3 ms·
it's not even that viruses don't work that way, entropy doesn't work that way.
by clairity 7y ago
it's not even that viruses don't work that way, entropy doesn't work that way.
- greenshackle2 7y agoYou mean you don't assemble Lego models by putting all the pieces in a box and vigorously shaking it?
- pvaldes 7y ago> why dead fragments can't join again to make full blown virus? Is a good question. Around 220 species of viruses are known to be able to infect humans. Another 8 at least can affect dogs, but not humans. Lets say that 50 more viruses are exclusive from each one of dogs, cats, cattle, pigs, poultry and fishes and most main crops Those species are studied. Less imagine that this list makes a total of 5000 viruses relatively well studied. Well. In a conservative estimate, only Mammals could host more than 300,000 species of virus still unknown to science. There are, probably, several millions of virus still unknown only among arthropods. Lets say that "1%" of the viruses don't work that way, and we don't know anything about the regenerating DNA capacities of the remaining "99%", but we can assume that probably will not happen. Probably. Viruses stop being functional when devoid of its capsides. But... I wouldn't bet against viroids, in this sense. Fortunately, we aren't plants.
- clairity 7y agothat's a noble attempt, but your argument boils down to "we don't know what we don't know" and "anything can happen", and that's true as far as that goes, but it's unhelpful in answering why viruses can't spontaneously reform from fragments. basic biochemistry and thermodynamics provide foundational knowledge in answering that question, not epistemology. if you could run your argument through that foundational knowledge and form a coherent theory for how virii might spontaneously reform, we'd all be open to it.
- pvaldes 7y agoThermodynamic laws are of limited use in biology and notoriously useless to describe life being's behaviour. Third law in particular is useless here. You can't put both concepts of life and zero absolute in the same room. They are mutually exclusive. Either you have one, or the other, or none of them. Claiming thermodynamics here is a false argument. Viruses can pass over thermodynamic laws all the time. They live in a bigger system that provides an unlimited source of materials, metabolism, energy and constant temperatures and where events like frost, ebullition or spontaneous combustion are just banned. The host pays the thermodynamic bills for they