CharonY

The thoughts in OP are mostly speculative and do not follow current knowledge (see below), so I am moving it to speculations for now (depending how the discussion develops). The rules for speculative threads can be found here: https://www.scienceforums.net/forum/29-speculations/#elForumRules First of all this assertion: That is mostly wrong. Initial life on Earth did not harvest light for energy for about 500 million years. The first (known) means of energy production were likely chemolithotrophs which do not use light. And rather obviously all the microorganisms which dwell in deep sea vents, soil and so on are somewhat decoupled from the primary products of photosynthesis (such as oxygen) though of course they are now connected to the overall carbon cycle. First, this seems a bit like an argument of for irreducible complexity. Some overall information why this argument is flawed can be found here: http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB200.html I am not sure what you tried to look up, but there is a host of literature out there highlighting the various light-receptors that evolved including those in our ancestors. Eyes have evolved several times independently, but all of them have a basis in using specific light-responsive pigments. This argument does not follow. Mutations are merely changes in the DNA. They are not directed for the most part. There is no sensory feedback how mutations should be. A very simplified way to see it is that, most genes code for proteins which then do something. Mutations in those proteins can then change functions. They can also duplicate, so that you have one copy that does the original function whereas the second one might mutate and slightly change and acquire new functions without compromising cellular health (as the original copy is still doing its job). And the functions can be very different. Our ears use stereocilia (kind of hair-like appendices to detect sound (they are cellular outgrowths and not just a simple protein, though). They are related to another structure, so-called microvilli which are kind of simple cellular structures which effectively increase cell surfaces. The original purpose of stereocilia was simple mechanosensing but has at some point been co-opted to sense sound. Though in principle all they do is still measuring the mechanical force on them. Another example which is often used in the irreducible complexity debate are flagella where it has been shown how accumulation of small changes resulted in different structures with different functions: http://www.talkdesign.org/faqs/flagellum.html So as a whole there is no reason to assume that there is some hitherto undetected system that somehow takes sensory inputs and then changes the DNA (i.e. causing mutations). The only example that is somewhat related is much more unspecific and is related to stress. Those can result either in higher mutation rates (which are still random). The other element are epigenetic changes (which causes differences in gene expression, but do not change the genetic material on the sequence level per se), however their contribution to evolution are considered to be much less than classic mutations. But again, those are not specifically guided (i.e. sound does not suddenly result in cells creating stereocilia, for example). Rather things like age, but also exposure to toxins and stressors (such as cigarettes) have been shown to change methylation patterns, for example.

Yes, fair enough, it was not part of the study but I am not sure what the hypothesis would be? E.g. that there are specific cultural groups within the racial groups that drive the higher infection rates? What specific groups could one meaningfully build to capture "culture" as a variable? The study ultimately was aimed to see whether the higher death rate in Hispanic and black folks could be explained by higher infection rates (as there has been speculation of a biological basis) and the study indicates that if one simply adjust for being infected in the first place (which does correlate with socioeconomic factors) the survival rate is actually higher. I.e. major driver here seems to be socioeconomics and not race.

Fair enough. Sorry for adding in, I just saw the post and for some reason chimed in. Too much work and not enough coffee...

I am not sure whether I am understanding the situation correctly, and maybe I am just stating the obvious, but public schools in the UK are endowed schools and historically have started as charity schools which were established to provide access to poor students. Now with the presence of an actual public (state) system, they are what would be called private schools elsewhere. However, I think most still enjoy the benefits of having a caritable status (but not sure whether that is still the case).

On top the cooling chain is a bit of a headache.

I assume you mean allelic variants instead of genes, as pretty much every member of a species has the same genes. The only difference are small variations in the genes. But even so we do not expect alleles to be always causing cancer. All cells in an individual carry the same alleles. So if there was an allele causing dysregulation of cellular replication, it is unlikely that a living organism would form. As such, all oncogenes basically increase the likelihood of cancer and/or tumors. For the reverse question, a similar answer applies. One of the causes of cancers are mutations and there is no full protection against it.

