Off to Atlanta

So that's why the train is so packed with CDC badges this morning. Hope you are enjoying the ATL. Don't mind the tornado damage, nothing to see here, move along...

Looking forward to reading your posts on the conference.

Tara, I hear that there was a case of coinfection of H5N1/H3N2 last year, and the paper is presented at the conference. Were you there? Would you tell us more? Thanks.

A conference on "Emerging Infectious Diseases?"

Since both microbes and human beings have been on earth evolving for hundreds of millions of years, do these jokers really think infectious diseases are emerging?

Of course, they WANT infectious diseases to emerge, and they NEED infectious diseases to emerge. Crowded field, need new stuff to write about and study and get grants ..etc, etc, ad infinitum.

Can't really impress anyone if you study the flu or the common cold -- need to sex it up a bit.

Wasteful, irrevelant, busy work under the guise of "scientific discovery". Wow. The beat continues.

Mountain man, you sure would be pissed if some "new" virus was discovered but no research was done, then it turns out it fatally infects you and a whole bunch of people. Before you died, you might ask "Why didn't anybody study this thing and create some antivirals? Didn't they know this thing could kill me?"

Or even - "I looked on the internet and found a whole bunch of information about this virus that is killing me! Why didn't researchers hold a conference about these types of viruses so they could educate health care workers to diagnose my disease back when it was treatable?"

"Since both microbes and human beings have been on earth evolving for hundreds of millions of years, do these jokers really think infectious diseases are emerging?"

Emerging in the human population. It's a process called Zoonosis and it happens fairly frequently (think West Nile and H5N1). Also, some emerging infectious diseases may in fact be long time human pathogens but until now we haven't had the technologies to detect them or they are beginning to spread beyond their previously limited geographic distribution. Emerging doesn't equal previously non-existent.

"Can't really impress anyone if you study the flu or the common cold"

Actually there are a lot of people still studying influenza and rhinoviruses (common cold) without a need to "sex it up".

"Wasteful, irrevelant, busy work under the guise of "scientific discovery". Wow. The beat continues."

As does the beat of your ignorant rants.

Wasteful and irrelevant until someone you know/love is severely effected by one of these illnesses. Fortunately not everyone in the world thinks like you.

I would have to agree with Mountain Man, a mean this large group of professional ninnies come together and push microbes that are in 1/1000 cells, have 50 year window periods and dont do sqwat into animals when they are much more likely enviromental causes for these diseases.

Then they ignore microbes that are visual in dying people's tissues by EM, kill every animal injected, and terrorize the population.(mycoplasma incognitus/penetrans)

I mean I'm all for uncovering new infections, but not by a bunch of mediocre scientists that dont know anything about microbiology.

CoolerSteve says
I would have to agree with Mountain Man

Ya know Steve Billingham and Michael don't agree atall. Mikey says zoonosis is dumb a joke no way animal virus can infect some one and emerge. Stevie cooler B. says except if a virus can infect every person and every animal and kills every one it infects its not real. So the lunatics are at the opposite sides from each other. They don't get that like they don't get any thing else.

get a job, loser

@cooler - a question - what is a professional ninnie?

I am new to this website - Are you a troll or an idiot? If the latter, read below.

Your comments make no sense. 1/1000 cells? Since when did the lack of an animal model preclude studies on an agent? I will assume that you have the smarts to critically evaluate the work of the scientists that are working on these types of diseases. Since you are all for uncovering new infections, who if not trained scientists should do the research? Some guy/gal off the street? You? Just asking since you seem to know more microbiology than they do.

Sounds like you have a bone to pick. Why not go to pubmed and look up all the mycoplasma research. You'll find plenty. It's an AIDS-associated seconday infection, so there might just be some $$$ going its way...probably not worth ignoring, but not likely to fit into the demographic for this meeting.

Wrong, have you bothered reading Dr. Shyh Ching Lo's from the Armed forces lab research, he clearly proved they were pathenogenic in their own right. Kochs postulates follfilled right here. This is what the Nicolsons are finding in 50% of CFS patients etc by PCR, can't look for antibodies because the monkeys that died only had a weak antibody response when near death.

Lo SC, Buchholz CL, Wear DJ, Hohm RC, Marty AM.
Department of Infectious and Parasitic Diseases Pathology, Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, Washington, D.C. 20306-6000.

The newly recognized human pathogenic mycoplasma M. fermentans (incognitus strain) causes a fatal systemic infection in experimental monkeys, infects patients with AIDS, and apparently is associated with a fatal disease in previously healthy non-AIDS patients. An apparently immunocompetent male who lacked evidence of HIV infection developed fever, malaise, progressive weight loss, and diarrhea and had extensive tissue necrosis involving liver and spleen. M. fermentans (incognitus strain) was centered at the advancing margins of these necrotizing lesions. Following the treatment of 300 mg doxycycline per day for 6 weeks, he recovered fully. He has no fever or diarrhea, and his abnormal liver function tests have returned to normal. He regained all lost strength and 14 kg of lost weight and has remained disease free for more than 1 year.

PMID: 1788266 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Boomer,
Cooler is both an idiot and a troll.

The whole 1/1000 cell no animal model 50 year window is repeated over and over in every post he writes (usually some reference to Dr. Shy Ling Lo chief army pathologist blah blah blah Micoplasma) regardless of the virus being discussed.

He doesn't have the smarts to critically evaluate scientific literature, only the ability to parrot what he reads on denialist websites and quote mine Pubmed. If you look above, you will see one of many examples of Cooler's own citations being turned against him because he doesn't understand what he reads, but just takes selective sentences and discussion points that support his position.

Boomer,
Since you are new here I suggest you google Project day Lily to find out this was probably part of the biological weapons program.

Lo was able to do something the virus hunters that gave us HIV and hepatitis c were never able to, induce fatal infections in monkeys and mice and take electron microscopic pictures of the microbe rotting patients organs. He did not find it one healthy control. He clearly ruled it to be the cause of death of several people that died of mysterious infections. Researchers at the University of Alabama confirmed it was a novel strain when injected it into rats and and found it to be very invasive vs. the ordinary strain of m fermentans. I've posted many refrences for this in the "mbekis still in denial" from a few months ago thread.

This is clearly something that should be brought up at a conference like this.

Thanks, Jimm for the clarification. I am surprised that he would drop the "chronic fatigue" bomb. I remember when they called it "Epstein Barr Syndrome", 'cause everyone that had CFS had EBV. Doesn't everyone know that "American Life" causes chronic fatige? One of the few situations that [i]might[/i] support his "much more likely enviromental causes" hypothesis.

I am interested in postings about the conference. Is Tara ever going to post?

Tara: Aren't you ever tempted to disemvowel cooler? I mean, he's amusing for a while, but...

Boomer,
Who are you going to beleive an idiotic troll who has no scientific sense/capability at all like Jim or real experts like the military's highest ranking infectious disease pathologist Shyh Ching Lo MD PhD, the rest scientists at the Armed Forces of Pathology, Dr. Luc Montagnier, Dr. Joel Baseman from the NIH Dr, Garth and Nancy Nicolson and a nobel prize winner Dr. Roger Guiliieman, all these scientists were and a still are impressed with Lo's work and state that Lo's mycoplasmas are pathenogenic in thier own right and have spread through the general population.

Some of you people are so stupid you'll destroy humanity, at least I have credible scientists that agree with me, who do you have frauds like Gallo and the child molester Gaduseck?

Cooler - I have no issue with the fact that these mycoplasmas cause disease. I have issue with you suggesting that the researchers at this meeting no nothing about microbiology, are ninnies, and work on meaningless agents.

You sound like a conspiracy theorist. I may not be able to critically evaluate these articles, but I do know my limitations. From your postings, it is clear to me that you do not.

Jim, boomer,idli,
You guys are so stupid it defies reason. A great mathemetician Darin Brown Phd pointed out how dumb you people are, and how easy it is for scientists like you second rate hacks can make huge scientific blunders to cost people their lives. Although Dr. Brown focuses on HIV in this post, this can be easily applied to other isssues such as Vaccines, Mycoplasmas and why you shills are so resistent to new ideas that are not supported by drug companies or crooked politicians Like Fauci.

These are sociological issues, not scientific ones as Dr. Brown points out. Here is his awesome post.

Apparently Tara closed the "Denialism they don't remember" thread, so I must resort to putting a response to other posts here.

Thank you Chris Noble for at least having the courtesy of responding to my lengthy post from a couple weeks ago.

Chris Noble said:

"As usual Drain [sic] Brown totally misunderstands the nature of the problem. It is encumbent upon the Denialists to demonstrate to the scientific community that any of their theories have any merit."

