We've been doubling every two to three days. Five days doubles twice.
We'll have thousands of cases by the end of this week.
Maybe a couple.
Spain looks in trouble.
Our apparent current case fatality rate is 3.89%. That probably means we either aren't detecting most of the cases, or the ones we do detect we're not taking good enough care of to keep them alive.
That's of course not a "real" CFR, just a throw-around working number.
The super-sad thing about Italy is that even though they've just today gone to full national lockdown, there's a week or two's worth of already-launched torpedoes already on a guaranteed course. So it will be a week or two before this helps, if it does. In the mean time, there are at least 2, maybe 4 or 5 doubles to go for them. AND THAT IS IF THIS EVEN WORKS!
I guess that's true for all of us, but we aren't doing much yet, so we'll be a month or six weeks behind before anything we do will lower the torpedoes launched daily.
It seems to have worked in Wuhan/Hubei/China. I don't know. They've done more than we'll ever do.
I don't know how strong the measures in those two places are. Japan in particular worries me, even though Korea appears rather worse but getting less so.
Remember also that there may be a delayed effect in Italy: the current increase may be mostly of people who caught the virus before most of the government measures were in place. The measures taken two weeks ago may come into effect only now.
> The investigators of a recent study, published in National Science Review, used SARS-CoV-2 genomic data and uncovered that there appears to be 2 major types of the virus in circulation— the L and S type. The S type is ancestral, and the L type evolved from the S type.
> While the S type is the ancestral type, the L type was found to be more prevalent. The L type made up 70% of the 103 sequenced strains, whereas the S type made up 30%. It is not yet clear whether the L type evolved in humans or in zoonotic intermediary hosts.
> The team found that the L type was most prevalent in the early stages of the outbreak in Wuhan, China. After early January, the frequency of L type started to decrease.
“Human intervention may have placed more severe selective pressure on the L type, which might be more aggressive and spread more quickly. On the other hand, the S type, which is evolutionarily older and less aggressive, might have increased in relative frequency due to relatively weaker selective pressure,” the study authors explained.
It probably means nothing, or is an accident of sampling.
> The finding that the coronavirus mutates into two strains with the L strain leading to more severe disease "is most likely a statistical artifact," Richard Neher, a biologist and physicist at the University of Basel in Switzerland wrote...
Well, I'm already coming down with something. Swollen glands, tight cough. Not sure what it is, but so far the only measures I'm taking are not to ride my bike, or at least not strenuously. I doubt it's COVID-19.
@tchrist When I saw that line, immediately a melody and lyrics popped up in my mind. But I had no idea what artist or what song. Turned out it was Smooth Criminal.
Yeah. I would have to go to the stores ten times to put up Amsterdam numbers.
> A healthy amount of exercise provides an overall “boost” to the immune system (to the extent that you can really “boost” something as complex as immunity). But did you know that overdoing it actually reduces immune function? Endurance athletes (like marathon runners, distance swimmers, and triathletes) have notably depressed immunity, especially when it comes to upper respiratory tract infections (like colds). And when these elite athletes do get colds, their symptoms tend to last longer and be more severe.
So I may have amped up my performance too quickly. A week ago I was on my fifth day of riding with no rest days. I went to six days, and after that I started feeling my glands fill up.
> April 27, 2020 — Greatest illumination. Venus is now at the pinnacle of its great brilliance, shining at magnitude –4.7. It is so bright now that it can be seen easily with the naked eye in a deep blue, haze-free afternoon sky. It continues to approach the Earth while appearing to curve back in toward the sun in our sky. In a telescope it is now a big, beautiful crescent that grows larger and thinner with each passing night. The crescent can now be glimpsed even in steadily held binoculars.
> When Venus displays a full (or nearly full) disk, it appears relatively small. Conversely, when it appears very large, it's a very narrow crescent. Right now though, we're at the midpoint between these two extremes; hence the term "Greatest Illuminated Extent." Venus now stands 42 million miles from the Earth and on April 30 its disk will be 25 percent illuminated. It now appears nearly 40 percent larger in size than it did just one month ago.
Well, it's inside our orbit so we never see its full face. Can't.
Guess the author:
> "They have the tests. And the tests are beautiful. Anybody that needs a test gets a test."
Or this:
> "I like this stuff. I really get it. People are surprised that I understand it. Every one of these doctors said, 'How do you know so much about this?' Maybe I have a natural ability. Maybe I should have done that instead of running for President."
> The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.
Soon enough this trouble shall pass, but she will ever hang there above us.