I suppose it depends on the precise definition of "firm" orders. But IIRC already last year a couple of contracts were made between the EU and the involved firms pending authorization. This includes about 200 million doses of the J&J vaccine with conditions for further 200 million. Likewise there was an agreement with Moderna for around 80 million (I believe). However, I do not know the details of that deals, especially with regard to the timeline that were negotiated. The companies also ran into production problems in some plants as vaccine production in Europe had been ramping down prior to the pandemic. In addition, certain supply chains and probably additional monetary commitment increased delivery for the US, using production means on US soil, for example.

From what I have heard Canada is technically still on track, though the track has been running until September. I guess when the times draws closer we can see how far we are off. The US has been accelerating instead, which sounds like a great idea.

I wish you the best for your journey and hope that it will at least occasionally lead you back here.

And for the other established vaccine methods, too. Moreover, there is about a decade of research on coronavirus vaccines, but most have not moved into trials (as interest declined rather rapidly). In fact the pure vaccine development is not that long. A critical factor is usually identifying the best candidate, which often is done in pre-clinical studies. That part has been skipped for the most part and folks went into the safety trials (Phase I) pretty soon. Another part that could be considered reduced is the range of different dosages tested in a trial. Often you will have different cohorts with higher or lower concentrations to figure out which gives the best response. Most trials for COVID-19 vaccines had (IIRC) one or two regimens. The risk here is usually that if one is unlucky, the dosages may actually not elicit an immune response. At this part, we kind of got lucky as most vaccines showed very good responses. Typically about 40% of all Phase I and 70% of Phase II trials fail in drug discovery, so again, luck plays a big role here. It could have been possible, for example that phase III showed low efficacy and folks would have had to push another candidate through the pipeline. By then we probably have so many infections that phase III could have done within a few weeks, though....

That is basically true. The development itself did not start from zero but was prioritized so it was faster because more folks worked on it. Phase III are smaller and faster than some other vaccine trials but it benefitted from an actual bad situation: the virus was spreading rapidly and had in many countries a high prevalence. So while other vaccines might have taken years to identify enough infected folks to estimate efficacy, in the pandemic the numbers were reached much faster. Production is not an issue as it is regulated and controlled the same way as others. It is fast because more companies work together to make it happen. If you are talking about development and testing, Area54 basically addressed that. If you are surprised that things happen faster because more folks and more money was dedicated to the project then I am not sure what to tell you. Would you feel better if they waited until you think it took enough time?

This or something similar is pretty much the same tactic everyone I know use. There is no other way to keep up with the workload. Though deleting seems like an interesting idea that I have not thought about- usually stuff just lingers in my inbox (and I have unanswered emails going back years on my conscience that I really should delete). Yes, there are the zero inbox methods or focused inbox and so on, but at some point (mostly around grant deadlines) things break down on my end. I have allocated a bit more time to emails as my teaching load has been reduced but I have set my inbox on refresh only every 3 hours or so. I found that if I finally found some precious time for writing, inbox notifications tend to destroy my focus. I know a colleague who is extremely successful with tons of collaborations all over the globe. When she showed me her inbox after an hour working on them there were still over 400 unread emails to go through (for the same day). Usually in her case showing up physically (even if you need to take a plane) can be faster. But also in her case she really prioritizes her undergrads with a patience that I can only admire. But it also means that some projects end up in email hell...

It is you who is unaware about the contents of the studies. There are no knockouts (which generally refer to genetic deletions) and stopping hyperinflammation would at best be addressing a symptom, but not the disease. You keep saying mRNA editing (well, actually m'rna, which is not a thing), except that there is no editing involved. Apparently you are not understanding how vaccines work (or immune responses). Vaccines prime the body to specific parts of the virus (or other pathogens). The immune response then becomes targeted and is able to clear the pathogen. It is not even vaguely the same approach. Antibodies produced in the process are (and have to be) specific to the pathogen. Even if you change somehow antibody regulation, it won't suddenly target the disease. All you have established so far is that you need to read more about how the immune system and vaccination works before making broader claims.

