Viruses May Exist 'Elsewhere In the Universe,' Warns Scientist (theguardian.com) 124
Astrobiologist Paul Davies suggests viruses may form a vital part of ecosystems on other planets. The Guardian reports: "Viruses actually form part of the web of life," said Davies. "I would expect that if you've got microbial life on another planet, you're bound to have -- if it's going to be sustainable and sustained -- the full complexity and robustness that will go with being able to exchange genetic information." Viruses, said Davies, can be thought of as mobile, genetic elements. Indeed, a number of studies have suggested genetic material from viruses has been incorporated into the genomes of humans and other animals by a process known as horizontal gene transfer. "A friend of mine thinks most, but certainly a significant fraction, of the human genome is actually of viral origin," said Davies, whose new book, What's Eating the Universe?, was published last week.
According to Davies, while the importance of microbes to life is well known, the role of viruses is less widely appreciated. But he said if there is cellular life on other worlds, viruses or something similar, would probably exist to transfer genetic information between them. What's more, he said, it is unlikely alien life would be homogenous. "I don't think it's a matter that you go to some other planet, and there will just be you one type of microbe and it's perfectly happy. I think it's got to be a whole ecosystem," he added. While the thought of extraterrestrial viruses may seem alarming, Davies suggests there is no need for humans to panic. "The dangerous viruses are those that are very closely adapted to their hosts," he said. "If there is a truly alien virus, then chances are it wouldn't be remotely dangerous."
Davies [...] said it is also important should humans attempt to colonize another planet. "Most people think about, well, we would need to have very large spacecraft, and then sort of recycle things for the very long journey, and then all the technology you'd need to take," he said. "Actually, the toughest part of this problem is what would be the microbiology that you'd have to take -- it's no good just taking a few pigs and potatoes and things like that and hoping when you get to the other end it'll all be wonderful and self sustainable." While Covid has left most of us with a dim view of viruses, Davies said they are not all bad. "In fact, mostly, they're good," he said. [A]s Davies notes, a significant fraction of the human genome may be remnants of ancient viruses. "We hear about the microbiome inside us, and there's a planetary microbiome," said Davies. But, he argues there is also a human and planetaryvirome, with viruses playing a fundamental role in nature. "I think without viruses, there may be no sustained life on planet Earth," he said.
According to Davies, while the importance of microbes to life is well known, the role of viruses is less widely appreciated. But he said if there is cellular life on other worlds, viruses or something similar, would probably exist to transfer genetic information between them. What's more, he said, it is unlikely alien life would be homogenous. "I don't think it's a matter that you go to some other planet, and there will just be you one type of microbe and it's perfectly happy. I think it's got to be a whole ecosystem," he added. While the thought of extraterrestrial viruses may seem alarming, Davies suggests there is no need for humans to panic. "The dangerous viruses are those that are very closely adapted to their hosts," he said. "If there is a truly alien virus, then chances are it wouldn't be remotely dangerous."
Davies [...] said it is also important should humans attempt to colonize another planet. "Most people think about, well, we would need to have very large spacecraft, and then sort of recycle things for the very long journey, and then all the technology you'd need to take," he said. "Actually, the toughest part of this problem is what would be the microbiology that you'd have to take -- it's no good just taking a few pigs and potatoes and things like that and hoping when you get to the other end it'll all be wonderful and self sustainable." While Covid has left most of us with a dim view of viruses, Davies said they are not all bad. "In fact, mostly, they're good," he said. [A]s Davies notes, a significant fraction of the human genome may be remnants of ancient viruses. "We hear about the microbiome inside us, and there's a planetary microbiome," said Davies. But, he argues there is also a human and planetaryvirome, with viruses playing a fundamental role in nature. "I think without viruses, there may be no sustained life on planet Earth," he said.
Speculation (Score:2)
Well, there might be a hot Orion slave girls on the planet Verex III .. but we haven't any evidence, do we?
Re: Speculation (Score:3)
A slave girls? They're into conjoined twins there?
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Yes, who are we to judge an alien culture?
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I think that misses the point, but Funny Comment(tm) anyway.