What a load of horseshit. YOU'RE the ones spending billions of dollars. YOU'RE the ones pumping people full of highly toxic ARVs. YOU'RE the ones instilling terror in people. YOU'RE the ones calling on people to be fired and hoping their careers be ruined. What a load of horseshit.

I've been looking for ELEVEN years to find ANY justification for what you people are doing. I haven't found an acceptable answer yet. Yes, it's true I've been supplied with a few papers ON OCCASION such as Chris Noble did above, but none of these even come close to establishing causation. Apologists would say it's because I "don't understand the science" or "don't understand the papers". I say it's because the papers don't prove what you say they do. And I'm willing to put my reputation and career on the line to take it to the people to let them decide for themselves and let them take away power away from the establishment which is the only way this entire affair will ever end. This is a political problem, 100%, and political revolution is the only solution.

"Denialists suffer from the delusion that the world revolves around them."

I don't think the world revolves around ANYone.

"There are plenty of cranks on the internet demanding that people prove Einstein's relativity to them."

Which is entirely irrelevant to this.

"Duesberg and Bialy have demonstrated that they will ignore any evidence presented to them."

What evidence?? For gods sake don't say Ascher or Schecter or Darby. Really, Chris, you're like a friggin broken record.

In my estimation, apologists have demonstrated that THEY will ignore any evidence presented to THEM: Piatak, Padian, Rodriguez, and so on. Yes, I know there are "responses" to each of these (usually some form of childish taunting on AIDStruth or somewhere else, the equivalent of "nanny-nanny-nanny, YES SO YES SO YES SO, well I triple-dog-dare you, what about that??"), eventually it will be left both to those scientists who work outside HIV or aren't emotionally attached to it, or finally to the general public to recognize how shitty and pathetic the orthodox responses to them have been. As I've pointed out before, the main reasons there is such a consensus at the moment are:

1. Financial (money at stake)
2. Cultural (science is as much a society/culture as anything else, you're brought up into it)
3. Political (pressure to conform, with severe consequences for those who don't)
4. Emotional/Social (doctors can't give up HIV because it would diminish the priestly role over life and death they've acquired in the past several decades)
5. Saving face (self-explanatory)

There are cases in the literature where scientists and doctors literally HALLUCINATED evidence for disease causation. They were certain at the time that they were seeing "evidence" for such causation, but in time, it was shown their notions were completely wrong and their interpretations and observations entirely a product of their mental state and loss of touch with reality.

As long as these forces are in place among those in power in science and medicine, HIV will continue to mesmerize the minds of medical scientists just as ecclesiastic and religious debates about angels on the head of a pin and requirements for salvation mesmerized the religious elite for centuries, and they will be powerless to see reality in front of their face.

It will also continue to hold political sway. The HIV hypothesis is purely, 100% a POLITICAL problem, NOT a scientific problem. The evidence was non-existent 20-25 years ago, and it's even less existent now.

Since the HIV hypothesis is purely a political problem, POLITICAL INTERFERENCE is the ONLY solution to this problem. The people MUST take power away from those holding this PHENOMENON in place. This is why this issue MUST be taken to the PEOPLE. The people are not emotionally wed to the hypothesis, and they will recognize the enormous chasm between the hypothesis and reality sooner than anyone else.

"I could go through and find some of these key papers, for instance Jay Levy's isolation of ARV in 1984 that replicated Gallo's and Montagniers work, Weiss's demonstration that HIV binds to receptors on CD4+ cells. There are several other key papers published in this time period. These are what convinced the scientific community."

Let it be written for posterity that Chris Noble offered the following papers published between May 1984 and October 1986 as proof of the HIV hypothesis:

1. Montagnier's paper -- a paper which even Montagnier at the time didn't think proved anything re: causation

2. Gallo's 4 Science papers -- where HIV could only be "isolated" in 26 of 72 "AIDS" patients, and in which HIV could only be "isolated" by stimulating cell cultures with IL-2 and PHA and detecting certain phenomena ASSUMED to be proof of the presence of a retrovirus, hardly proof of anything

3. Levy's "isolation" of ARV -- again, HIV could only be "isolated" in 22 of 45 patients with AIDS, only marginally more "frequent" (!) than Gallo's attempt

These 3 papers are completely laughable in establishing causation. The best that can be said is that after taking cells from AIDS patients and subjecting them to enormous mitogenic stimulation, SOME of them began producing effects INTERPRETED by SOME as evidence of an infectious exogenous retrovirus.

How on earth this proves ANYthing is beyond me. All it's saying is [assuming "isolation" is really "isolation"], "Look! We 'isolated' HIV from a fraction of 'AIDS' patients! It must be the cause!!"

What a friggin joke. If this is your idea of the foundation upon which to devote $2 US billion per annum and a massive educational campaign, you've got one more screw loose than I thought.

4. Weiss demonstration that HIV binds to receptors on CD4 cells -- despite the fact we now know that almost all "HIV particles" lack the gp120 spikes supposedly necessary to "bind" to CD4 cells, rendering them essentially non-infectious and therefore pathogenically irrelevant

Nice try, Chris. But I have to at least give you enormous credit for offering a response at all.

"Dairn [sic] also ignores several papers such as those by Ascher et al, Schechter et al and Darby et al that have specifically dealt with and refuted Duesberg's claims."

Oh, give me a break. Duesberg's responses to all 3 of these are out there for anyone to read on the internet and make up their own mind. Schechter, if I recall, wouldn't even share his god-damn data, rendering the entire study completely worthless on that point alone.

Even if one grants the studies prove what they say (and I'm not granting that), all 3 of these are purely epidemiological studies. All they prove is a correlation at best. Alone, they don't prove the HIV hypothesis at all. I'm almost embarrassed explaining this to you.

It all comes down to what I wrote almost 2 years ago in the magnificent pipedream (a document that is still extremely instructive and would be to relative newcomers to this blog, simply go to Harvey's page and scroll down to "a magnificent pipedream" under "insurgency blogging"):

"The epidemiology is supposedly used to justify the biological 'quest' for how HIV kills T cells or causes 'AIDS', yet at the same time, the epidemiology REQUIRES some kind of biological justification to move itself from beyond the realm of epidemiological surveillance tool and into the realm of gestalt diagnosis. The biology is supposed to justify the epidemiology, yet at the same time, the epidemiology is supposed to justify the biology. Another example of the ubiquitous circular logic of 'AIDS science'. Caveat emptor."

All of your "epidemiological" (I put that word in parentheses given in my own experience -- granted, primarily with HIV/AIDS -- that its illogical practices strain the label of "scientific discipline" to its limits) "evidence" is based on WHAT?? HIV ANTIBODY TESTS?? And what are the antibody tests based upon? Proof that the HIV tests are sensitive and specific for HIV. Which is itself based upon some clear knowledge of what the hell "HIV" is in the first place. If your BIOLOGICAL understanding of the nature of "HIV" is all screwed up, then all the epidemiological evidence in the world is just being misinterpreted at best or contrived at worst. It all comes down to what I was taught as a mathematician -- YOU HAVE TO UNDERSTAND YOUR BASIC DEFINITIONS AND NOTIONS FIRST or else all the rest of your thinking will be completely nonsensical.

Likewise, the biological "evidence" in these early papers is entirely based on the notion that HIV is sexually transmitted and that "AIDS" is a coherent infectious disease. Who in their right MIND -- without ALREADY accepting the notion that HIV and AIDS are both infectious and sexually transmitted would for a second consider Montagnier, Gallo, and Levy's papers as proof of JACK SQUAT???

"If science worked the way that Denialists pretend then we would still be trying to convince phogiston proponents that oxygen exists."

What a load of crap. The problem is not that science "works a certain way", it's that scientists are human like everyone else, and once the scientific process gets off on false branch of reasoning (which it inevitably will at times), the process of science itself will force science down that false branch of reasoning unless some external force is applied to make it conform more to reality. The process of hypothesis generation, experimentation, observation, and modification only works if all agents are allowed to pursue all avenues of investigation. When one narrow branch is pursued and all others completely cut off, IF that branch happens to be wrong, then the scientific process will continue working away and away, generating ad hoc hypotheses and further explanations and more and more branches in all and every conceivable direction will shoot off, desperately trying to "find" the branch of reality that has been cut off. As Feyerabend said, "VARIETY OF OPINION IS NECESSARY FOR OBJECTIVE KNOWLEDGE." And the variety of opinion was certainly cut off prematurely in 1984-86, and the result has been predictable.