@RegDwigнt He's just saying he's happy to meet you, and sorry because he can't give a good reply(?). He apparently noticed your many hobbies in your profile and rather idolizes you as a Russian pianist ロシア人(ピアニスト "RoshyajinPEE-AH-NISU-TO)
I am looking for a polite way of saying, in Japanese, that they are welcome to continue writing to me in Japanese, but that I won't be able to return the favor, if only for the fear that even the tiniest mistake can very easily come across as offensive, with no offence meant on my part.
@Robusto yes, I know. Which is sort of my point. My passive knowledge plus Google Translate are fine. My active knowledge is non-existent.
> I'm sorry here because I can't reply well there.
Nice to meet you. I saw your profile. There are many hobbies (?) And it's very nice! It's so cool to be a Russian pianist!
That's what GT gets me. I can work with that. They won't be able to work with what it gives me to send them.
(FYI, the here-there distinction is public on the forums vs private messages. That's what he means by that.)
I wouldn't translate 素敵 as "very nice" ... more like wonderful or lovely.
Self-introductions are complicated in Japanese, by the way. He's going way out on a limb, but maybe that is the current generation breaking strictures.
He's a new user that came to the public site, and posted, in English, that he's Japanese and looking to meet new people. Everyone welcomed him, some folks in Japanese. Including myself who could muster a "doumo, alex des, hajimemashite".
I'm telling him you thank him for his message and would very much welcome further communication. Then I explain that because your Japanese sucks, you will have to rely on English. You apologize for your manifest shortcomings and ask him if that will be acceptable.
@Cerberus It is. I'm surprised they've put that much together. There aren't many surviving historical records from that time and place, and I don't know that there are any in the indigenous tongues (not Greek, Phoenician etc).
We get glimpses of the Celtiberian substrate. But not much more that I'm aware of.
Is Biden's mental decline not in plain sight now? How can anyone put their bet on him in the race against Trump?
Now it's the Dem's turn to gaslight the people into believing he can fare okay. The bipartisan project of gaslighting the population carries on with renewed force.
For example: the word - "legend" has below two meanings as a noun.
a traditional story sometimes popularly regarded as historical but unauthenticated.
an extremely famous or notorious person, especially in a particular field.
Why not just have another word for the different meaning. Does it s...
How can you even get on the Internet without realizing — and many many years in advance, mind — that the words get, can, on all have fifty different meanings.
How can you pick legend as an example. Have you never noticed it about the word go. Or the word a. Or the word word.
OK, I'm trying to think of a trope and my memory is failing me. Here's the structure, with a placeholder for the verb(s): "He verbs best who verbs least." No jokes please. I simply can't think of the actual quote, if it is a quote.
@RegDwigнt I'm guessing his name is short for Jellybean.
> The quote can be found in Henry David Thoreau's essay entitled Civil Disobedience published in 1849. However the quote is often attributed to Thomas Jefferson, but there is no writing suggesting Jefferson actually said it.
> [Edit: Indeed Jefferson did NOT coin this phrase. This motto (originally "The best government is that which governs least") was in fact that of the monthly periodical of the mid-19th century called "United States Magazine and Democratic Review," it is a most excellent read too. Archives can be found in the Cornell Library.
Yeah, Civil Disobedience is it:
> I HEARTILY ACCEPT THE MOTTO,—“That government is best which governs least”; and I should like to see it acted up to more readily and systematically.
But it's not in the same form as verbs best that verbs least.
Well I can see the problem here. Nowadays they reword that for the millennials. Like, the SE mod agreement literally starts by saying the same thing. But it uses the words "What should a mod do? As little as possible!"
My first thought, like everybody else, was 'what an idiot' too. But then I realized it is not an unreasonable question. also I answered it, and I always feel like if it is worth answering it is worth upvoting (of course there are cases where it is not)
See, there's my next "Good Answer" badge: "What is the positive counterpart to Troll." And the accepted answer will include "You know, kind of like @Mitch."
@Mitch See, I think you already had put in most of the work on your answer and wanted to make sure it didn't go to waste. So, a selfish motive after all. No Pollyanna, but a cynical manipulator of the reputation cogwheels.
My father told me that one of the entertainments was to go down to the barbershop on Saturday morning before it opened and watch the barber strop his razors. I think that is the opposite of Netflix.
And it had none of them electronics. Only electrics. Radio lamps. The size of a Tesla. You could fix a broken one with an old shoelace and some potato starch.
For example: the word - "legend" has below two meanings as a noun.
a traditional story sometimes popularly regarded as historical but unauthenticated.
an extremely famous or notorious person, especially in a particular field.
Why not just have another word for the different meaning. Does it s...
English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…
English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…