OP seems to start with a wrong assumption. The genetics of skin colour is not related to the environment per se, or at least not the way OP seems to imply (i.e. focussing on genetic aspects not the adaptive melatonin production in response to sun exposure). Sun intensity can be a selective trait favouring those that have darker skin. But it does not cause genetic changes. In other words the birth of a child with darker skin will occur with the same likelihood regardless where they are born. What OP actually is seemingly asking is how long it would take to have mutations resulting in darker skin. This is not only a random process, but it is not a yes/no answer, either. There are several alleles associated with skin colour and there are obviously many different shades as a result. So if even if your breeding program would only select for folks who identify themselves as white, you might not have strictly a gene pool that concentrates all the alleles which are associated with a lack of pigmentation.

The terms have been around since the 90s, I believe. However, the easiest way to think about it is that in this context man or woman corresponds to the gender which a person identifies with. Trans or Cis refers to the relationship between their identification and their sex. A transgender person therefore was born with a different sex than what they identify with, whereas a for cis-person both are aligned. So a trans-man would be someone who was born female and underwent gender re-assignment, which typically includes testosterone supplementation. As that person identifies as a man, it would make no sense to compete with women (and vice versa). As such, your examples simply did not make sense to me. If that is the basis for the confusion, it would appear that you might have missed the basic premise of OP.

I am having difficulties understanding what you are trying to say. After re-assignment surgery testosterone suppressors are used in addition to estrogens, both of which reduce testosterone levels. After an about one year- regimen the levels are typically stably reduced to that of cis-women and I believe current regulations require that transgender women need to maintain these low levels in order to compete. I.e. in you example only the cis-woman is expected have higher testosterone levels. If the trans-woman show enhanced testosterone levels, it is not because of hormone therapy, it is despite of it (and again, these tests are done routinely, so I also do not quite understand why you seem to claim that they aren't and I cannot see anyone stating that they shouldn't). Or do you mean transgender men? Because they would get testosterone supplements. In that case you need to be more specific (heh) in your explanation as most of the discussion was about how transgender women might have an unfair advantage. And from what I understand trans-men are allowed to compete without restrictions.

Considering that the discussion is 4 pages deep, this claim is more than a little weird. I still fail to see why your are so hang up on testosterone, as I mentioned a few times, the levels are the same in trans as well as a cis-women. I did not say that the do not need to be screened. I said that screening did not reveal any statistical differences. In fact, simple testosterone testing would likely be very inclusive, but in the lit Prometheus provided the discussion is more fundamental as the concern also highlighted in OP is about whether a) there is lingering competitive advantage regardless of testosterone levels b) whether that inadvertently creates a non-inclusive situation for cis-women in spots. I agree. I think the overall discussion is at the interface between being inclusionary, but for all women (trans and cis) and trying to come up with a scenario were neither are unduly penalized. But I also think that currently the body of knowledge has not advanced to a point where we can make clear claims. The call for prolonging therapy time is evidence of how information has changed during these discussion. I think that the current 12 month rule was in part implemented as it was found that after about this time period testosterone levels are reduced to the same levels as cis-women. The gist of the Lundgren group (and others) is that physiological advantages extend beyond that point.

Thank you Prometheus, I am aware of at least the review from the Lundberg group (the paper I mentioned with regard to muscle loss was from their group). From what I remember the authors discusses elite athlete mainly in the context between men and women (not transgender) and the actual discussion of transgender performance is based on their (and others) work showing that testosterone suppression only resulted in limited performance reduction. However this was on the non-elite level (i.e. they extrapolate from their first part where they highlight differences between female and male elite athletes) and is mostly based on measures such as grip strength, rather than sports performance. I.e. in many ways it is talking about the potential advantages of transgender women in sports. And that is where my thinking goes to mostly. So far the discussion talks about unfair advantages of transgender women and how they could dominate the field making it impossible for non-transgender women to compete. I have found bachelor theses calculating high likelihood for transgender women getting all top spots. I have to admit that I am not particularly interested in sports, but from what I can tell these scenarios are not happening and as mentioned above and as long as there is little evidence of exclusion of non-transgender women I feel that is no strong indicator for a need to be exclude transgender athletes. The assay seems to discuss ethical aspects and perhaps addresses what OP has in mind. I will need to track the full text down and read it in order to follow their argument, though.