Trrll offered the following in response to my question (again, such response is appreciated):

"It is likely that much of the work that convinced people in the field was not actually published by that time. What typically occurs when a hot result is published is that labs all over the world jump on it and start trying to replicate it and extend it. After a year and a half, little of that work will have been published, but scientists in the field will be talking to one another about it, and will have a good idea of whether other labs are able to confirm it. So all of the people actually working in the field will know if the 'buzz' is favorable or unfavorable, and this is one point at which a new theory can collapse. So it is hardly surprising that after 17 months there was general agreement among virologists that the evidence for the virus was strong enough to support a major effort. Then there is a second phase in which those results are published, and begin to convince clinicians and scientists who are working on other aspects of the disease. [Followed by a link to the ever-popular NIAID/NIH "factsheet"]"

and later

"By 'buzz,' I am referring to the less formal communications between scientists that precede formal publication. Scientists in a field generally have a good idea whether a research direction is proving fruitful before the papers come out. Considering the potential importance of the discovery, everybody jumped on it, trying to reproduce and extend the results. This often happens in science when there is a possible breathrough. If the follow-up studies fail, then everybody drops that direction en masse, and the blip in funding dies out quickly. It is not a matter of faith -- it is a matter of following up a potentially important result to find out whether it is valid or a blind alley as quickly as possible. And as we know, the follow-up studies supported the initial findings, and the rest is history."

and from another post:

"There are many points at which the HIV hypothesis could have faltered based on subsequent work: if Duesberg's original claims that HIV was not present in many AIDS patients had been confirmed once sensitive PCR tests had become available, if people had been found to mount an effective immune response to HIV as Duesberg claimed, if anti-HIV drugs had not been found to postpone the onset of AIDS in clinical trials and in the practical experience of AIDS doctors, if a plausible mechanism for HIV infection of cells of the immune system had not been found, etc., etc."

This forms the ENTIRE extent (unless I've missed something, do point out) of Trrll's "response" to my query for what convinced the IOM to devote $2 US billion per annum in the name of the HIV hypothesis.

WHAT A LOAD OF ****ING HORSESHIT.

REALLY, HOW CAN ANY OF YOU PEOPLE READ THIS ABSOLUTELY PATHETIC CRAP WITH A STRAIGHT FACE?? WHAT THE **** IS THE MATTER WITH YOU PEOPLE READING THIS BLOG?????????

Meanwhile, "ElkMountain" (whoever he/she is) offers the following wonderfully insightful commentary on the nature of scientific process:

"Think about the denialist fantasy of what really happened in the 1980s. What if it were true that two or three labs misled the entire world with nothing more than correlations? What if your IOM was premature with its statement? What if?... Answer: everyone involved in the scam would have been sliced to pieces, their careers ruined, mercilessly and within a few years, by hordes of skeptical scientists. And if there was a 'gravy train' in play, then doubly. With nothing more than correlation supporting HIV and AIDS, rival scientists would have found a more plausible explanation, double-time, and steered all the money into their own labs.... Instead, the hordes of skeptical scientists, to the disappointment of many of them, could only confirm the HIV link to AIDS again and again. Thousands of experiments later, there still is no alternative explanation for AIDS that holds up in the lab... If any rethinker reading this has a better explanation for AIDS, don't keep it to yourself. Experiment, support, and publish, and you will become the most famous scientist of our time."

And then we have "Dr. Duke" from the complete outer edges of the universe, claiming Callen and Ashe never took recreational or pharmaceutical drugs (WTFF???) or that they claimed this themselves (WRONG on both counts, as anyone even REMOTELY familiar with ANYthing knows):

"HIV-infected people such as Michael Callen and Arthur Ashe who lead very 'clean' and healthy lives, died of AIDS... My point was that...denialists simply 'rethink' the issue and declare that Michael Callen must have been lying about his healthy lifestyle"

Then the Small Inquisitor proceeds to offer the following VIRTUOSIC double-talk and side-stepping that would make even Bill "it depends what the meaning of the word 'is' is" Clinton proud as a peacock:

"That NY Press article was published BEFORE the LA Coroner's report into the death of Ms Maggiore's daughter became publicly available. That report proves that MS Maggiore is HIV-infected because it shows that her daughter died of AIDS, with p24 antigens detected in her brain tissues (I think it is safe to discount the incredibly unlikely possibility that the daughter acquired her HIV infection from any source other than her mother). Once the LA Coroner's report became available, it therefore provided solid medical evidence on the HIV infection status of Ms Maggiore, evidence that outweighs Ms Maggiore's own, and conflicting public statements on the issue."

And Chris again:

"How can you ignore the natural history studies that show a much higher mortality in people that are infected with HIV?"

as if Chris has never even HEARD of the perth group

Really, I'm serious. I don't know WHAT the **** is the problem with you people.

The posts on this blog have gone beyond attempts at scientific discussions or even political rantings or even ill-mannered personal attacks, and have entered the realm of HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS for future generations to ponder over the absolutely stunningly pathetic statements made here.

darin

Posted by: Darin Brown | November 9, 2007 10:20 PM

Crap. Does this mean Tara isn't going to post anything from the meeting? Do these postings always get so out of hand?

"Cooler - I have no issue with the fact that these mycoplasmas cause disease"

Thanks, finally, Although I addressed the above post to you, please disregard it, I only did so because you seemed to agree with Jim that I was a troll. Anyways, I don't think all the scientists at this conference are incompetent, and many would be impressed with Lo's work etc, if they knew about it.

Also you are probably going to call me a troll and rejoin the anti-crankery club again, and I don't care.

Cooler,
Your post is only further proof of your trolldom. None of it, just like most of your other posts, contains anything that is original and thought up by YOU.

"I don't think all the scientists at this conference are incompetent, and many would be impressed with Lo's work etc, if they knew about it."

Many probably do know about it. Hell, many probably know Dr. Lo personally. Most importantly though, Cooler, is that these scientists also have the training and expertise to read his work and actually understand it and it's ramifications entirely, a claim that YOU cannont make but still have the audacity to call them incompetent.

Boomer,
Yes, the postings usually get this out of hand. The same people pushing the same arguments regardless of the topic.

What the hell are you credentials Jim since you come off as the high priest of Virology? Have you won any awards? Published anything in the peer reviewed literature like the scientists I mentioned above? Come clean now you big expert you.

Nevertheless, many "experts" can be pretty stupid in many cases, like when the cure for Scurvy was known in 200 years in advance and ignored by losers like yourself. If you bothered to read Dr. Browns post you'd have answers to why some scientists can pursue idiotic hypothesis and ignore valid hypothesis's and endanger the public at large.

"What a load of crap. The problem is not that science "works a certain way", it's that scientists are human like everyone else, and once the scientific process gets off on false branch of reasoning (which it inevitably will at times), the process of science itself will force science down that false branch of reasoning unless some external force is applied to make it conform more to reality. The process of hypothesis generation, experimentation, observation, and modification only works if all agents are allowed to pursue all avenues of investigation. When one narrow branch is pursued and all others completely cut off, IF that branch happens to be wrong, then the scientific process will continue working away and away, generating ad hoc hypotheses and further explanations and more and more branches in all and every conceivable direction will shoot off, desperately trying to "find" the branch of reality that has been cut off. As Feyerabend said, "VARIETY OF OPINION IS NECESSARY FOR OBJECTIVE KNOWLEDGE." And the variety of opinion was certainly cut off prematurely in 1984-86, and the result has been predictable.

As I've pointed out before, the main reasons there is such a consensus at the moment are:

1. Financial (money at stake)
2. Cultural (science is as much a society/culture as anything else, you're brought up into it)
3. Political (pressure to conform, with severe consequences for those who don't)
4. Emotional/Social (doctors can't give up HIV because it would diminish the priestly role over life and death they've acquired in the past several decades)
5. Saving face (self-explanatory)

There are cases in the literature where scientists and doctors literally HALLUCINATED evidence for disease causation. They were certain at the time that they were seeing "evidence" for such causation, but in time, it was shown their notions were completely wrong and their interpretations and observations entirely a product of their mental state and loss of touch with reality.

As long as these forces are in place among those in power in science and medicine, HIV will continue to mesmerize the minds of medical scientists just as ecclesiastic and religious debates about angels on the head of a pin and requirements for salvation mesmerized the religious elite for centuries, and they will be powerless to see reality in front of their face."

Cooler, if you're so hung up on that train of research that no one else is following, despite your repeated bleatings, have you actually considered becoming a microbiologist, or are you just some serious grade a crazy with an obsession?

I mean, if its that important to you, go get your degree and get down to work, instead of browbeating and trolling.

Now why would I want to become part of cult that cuts off good scientists like Lo, the Nicolsons, Baseman, Montagnier, Guilleman, Mullis etc and rewards Frauds like Gallo and child molesters like Gaduseck? I will stick to my field which is Sociology.

I will copy another quote From Browns Magnum opus on why outsiders like myself can offer a more realistic perspective. Although he talks about HIV, it can also explain why some scientists in power cling other failed hypothesis's...........