We have to be extremely naïve to believe that living things only exist on earth, and that sending a space craft to Mars won't bring back something nasty, even if it's just earth biological matter that picked up some new tricks by being exposed to another atmosphere.
I mean, look at how fast Covid evolving because the plague-rats won't get vaccinated.
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While this is not an argument constructed to defend the antivaxxers, the petri dish of viral mutation that they devolve into pales in comparison to that of the under vaccinated developing world... who by the billions simply can't get the vaccinations that spoiled first worlders are spurning.
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Give the antivaxxers a break. They have studied long and hard to become epidemiologists and thus are in a position to tell us all to eat Covid and Die.
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You mean because the plague-rats are getting vaccinated, thus putting a new evolutionary pressure on a hyperevolutionary virus, selecting for strains that are vaccine-immune.
That's how selective mutation works in the real world, as opposed to in some politician's head, anyway.
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selecting for strains that are vaccine-immune.
That is not how vaccines work.
It is not an antibiotic.
Go back to school, idiot.
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If vaccines do not create immunity, which is a form of anti-viral, then what good are they?
No, it is precisely that immunity is a form of anti-viral that the vaccines work, and thus, change the environment from the point of view of the virus.
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Beings on other planets open mind-boggling religious conundrums. Did they have their own Jesus? Is Mohammed the last prophet or just one of many, they cannot all be synced to his death? Is the Universe filled with Prosperity Preachers? If so, isn't that a dead giveaway that G-d hates everyone?
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We have several hundred located and identified samples of Martian rock in meteorite collections across the Earth. Some - such as the ALH-yyXXX meteorites have been on Earth for a few hundred thousand years ; most are younger (and succumb to faster weathering when not stored in a frigid desert), but one can safely infer that there are millions of such specimens laying on the Earth's near-surface, and about 3 times that laying on seabeds.
If Mars h
Orion Slave Girls have Orion-Aids, Orion- .. (Score:2)
Genital-Herpes, -Dripper, -Gonorrea
Protect yourself with Herpexia:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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I thought we've known this for quite some time. Didn't we find alien viruses on a meteoroid in Antarctica some time back?
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The debate over those structures was fairly long, but most people weren't convinced by the claim that they represented microfossils of Martian life. But it did do a lot for persuading NASA to go back to Mars with a lot more life-hunting technology.
Even then, the claim was that microfossils have been found, not intact - let alone revivable, or "culturable", life forms.
Explains a lot of our behaviour (Score:5, Insightful)
"A friend of mine thinks most, but certainly a significant fraction, of the human genome is actually of viral origin,"
I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species and I realized that you're not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You're a plague and we are the cure.
--Agent Smith, The Matrix
Re:Explains a lot of our behaviour (Score:4, Insightful)
"Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium .. "
That's 100% false. ALL animals reproduce and eat as much as they can .. were it not for predators or other constraints they'd strip the land bare. Put a male and female rabbit in a fenced-in backyard and come back a couple years later.
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You do understand that the quote is from an action movie, not a documentary, right?
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You're telling me Neo doesn't really exist?
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Of course I exist, the story was blown way, way out of proportion, though.
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There is no spoon either.
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Some of us have a hard time resisting the urge to correct misinformation when we see it online, regardless of the context in which it is presented.
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Not nearly as finite as they first appear.
If we all lived like subsistence farmers in Bangladesh, we could support a population of 80 billion easily.
Re: Explains a lot of our behaviour (Score:2)
Given that all animals do that, including predators, it follows you get a natural dynamic equilibrium - - provided there's sufficient diversity.
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But it's not because they deliberately do it. Besides, if we go by that standard we follow that too.
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You are correct, it's not deliberate.
The problem with humans is the lack of diversity. If there were five homonin species, roughly equal in intelligence and ability, there'd be a lot less risk to the environment.
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All animals reproducing and eating as much as they can- that's call equilibrium.
The balance is maintained much like the balance of power in a geopolitical status quo.
Humans didn't evolve to break this equilibrium, we developed technology that allowed it.
But the fact is- due to that technological advancement, we no longer form equilibrium with our environment, unless we choose to. Which of course- we don't.
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Humans didn't evolve to break this equilibrium, we developed technology that allowed it.
