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mcculley ◴[] No.45030508[source]
I always wonder this and maybe people in the comments here know the answer: If humans had the technology to eliminate all viruses on Earth, what would be the outcome? Do viruses keep other bad things in check? Would there be bad consequences if we eliminated all viruses?
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lotsoweiners ◴[] No.45030534[source]
Population control.
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aurizon[dead post] ◴[] No.45030812[source]
[flagged]
olddustytrail ◴[] No.45032958[source]
Not really. Races don't exist biologically. There are certainly traits within populations but that's a bit like my cousins tend to be fatter than my family. It's not something that can be accurately targeted.
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asdff ◴[] No.45033104[source]
You'd be surprised. There is quite a bit of polymorphism within the human species that is very much distinguishable per population. E.g. haplogroup analysis or microsatellite analysis is remarkably accurate in this regard due to a lack of interaction between far flung populations until quite recently in human history. Now, does this imply all the bullshit eugenicists and other racists tend to preach about with race? Hell no, social factors are responsible for most of that variance, but to suggest there would be no biomarker for "race" in its colloquial definition as proxy for population of origin is inaccurate.

This is also why there is a big focus now to seek out underrepresented populations in genetic analysis, because there may be population specific biomarkers that are relevant in disease that you miss if you limit yourself to the handful of widely sequenced homogeneous populations (e.g. there are Utah and Iceland datasets that are popular to use for this).

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1. darkwater ◴[] No.45036488[source]
Not an expert but I don't think that still qualifies as biological differences in races. I mean, obviously we are all biological different and it seems obvious as well that if a group of people stays isolated enough it will develop and reinforce differences to other groups.

For example the Basque population has clear genetic differences to the rest of the Iberian and Westerner population [1] but that doesn't make them a different race.

Race is just a social construct, mostly based on visual traits.

[1] https://www.ibe.upf-csic.es/news/-/asset_publisher/PXTgqZXxl...