"It will also continue to hold political sway. The HIV hypothesis is purely, 100% a POLITICAL problem, NOT a scientific problem. The evidence was non-existent 20-25 years ago, and it's even less existent now.

"Since the HIV hypothesis is purely a political problem, POLITICAL INTERFERENCE is the ONLY solution to this problem. The people MUST take power away from those holding this PHENOMENON in place. This is why this issue MUST be taken to the PEOPLE. The people are not emotionally wed to the hypothesis, and they will recognize the enormous chasm between the hypothesis and reality sooner than anyone else."

Actually, this thread stayed on the tracks longer than some. Boomer, you'll learn to recognize some names in the comment threads, cooler, fleming, adele, jspreen, MountainMan, ElkMountainMan, Apy, there are more but I can't think of them at the moment.

Frankly, I'd like a field guide to comment threads, but I'm too lazy to make one.

Just a question, is all. I used to work where a guy walked by every friday and yelled at us in the office to look up the security privacy act, because we were airport security.

Until one day I said "if it's so important to you, YOU look it up."

I just believe if you honestly felt that strongly, you'd be doing the work, but claiming you don't want to be part of the cadre of OTHER microbiologists is in essence, a cop out.

As others have observed in other threads, cooler's hero-worshipping of Dr. Shyh-Ching Lo has not extended even to learning how to key the scientist's name correctly, much less to understanding Lo's research and conclusions. Lo recognizes that HIV causes AIDS and has contributed solid research on opportunistic infections. I hope that none who reads cooler's words will think any less of Lo (or Montagnier, etc.) merely because of this unwanted, obsession-born association with a misguided and pitiful young man.

Cooler, In today's world, I can't understand why people still think HIV doesn't cause AIDS. Is it semantic? Technically, patients don't die from the human immunodeficiency virus. They die from secondary infections that are allowed to run rampant because HIV has destroyed their CD4+ T cells. And yes, many of these secondary infections can also cause severe disease and death in immunocompetent people. And I'll even grant that many of the early antivirals (pre-HAART) were extremely toxic and may have contributed to advancing the disease.

But these days, all of the controlled clinical data shows that AIDS is directly caused by HIV. HIV+ People die of many different types of infections. If they could live in a bubble and somehow prevent their latent viruses from reactivating and their resident bacteria from causing problems, HIV+ people would likely live to their normal life expectancy. Just because your adaptive immune system is shot doesn't mean you die immediately.

Do you know anyone who is HIV+? I'm going to go out on a limb and hypothesize the answer is no. Otherwise you would know that 1) These folks are super sick if they are not on HAART and 2) They get dramatically better when they do go on HAART. I have seen it with my own eyes. If you are somehow convincing someone you know that is HIV+ that they shouldn't try to stop HIV because it isn't the cause of AIDS, you are going to be responsible for their early death.

Please, I hope you are just being a devil's advocate about HIV for this forum. They way you say "doctors can't give up on HIV because it diminishes their priestly role...". WTF? If you think doctors should just turn around and tell their HIV+ patients not to worry, HIV doesn't cause AIDS, go off your HAART therapy, everything is fine - you really have a screw loose.

Please tell me this is a sociology experiment of yours to see how outlandish posts get people to pour their hearts out in defense of reality. Please!

Actually Lo and the rest of the scientists at the AFIP had serious doubts about the HIV hypothesis in the early 90's Elkie you stupid idiot, and publicly supported Deusberg. If you actually bothered to read Lo conclusions in his the Chapter he authored in the book "Mycoplamsas Molecular Biology and pathenogenesis" since they ruled it to be the cause of death in lab animals and several people that died of acute fatal infections, his team concluded that mycoplamsa incognitus/penetrans were pathenogenic in their own right you pervert, not oppurtunistic infections.

What the hell are your credentials anyways you troll since YOU try and come off as the high preist of Virology?

Boomer,
I believed in the Hiv hypothesis all my life until I saw the film Hiv Fact or fraud. I found some of Duesbergs other scientists arguments more compelling, the fact that over a hundered chimpanzees have been inoculated and none have died, the extremely low amount of T cells that are infected, about 1/1000, a window period that was extended from 10 months to ten years amongst many other strange paradoxes in the hiv hypothesis.

Duesberg, Lo, Mullis, Strohman and many other scientists had other theories on what could destroy the immune system such as AZT, the chemotherapy in a pill, mycoplasmas, severe drug abuse, other theories had to be explored, for if you see Darin Browns post above there was no evidence, at least in the beggining, that HIV was the cause of AIDS when Gallo had his press conference.

You are just going to have to deal with it that many people are starting to doubt the HIV hypothesis instead of having a hissy fit.

I believe I said
"And yes, many of these secondary infections can also cause severe disease and death in immunocompetent people"
- sorry i didn't spell out that I meant they were not secondary in immunocompetent people.

My credentials regarding HIV is that I have seen coworkers and friends get the disease from the late 80's until the early 00's. I have seen the changes in the effectiveness of the therapy over these years from the failures of the early years to the extreme success of the recent years. I have a friend who got extremely sick about 4 years ago - lots of fungal and viral infections - HIV was diagnosed. She is still living today, her T-cell counts are back up and she has only had one opportunistic infection since then, a shingles reactivation. (no, you don't have to be HIV+ to have a shingles reactivation.)

My mother volunteers with AIDAtlanta and I see the hope of HIV+ patients as more and more are surviving longer and longer on the HAART. Those that are diagnosed earlier have a very good prognosis for a long life. I think if you were to meet some of these people and you mentioned what you have said here about HIV not causing AIDS, some might be angry with you, but most would just pity you.

I still have hope that this is your sociology project.

Good night from the ATL. Tara! How about a new post with some info from the meeting!

Wow, anecdotal refrences, real convincing, if that were evidence the film "The Other Side Of AIDS" would debunk hiv causal role for there were many people who lived for decades without drugs. No wonder Dr. Brown wrote that brilliant post and never posts here again, he knows that you guys are kind of nuts, and took off, I should do the same.

I wouldnt mind being banned from these forums for good, for they are addictive and useless.

So i guess that means the answer is no, you don't know anyone that is HIV+. You should really branch out. I googled "Sociology and HIV" - there seem to be alot of hits in the areas that you are expert in. I cannot hope to critically evaluate those links, but perhaps you can get an understanding of the human side to this disease - it will help you with some of the acerbic feelings you have towards the science and political side.

We agree to disagree on some pretty big fundamentals, but remember - this is ultimately about people - life and death. Anything that helps the cause is good for the advancement of our species.

Can you point me to some journal articles that have the data from your movie published? If these articles demonstrate sound science and have been reproduced by others, then they definitely should be brought to light. I think many people would find a paper describing the course of HIV+ people not on antivirals an extremely interesting read - it would provide some very important controls that probably aren't even legal in this day and age. Did they try to find out why these people didn't succumb to the disease? In retrospect, are they co-receptor mutants? Are these people still being followed?

I am intrigued with the possibilities of both a direct read and a reinterpretation of the data in light of findings over the last 10 years.

I agree with you, more research should be done on ltnp'ers, do they really have "special genes" or is hiv not as virulent as they say it is..................I'd support that study that attempted make that distinction, no such study exists for Fauci etc would destroy those scientists careers.

Re cooler

I see that whackjob cooler is on vacation from his job as a Walmart greeter today. For those folks who may be new to this blog, whackjob cooler is a world class denier and charter member of the mercury militia. Mr. cooler denies the relationship between HIV and AIDS, global warming, vaccine efficacy, and no doubt cigarette smoking/lung cancer and CFCs/ozone depletion. Whackjob cooler is a example of a sad sack looking for attention and with too much free time on his hands (being a Walmart greeter doesn't take much mental exercise).

Wow, now you're just lying, ciggarette smoking causing cancer, never denied that, Vaccine efficiancy, nope didn't deny that, just that it was a big mistake to put mercury in vaccines, I suggest you continue your search for a job, loser, for you are starting to have delusions of granduer.

cooler, haven't you promised to go away multiple times now? How about you stick with that?

Had another hellish day in the airport yesterday. I will get up posts about the meeting ASAP, but time with family comes first. More later today...

Re Walmart greeter cooler

Mr. cooler still refuses to address the mercury contamination problem from coal burning electricity generating plants. Just to prod him a little, attached is a link to an article in todays' Washington Post about the proliferation of such plants.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/19/AR20080…

Having mercury being dispersed through the air is a big difference than having 100x the Epa'a safe daily intake injected directly in your bloodstream.

Re cooler

"Having mercury being dispersed through the air is a big difference than having 100x the Epa'a safe daily intake injected directly in your bloodstream."

