According to this, around 1.5 million people are estimated to have been infected. Brazil has a population of about 202 million. According to this article, there are estimated to be roughly 4074 cases of Microcephaly. If you can extrapolate that out, then if all 202 million people were infected, you could end up with almost 550,000 cases of microcephaly just in Brazil.
According to this site, Brazil has a birth rate of around 15 births per thousand people, which means you should expect about 3,000,000 births in a year. Just as a loose ballpark figure, lacking more detailed data, that works out to almost 1 in five births possibly ending up with microcephaly, if Zika were to infect all 202 million people this year. In this age of vastly reduced infant mortality, that is actually pretty strong selection pressure favoring people who are driven enough to plan and act to avoid exposure to mosquitos, and sexual contact with infected people.
Those who sacrifice pleasure by avoiding night-time parties, are conscientious in applying mosquito repellant, avoid unprotected sex with people who might be infected, and work to protect their child by shielding themselves from exposure will have a significant advantage. Those are all amygdala-driven behaviors.
Disease is among the most K of selection pressures. Zika is poorly communicable, not even lethal to the patient, and we still have copious free resources with which to confront the outbreak. Yet you can see its potential effects on the psychology of a population here.
Now imagine what would happen if a highly communicable, highly lethal plague were to suddenly sweep through the populations of the world, at the very moment our resources were at their nadir. When the collapse happens, that is not at all unlikely. The Renaissance was not an accident. It was a disease knocking out as much as half of a population, and focusing on the less capable.
Given the suicidal leftist insanity I see all around, I’m half tempted to get a bumper sticker saying, “The Renaissance was not an accident – Yersinia pestis is our friend.”
Would that be too much?
The selection pressure actually works for K here, too, because both the male and female have to be monogamous and they have to be smart enough to avoid mosquitos.
Remember, disease that kills randomly favors the rabbits, because they’ll just have more babies they don’t have to take care of. Diseases that disproportionately kills the lazy and stupid favors K.
Good point. I wonder if disease becomes a K-pressure once animals get smart enough to understand how to get it, and thus rather than being random, disease tests for forethought, planning, and aversive drive.
http://theantimedia.org/zika-outbreak-epicenter-in-same-area-where-gm-mosquitoes-were-released-in-2015/
there are sites trying to debunk the theory about the genetically modified mosquitos but I see holes in their arguments, the mosquitoes may or may not be the reason for the outbreak but I also read that bill gates (his money) was involved in the GM project.
why ? we know bill gates is for population reduction so why is he funding vaccines which are supposed to save people?
Those super-rich eggheads, with their dreams of population reduction are scary shit. Who knows what they are putting gin all their vaccines and other “health products.”
>why ? we know bill gates is for population reduction so why is he funding vaccines which are supposed to save people?
I would love to see someone pose that exact question to him.
It would be going too far for me, although maybe that’s my naive K-ness of not seeing the threat from within talking.
It’s weird that the ultimate r-organism of bacteria can produce K effects, almost like some circle of life thing. I thought of the thing you said about _caring_ and how a mother wolf uses violence because she cares for her cubs. I wonder if it’s the same thing about vegetarianism – the guy not eating meat claims to care more, but does the meat-eater care more about himself, his family, and even the animals themselves on some level?
Epidemic leads to population drop (Malthus!!!) leads to prosperity leads to great art (Medici!!!) leads to moral decay leads to cultural decline leads to stupidity leads to epidemic. Voila! The circle of life (begins with death).
If not for US aid how many of these deformed babies would have been miscarriages? The R selected woman has a machine gun for a vagina, a few rounds being duds wont stop her.
If it’s a retrovirus, then all of her “rounds” will be duds.