The Book Of THoTH

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Man, what a crazy development this is. Here's a virus which evidently hails from Australia, but they're calling it the "Israeli virus", because it was discovered and studied in Israel.

I can just see the headlines on the conspiracy websites soon: "Israeli virus killing American Bees on our soil!" This is bound to get connected to the various sinister theories about Israeli biological capabilities and plans.

It's amazing how quickly an announcement like this travels in the Information age. The story broke just three days ago on Thursday, and already there are hundreds of mentions of this on the Net.

The Wiki page on "Diseases of the Honey Bee" has already been updated the same day, Sept. 6, to include the "Israel Acute Paralysis Virus" (IAPV). A look at their discussion page shows that somebody already had a chance to object that the name of the virus has the word "Israel", and not "Israeli" - and this was amended on Wiki.

This is a very minor difference in spelling, just one letter "i" at the end, but it carries a vast semantic difference. The "incorrect" version of the name makes it sound as if this virus originates in Israel. And interestingly, all the news stories about this, including the linked one from the LA Times, say "Israeli" virus. So the chances are, this misnomer will stick.

And anyways, since when do you include the name of a country when you name a virus? That's plain silly, associating yourself with a disease. All this is really werid stuff, what can I say.

Sol

Sol, I can understand your fear, yet I hope that you are simply being over-sensitive. I thought nothing of the name as we have the West Nile Virus, Asian flu (and several other area or country specific versions of the flu) and African killer bees as quick examples.

I certainly would hope that most people are mature enough to know that often the country's name studying a virus or disease is included in the name of the virus.

Well, unfortunately I think that most people are actually not mature or discerning enough to understand the difference.

And in fact what you say is not actually so - the country where the virus was studied is not usually included in the virus's name. The examples you cite - the West Nile Virus, the Asian Flu, and the African Killer Bees actually prove my point. Because these ARE the places where the virus or the disorder originated, and not where they were studied, such as in this case.

In addition, all of these are big international regions, and not specific countries. The association of a specific country or city with a disease, such as the "Mexican Flu" or the "Boston Flu", was discounted long ago, precisely because it leads to a very unpleasant yet entirely unnecessary negative association in people's minds. Other discoveries often do carry the country's name, to give the local researchers prestige. But not diseases.

So all in all, the name of this particular bee virus stands as a big exception in the modern naming convention of such things. And I'm really wondering about that idiot Israeli scientist who chose to give the virus this name - irrevocably tying its negative connotation to his own country. I still say, this is a very strange incident.

Sol

(same report, just different source)

Months of genetic testing have fingered a virus that was first reported in Israel just three years ago and may have passed through Australia on its way to the United States. The correlation between Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus and the mysterious bee disease — known as Colony Collapse Disorder, or CCD — was reported Thursday on the journal Science's Web site.

Read here ....

That's a good article Graham, thanks for the pointer. It's also dated last Thursday, the day this news broke everywhere, but is a better description of the whole thing. Plus I like how the author made this into a Sherlock Holmes mystery, to fit with one of the Penn State researchers being named Holmes too.

I'm beginning to think I may've spoke too soon - this virus was not only studied in Israel, but it may actually originate from Israel somehow. Seeing as these researchers in the University of Jerusalem have been playing around with bee genes and viruses, perhaps this was some inadvertent result of their other experiments. Such things happen.

The thing is, I camped in the Jerusalem mountains for a couple of months in the summer of 2005 - and one major anomaly I noticed was the totally different behavior of the bees. I've camped in those areas countless times before and never had any unusual bee problems, but this time there was a really aggressive strain there, who weren't interested in eating but mostly in just attacking me.

Mind you, these were "wild bees" (or wasps) - the ones with the smooth yellow-black belly, and not the hairy orangish honey bees. The honey bees rarely come near a human except to bodily protect the hive, they're smarter than that. But they were still bees, whose behavior was most unusual. And I'm starting to get a nagging suspicion that what's happening with this "Israeli virus" now may somehow be related to that.

Cheers,
Sol

I love it. All the 'what if's', might be, possibilities, perhaps. It's quit scientific for sure. Now it's an Israeli finding that went through Australia to the US. What!?