One might argue that we evolved big brains and delicate hands which enabled that. The only other animals close to where we are in ability have the same things, they're all primates. They are all stronger than we are pound for pound, so they don't have to get by on just brains like we do. Everything is stronger, faster, and has better senses than we do so we have no other choice to get ahead but thinking up clever solutions to dangerous problems.
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For the vast majority of the existence of the human species, we were in equilibrium with our environment, because there were things that still kept our population in check.
It took a quarter of a million years for us to turn into an invasive weed.
I think the evidence better supports that mankind's capacity for language (and thus the generational transference of knowledge) was the key, but there's no way evolution could have known just how powerful it could
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You suggest that sealing a mating pair of rabbits in a garden would result in the rabbits breeding until the land area they occupied would be unable to sustain the population. As you have expressed it, that is likely true. (I haven't tried this, so I don't know for certain).
But the model you ask us to consider is not an accurate reflection of a "real-world" environment, because it doesn'
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Once again, I'll use a very simple model to illustrate my take-away from that explanation.
Suppose you have a planet that harbors life and on which that population of life includes two very prevalent species of plant. One species thrives in hot weather; it does this by growing white flower petals that are reflective and which radiate heat
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The quote was: "Every mammal [except humans] on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium .."
The word "instinctively" should not be glossed over, because it is the most important part of that statement. The statement was implying that animals inherently resolve to achieve the equilibrium rather than simply become a victim of it. The intent of the statement was to convey that animals were morally superior to humans because humans just try to consume all the resources with no regard to conseque
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Yep. And WE are part of that equilibrium - we call it "rabbit season"....
Note that humans are, for the most part, the top of the food chain except where limited by law. Yeah, forbidding people from carrying guns while walking in Yellowstone moves us down a notch on the local food chain
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The original hypothesis, which is that non-human mammals would SEEK an equilibrium rather than abuse the resources is flawed. If it was correct, the Lionfish (ok, its not a mammal but close enough) would be more responsible and not eat up its prey. We are seeing that with pythons (granted they are not mammals) in the everglades eliminating all small mammals. Ok, a mammal example .. rabbits in Australia.
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Granted its a movie quote. Lets put that aside as its an interesting sort of claim.
There is an equilibrium that generally emerges in most ecosystems. Its a function of natural selection, if no equilibrium forms, the conditions end up becoming hostile to the animal.
The truth is, humans are just animals and given the right circumstances we find equilibrium too. Aborginal Australians caused environmental havoc when they arived some 60-80,000 years ago. But eventually, after kind of denuding most of the country
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It'll probably work out similarly to your Australia example. There will be some kind of equilibrium, but in all likelihood it won't be pretty.
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I would expect our "equilibrium" moment will arrive when either we figure out a way to EMP the entire planet at once, or the Sun takes care of it for us. If every non-hardened, non-radiation shielded system, chip, control module, router, etc. gets fried all at once, imagine the fun as trade stops, airplanes fall from the sky, and all the chipped up cars and trucks fail at the same moment. And all us people being laughed at for being in flyover country are the only ones with access to enough food to sort o
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We've h
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In fact arguably, so did humans everywhere else.
In fact arguably, so did humans almost nowhere else. The residents of what is now North America managed it until some other people showed up and fucked it all up. But it's been argued that Europe would now be a desert if not for the black plague slowing deforestation until humans could advance to the point that it became obvious that it was a mistake. Certainly the Easter Islanders didn't manage to sustainably manage their resources.
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Personally I don't know any other animal that will ruin your land as efficiently as chicken if you don't keep their numbers in check.
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Actually, do the wild predecessors of chickens naturally eat seeds? Or are they actually near-enough carnivores, specifically insectivores? And chicken
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I know that the original idea was to use the humans as 'processing power' which apparently was expected to be too cerebral for the target audience. But still we got human batteries. And I also know that there's some fans who want to explain it away with the character who
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Even those rabbits will come to an equilibrium. Eventually they will breed to the point where their food source cannot meet the demand they are putting on it. All of the rabbits will die of starvation and an equilibrium of zero rabbits will be achieved. The same will eventually happen to the human species as well unless we find a way to achieve some other level of equilibrium.
The quote is a bit misleading though since even viruses eventually find an equilibrium of some sort.