Mr. cooler demonstrates why real scientists consider him a whackjob. The issue isn't the dispersal of mercury in the atmosphere; its the accumulation of it in the food supply, such as tuna fish. And where did Mr. cooler his figure of 100x the EPA safe daily intake from? I suspect he pulled it out of his posterior orifice or from a mercury militia site. If Mr. cooler is so concerned about mercury, I suggest he lay off those tuna fish sandwiches that Walmart greeters get for lunch.

Actually many experts advise on pregant women not having too much mercury, like your mom who didn't follow this advice, which is why you are retarded. Even the FDA advises on limiting Tuna Fish intake during pregancy.

http://www.mindfully.org/Food/Pregnant-Limit-Tuna-FDA26jul02.htm

Re cooler

Mr. cooler has been snorting too much nose candy lately. He should be aware that Walmart will tie a can to his posterior if he gets caught during a drug test.

Please, Tara, please, just disemvowel cooler, no banning necessary, he can still continue his one-handed typing, but your comment threads may get less derailed.

Can it idli, why don't you just get a job, I heard Target is hiring. If you notice I only repospond to attacks, since you guys have no science to support your positions the first words out of your mouth are "whackjobs" etc. Figures, I would resort to censorship and name calling If I had no evidence to back my positions as well.

Re cooler

The only evidence Mr. cooler cites is that which he has purloined from denialist web sites. He cuts and pastes from these sites, without acknowledging them which is unethical. Of course, to Walmart greeters like Mr. cooler, ethics are for his betters.

Jesus,
Lets end all this BS. I propose a denialist/orthodoxy picnic. We all get together, no shop talk, and just eat, be well and be merry. It would mean a lot to me if SLC and the rest of the gang coould come. Tara could pay for all the plane tickets and food, and I'll chip in for one straw and maybe a paper plate. Lets do this. Lets be adults for a change.

I'll bring the dope

Tara could pay for all the plane tickets and food, and I'll chip in for one straw and maybe a paper plate.

With all the kickbacks and bribes I get from Big Pharma, I suppose.

Re cooler

It should be noted that, in addition to his denialist activities, Mr. cooler is also a 9/11 troofer who insists that the official explanation for the collapse of the World Trade Center towers is a coverup.

Yeah thats a compliment, anyone with have a brain knows that 9/11 was a sham, thats why the most online viewed movies in history are Zeitgeist and Loose Change, probably over a 100 million views already, because anyone with half a brain knows the OCT is a joke.

And the finale of MASH had 105+ million viewers, making it 5% more factual than Zeitgeist and Loose Change by Cooler reasoning.

Everyone knew Mash was fiction, millions of people view these films as fact, not because people are crazy, but because anyone with half a brain thinks its strange that planes dissapear in shankesville and terrosists passports still survive, amongst many other absurdities of the OCT.

You should go to Orac's thread "The Troof hurts" to see how I debated and humilated 9/11 conspiracy nuts and blew them away. Dont feel like having this debate again, for Ive already put the smack down on Orac's thread.

A mathematics professor named Darin Brown wrote a great post on what this is all really about. One can only come to the conclusion that people like SLC et al et al have the "Taboo reaction" so eloquently described by Dr. Brown on issues such as HIV/9/11 etc. These are sociological issues and have nothing to do with the evidence.

SLC,

Your comments, even from someone "with a PhD in elementary particle physics", remind me of the central sociological fact surrounding the reaction you embody:

This has nothing to do with the HIV hypothesis. Nothing to do with the pros vs. cons of vaccine administration. Nothing to do with whether global warming is human-caused. Nothing to do with the cause of the 9-11 attacks. Nothing to do with the issues.

It's all about "joining the anti-crankery club". It's all about getting patted on the back for "being skeptical". It's all about wearing "Skeptical Inquirer" t-shirts and throwing around terms like "whackjob" (implying that anyone who doubts a consensus viewpoint is akin to ejaculate fluid) and "denier" (implying that anyone who doubts a consensus viewpoint is akin to Holocaust deniers). It's all about having your ego stroked for helping in the fight against "scientific illiteracy" and "the cult of irrationality". It's all about the "taboo reaction" so eloquently and prophetically expressed by Feyerabend in Against Method years ago:

"Science [relating another person's characterization] ... is characterised by an essential scepticism; 'when failures start to come thick and fast, defence of the theory switches inexorably to attack on it'.' This is possible because of the 'openness' of the scientific enterprise, because of the pluralism of ideas it contains and also because whatever defies or fails to fit into the established category system is not something horrifying, to be isolated or expelled. On the contrary, it is an intriguing 'phenomenon' - a starting-point and a challenge for the invention of new classifications and new theories. We can see that Horton has read his Popper well. A field study of science itself shows a very different picture... Such a study reveals that, while some scientists may proceed as described, the great majority follow a different path. Scepticism is at a minimum; it is directed against the view of the opposition and against minor ramifications of one's own basic ideas, never against the basic ideas themselves. Attacking the basic ideas evokes taboo reactions which are no weaker than are the taboo reactions in so-called "primitive societies." Basic beliefs are protected by this reaction as well as by secondary elaborations, as we have seen, and whatever fails to fit into the established category system or is said to be incompatible with this system is either viewed as something quite horrifying or, more frequently, it is simply declared to be non-existent."

Read over the responses generated at this blog in reaction to HIV, vaccines, global warming, 9-11, etc. REGARDLESS OF THE MERITS OF THE DOUBTERS ON ANY OF THESE ISSUES, can anyone doubt that the "taboo reaction" expressed by the defenders of the faith here is any weaker than that in so-called "primitive societies"??

darin

Posted by: Darin Brown | January 13, 2008 6:57 PM

Jesus Dr. Brown just broke you guys down, it's so obvious in your primitive ad hominem based reactions to people who disagree with you, none have you have even taken an honest sincere look at the 9/11 "nuts" claim.

Re cooler

Mr. cooler posted this rubbish from Dr. Brown previously. And I responding to that posting previously.

By the way, the 9/11 conspiracies have been fisked by numerous real scientists and have been found to be a crock of horse puckey. See Prof. Steven Novellas' blog and several of his podcasts for the denouement. The 9/11 conspiracies are no different then the conspiracy nuts who claim that the Apollo missions never when to the moon.

The problem is that people like Mr. cooler who feel their talents are unappreciated because they are forced to work as Walmart greeters troll for attention by going against the grain. And they succeed in getting that attention as bloggers like Dr. Smith allow them to make fools of themselves on their blogs. I prefer the way Ed Brayton handles nutcases. He bans them, thus sparing his readers the toil of wading through their ravings and the scienceblogs servers the wasted storage space.

Lol, over 300 architects and engineers have come out at www.ae911truth.org to say explosives were used, and you're babbling about some random Nuerologists blog.

You are the one that brought up 9/11 not me. All your doing with your primitive ad hominem rantings is proving everything said in Dr. Browns above post.

Oh I thought consensus was bad but now 300 people agree so they must be right. Don't you have some online gaming or ANYTHING ELSE to do Steve cooler Billingham??

Re Adele

He's supposed to be greeting people at Walmart. Apparently he's neglecting his duties.

Re cooler

I believe that Mr. cooler stated previously that he was not an evolution denier. I would point out that the Discovery Institute has gotten some 700+ so-called scientists to sign a petition stating that the evidence for evoltion is not convincing to them. Therefore, by Mr. coolers' logic, evolution must be false!

"Everyone knew Mash was fiction, millions of people view these films as fact, not because people are crazy, but because anyone with half a brain thinks its strange that planes dissapear in shankesville and terrosists passports still survive, amongst many other absurdities of the OCT."

My point is that you can't determine the veracity of a movie or documentary based on how many people view it. The fact that 9/11 was an event that impacted the lives of almost everyone in the US makes for a good potential audience.
Let me give a better example than MASH, then. "The Jesus Film" is considered one of the most viewed movies in the world (it's claim, not mine). Yet if IDers use these viewers (who believe it to be fact) to "prove" that the Christian god is real and thus supports the Intelligent Design, you would probably not take them too seriously, and rightly so. Viewer number is no measure of truthfulness.
IDers will also cite scientists and research papers for their causes. However their twisting or misunderstanding of facts, citing of incompetent authorities, repeating incorrect statements they see in movies ect... doesn't make them right. (Crap SLC beat me to the ID scientist stats). Thing is, one can't base your reality on movies, be it reality on HIV, Evolution, 9/11, CIA telepathy experiments ect...

You guys are just making ridicoulous guilt by association blanket speculations that have nothing to with the evidence. It's like walking into a courtroom and saying because defendant X made an absurd argument, all defedents make absurd arguments, its totally baseless and has nothing to do with the evidence at hand.

I don't know many 9/11 "nuts" that don't believe in evolotion, these are just fallacious smokescreens that you people use to avoid talking about the evidence. You would never talk about the evidence, and if you did you would mindlessly accept everything the government provided as fact for the reasons so articulated by Orwell years ago and Dr. Brown above.

