What happened? You gave up on arguing? So are you admitting I’m right, or are you going to make an excuse like “ONLY I CAN UNDERSTAND MY ARGUMENT!!!”?
And it’s really not pointless, how can you say we dont learn anything from it. Dont you find it a little useful that we can make a cactus grow hair instead of spikes? Like someone said, we could probably make a human grow spikes instead of hair.
And if we can do something that simple, it makes you wonder what else we could.
Notice the “other than” part of that.
You must’ve posted just a split-second before me, because that post of yours before my last wasn’t there when I typed mine.
Now, onto finishing this up.
I made it up? So I guess my biology teacher, who has a PhD on the damn subject, was wrong.
Tell you what. You bring me proof that companies are researching smallpox, and I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.
Uh, first, I had no idea you meant 100 years ago. Look at your post. Tell me if I could interpret 100 years ago out of it.
Next, well, Modern medicine was started about 100 years ago. Which means: 2008-100=1908. So 1917, almost 10 years under that line, is relevant.
Once again, I never said it was unstoppable. Not once. But being a different strain, we would need a new vaccine for it, and if the virus was deadly, it could kill several people before that vaccine reached the general public.
Ok, do you know what penicillin even does? It stops infection. The flu is not passed through infection, obviously, so penicillin wouldn’t even matter.
Did I ever reference how it spread? If so, give me proof. I never said it was airborne. I said it was a retrovirus that mutates so quick our immune system can’t keep up.
I never once said a single word about it spreading. I know how it gets spread. It’s obvious, considering it’s a sexually transmitted disease.
Wow…if it is unknown, we would have no way to detect it. It would escape into the populous quite easily, and could cause an epidemic.
Fail. That isn’t proof gravity exists. That’s proof that the theory of gravity is correct 100% of the time. There is no way to determine if there’s some force holding us to the planet. There is only the theory of gravity, which is correct 100% of the time. That doesn’t make it proof.
Wrong again. As far as the movie told us, animals can only be infected by contact. A scratch or something, but if the infected were eating them, then the infected animal would die anyway.
It’s obvious that the infected weren’t weakened. They would only die by sunlight, natural causes, or murder. They had enhanced strength, as displayed at the end of the movie. It also displayed that they can move quite fast.
I was saying in the event that these radicals went out and started attacking or shooting people. I’m pretty sure D.C. would have a hard time rounding up people from every corner of the U.S., considering that I see radicals all the time.
You’re right, I can’t deny that, but my point is that you said ages ago, and still do. And considering how long Britain has been around, we pale in comparison to it’s age. 240 years is not ages. That’s about 3 people’s combined standard life expectancy.
Uh…you said that our principles our country was founded on don’t matter. Right here:
Thus, by saying that, you were then saying that Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness were pointless. I simply elaborated on that.
I’m not even going to address your points about arguing, because it’s obvious that it doesn’t mean anything.
Also, I would suggest listening to admins. They tend to, you know, know stuff.
It doesnt make a difference, you still said “little or no” which I beleive is wrong.
I was mocking the fact that you said that small facilities were studying deadly viruses, yet you said that smallpox is contained in facilities. Smallpox was just an example to show you how you contradicted yourself…which you did.
I dont get what your saying, but I know I’m right.
You said that if the government couldn’t control an outbreak a hundred years ago, that they couldn’t do so now.
I said the amount of medicine we’ve developed in the last years is why you cant compare a hundred years ago to now.
You basically said that our medicine technology now, and back then is the same…which couldn’t be more wrong.
No, my point is that there’s there’s no difference between impossible and almost impossible.
And sure, several people? That’s nothing compared to the plagues in europe. Even those took WEEKS to kill. We could distribute a cure/vaccine quickly and efficiently, and even then, we could probably develop one if we didnt have one that fast.
You completely missed my point. When I said we didn’t even have penicilin back then, I’m saying that back then we didn’t even have penicilin, the most basic of our bacteria cures. How much we’ve advanced is what I’m saying, but somehow, you didn’t see that. Instead, you read it in a way that you thought you could get at me.
Anyway, I already said that comparing 100 years ago to today is stupid, there’s no comparison in medical technology.
