[cmsgop]

Thanks France !!!!!!

[Darksheare]

I'll leave the tinfoil stuff to the tinfoil dudes.
But, other than that, I'll do a Sci Fi twist to it:

Who would have thought that mankind would kill themselves in this fashion?
Perhaps I should back up a bit in my story. I'll just take a small, pained sip of my drink and recall the promise of a few years time passing us by:

I remember it well. I had been at an exposium on DNA and pro-viruses in the human genome listening to a Dr. Geraud speak on what these pro-viruses do. The doctor had quoted an expert in the field on a link between a certain pro-virus and some forms of schizophrenia. The researcher had found pro-virus dna in the blood of several patients, meaning that the pro-virus was active. But he didn't know how a small segment in the DNA could become active by itself like that, nor did he know the mechanisms behind it.
Then Dr. Geraud stunned the crowd. He stated that he had researched the human DNA and discovered what appeared to be bio-engineered sections in our own DNA. Silence followed for a few minutes as the throngs of scientists and reporters digested the implications of this. Then silence was followed by laughter and mockery.
Who would have thought it? Humans bio-engineered? Pure tripe! They all said so. But they were all so desperately wrong. I laugh now to think of it. But the doctor, the poor fool, let loose his next fusilade at the walls of intellectual superstition and let it be known that he'd identified a few of the 'useless' sections of our DNA as actually being useful when turned on. And he let it be known that he'd actually activated a few of those sections in some of his subjects in tests.
At first, the scientific community went insane with rage. A few dared to say that the doctor was playing God. Poor sick fools, they all denied His existence, and now they invoked Him as a King Arthur to the doctor's Mordred. But years passed, and research went on, as it always does. And the promise of a new era in medicine came to light. They found dormant DNA sections that could be used to repair unheard of damage to the body. They found out how to make the nerves fire faster, making boxing an even more difficult sport where the combatants already had a hard time seeing the movements of the other. But then, then they found a section of DNA that was even more complex than anything they'd found so far. And just as dormant as the others. They studied it for a year, and modeled the section, and postulated it's uses.
And then the folly of it all came to pass. They activated the section. Remember the viruses I mentioned earlier? Oh yes, yes there are worse things than ebola in the world. And mankind carried this one in his own genetic code. Schizophrenia was a warning to us. A warning not to activate the dormant sections in our DNA. Fools! All of us... And it was there all the time. And we did it to ourselves. The ones who engineered us didn't have to put us down. They merely had to wait and we'd do it ourselves, once we got smart enough to.
And we died. All of us. By the millions we dropped. Dead as the lake in Utah. And so I sit here and wait for my own end, with my drink and my time dripping away from me. I wait for them to come and see the end of what they started all that time ago when they engineered us for our own destruction.
I wish I knew what the doctor thought of al....

[dighton]

One way or another ....

[Brian S]

[the_doc]

Thanks for the article. It's always good for us to be reminded that some scientists are idiots.

[ClearCase_guy]

Cardiff Center for Astrobiology

Uh, do they actually have anything to study at this center? Or do they just pick stuff and say "Could be from outer space"? Ya know, those lemurs are pretty weird. Might be aliens.

[Ben Ficklin]

Wickramasinghe co-authored with the late Sir Fred Hoyle, who was his mentor, the book titled Diseases from Space. This was 20 plus years ago.

[Arkie2]

It hasn't been revealed but the real epicenter of the SARS epidemic is in Roswell, New Mexi--what! who are you! No, let go of me! NOOOO!

[goodseedhomeschool]

LOL now that is funny. I think it came from a science lab in Nevada.
It could also have come from some long dormant virus dug up by some anthropologist.
The very laughable idea that SARS came from outer space shows just how idiotic the "scientist of this world" really are. I guess we can expect nothing more from a bunch of quacks who think the world began with matter the size of a period on a page and exploded into all the universes we see now. Or how about the even funnier idea that dinosaurs turned to birds (punctuated equilibrium). I often wonder how much tax payers dollars go to these comedians.

[buffyt]

God sent it to us??????

[Gorzaloon]

In studies of air samples taken from 25 miles above the Earth, large numbers of micro-organisms were found, Wickramasinghe said, so it is possible SARS came from space.

Glad to see that education systems besides ours have collapsed. Microorganisms from the surface can stay aloft for a long time, brought by sandstorms, winds, etc.

The shorter wavelengths of UV (Below about 260 nm) are called the "Vacuum Ultraviolet" because they do not penetrate the atmosphere and are not found at the surface. They are wonderful for sterilizing clean rooms, etc. because _they kill pathogens_.

Near space is an inferno of radiation and free radicals...UV, cosmic rays, solar wind, ozone, and atomic oxygen. If SARS can only live a day or two exposed to sea level atmosphere, there is no possibility it arrived from space, and little possibility it would be opportunistic on mammals if it did.

What we have here is a paper desperate for stories, and possibly a drug-addled or mercury poisoned mental defective. The mere fact that this appeared in print, anywhere except _The Onion_, _Mad Magazine_, or _The Lampoon_ is a disgusting commentary on our times. Were the theory not propounded by an utter imbecile, I would call it a blasphemy against Science.

[ZULU]

"I think it is a possibility that SARS came from space. It is a very strong possibility," Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe told Reuters."

Professor Wickramasinghe is planning a field trip to study Yeti mating behavior in Nepal after he refines this theory.

How can a virus which requires an earthly host survive in space?? Get real Chandra.

[Exit148]

Look up in the sky!! It's an insect, it's a bug, -----it's Super SARS!

I shouldn't make fun of this horrible virus, but it seems to me that scientists seem so wary of what they say until they have proof. And then they come out with something like--- 'studies now show----'.

[aristeides]

Ping.

[goodseedhomeschool]

Art Bell fans would love this silly story

[#3Fan]

"I think it is completely nuts," said Dr Anne Bridgen, a molecular virologist at the University of Ulster. "It has a lipid (fatty) coat on the outside and it would tend to dry out in an atmosphere such as space," she told Reuters.

A "scientist" said this? It would "dry" in the "atmosphere" of space? It may freeze solid or disintegrate in the vacuum of space. Inaccurate choice of words at best.

[Consort]

It could have come from the melting polar ice after being dormant for eons, or from the many archeological digs in China and elsewhere. Maybe it's binary...two benign spores/bacteria/microbes/germs combining to make one lethal one.

[Larry Lucido]

Here are the culprits.

[liberalnot]

then why has china always been a generator of the flu?

[DB]

How about a little gene splicing gone wrong...

It isn't hard to believe that the Chinese are conducting these types of "experiments" in less than ideal conditions. We also know they are doing gene splicing experiments with live virus like so many others are doing, here included.