of the coin" way - but more of a "mathematically defined to a near incalculable degree of probability" way. Vaccinating a human population for COVID19 will result in fewer deaths and loss of QALYs than not vaccinating the population, unequivocally.

I don't like the way that the Uknainian problem is reported. There are two sides to it, but none of our media even adresses the Russian side. Russia gave up control of Ukraine voluntarily. It was part of the USSR. Would the USA do the same for Alaska, or Hawaii? Not a chance. But instead of getting credit for that, they get villified. Crimea was historically part of Russia, till a rather drunk Nikita Krushchev (a Ukranian) signed it over to Ukraine on his birthday. (from memory) When Ukraine was given independence, the understanding was free access to Crimea for Russia. When it became obvious that the West was doing all it could to gain control of Ukraine, and hence severely damage the Russian Black See fleet, Putin did the obvious, and took Crimea back. In hindsight, Russia should have retained Crimea, when Ukraine was cut loose. In even better hindsight, Ukraine should have been made to sign up to neutrality agreements as a price for independence, but that was done by Boris Yeltzin who was drunk most of the time. The west has been interfering in Ukrainian politics from the word go, with money and encouragement for anti-russian factions, all with the intention of denying Russia a base on Crimea for the Black Sea Fleet. When Putin put an end to that, it caused major rage in the US and CIA, they didn't like being thwarted. In view of all that, it's hardly surprising that Putin would object to Ukraine joining NATO. NATO is just an anti-russian military alliance, it has no other purpose. Why would Putin just roll over and accept all that? The politics of Ukraine is just about the most rotten in all Europe, they've never run a free and fair election. Both sides are as bad as each other. The idea of Ukraine being a member of Nato is pretty much an invitation to world war 3. If everyone could forget their egoes, the best way to progress would be for NATO to agree to Ukraine not being eligible to becoming a member, and for the West to stop trying to squeeze the pips out of Russia. The Russians lost nearly thirty million people in WW2. They have a right to be paranoid. What if Russia and China formed their own version of NATO ? Where one committed to fight alongside the other, in any conflict? That would be a nightmare, but it's not exactly impossible if we keep pushing.

Perhaps it is your choice of news sources that is the problem.

Nonsense, and as already mentioned previously and reproduced below, I have read those hypotheticals, as oppossed to scientific theories, which most reputable scientists reject. It is nonsense to suggest that octopuses who have had more then 300 million years of evolution will ever be space faring entities, and we have no evidence to suggest they are Alien, and which most reputable scientists reject. But et pet, I must now ignore you for reasons known by yourself and myself regarding past interactions elsewhere and your reputaion. Hope you understand. Thank you. "I read the essential bits that relay the guts of it and see it as our duty to seed sterile worlds." seriously? It may be that you need to practice real Science, and carefully read the entire Paper. https://arxiv.org/pdf/1901.02286.pdf You know, like actually look at the evidence, objectively Just maybe? and this is just pushing a STRAWMAN ? - "suggest(ing) that octopuses who have had more then 300 million years of evolution will ever be space faring entities". that is merely a poor attempt at erecting a STRAWMAN, that is not Science! it may be that you should try and practice some real science and look into the reality of "space faring cephalopods" maybe even check with NASA actually discuss science and possibly learn something or continue to be ignorant of real science, that is entirely up to you