You did, you used it along an Airborne virus as an example, saying that if it mutated it could kill us all.
edit:
Here we go, you compared AIDS to the flu, an airborne virus.
So what if AIDS mutates, it doesnt spread the same way.
How would we have no way to detect a virus? We can see pieces of godamn atoms, so no, there’s no such thing as a virus we can’t see. And since you said the virus/byproduct would have escaped from a lab, we would have seen the byproduct/virus created, so we WOULD know about it.
Dude, you’re absolutely wrong. You obviously don’t know what proof is then. What the HELL do you mean “there’s no way to determine if theres some force holding us to the planet”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity
He only said Dogs, not all animals, so you can’t prove that.
I never said that, you need to read. I said that there’s no possible way that a virus could do that to people. For starters, Viruses are parasites, not symbiotic.
How the fuck could a virus kill 90% of the population, then strengthen the other 9%??? Fantasy.
Yeah, you did, and I said that the swat team would arrest them swiftly.
And I’m sure you don’t see radicals shooting people. That’s the difference. It’s fine to wear a KKK hood, it isn’t fine to shoot people. They’d OBVIOUSLY only round up violent radicals.
When I said Ages ago, It was relative to how recent modern medicine is.
And britain doesn’t have anything to do with this.
Well that obviously wasnt to be interpreted LITERALLY. How the hell would I mean that Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are pointless? I simply meant that the government breaks those rules all the time, so they technically arent correct.
That’s called giving up…when your points suck.
Reread my statement. The entire thing, not just two words. I said other than knowing “We can do such and such.”
It’s an example that isn’t correct. I never said Smallpox was studied, I said it was contained. There’s a difference.
Ok, first we would have to attain the strain of virus, which would take about a week. Then, we would have to mass produce that strain in cell cultures, which would take anywhere from a week to a couple of months. Finally, we would have to kill all that viral bacteria and release that dead virus to the general public, which in order for it to reach everybody, that would take about two weeks, give or take a few days. More than enough time for a lethal virus to infect and kill several people.
Incorrect, I read it the way you typed it.
Furthermore, you keep saying I can’t word my arguments, and then you go and word an argument in such a way that has me telling you the same thing.
I used it along an airborne virus so I could give you two types of retroviruses. Airborne and Contact.
Each virus in existence has it’s own distinct shape. If a new virus were to be produced, it would be different enough from it’s original that we wouldn’t even consider it harmful. This would allow it to get by quarantine, and infect the population. Also, what if the virus was immune to all of our ways of killing a virus? Then it would get by with nary a backwards glance, even if they quarantined the host.
I never compared the two. I simply showed you two different types of retroviruses.
I know it doesn’t spread the same way. I’m not an idiot.
I love it how your link refers to gravity as a theory. 
I know I can’t prove that. I even addressed it. But as far as we can tell from information given from the movie, that’s all we can assume.
Let me put it this way. I have about as much proof saying that they can’t be infected from the airborne form as you do saying they can.
I didn’t say I saw them shoot people. I said I saw them. But, if the Vatican were to say “kill!” I doubt those radicals would hesitate to think about what the pope just asked them to do.
Well, now I know that. The way you said it, there was no way for me to know the two were connected.
No, it’s called listening to an Admin when they tell you to do something. Perhaps you should follow suit.
There are more than 8 million people in New York City alone. I don’t know where either of you two have been, but there are 6.6 billion people on the planet. 
You do need evidence for science, else it isn’t science. Proof, on the other hand, you can’t get, so no, you can’t prove theories to be true. Also, you can’t think up a theory on the spot; that would be a hypothesis. Read up on the scientific method, as there are precise definitions for the terms being confused here.
As I was saying earlier, this is the internet. It doesn’t take much effort to get accurate information quickly, so I don’t see why this argument should be fueled by guessing. Also, the lack of common knowledge and general education is beginning to scare me.
STOP the flaming. You’re each splitting the posts into a hundred bits and pieces and angrily ripping each sentence apart, followed by pure insults and intimidation.
If your points are good enough, there’s no need for telling the other to rethink their case, especially so harshly. If you present those points briefly but effectively, there’s no need to point out every little detail wrong with what the other has said. If they’re completely and totally wrong, give them a link and tell them to read up. There’s NO NEED to be so furious and harsh.