As mentioned above, after reassignment, testosterone level are virtually indistinguishable. Also as already mentioned, there is a paucity on data indicating that there is a problem. If you have access to studies that demonstrate an actual issue, please share them. All articles I have found point to a very limited number of studies among non-elite athletes showing either no performance difference or only potential differences (i.e. lack of significant muscle loss, but no indication whether that would had any impact on training on the elite athlete level). I.e. all I have seen so far continues to indicate that the theoretical worry is not well funded on facts. And with that lack of evidence I do not think that exclusionary policies are a good idea. One could make a philosophical argument and let's say some sport is going to be dominated by transgender women, the question that one could then raise is whether that is important. Of course that is a related but also somehow separate discussion but one then would also need to figure out what the pros and cons are. OP has asked at some point whether sports should be stratified according to some performance parameters and while some sports are (e.g. by weight as mentioned), some are not (e.g. there is no height-based classifier in volleyball). So what then is fairness based on what kind of distinction do we perceive to be beneficial for a sport?

I think the answer is pretty much similar, there is no convincing evidence that the prosthetics provided an unfair advantage. And this suffers from the issue that others already pointed out for the other example, it is fictional. I.e. if much of the concerns and evidence are based on fictional accounts and speculations it is probably fair to say that at this point there is simply no good reason to be non-inclusive. While this may change at some point (say, if prosthetics are clearly providing performance enhancement) it may be time to re-open the discussion.

I think there is a delicate balance here that needs to be found. My first reading was similar to yours. However, there is an extensive context of exclusion which I initially did not consider. The big issue is that historically many exclusionary policies have been enacted base on such potential and potentially unfounded concerns. Many of these have deep impacts to this day. Examples include anti-drug or health policies. For example, it was believed that black folks feel less pain, have thicker skin and are more susceptible to addiction. These has resulted in systematic maltreatment based on these myths which apparently are still persistent among health care providers. So I think that before any measures are considered, one should actually find strong evidence for the need of action in the first place. After all, sports carry inherent risks as others have pointed out and as far as I can see there are no substantial studies indicating that inclusion of transgender folks significantly increases risk beyond the usual baseline. And I do agree that the invented scenarios are probably not a good basis to start of this discussion. However, I think the resulting discussion made it clear that OP provided the opinion in good faith. While the points about how problematic the starting might be are valid, further discussion of motivation might derail the topic needlessly.

If folks had taken it seriously and had been committed to social distancing the pandemic would have been over in Summer last year. The vaccine is needed because folks are still downplaying the risks of the disease, like you do.

So no you still not acknowledging that these technologies are unrelated and therefore carry different risks. So there appears no balls for a meaningful discussion here. Basically it is the same as trying to bin the risks of nuclear power to combustion engines. Also your desire to downplay the impact of b the disease is nothing short of ridiculous. Some of the worst flu seasons in the US killed about 60k folks, which was a huge deal for the medical community. COVID-19 killed 500k. It is more than obvious that the mortality rate means little if everyone is susceptible.

I think that is the crux of the matter. If everyone would make perfect decisions, it would not matter on which level things are done. But whether a centralized or decentralized approach works better depends on the likelihood of bad decisions along the way (and their respective impact) as well as structural limitations, such as e.g. level of coordination required. For disease outbreaks decentralized responses tend to be result in worse outcomes as a lot of coordination is required, ranging from building supply chains for e.g. testing and PPEs, travel restrictions (including between provinces) contact tracing and so on. Now, the big question here is whether that also applies to minimum wage.

It is going to be off-topic a bit, but I think COVID-19 is not a good case. While you could state that a decentralized approach has been good for Nova Scotia, the precise opposite can be said about, say Quebec. An actual comparison would need to be done between countries with decentralized vs centralized approaches and recent reviews from Canadian researchers (e.g. Hansen and Amelie, 2020 JMIR Pub Health Surveill). Showed that the decentralized Canadian approach resulted in worse outcomes compared to countries with a stronger, centralized strategy, even if they had worse infrastructure and other issues to deal with.