Ailurophobia

Quarantine does not secure protection against disease. Yes, but then again diseases evolve more quickly in the scale of things. Adaption may be passive but within a matter of days a disease can change dramatically, and within months/years a disease could perhaps even switch target species. A disease may not even evolve down the path of lower virulence when it could spread and adapt off humanity and then target another species.

Really any, I'm just interested in learning more about the field. Central Dogma is the principle of all life, and it's properties are fascinating. We don't even know all there is to know about genetics. If I was looking to life forever I'd be working at a cancer research center.

Popular game pandemic has conquered the iPhone market. Owned by many people, the game's point is in essence to kill every last human being on earth...but would a disease actually do this? To start, a disease is really only ever as deadly as it needs to be. Virulence, the level of how deadly a disease is is primarily determined by how much a disease needs or doesn't need to spread. The cold for example, has little to no side-effects because it's very easy to spread and gains nothing from hurting you. Something like Ebola would be on the opposite end of the scale. So in theory, if the cold was given to everyone, would it become harmless? Evidence suggests that such has happened in the passed through viruses actually becoming part of our genetic code with up to 8% of our current genome being viruses according to Sharon Moalem in Survival of The Sickest. If a virus were to kill every last human on earth, that would be the end of that virus... However, there is a flaw in that theory because if a disease were to spread before it could adapt to become less virulent could it actually end itself...? I'd like to hear what all of you guys think. Also to consider: things that have wiped out mass majorities of people in the past such as the black death.

I haven't been catching up on my science reading in a while. Does anyone have any recommended reading on genetics?

We've not much reason to believe aliens exist, besides common sense on either side...(The universe is to big for them to not, or we would have met/known if they did). So, you can't really argue the point of existence because we don't have a majority of the factors, the big one is being able to see far enough.

I didn't just point out being a Christian, it was just to prove the point that creationists don't necessarily have anything against genetics.

I must say, creationism isn't entirely based on the sole idea that genetics is wrong, consider the big bang. Also, creationists aren't all against genetics. As a Christian, it's my favorite area of science...

It is asked in some places, I had a friend who went to Roper Middle School and they test your IQ to let you in, so it is detrimental in some cases.

Science Fiction also contains the word fiction. The stuff in Star-Trek isn't real, if we had the knowledge to figure that stuff out we'd have those things like super space ships and phasers. Alas, science fiction is mostly concepts. However, I'm not completely opposed to the fact that we may be able to change the laws of physics. Without the answer to the link given, we can't answer the question here. Is it scientifically possible to prove something is impossible?: http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/80895-is-it-scientifically-possible-to-prove-something-is-impossible/ Also, a lot of a studies info get's overwritten in science all the time. We constantly find new things we thought were "crazy" before, such as changing physics.

Agreed, in fact a defined IQ may prevent further growth in life. You've got your number, your only going to reach that high.

Yes, the quote interested me. I was wondering about the truthfulness of the statement.

I think it refers to the chickens egg, not any egg ever. However, I was just making a joke on the topic of hard to answer questions.

It's not a statement, it's more of the general idea of the book. The actual knowledge and validity behind it is in the 6th chapter I believe. I no longer posses it either.

I'm no psychologist, I can't even spell half of the words with the prefix psych-, however I do know that psychology is a relatively unstable field. Canadian Psychologist Donald Olding Hebb once stated that the Half-Life of Knowledge, or the time it takes for half a field's knowledge to be outgrown, is only 5 years. With that, does anyone who knows a lot about psychology agree, disagree, or have anything to share regarding the almost inevitable demise of a lot of psychologies new knowledge, or why it is so?

In Ray Kurzweil's book, The Singularity Is Near, he suggests that eventually we will figure out a way to surpass the laws of physics due to the fact that we will be much more effective and learn at an incredibly quick rate, but much-much farther down the road.