Really, keep a cool head, present your main points, back those points up, and stay simple.
Sorry Troid.
Oh, and I knew that you can’t just make up a theory. I was just simplifying it so as to save room and prevent wordy posts, but I guess I failed in that anyway… 
I apologize troid as well as to s123i68.
I’d just like to say that I dont think it’s possible to recreate only a few paragraphs in this arguement. We’ve already isolated the main points, let’s just finish those.
No, you definetly didn’t.
And no more “re-read my statement” stuff. It just dodges the issue and makes me do work when you should be supporting the claim yourself. Either explain it, or give it up, I dont tell you to go back and re-read, though I repeat myself all the time.
It’s an “example”, so it’s techincally it is correct. And I never said what YOU said, I said that smallpox was studied, because I know it is.
Did you even read ANY of my last post? I just got done explaining how we’d ALREADY HAVE THE VIRUS in captivity.
Jesus, pay attention.
No, the way I typed it was fine, since that was the second time I had to say it, and you completely ignored it the first time.
You can TELL me the same thing, but it doesn’t mean your right. You could easily pretend you didn’t understand my argument just to get at me, but I see NO way you could misinterpret that.
How old are you anyway?
Why? Contact viruses are completely unrelated to this argument, ESPECIALLY sexual transmitted ones, so don’t give that excuse. Just admit you made an irrelevant point.
Now you’re just making shit up. We test EVERYTHING, and incinerate everything after we’re done. So even if we didn’t realize a compound was dangerous, it would be immediately destroyed.
Do you even know lab procedure? You keep making assumptions, that just because you can’t distinguish viruses, that scientists can’t either. You’re severely underestimating the people in these facilities. They aren’t about to let ANYTHING outside of the labs, not even regular bacteria. They COMPLETELY sterilize you, and scan you to make sure there are no bacteria on you period (or at least nothing that shouldn’t be expecteD).
And please dont make an excuse about “well what if we dont see it?”. A virus isn’t suddenly going to take a form that we wont recognize.
You did compare the two, read your own writing, that’s definetly a comparison.
But that’s a PROVEN theory, unlike your spinal column theory which you made up as troid pointed out.
Oh well, it doesnt make a difference, since like I said, the concept of the movie is impossible anyway. And please dont ask me how, because I’ve explained it at least 4 times.
Sarcasm.
You keep changing your mind after you say things.
First you said how the radicals were going to shoot people, and that you see radicals all the time.
Then I said how they wouldn’t go shoot people in public.
I NEVER Said you said you saw them shoot anyone, I said that nobody in their right mind will start shooting people randomly if they actually want to accomplish something like that. If your objective is to kill certain people, then there’s obviously going to be method to it, and it wouldn’t very well even that way.
Those radicals are overseas, with the pope. People in america want peace, a couple supporters of the pope arent going to suddenly wage war on the country.
Regardless, the argument here has been about Genocide, and I’ve already proved that genocide of non christian believers wont happen.
How old are you? I don’t see anyway you could interpret that literally.
No offense, but you sound like a 12-13 year old ish.
Troid didn’t tell us to stop arguing. He told us to put the points together, but that would kill many aspects of the conversation, and many points would go unadressed. It’s not efficient to try and argue it all at once.
Alright. If that’s the way you see it, I’m not stopping you. Just keep the offtopicness and flaming down.
AH! Curses! Troid beat me to the population error! I was going to present that interesting tidbit of factual data! Eh, it is irrelevant now.
First, on topic with the cactus thing…cool? Woohoo? A cactus with human hair…that’s vaguely disturbing. Course, it’s really not that surprising that something like that is possible, considering that scientists have already messed with pigs genes enough to get some of them to glow in the dark, an invaluable ability.
Second: Redhalberd and S123i68…wow. Just wow.
Third…sorry, I have to say wow again. Wow again.
Fourth…you two have had one of the worst arguments I have ever read in a while. Half of your sentences make little to no sense, and a large percentage of your “facts” come from movies and potentially thick air.
