[ExI] Virologist cures herself of breast cancer with a lab grown virus

[Adrian Tymes]

On Thu, Nov 21, 2024 at 5:42 AM efc--- via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> Given her training and expertise in the area, as well as the fact that she
> probably had the support of colleagues, I think this is great!
>
> As long as you harm no one else, I do not see why you should not have the
> right to experiment with your own body.
>

The problem comes with the unstated condition: "...and has a reasonable
chance of success."

What of those who have no clue and are all but guaranteed only to harm
themselves if they try, such that they would either become society's ward
whose welfare other people must pay for, or unfit for normal work and left
only able to prey upon others (in the criminal sense, not - necessarily -
the cannibalistic) to survive?  This is among the more coherent objections
of those who warn against the masses being allowed to try such things on
their own.

And in that sense, even this example was not truly on her own.  Surely she
discussed her plans with her colleagues (who were presumably trained and
competent like her), both to review beforehand and to help monitor
immediately after treatment, yes?  If this was permitted without
limitation, many - likely most - cases would not have that benefit.


> Since I am not an expert in medicine, I would be very interested in
> knowing what kind of experiments, anyone at home could do, that would
> result in mutating viruses or other things, which might risk the lives of
> others?
>

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_case - aka "patient zero" - is the
start: be the first host of an infectious disease.  I think I recall a
movie where the plot revolved around a bioterrorist who did just that,
visiting as many airports as he could while his body held out (and then a
time traveller from the resultant ravaged world going back to intercept
said terrorist around or before the first airport).  A better version would
be to immunize oneself (and perhaps a small group one cared about) while
still being a carrier.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimicrobial_resistance describes another
possibility: cure a disease just enough to repress symptoms but still
incubate the microbes in one's system, which can lead to the survival of
the few microbes resistant to whatever cure was administered, which are
usually cleaned up by the immune system once the other microbes are dealt
with, but in this scenario are unintentionally (or, for those with ill
intent, intentionally) left in large enough quantities to overcome that.

And that's just stuff one can do in one's own body.
https://www.google.com/search?q=how+to+create+a+bioweapon has lots of
results.
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