[extropy-chat] The Funeral as an "act of conspicuous consumption"

[Robert J. Bradbury]

On Fri, 28 Nov 2003, Charlie Stross wrote:

> Possibly. But there's a fly in the ointment: CJD has such a long
> incubation period -- at least in the classically known familial form --
> that before Kuru, Scrapie and BSE were identified as prion diseases it
> appeared to be genetic. A new generation would be infected in utero,
> and they didn't exhibit symptoms until well after they reached
> reproductive age -- thus infecting their own children.

Charlie, are you sure about this?  I've never encountered anything
that suggested there was mother-to-fetus transmission.  It would
be very hard to separate out -- if a mother was normally consuming
infected individuals there would probably be ample opportunity for
a child, teenager or young adult to consume infected individuals
as well.

One thing I do recall seeing is that some population groups *do*
appear to have genetic polymorphisms that allow them to resist
CJD and its variants.  That is one of the factors that led scientists
to conclude that cannablism was common in some societies at some point
and that the disease must have exerted a selection effect.

Robert