Fifth, on addressing the whole potentially earth-shattering, virus creating argument that was brought up earlier about why messing with genes is bad…if there is a likelihood for some extremely negative consequences, than isn’t there also one for extremely positive one, like some kind of cure for AIDS, or a bizarre anti-virus that extends life spans? Seriously, genetic research can do good things occasionally.
(P.S. There are five…now four, people in the world who can defeat me. One of them just exploded from an excess of awesomeness.)
Excellent point. In fact, that’s what I was trying to say for such a long time, but I guess I never got around to it. But I’m primarily a pessimist, and thus, I tend to lean towards “Glass half-empty” area.
Red, I appreciate the apology, and accept it, and offer the same apology to you.
Unfortunately, that’s not why I bring it up. I bring it up simply because you get done apologizing and go back to insults. That, I find offensive.
Now, onto my main points.
I most certainly did. Here it is in it’s original format:
Right there, in the middle.
Correct, you never said what I said, but at one point you did say I contradicted myself, even though you were the one pointing smallpox out.
That’s where you’re wrong. The virus would be a new strain of retrovirus, which could potentially escape if given the right conditions. It’s all in the context. My side of the issue deals with worse-case scenarios, while your side of the issue deals with the practical, common-day scenario. So, technically, we’re both right…
The exact same thing applies to you. For all I know, you could be lying about understanding my argument.
No, they’re not irrelevant. At all. Contact viruses are just as much of a virus as any other one. For instance, let’s say someone carries a mutated form of AIDS in them that turns into a truly deadly killer (like it attacks the nervous system or something). Let’s say this person doesn’t know or care that they have AIDS. So they have sex with someone. Then that person has sex with someone, and so on and so forth. Pretty soon, you could have a deadly form of AIDS that’s infected over a thousand people. Contact retroviruses are just as relevant as airborne ones.
Tell me, where did I say I could identify viruses? I assumed you knew I meant IF scientists couldn’t identify a virus. Then we’re in some pretty deep shit. Not all labs follow the same procedure. They do differ. You can’t just take one procedure and slap it on all things that would use that procedure. That’s stereotyping.
Now, say that someone forgets to follow procedure? Say it’s a one-man lab (of which there are), and he just forgets. An honest mistake, but now maybe he’s released a new type of Anthrax on the world.
That’s a worse case scenario, but as I stated earlier, that’s what I’m focused on.
Gravity is not a proven theory. It says it right Here.
Not to mention that’s the article you brought to my attention. It never once says gravity is proven. So that’s merely an assumption that gravity is proven.
Did you not understand me when I said “I live in America” and “I see radicals all the time” because I’m pretty sure that anyone can connect the dots. Oh, and not everyone in America want peace, as is obvious by our current government.
You are correct in saying he never told us to stop arguing, but he did tell us to stop arguing about how to argue. That’s what I was addressing.
As Troid said, any argument can be misinterpreted if picked apart. Taking it as a whole may be inefficient, but misunderstanding and correcting each other is just as, if not more, inefficient.
You say excellent point now, but when I said that back in my very first paragraph, It went unnoticed.
You provided a quote, and then said “right there in the middle”. You’re expecting me to know what that means. I don’t even know what I’m looking for. I didn’t see it the first time, so you have to explain what it is if you expect me to understand, espcially since the text went unchanged.
“but at one point”
Yes, I did, but not there.
The contradiction was unrelated to the smallpox part of the conversation. It was related the difference between stoppable and unstoppable.
If you don’t give examples, you can’t expect me to know what you’re trying to referrence in your own text, like you did earlier.
Even under the worst case scenario, you seem to think that just ANYONE can get ahold of these kinds of viruses (which I’ll address later). You don’t seem to realize HOW high the security protocols and rules are in these places. They’re in the middle of no where to add to that.
It’s a theory (I dont have a reference), but some are equipped with nuclear weapons in the case of an outbreak so they can incinerate everything for miles to prevent it.
Lol, I dont mean to be mean, but you really messed up here.
That’s exactly what AIDS is, a deadly virus. So what if it mutates? It’s still just that, a deadly virus. And it obviously doesn’t spread that fast, seeing as how we dont all have aids. And we have these things called AIDS tests on top of that. And dont say it could mutate into a form we couldn’t detect, because viruses DONT change completely.