Not at all. It is not fallacious to say that people should not base their reality on movies. It is common sense. Further, since you are citing a list of 300 so called experts on the subject without looking into their credentials and disregarding the remaining experts who disagree with your point of view, you are doing exactly what IDers and others do. The tactics used by so many conspiracy theorists are strikingly similar.

"You should go to Orac's thread "The Troof hurts" to see how I debated and humilated 9/11 conspiracy nuts and blew them away. Dont feel like having this debate again, for Ive already put the smack down on Orac's thread."

I read your posts at ORAC's blog and I must say that your claim of both humiliating and blowing away people on the board seems to be completely in your own mind. Just because you think you are winning doesn't make it so. IDers also think they have the winning arguments.

It is fallacious to say because one popular documentary is false all popular documentaries are false.

Per 9/11/Loose Change debate, Wired magazine (I think) hosted a debate with the makers of the movie and can be found on Youtube. It's fairly amusing to watch these two college kids whine like little girls because the Wired editors who have actually talked to a variety of experts in the fields discussed (some even worked on 9/11 investigation itself) make them look like fools. Hell, the excerpts from the movie that were shown were laughable and I can't believe people actually believe them.

As for Cooler's unoriginal, long winded post, while you claim it's all about joining the "anti-crankery club," what's with your side and the massive Galileo complex? Y'all seem to think going against the grain makes you right and an intellectual. News flash: going against the grain requires extraordinary evidence, something your side hasn't produced, not just posing questions (some provocative, others ludicrous).

""It is fallacious to say because one popular documentary is false all popular documentaries are false."

It is equally fallacious to say that since a documentary is popular it must be factual. Therein lies your error. You have stated that you decided that HIV couldn't be real after watching "Hiv: Fact or Fraud" and you decided that 9/11 wasn't real from watching Loose Change. Movies aimed at recruiting people against mainstream ideas tend to oversimplify and bias data to try to sway people to their beliefs. Take the movie "What the Bleep Do We Know" as another example of this. They have "experts" that seem credible if you simply look at their titles. However the whole thing is just a crock written by a pseudo-cult to try to recruit people. I've known quite a few people who watched the movie and thought it must be true because of all the convincing "evidence". However, if one truly knows the subject matter and examines the claims of their "experts" one finds quickly that the whole thing is a scam. Odds are, however, that you will never dissuade the true believers in that movie. So convinced are they that this movie makes sense and that it must therefore be true.

Quotes like ""Fire doesnt melt steel, at least last time I had my bbq it didnt, and I didnt need to fireproof my grill LOL." that you made in the 9/11 blog may make sense to you because of your limited knowledge in physics and engineering but to people who are knowledgeable it makes as much sense as when IDers say "the earth must be only 10,000 years old because carbon dating is inaccurate". Sure, it makes sense to them and they doubtlessly will never make a serious attempt to learn the science required to understand why they are wrong but their perception of truth does not dictate reality. An example I can cite of your doing this is your constant use of Lo's research in an attempt to disprove HIV. The problem is that, unlike you, I have actually read Lo's work. Lo initially posited that it may actually be either cause or cofactor to AIDS. This was based on his initial findings and he did not say that it WAS, just that it MAY be. Later research showed that mycoplasmas were not required for progression to AIDS at all although they did act as co-factors (that is, in people with HIV progression to AIDS was not dependent on, but was accelerated in the presence of, m. penetrans). Experimentally it had been determined that mycoplasmas act in a way similar to other mitogens, stimulating T-cells to become active. The problem is that dormant, infected T-cells do not produce many viral particles. When they are activated, however, viral production kicks into high gear, producing the opposite effect one would hope for. I encourage you to look through pubmed using Lo's name and 'mycoplasma penetrans" as search parameters. If you truly want to know what Lo's work means you can start there. I'm sure anyone on this board would be more than happy to explain to you parts where you may be having trouble understanding if you ask honest questions. If no one else, I will. The other option is to blindly accept what little you think you understand to be etched in stone as fact and join the crowd of IDers, Moon Landing Hoaxers, ect... all of whom are equally confidant in their beliefs.

You are wrong on Lo's work, he and his team clearly stated that mycoplamsa incognitus and mycoplasma penetrans were pathenogenic in their own right since they induced fatal wasting disease in animals and ruled it to be the cause of death in several people that died of acute fatal infections. Note they were able to do these things, see the microbe rotting patients organs, Ive never seen a picture of hiv from a patient.

I suggest you read Lo's chapter in the book where he and his pals at the AFIP, like Duesberg, seriously doubt that HIV is pathenogenic to humans, and prove these mycoplasmas are pathenogenic in their own right. Go to Chapter 32 page 527 in the Chapter in the book he authored in 1992.

http://books.google.com/books?id=G3rURFq6u84C&pg=PA525&lpg=PA525&dq=shy…

Lo brings up all the paradoxes of the hiv hypothesis that Duesberg does, the lack of an animal model, the low amount of tcell infection, the ever extending window period...

"All these findings indicate that HIV-1 is a necessary but not sufficient cause of Aids Disease"
Shyh Ching Lo Md Phd
Mycoplasmas and AIDS 1992

And as time as passed, the paradoxes that Duesberg, Lo, Mullis, Walter Gilbert brought up back then have only gotten larger.

Those hundereds chimpanzees inoculated have still not died after 20 years, the Padian and Rodriguiez studies came out, and I have yet to see an EM pic of these 100,000 ml viral loads. And I got the an HIV expert, Joel Gallant, that said HIV only infects a fraction of cells, and its a "immune reponse" responsible for the immune destruction, so all these parodoxes brought up by those scientists in the early 90's are the same today, probably even larger.

Cooler,
I see you have chosen the path of the IDers. I have seen now many times when people have tried to explain to you why those "paradoxes" as you put them are incorrect and every time you come back with the same lines over and over. I don't think you will actually learn anything from this but I will explain it to you anyway.

"I suggest you read Lo's chapter in the book where he and his pals at the AFIP, like Duesberg, seriously doubt that HIV is pathogenic to humans, and prove these mycoplasmas are pathenogenic in their own right."

I have read it before. No one doubts that mycoplasmas can be pathogenic in their own right. However, Lo's chapters in mycoplasma were written in 1992. You should probably read his later works. Both Lo, Montagnier and many others have studied m. penetrans and come up with very interesting information. In the US and Europe, m. penetrans is found primarily in HIV+ homosexual males primarily. It is rarely found in other risk groups, even those who have already progressed to full blown AIDS. Further, in those homosexual HIV patients tested, about 18%-40%-ish (give or take) have m. penetrans, depending on which study you are looking at and the geographical location where the patients are taken. M. penetrans alone does not cause AIDS, although it does cause other health risks as can be seen in the few cases of HIV- m. penetrans+ people. These symptoms are easily taken care of in most cases with simple antibiotics. Unfortunately, AIDS patients taking these antibiotics do not suddenly become AIDS free. So now you have HIV- people who have m. penetrans and do not develop AIDS and HIV+ people and no m. penetrans and do progress. The distribution of m. penetrans actually indicates that it is an opportunistic pathogen.

"Those hundereds chimpanzees inoculated have still not died after 20 years, the Padian and Rodriguiez studies came out"

As many people have commented before, humans and chimps differ in their genetic makeup so this is not unexpected. An example of this is the immune protein Trim5-alpha. The human version of this protein does not protect against HIV. However, the chimp version makes cells 100 times less susceptible. This alone should serve to illustrate how simple differences in genomes can have such a drastic effect on survivability. Now, if you take non-chimp SIV and inject it into chimps, they can and do suffer immune collapse and opportunistic infection.

Most viruses tend to be host specific. Take FIV, for example. FIV is the feline lentivirus similar in many ways to HIV. In cats it leads to a decrease in CD4 cells, a change in CD4:CD8 ratio and opportunistic infection followed by immune collapse. Sound familiar? And yet while this virus can be lethal to most cats it is generally harmless to humans. How about another example; EIAV (equine infectious anemia virus) likewise is fatal in most horses but harmless to humans. This is not unexpected and is observed in many non-retroviral viruses as well.

"And I got the an HIV expert, Joel Gallant, that said HIV only infects a fraction of cells, and its a "immune reponse" responsible for the immune destruction"

Direct cell killing is only one way in which HIV leads to immune collapse and, more recent evidence shows, it is not the main one. Runaway syncitial formation leads to more damage than direct cell killing. Induction of apoptosis (programmed cell "suicide") in non-infected cells is another mechanism of cell death in addition to the one Joel suggested.