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Correct. Goats, for instance, built the Sahara.
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A popular enough trope. But while the Sahara was forming (and driving the predecessors of the Egyptians into the Nile valley), goats and their close cousins sheep were probably still skittering around in the mountains of Anatolia, just starting to be domesticated.
You'd probably be less inaccurate saying that goats destroyed the Roman provinces of Carthage and Libya, and brought the Sahara several hundred miles closer to the southern coast of "Our Sea" (the Mediterranean). But
Re:Explains a lot of our behaviour (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually that quote annoyed me in the movie. It's nonsense. What agent Smith observes is a plague. Could just as well be a plague of weeds or rabbits or other fast replicators.
what separates a virus is only its lack of autonomy. A cell has its own metabolism and can replicate. A virus is missing parts , it needs a full cell to replicate.You could imagine intermediate lifeforms between virus and full cell. So Paul Davies' observation is pretty trivial.
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To be fair, very few humans today could survive in the wild with no modern tools (ie no guns, knives or anything manufacturered) - we need our technology and agriculture just like a virus needs its host.
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That is not 'being fair'. A virus is inert from the moment it leaves a cell to the moment it sticks to another cell.That is -roughly- why it gets a different name from lifeforms in general. If Davies mentions viruses as opposed to lifeforms in general it is because he wants to focus on what sets them apart. If Agent Smith calls humanity a virus he does the same, as some technical classification. But it is sloppy.
When gSmithets to the point and describes us us as a pest which overwhelms the system, as a di
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It happened in the past ; there's no good reason that it can't also be happening in the present as well.
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To be fair, very few humans today could survive in the wild with no modern tools (ie no guns, knives or anything manufacturered) - we need our technology and agriculture just like a virus needs its host.
Take an ant or a bee outside of its colony and see how long they survive.
Take a beaver outside of its lodge in the middle of winter and see what happens, or even take a wolf away from its pack [iflscience.com].
Humans are hardly unusual in being ill-suited to survive on their own when randomly inserted into an area of wilderness.
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There are plenty of lone bees, google it and quite a few lone wolves though admittedly they tend to die young. And yes, if you put any animal outside in a cold winter plenty will die of exposure, that doesn't mean they can't survive in the wild with just their physical bodies unlike us. Put a human or even group of humans alone in the wild with zero tools and even if they find water it might make them ill due to our lousy immune system and will probably quickly starve.
Re: Explains a lot of our behaviour (Score:2)
You found it totally credible that people hooked up to computer with a machine interface would die if the computer would simulate an event that would cause their digital deaths..? And that in the development of such technology, no nerd ever made an escape such as, if you click yo
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Size has got nothing to do with it. She said. You could see a virus as a part of a cell which becomes detached and is dead until it reattaches to a cell. It does not matter how large it is or whether the cell benefits. What matters is the virus lacks the cogs and springs that makes a cell work.
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Don't fucking demand people read whatever link you care to provide. Start by explaining why they should.
Re:Explains a lot of our behaviour (Score:4, Informative)
Why this warning? (Score:2)
a) It is obvious
b) Unless this "alien life" is a _very_ close match, there is no risk.
So, pointing this out, ok, but "warning"? Somebody wants to sell something here.
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To support your point, think about how bat coronaviruses mostly didn't infect humans, although humans and bats are very similar (compared to aliens). It took a mutation for it to make the jump to humans (and probably more than one mutation).
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Exactly.
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Our bodies also host a lot of helpful viruses as well, that kill and destroy harmful bacteria that is in our body, however the virus best evolutionary interest is to not infect us.
However single cells that evolved on different planets are probably more like and compatible with cells on earth, but it would probably need some good exposure from Earth based cells for Extraterrestrial viruses for it to adapt to our DNA.
Having this a Warning is defiantly click bait. As it is just a hypothesis without any ways t
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However single cells that evolved on different planets are probably more like and compatible with cells on earth
I don't know if that's really true. Throughout history, we've had two different structures as building blocks for building things in the body (amino acids and nucleotides). There is no particular reason that these are the only two ways to build things, it's likely that an alien virus would be something completely different.