Anyway, sorry, you’re wrong Contact retroviruses are/were irrelevant in the previous argument, ESPECIALLY AIDS. And if AIDS killed faster, than it would spread less, so dont say it would be more dangerous.
I’m not speaking literaly when I say you can identify viruses.
We’ve had this argument several times. It’s the part of my argument you seem to continually ignore. I said it’s IMPOSSIBLE for a scientist NOT to be able to identify a virus. If they’ve never seen it before, than they’ll study it, and give it a name, there identified.
ANY LAB that is carrying a virus that would be a threat to humanity HAS to follow the STRICTEST government procedures. NOT JUST ANYONE can get a hold of those kind of viruses. I’ve said that several times. This is at least my 3rd.
So no, while the event of an outbreak is possible if a goddamn plane crashes into the wrong facility at the wrong time, people arent going to slip up.
Fine, no difference, there’s evidence of the theory, unlike your theory.
Okay, you’re doing it again.
Saying “anyone can understand” is making an assumption, and avoiding proving your point. It wastes time, and makes you sound like you’re stalling because you have nothing to say.
There have a been a few legitimate misunderstandings, but as I said 3 times previously, you’ve simply ignored me several times when it was convenient.
I noticed it, I just chose not to address it. The reason was I was more concerned with you arguing against me.
Now you’re just trying to test my patience. When I said in the middle, I meant go through, read it, and in the middle is where I addressed the problem at hand.
Here it is again:
That’s exactly what you said I didn’t say.
Well, since you said that I contradicted myself shortly after you were talking about smallpox, I can’t simply assume it’s unrelated. Here’s the post:
Oh, and furthermore:
Explain how I could assume the two weren’t connected after that.
Actually, AIDS itself isn’t deadly. It simply provides the means for other not-so deadly viruses to become deadly. Here. Look At This.
As to the second part of that, I never said it would mutate into a form we couldn’t detect. The scenario I gave said that she didn’t know she had AIDS. Here it is again.
Give me reason they are/were irrelevant.
You seem to not understand me when I say that a new, unidentified virus can differ greatly from the original, unmutated form. Thus, if a virus were to mutate enough, then it would no longer be recognizable by the scientists, and would have to be deemed harmful to be considered a virus. Now, if it were deemed harmful, then you are correct. They would quarantine it and any hosts, and study it for a cure, name, etc.
You just proved me right. Under the worse-case scenario, these viruses could get out, which could cause major problems.
That’s a stereotype. It depends on the context. If someone were to look at this topic, take all the time to read through our bantering, and see the post you quoted, they would most likely be able to see my side of the argument. When I said almost anybody, I meant it in the context. Here’s the quote.
It’s hard not to understand what I’m saying there, if you’ve been paying attention.
I try not to ignore any of the content in your posts, but when they’re filled with shit that’s just trying to make me admit I’m wrong like this, it’s hard not to disregard you’re entire argument.
Cough, I love the way you’re talking now.
It’s like… the same, but going out of your way to be nice to each other.
Okay, this is annoying, to re-instate it, I’ll repost that ENTIRE part of the conversation, and then explain it.
The first thing I said was that “we can do such and such” is MORE than enough reason to do the project. You said the project was pointless, so you we’re saying that “such and such” that we could do obviously isn’t very useful. And don’t say that’s not what you meant, because that’s EXACTLY what you said.
So no, you said we can do such and such, but you also called the project pointless and said it’s just humans trying to mess with nature.
Oh, well you’re right, I those to were connected, but you misinterpretted/ignored my point.
"
My mistake, I SAID smallpox was studied, because it IS. Technically, I contradicted you then, either way,you were proven wrong.
I know aids itself isn’t deadly, but you know what i meant. SO WHAT if aids suddenly becomes deadly, it kills anyway.
That’s the same thing if NORMAL people don’t know they have aids. There’s no difference. That version of aids would spread NO FASTER than normal aids, so yeah, your point is irrelevant.
Because they were completely unrelated to the conversation at the time. That’s what I said the FIRST TIME you asked me why it was irrelevant. We were talking about airborne viruses escaping, so Contact viruses didn’t have to do ANYTHING with the conversation.
You just suddenly decided to bring them up.