So no, these "paradoxes" are not getting larger, as you say. They are being solved or have been understood for a while. Unfortunately those who choose to blindly keep their minds closed will ignore this so they can keep on repeating the same "paradox" claims incessantly. What about you Cooler? I have seen people explain to you or others about the differences in genomes and why the low susceptibility of Chimps to HIV-induced AIDS is expected. Will you continue to ignore this and repeat these "paradoxes" over and over or are you capable or learning?

In reading the types of comments that Mr. cooler posts, it is interesting to compare his techniques to those of other denialists. In particular, compare Mr. cooler, an HIV/AIDS denialist, 9/11 troofer, and global warming denialist with an evolution and big bang denialist calling himself JonS (who is a young earth creationist) over at the evolution blog (link attached). Although they are denying different things, their techniques are very similar. They cite links to denialist web sites and homepages from fringe scientists who dissent from the scientific consensus. Thus just as Mr. cooler cites authorities like Peter Duesberg and Lynn Margulis, Mr. JonS cites authorities like Russell Humphreys (although, in fairness, Prof. Duesberg and Prof. Margulis actually had legitimate scientific reputations at one time, unlike Humphreys who is a lifelong whackjob). For a more comprehensive analysis of the denialist mentality, I recommend visiting the denialist web site of the Hoofnagel brothers on Scienceblogs.

http://www.scienceblogs.com/evolutionblog/

Cooler says
Lo brings up all the paradoxes of the hiv hypothesis that Duesberg does, the lack of an animal model, the low amount of tcell infection, the ever extending window period...
and
the paradoxes that Duesberg, Lo, Mullis, Walter Gilbert brought up back then have only gotten larger.

No they didn't the evidence didn't support it that is why real scientists like Lo and Gilbert change their mind. Lo said mycoplasma MIGHT BE cofactor in 1992. His stuff and other people's stuff showed him its HIV causes AIDS. Walter Gilbert was behind Duesberg 20 years ago today he says HIV causes AIDS.

Lack of perfect animal model is not paradox its difficulty. Low amount of tcell infection is not true majority of t cells in some parts of body get killed in a week after HIV comes in. Ever extending window period is crap people live longer bc drugs are here.

Cooler do your self a big favor go to a AIDS clinic near you, talk to people there. Do you know any body with HIV? Its a good perpective.

Link to Jason Rosenhouses' blog entry was incomplete. Full link is below.

http://scienceblogs.com/evolutionblog/2008/03/is_richard_dawkins_a_fund…

Re cooler

The attached link is to a thread on Jeffrey Shallits' blog in which an individual named Arthur Scheuereman comments on the issue of the collapse of the World Trade Center towers (incidently, there are other threads on Prof.Shallits' blog on this subject). He demolishes many of the troofer canards.

https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=20067416&postID=85311755695369…

Cooler,
In addition to my above post I am including the following quotes by Lo himself in the mycoplasma book you cited:

"M. penetrans is a previously unknown mycoplasma recently isolated from HIV-1 infected patients with AIDS. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ITS INFECTION IN AIDS or any other human diseases AWAITS THE FINDINGS OF FUTURE STUDIES"(emphasis mine, p. 526).

This hardly sounds like a quote a man who was sure that m. penetrans and not HIV was the cause of AIDS.

Towards the end he gives 3 possible significances to AIDS-associated mycoplasma infections. They are:
1)The mycoplasmas could simply be opportunistic infections
2)The m. penetrans and fermentans could increase (note he does not say "cause") the pathogenicity of HIV.
3)The mycoplasmas themselves have pathogenic properties (again note he does not say they cause AIDS). (all from page 539)

He finishes off by saying:

"It is important to note that mycoplasmal infection is still highly significant clinically in AIDS, even if it is merely one more example of an opportunistic infection."

Again, this is not a highly respected scientist saying that HIV doesn't exist/isn't the cause of AIDS, nor is it a highly respected scientist saying m. penetrans causes AIDS. This is a highly respected scientist (even, you claim, in your eyes) saying that while these may act synergistically with HIV to enhance its cytotoxicity, at the time the book was written, the significance of m. penetrans in AIDS was UNKNOWN. He never says that it causes AIDS. The book, chapter, and author you cite refute your claims that he is a denialist. So again I ask; are you capable of learning? Are you capable of admitting you were wrong or will we see more of Lo's name smeared with misinformation?

Lo definately was a "denialist" in the early 90's, he and Dr. Col. Douglas Wear of the AFIP sent an open letter to Duesberg applauding him for speaking out, and in that book chapter pointed out the same flaws that Duesberg did and said HIV was insuffucient to cause AIDS by itself, and that mycoplasmas were pathenogenic in their own right.

Not sure what his position is now, what difference does it make, if he spoke out he'd be labeled a crank, Walter Gilbert said in one email meant to be private that he felt the success of the drugs made him him rethink the situation, I thought that the Parenzee trial showed that private emails mean nothing, like when an HIV expert from the prosection told Kary Mullis that AIDS science was totally fraudulent? Gilberts main reason why he supported Duesberg publicly all those years was that there was no animal model, there is still no animal model.

Are YOU willing to learn, obviously not, nothing would falsify your beleifs. You should read Darin Brown's above post when he asked what evidence was provided between 1984-86 that caused the IOM to dedicate 2 billion per annum towards curing AIDS, the studies that you guys claim prove casuality are laughable.

Are you willing to learn anything? Or are you going to keep acting like those trailer park hillbillies that think there are still WMD's in Iraq?

"Lo definately was a "denialist" in the early 90's, he and Dr. Col. Douglas Wear of the AFIP sent an open letter to Duesberg applauding him for speaking out, and in that book chapter pointed out the same flaws that Duesberg did and said HIV was insuffucient to cause AIDS by itself, and that mycoplasmas were pathenogenic in their own right."

Here is your problem Cooler; he gave the possibility that mycoplasmas were pathogenic in their own right as one of 3 options. He did not say they were the cause of AIDS; just that it was possible they had their own pathogenic properties. The other options (which I listed above) include it being just another opportunistic infection. Why would you pick only one suggested possibility, ignore the rest, and then claim Lo said it was fact? He makes it quite clear that at that point (1992) even he was uncertain as to what role they actually played in AIDS.

"Not sure what his position is now, what difference does it make..."

You don't know his position now? After touting him as your example of what a scientist should be, the latest research of his you've read is from 16 years ago? As for what difference it would make I think it should be clear. If you respect him as much as you say you do then I think you owe it to yourself to find out what his position is and why. It might be hard to have to admit that even the hero you brought up over and over again in past blogs doesn't support your argument, however.

Cooler: "Walter Gilbert said in one email meant to be private that he felt the success of the drugs made him him rethink the situation"

Correction: Walter Gilbert considers their success to be "reasonable proof" that HIV causes AIDS. In his own words:

Today I would regard the success of the many antiviral agents which lower the virus titers (to be expected) and also resolve the failure of the immune system (only expected if the virus is the cause of the failure) as a reasonable proof of the causation argument.

Cooler re: the Adelaide trial: "an HIV expert from the prosection told Kary Mullis that AIDS science was totally fraudulent"

Correction: the expert told Mullis that he, like Mullis, was personally uncomfortable with the use of science in the courtroom....but that he testified and hoped Mullis would testify out of respect for the law.

Poodle,
Lo has not spoken out against or for the HIV hypothesis for 16 years, not that this matters, what matters is evidence. Can you provide any evidence that prompted the IOM to dedicate 2 billion per annum for the HIV hypothesis in 1986, can you provide the evidence that proved HIV causality since this was the time that every doctor was taught in medical school HIV was the cause of AIDS and the blood supply was screened?

Can you provide this evidence published between 1984-86 that proved causality, since medical schools, blood banks and the prestigious IOM were talking about HIV causal role as fact during this period?

Or are you just going to make a fool of yourself like when Noble et al responded to this question proposed by DR. Brown (see above)?

As for Lo's concluisons on mycoplasma, if you bothered to read his chapter in the book, his final conclusion on the situation is this,

"Finally it is possible that the microbe itself is pathenogenic in humans. The final consideration is supported by our animal experiments and by the association of M. fermentans and those previously healthy non-AIDs patients dying of a fatal disease"
Lo 1992

Other labratories reported the same findings, people many people suddenly became ill and died/were dying and the only agent identified was m. incognitus, a microbe that caused a fatal infection in primates, and was visible by EM in dying patients rotting organs. (See pics in the book link above)

And in 1996 he inoculated embryos that all deformed or died with mycoplamsa incognitus/penetrans and repeated the claim that they caused systemic fatal infections in humans.

Thats nice of Fauci to let this microbe spread through the population, destroying people's lives. Another blunder by the blood stained orthodoxy.

Cooler wrote:
"Lo has not spoken out against or for the HIV hypothesis for 16 years, not that this matters, what matters is evidence."