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That is why I stated "probably" I don't know if that is really true. However our life is from abundant chemicals, that form a particular chemical reaction, as well on earth we don't have much evidence of an other method. While I expect on really hot or really cold environments their could be different chemicals that can create that duplication property, however they will either be with more rare or volatile chemicals.
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No, you didn't understand. Even from the same chemicals, there are many ways to build a body. That is why bat coronaviruses mostly didn't infect humans, although humans and bats are very similar. Consider fish and humans - getting a virus from a fish is even rarer. If you're not actually related to the animal, then there will be many differences.
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Stop giving them ideas.
"them" being fish-fondlers.
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Four.
AAs, the five nucleotides, plus the wide variety of fatty acids which are vital components of most cell walls, and the complex variety of carbohydrates that serve as both structural materials (celluloses and lignins) and energy storage materials (starches, sugars).
You could make an argument that the sterane polycyclic hydrocarbon-with a bit of fatty acid sidechainin
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In 2008, the spread
Re: Why this warning? (Score:2)
Well, after the first car in space got both a speeding ticket and a littering fine from the Vogon transport department, there has been an increased risk of aliens inserting genes from their own viruses into those on Earth to wipe out annoying humans.
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Yes, we should be much more worried about alien bacteria. They are likely to use chemical tricks to devour their prey that our bodies don't have defenses for. It's the real "War of the Worlds" threat.
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b) Unless this "alien life" is a _very_ close match, there is no risk.
It only has to be similar enough to survive (and replicate) in our bodies and be capable of interacting with anything in them to potentially cause a problem. An alien virus might conceivably interfere with our physical operation in some way that we've never even seen before.
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It only has to be similar enough to survive (and replicate) in our bodies and be capable of interacting with anything in them to potentially cause a problem.
And that would mean it is based on the same DNA, same RNA and uses the same mRNA mechanisms:
extremely unlikely.
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b) Unless this "alien life" is a _very_ close match, there is no risk.
It only has to be similar enough to survive (and replicate) in our bodies and be capable of interacting with anything in them to potentially cause a problem. An alien virus might conceivably interfere with our physical operation in some way that we've never even seen before.
You are right to require even more than I did. What you describe would be an "exceptionally high" level of similarity.
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c) There currently isn't any real evidence that there is life outside of Earth (Microscopic or otherwise). I expect that there is life outside of earth, but I have no evidence other than my own sense of humility that the Earth cannot be that special in a universe so vast. At best we got from Mars some things that might be a byproduct or a microorganism.
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c) There currently isn't any real evidence that there is life outside of Earth (Microscopic or otherwise). I expect that there is life outside of earth, but I have no evidence other than my own sense of humility that the Earth cannot be that special in a universe so vast. At best we got from Mars some things that might be a byproduct or a microorganism.
True. As long as we have zero clue how life comes to be, we have no basis for even an estimate. Sure, plain live (no intelligence, consciousness, etc.) _seems_ to be an essentially physical/chemical thing, but we cannot be sure. It would require creating it from scratch to be sure and nobody has ever even come close to that so far. And even if it is a purely physical/chemical thing, the probabilities of it arising by accident can be such that there still is no other life in this universe.
Hence the case wher
Good Point (Score:5, Interesting)
**SPOILER WARNING!!** (Doesn't significantly affect the plot, though)
"Actually, the toughest part of this problem is what would be the microbiology that you'd have to take -- it's no good just taking a few pigs and potatoes and things like that and hoping when you get to the other end it'll all be wonderful and self sustainable."
In the recent novel Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson, they end up with unexpected nutrient imbalances on the ship because the microbes evolve at a different rate than the other occupants.
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In the recent novel Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson
This book totally soured me on Kim Stanley Robinson.
I mean, they imply that the ship's occupants develop severe developmental disabilities and brain damage on the flight in. But putting people down on the planet in large numbers before testing it for pathogens on animals? That's just too stoopid.
Or the whole "flight back" sequence that was totally unrealistic and filled with moar stoopid.
because the microbes evolve at a different rate than the other occupants.
That's ALREADY true. Microbes evolve at the rate that is millions of times faster than humans.
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In the recent novel Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson
This book totally soured me on Kim Stanley Robinson.