For starters, I just got done saying that it’s IMPOSSIBLE for scientists to not be able to see a virus. And if they can see it, they can do research on it. And once they do research on it, they can give it a name, and BAM, it’s identified.
Second, a virus doesnt mutate that much. Scientists know what viruses look like. There are certain characterists which make something a virus. So what would it turn into if it wasn’t a virus? Viruses can’t mutate into something that’s not a virus for starters. That’s more scifi coming from you. It’s impossible for us not to be able to test if somethigns a virus, and we will test it, because we test EVERYTHING.
And like I said Scientists incinerate any and everything after experiments, so any byproduct, or chemical will be destroyed (and if the byproduct was just a chemical, it wouldn’t be able to spread enough to cause any damage, seeing as how small viruses are. Even if it WASNT deemed harmful, it would still be destroyed, period.
And then?
If this whole argument has been “what if a plane crashed into the facility” then I’ve been wasting my goddamn time.
And you’ve continually talked about something slipping past security (which is impossible), now you’ve resorted to falling back on planes? Of COURSE something like that could free a virus, but the chances of that happening are so slim it’s not even worth arguing.
Besides, your initial arguement was about a virus “just escaping”, like some resident evil or 20 days later shit.
For starters, that’s not what a stereotype is.
If someone read this topic, they would laugh how you first said it’s perfectly plausible for a virus to escape, then said how a plane crashing into the facility would do the trick. You’ve had to change parts of your arguement several times to get around things.
What you said there is wrong. You said “I see radicals all the time”, but you dont see them shooting people, which was my point. Radicals arent just going to go around shooting people, so the fact that you see radicals doesn’t mean anything. That was the arguement at the time, but I already proved you wrong on that.
Well the point of arguing is trying to convince your opponent they’re wrong, no? How you go about it only depends on the rules of the argument.
And please dont make escuses, because I’e had to continually restate the same thing over and over because you ignore it continually, or listen to it once, and ignore it where it applies somewhere else.
You have no reason to expect me to be nice, this is a debate, and one of my biggest pet peeves is people who dont know what they’re talking about, bend reality, and make stuff up.
Ok, you know what? I’m done. There’s just no getting through to you. I mean, you’re not even arguing about the god damn project anymore. You’re just trying to get me to admit I’m wrong on points that don’t make any sense. So I’m done.
Argue with someone who can put up with people picking apart posts so they don’t make any sense.
And so four pages of you two arguing stops.
I can almost taste the silence.
I’m not arguing about the project anymore, I’m arguing to a theory you posted in relation to the project, which I felt was wrong, and I felt the need to point that out to you.
You could have simply said “okay, mabye my theory doesn’t make sense, or isn’t supported by facts very well”, but you made the decision to defend your theory, regardless of why.
Like I said, my biggest pet peeves are people who don’t know what they’re talking about, are stubborn, make stuff up, or are just plain wrong. I wouldn’t be as rude to say that you are all of those, but I myself quite stubborn in correcting people. The world is bad enough with what we have now, and erasing ignorance will erase most of our problems.
Oh, and like I said, that’s HOW you’re SUPPOSED to argue. You find flaws in your opponents armor, and attack them. You just happened to have a lot of them, so the whole arguement had to be taken apart.
I’m really not done aruing. If someone says something unreasonable you can be sure I’ll be there.
Well, Mr. Halberd if you’d like to continue arguing you could respond the following:
“Everything you say is unreasonable and wrong. I find you highly unpleasant, and there is no possible way you could prove me wrong about the above point that I failed to mention, let alone make.”
I guess you could have a field day on that.
Besides the arguing…does anyone else have anything they’d like to say about this project of cactus?
(P.S. I got to hit someone with a wad of money yesterday. It was fun.)
Lol, I have to humor you on that then, dont I?
How? I’m afraid that first you’ll have to explain what makes me unreasonable, then post links to websites proving I’m wrong. Since unpleasantness is relative, you’ll need other members to corroborate that, and you’ll also have to prove your point irrefutable.
I dont have anything else to say about this really. There wasn’t really much to debate even then, so we sorta just turned it into a moral debate, which turned into a common sense debate.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7227861.stm
Relevant. Discuss.