Either way it turns out, that is EXTREMELY cool stuff! I've been a shark nut for years and *I* didn't know that sharks were capable of that kind of awesomeness.
Invincible to cancer AND possibly capable of asexual reproduction.
Just out of curiosity I'm sure there are, and I'm going to look it up, but do we know of any other organism as complex as a shark that are capable of asexual reproduction? Exactly how would that work in a shark for example if it turns out to be asexual reproduction instead of hybridization?
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Fish, sheep, monkeys, cattle, cats, mules, and horses are all capable of asexual reproduction link
But as for "natural" asexual reproduction, at least according to Wikipedia there are a surprising number of species including insects and reptiles. link In terms of evolutionary distance link these species are incredibly similar to each other and us *shrug*
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: Invincible to cancer
Not true. That is a myth perpetuated by "medical" con artists. [Beaten! ]
Parthenogenesis is known to exist in certain species of reptiles, and it has been seen in sharks before this incident.
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"Why can't I get some frickin' sharks...with some frickin' laser beams....on their frickin' heads?"
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The "invincible to cancer" statement was more for comedic effect, I already knew there were SOME instances of cancer in sharks.
That's interesting that the Smithsonian has thousands of fish tumors just sitting around if needed for study.
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I never understood why the claim that sharks don't get cancer would be a good thing for supplements that fight cancer, aging, Alzheimer's, etc. I'd be (make that "would have been," since it isn't true anyway) wary that the shark tissue would recognize my defective flesh and seek to put all of me 6 feet under, warts and all. There would be no immunological reason for the shark tissue to "recognize" human tissue as fair, not foul.
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CT, you are looking for logical consistency in the snake oil market. That makes about as much sense as arguing with a three year old. Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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quote:Originally posted by rivka: CT, you are looking for logical consistency in the snake oil market. That makes about as much sense as arguing with a three year old.
My sweetheart finds this hilarious. I am constantly cranking at television commercials for motor vehicle ads that don't make sense. "But the van is sliding sideways in the dirt. It doesn't maintain traction! Why would not being able to maintain traction be a selling point?"
We don't watch television so much anymore. *grin
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Edited to add: Yes, I do see most commercial advertising for motor vehicles to be the automotive equivalent of snake oil selling, at least as regards claims and implications. Beer, too. And purported beauty products.
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CT: I pretty much do the exact same thing when watching commercials. That and reading the fine print as best I can at the bottom or when its given verbally.
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Now that we rule the (immediately contingent) world, let's do something about advertising, Sir.
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If I were emperor of the world, as I hobby I'd watch TV and bestow boons or curses upon companies and organizations according to their advertisements.
"This ad is insulting to my intelligence. I fine you $50,000."
"This ad made me smile. I bestow a boon of $5,000."
"This ad simply displeases me. Fine of $10,000."
"This ad is utterly full of crap. $500,000."
As you can tell, I'd bestow more curses than boons. Perhaps it would decrease the amount of advertising. We can always hope.
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Speaking of ads, has anyone seen the Doritos rant given by Tycho on Penny Arcade's blog page? Hysterical.
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I would love it if you started sending various companies letters bestowing curses for their advertisments. I would love it even more if you posted any responses you got from their PR departments.
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You'd need to add some zeroes to each bestowment, otherwise the companies would laugh in your face.
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"I would love it if you started sending various companies letters bestowing curses for their advertisments."
That would be hilarious. The same letter should include curses from 8 or 10 different religious traditions. "I curse your commercial in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost, Jobu, The Great Spirit, Tasurinchi, Buddha, Shiva, Allah, Kuan Yin, Lao Tzu, and I'll write again when I think of the other dudes."
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I think I need to start sending letters to companies that say things like that.
You know what happens when "alternative" medicine is tested and actually found to work? Yeah, it becomes mainstream. I once saw a news program talking about some nutritional supplement sold through a multi-level marketing system. The company didn't make any claims, but the individual sellers said it cured just about everything. The program interviewed a girl who was taking it for a brain tumor instead of chemotherapy (she did have surgery to remove some of the tumor). She kept saying that the only reason that the company couldn't come right out and claim that it cures cancer is because the FDA won't let them. As if it was a technicality. But the FDA won't let them say it because it's not true. If it were, the company could put it through clinical trials, prove it works, and market it as a miracle cure. They would make a whole lot more money that way.
Regarding asexual reproduction, there are also lizards that do it. It seems that the fish/reptile/amphibian groups of animals are the vertebrates that do it -- I'm not aware of such a thing happening in mammals. I wonder what's required for that sort of thing to happen. Is it the same mechanism that allows lizards to regrow tails, for instance? Are birds also capable of that kind of reproduction?
Posts: 3546 | Registered: Jul 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Noemon: I would love it if you started sending various companies letters bestowing curses for their advertisments. I would love it even more if you posted any responses you got from their PR departments.
Unfortunately for this plan, but fortunately for me, we no longer get television in our new home.
quote:That would be hilarious. The same letter should include curses from 8 or 10 different religious traditions. "I curse your commercial in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost, Jobu, The Great Spirit, Tasurinchi, Buddha, Shiva, Allah, Kuan Yin, Lao Tzu, and I'll write again when I think of the other dudes."
I would never mock other's beliefs, let alone my own, in that way.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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You could just do it to companies you don't like. Perhaps I should curse Dell for making the USB ports on their PCs extremely awkward to access. Or I could curse my congressional representatives every time they do something I don't like. (As an aside: did you know one of our senators (Smith) is Mormon?)
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I want to curse whoever designed the USB port in the first place, making it so hard to tell which way it goes in.
No, I did not know that, Shigosei. For how long I've been here, I've done a crappy job of getting up to speed with the local political scene.
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USB port design is inconvenient, isn't it? I wish they'd put a little more thought into it and made the things less symmetrical.
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quote:Originally posted by ClaudiaTherese: Yes, I do see most commercial advertising for motor vehicles to be the automotive equivalent of snake oil selling, at least as regards claims and implications. Beer, too. And purported beauty products.
Yes; oh, yes; and GOOD GOLLY, YES!
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I thought you were making an inside joke from one of my favorite blogs ever-- a hollywood insider who would post excerpts from the worts pitches he got. There was a series of Shark ones that was evidently written in another language and translated by Babel Fish. they became semi-legendary.
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I'm pretty sure the comments are heavy on the sarcasm.
Every once in a while, someone got on and argued that their query wasn't all that bad, and those were some golden moments.
Unfortunately, the blogger was killed in a car crash in mid '05, so the contents of that blog are the whole deal. I do hope they leave it up for a long time. It's fun to go back and visit every once in a while.
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