Maybe James Lovelock is right with his Gaia theory. This story on the BBC website points out that these guys,
(image from the BBC website)
Salmonella typhimurium, when flown on the space shuttle in weightless conditions, become three times more virulent, and change the way they express 167 genes.
"Wherever humans go, microbes go; you can't sterilise
humans. Wherever we go, under the oceans or orbiting the Earth, the
microbes go with us, and it's important that we understand... how
they're going to change," Cheryl Nickerson, from the Center for
Infectious Diseases and Vaccinology at Arizona State University, US,
told the Associated Press.
Now this is wild-ass baseless speculation, but maybe Gaia doesn't want this plague of humans spreading through space. Maybe this is one more step in containing the cancer. I realize that I'm just poking at a bruise here, but maybe all that great SF taking place in human colonies on other planets, on generation craft, and the like, maybe the planet, maybe the universe, aren't all that interested in letting us out. This is, after all, just one of the many many microbes we carry around with us. If we hit space and they all start going bugfuck on us, well, then maybe the enviro's are correct. Maybe we have to deal with our life here at home, 'cause Earth might be the only planet we get. Just a thought....
(image from the BBC website)
Salmonella typhimurium, when flown on the space shuttle in weightless conditions, become three times more virulent, and change the way they express 167 genes.
"Wherever humans go, microbes go; you can't sterilise
humans. Wherever we go, under the oceans or orbiting the Earth, the
microbes go with us, and it's important that we understand... how
they're going to change," Cheryl Nickerson, from the Center for
Infectious Diseases and Vaccinology at Arizona State University, US,
told the Associated Press.
Now this is wild-ass baseless speculation, but maybe Gaia doesn't want this plague of humans spreading through space. Maybe this is one more step in containing the cancer. I realize that I'm just poking at a bruise here, but maybe all that great SF taking place in human colonies on other planets, on generation craft, and the like, maybe the planet, maybe the universe, aren't all that interested in letting us out. This is, after all, just one of the many many microbes we carry around with us. If we hit space and they all start going bugfuck on us, well, then maybe the enviro's are correct. Maybe we have to deal with our life here at home, 'cause Earth might be the only planet we get. Just a thought....
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