He didn't need to speak out, his later publications made his stance on the issue clear.

"Can you provide any evidence that prompted the IOM to dedicate 2 billion per annum for the HIV hypothesis in 1986, can you provide the evidence that proved HIV causality since this was the time that every doctor was taught in medical school HIV was the cause of AIDS and the blood supply was screened?"

Now why would you be trying to change the topic from your misconceptions of Lo and his work?

"As for Lo's conclusions on mycoplasma, if you bothered to read his chapter in the book, his final conclusion on the situation is this,
"Finally it is possible that the microbe itself is pathenogenic in humans. The final consideration is supported by our animal experiments and by the association of M. fermentans and those previously healthy non-AIDs patients dying of a fatal disease"
Lo 1992"

I did "bother to read it". In fact, if you look at my previous posts you will notice I refer to this exact sentence. What you fail to see is that the operative word is "possible". He did not, at the time, know if m. penetrans truly had any significance in AIDS, hence why he uses the word POSSIBLE. As I stated earlier, if you look at the exact same paragraph as that sentence you will find he also proposes that it is POSSIBLE that m. penetrans is nothing more than another opportunistic infection. Lo is a real scientist and thus did not say that m. penetrans was or was not significant in AIDS progression precisely because he himself did not know. This is why he continued studying mycoplasmas and wrote more articles about it. He left the conclusion open to future studies. But you seem to pick and choose only what you think supports your argument and ignore the rest, never mind that what you think you are reading isn't even correct.

"Other labratories reported the same findings, people many people suddenly became ill and died/were dying and the only agent identified was m. incognitus, a microbe that caused a fatal infection in primates, and was visible by EM in dying patients rotting organs. (See pics in the book link above)
And in 1996 he inoculated embryos that all deformed or died with mycoplamsa incognitus/penetrans and repeated the claim that they caused systemic fatal infections in humans."

Again, you fail to understand the significance of his work. Studies done after 1992 showed that m. penetrans was not required for progression to AIDS. In fact the majority of those who progressed to AIDS did not have m. penetrans. Its distribution was limited in the US and Europe to homosexual HIV patients (and even then not the majority). Other risk groups had very low incidence of m. penetrans despite high AIDS rates.

"Thats nice of Fauci to let this microbe spread through the population, destroying people's lives. Another blunder by the blood stained orthodoxy. "

It is nice of you to drag Lo's name through the mud and try to destroy his reputation based on your lack of reading most his work and lack of understanding of what little you did read. Try actually reading what he wrote instead of reading into it what you want to see. "Possible" does not equal "definitely" and "the Significance of its infection in AIDS or any other human diseases awaits the findings of future studies" does not equal "thus m. penetrans causes AIDS".

You are the one dragging his name through the mud.

At the end of his book chapter he proposes three possibilties for m. incognitus/penetrans

1) they are just oppurtunistic infections
2) they are co factors that make HIV more virulent
3) they are pathenogenic in their own right.

He says the final consideration is the most likely because of fatal inoculations in monkeys and that he ruled it to be the cause of death in several people that died of an acute fatal disease.

What part of that don't you understand you fool? He never claimed Mycoplasmas Causes AIDS, he saw flaws that Duesberg saw and agreed with him back then, and both Duesberg and he went looking for other explanations, with Duesberg it was the Lifestyle hypothesis, Lo felt that a subset of AIDS patients had a systemic pathenogenic infection that needed treatment.

You see REAL scientists went looking for other explanations for the cause of AIDS, such as AZT, severe drugs abuse, Mycoplasmas, because there never was any evidence in 1986 that HIV caused AIDS, which is strange because every doctor was taught it in medical school, the blood bank was screened, and the IOM dedicated 2 billion per annum in research in 1986, kind of strange all these things happnened when there was no evidence that proved causality in the peer reviewed literature back then.

So is Lo no longer a REAL scientist if he agrees HIV causes AIDS? Why do you tout a non-scientist to prove your points, Cooler, when you've got Duesberg, Manniotis and all those other great minds who have managed to figure out what the other THOUSANDS of scientists haven't quite been able to grasp. HAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA you're one amusing SOB cooler. Caught in your own lies and distortions but still fighting none the less.

Hey Jim, elkmountain man,
You guys never answered my question, what the hell are your credentials since you guys come off as the high priests of virology?

I don't consider myself a "high priest" of virology. I simply point out inconsistencies and flaws in your thinking and statements. Also, as a microbiology graduate student these topics are of great interest to me and this blog an excellent source of interesting articles for non-project related reading.

What's your reason for being here?

OK every body let's stop beating up cooler. I know I did it too but it's enough. The guy is a antisocial and nut but he is SICK not a jerk only. We argue with him and call him stuff and it makes us all look bad bc its like winning a race against an obese guy or a paraplegic.

Jim, Poodle, SLC, Elkman, Boomer, all you have to remember is, Steve cooler Billingham is not your rational guy you can't argue with him. He is a sick person and he thinks he is sick bc of mycoplasma. He's brosoupi on www.cpnhelp.org/mycoplamsa_or_cpn?page=1 and he said

I should have been recovered a while ago, but my brain is very sensitive to drugs I was prescribed like Prozac/benzodiazepines and the withdrwals are really bad. Ive bounced around doctors for years with no answers, and been written of as a hypochondriac by some really pathetic doctors. Its sad how dumb some doctors are, and have no knowledge of the peer reviewed work I posted on mycoplasma incognitus, and thousands of people are slowly rotting away with this infection.

Suddenly became ill many years ago right after exposure. Symptoms included an initial flu like illness, followed by memory loss spatial problems, diahreah. Mycoplasma positive and been on Nicolson's treatment protocol 200 doxyi a day for a few months

His brain is very sensative to drugs and conspiracies bc Cooler is sick cooler spends all day and night on the internet arguing about mycoplasma pasting the same stuff every where. It is a sad person he is and I hope he lets doctors help him some day. BC every person has a contribution to the world and cooler needs help to get better.

My worry is, we argue with him and feed him and that's what he wants he feels like he is contributing that way but he is getting sicker and sicker. Can we ignore him and help him that way or am I wrong. Please tell me.

"let's stop beating up cooler. I know I did it too but it's enough. The guy is a antisocial and nut"
Wow, don't you have any moral values at all, "Lets stop beating up on cooler...........next line........ hes a nut" that really consistent, you are the only one people should feel sorry for, not me.

One would have to think how little Adele has to to all day then to try and dig up gossip on others, and that can be a sign of illness in itself, I have made no secret that I might have gotten this microbe, and expereinced symptoms, and am doing just fine, what Adele is trying to do is embarass me in any way possible, hell I already told everyone I was sick, not a big secret. Adele is the one that needs mental help for scouring the internet to dig up dirt on others, don't you have anything better to do? I mean it must take hours to find posts on messsage boards that might or might not have been made by certain people.

Ignore me thats the best! I hate this place! I tried to stay away for days but SLC kept asking me about mercury!

Ignore me! all my posts, just ignore them, When Dr. Brown left he left a telling quote on why any rational person would not want to debate with you people. It's like talking to people that belong in a mental institution.

"Really, I'm serious. I don't know WHAT the **** is the problem with you people.

The posts on this blog have gone beyond attempts at scientific discussions or even political rantings or even ill-mannered personal attacks, and have entered the realm of HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS for future generations to ponder over the absolutely stunningly pathetic statements made here.

darin

Posted by: Darin Brown | November 9, 2007 10:20 PM"

IGNORE ME!

Keep in mind all this started when I called Adele out on being a fake lab tech with no job. I guess i really touched a nerve because this lowlife nutcase scrolled every message board for days, looking for posts that could have been made by me, I guess she did that because I really spoke the truth, I mean with all this copying and pasting it only proves everything I said about her, she's a unemployed nut with too much time on her hands.

Cooler,
I'm curious as to which mycoplasma you think you had (which strain, ect...) and what made you think that is what it was? Also are you better now?

I'm also curious what tests you had done.

Poodle Stomper,
What is wrong with me is irrelevant, what does matter is that Lo's pathenogenic mycoplasmas were part of the biological weapons program, And when Two scientists, Garth and Nancy Nicolson at the MD cancer center found it in the blood of sick GWI vets and civilians with CFS armed agents from the DOD threatened them to stop their research, and thier boss Dr. Conrad was shot in the head 5 times in a professional hit a day after he told the Nicolsons it was part of the biological weapons program and being illegally tested.

You will laugh at me, but after this government killed 3 million in Vietnam, and experimented on Black people for no reason etc, this is not at all surprising to me. Besides the Nicolsons barely fictionilized new book Project Day Lily has rave reviews from many scientists, including a Nobel Laurete in medicine. So I don't care if you people call me a loon thats mentally ill.

http://www.projectdaylily.com/