Then you weren't a fan in the first place. It isn't like you'd read his other books first. He's a brilliant writer. If you say it isn't your style of story, OK. He does write a wide variety of different types of story, he's not a genre author, so you're perhaps an idiot to apply that judgement to the writer instead of the book, but that's just opinion so you're welcome to it.
But the idea it is "stupid and unrealistic" just means you're an idiot who is full of himself, and perhaps didn't think deeply enough
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Then you weren't a fan in the first place. It isn't like you'd read his other books first. He's a brilliant writer.
He's a science fantasy hack with zero knowledge of physics, who thinks that he's qualified to make great proclamations about science.
Nobody said it wasn't already true. You're an idiot if you can't see how it is more true in an isolated environment.
What do you mean by "more true"? Bacteria don't magically evolve superpowers if populations are isolated (which happens all the time in nature).
But Kim Stanley Robinson, in addition to being a popular author, is also a famous academic
He's a fucking English PhD who basically failed his high school physics. And it shows. He just doesn't understand numbers at all.
E.g. the ship in Aurora would weigh billions of tons, and it effortlessly accelerates under its own powe
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That's why I find it funny when nerds complain when science FICTION isn't "realistic". If you want realistic, read a text book. FICTION requires some liberties to be taken so
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That's why I find it funny when nerds complain when science FICTION isn't "realistic"
Science fiction needs to be realistic (apart from the fictional elements), otherwise you're writing fantasy. But even a good fantasy must be internally consistent. E.g. don't make stoopid mistakes like not testing the planet environment on animals before shipping down colonists in large numbers.
And there's nothing wrong with fantasy per se. I love good fantasy. But then KSR starts pushing his bad science to drive his pseudo-ecological nonsense, implying that it's actually hard science. And _that_ is under
"Warns scientist". (Score:5, Insightful)
Homogenous (Score:2)
"I don't think it's a matter that you go to some other planet, and there will just be you one type of microbe and it's perfectly happy. I think it's got to be a whole ecosystem,"
That's making a huge assumption that the alien life is based on our DNA or something as equally fragile. It is possible other forms of life could have genetic material stored in a manner that is far more resilient. It would mean evolution, cancer, etc, could not occur.
Perhaps the alien life lives in an environment far more homogenous (a gas planet, for example) where, once it reached a certain point, it became dominant and wiped out all other life and is the only form left. Of course it would be a primit
Viruses require hosts (Score:3)
Viruses aren't viable on their own, they require a host to survive. If there are viruses, there will be hosts.
So if there are viruses elsewhere, there is also life elsewhere.
Pink elephants with wings (Score:2)
Yeah, pink elephants with wings and crab claws might exist elsewhere in the universe too. How is this something that needs to be said?
Stupid and ridiculous (Score:3)
Bringing back life forms that could somehow feed, replicate and compete on earth would be the main risk, not alien virus infecting any earth life. I mean, this demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding what a virus is and how it works.
the mass media finds an issue (Score:2)
Duh. (Score:2)
Elsewhere In the Universe? (Score:2)
They are even in places where no sun shines, according to doctors.
The chances are ..... (Score:2)
The chances that there are viruses "out there" are 50/50; either they exist, or they don't. Lacking ANY data either way, we can't honestly say more.
Huh? (Score:2)
I'm desperately trying to figure out why anyone cares about what he's saying.
NASA has been concerned about bacteriological contamination since before the first Apollo astronauts launched. "Oh noe, there might be space viruses"...sir, we've already been thinking about that for 50 years.
What's next, some scientist announces that cigarettes maybe addictive and harmful?
Someone Point This Guy To The Expanse Series. (Score:2)
Why is wild speculation news? (Score:2)
The idea that there is extraterrestrial DNA and/or RNA that is compatible with our genome is about as likely as me hitting all major lotteries in the same week. The odds that it could get here even if it did exist is incredibly far fetched. For both to occur, well maybe in a dystopian fantasy.
One thing at a time, please! (Score:2)
Seriously, are the scientists in TFA trolling for research funding or something?
Welcome (Score:2)
I saw Expanse too, great show, better books! (Score:2)
Obvious (Score:2)
The claims seem obvious, what am I missing?