I'm sure they are frantically working on this, but if and when they find out what, (if they haven't already) we will NOT be told. Mainly because it will start interferring with humans and what they consume. Poison to the system. Thanks to all GM, sprayed and totally useless food.

I had an organic carrot the other day. My mouth was so excited it danced and was so happy I almost didn't know what to do. I said, 'now this is a carrot!!!!' I can taste it! Humans are much more adaptable to crap then the rest of the other species. We're bigger so it takes longer to really see the change. These bees and all the other species that have been altered by all we are doing can't fight back as good.

Poopoo me if you want, but this is one gut feeling I know is right and will voice it whenever I think it's needed.

I also find it funny how they named it Israeli desease. They just love to start a frenzy. Anywhere they can. These scientists really need to get their noses out of the books and their asses in the front lines. And quit cowtowing to the ones that pay them.

There's one problem with that --- they probably then wouldn't get paid!

All this and yet I've never heard one of our busy little bee's sneeze!! but seriously, I think they should be looking in the exotic tropic's of the amazon, there is so much we don't know about in those jungles, their finding new species everyday.

For what it's worth, here is another article on the Honeybee situation which arrived in my inbox this morning. I don't have time to compare the two.

article here

Did anyone notice this in the original article posted by nebula?



I have to agree with SolAris's initial position on this issue. It is dangerous to put a name on something with such negative ties. It might seem overkill but we have to look at current events in that region. Like it or not, the eyes of the world are on the middle east & especially Israel. Any influence can have an impact on that region whether it be negative or positive.

There's more to this. In that article it says the symptoms of the infected bees are different than those in the laboratory in Jerusalem.



So, they have found it in this jelly imported from China. I want to touch on that. We're getting the wool pulled over our eyes big time. This same crap is being pulled here in Canada. These disease ridden products are being knowingly imported by companies because they can. What we are seeing in recalls is a joke compared to what is actually on the market. Just last year the US government was going to allow one of it's major ports to be run by a company from another country, I believe it was from Yemen, because it would be cheaper.

It is not because it's China. If China were to clean up it's act tommorow, by the weekend there would be factories up & running selling us the same quality goods with dirt cheap labour from other countries. Kira, you mentioned the carrot, That's another one to be wary of. We grow our own so I often joke about it to my mother.

The reason this stuff is not kept in check is if they did keep the proper records & enforced proper monitoring, they would legally have to hand over all this & do something about it. It would cripple some of the larger companies who do the importing. You can imagine the chaos if the next weeks supply of paper couldn't get across the border.

This theory, & others, is to cover up the inept attitude of our "elected" officials. The more scapegoats they can come up with, the less emphasis on the core issue. The bottom dollar!

Oh Hear hear!! well said, very eloquent! Trent Cole!!
I'm sure it wasn't our aussie bee's, or else why would'nt it have happened sooner. Off topic for a second, We down here in Oz got a shipment once that had the American Black Widow spider nesting in the container, they got loose and crossbred with our native Red Back spider. apparently the offspring are much more poisonous that either the Black Widow or the Red Back. We as a nation are generally very strict about what comes through customs and what crosses our borders. on another note apparently Florida is having trouble with our native eucalyptys trees drying up some of it's wetlands. I think the sooner we all stop pointing fingers and get together as one world to combat these international problems the better. I may be naive but if we dont, something a simple as dying bee's and were all extinct. Pax Vobiscum to all.

Hehe, this was of course said best by Harry Bellafonte in his immortal song "Day-O": "A beautiful bunch of ripe banana, hide the deadly, black tarantula" (This is bananas that were exported to the US, mind you.)

By the way about Aurstralia, I heard that there was an "Aggressive African Bees" problem there, similar to what they had in the US about a decade ago. African bees were brought in to pollinate some wooded regions which were depleted by fire - and now these aggressive wasps are stinging picknikers and chasing them away from Queensland campsites. Have you heard anything about that? I hear this from travellers, many friends have spend a lot of time down under. They say that this is the same thing that happened with those aggressive "Jerusalem wasps".

Cheers,
Sol

Beautiful woman she smell like honey, beautiful woman she take your money!! No sol haven't heard of the african bee's in Oz, we have a little native bee, about a third of the size of a normal bee.
and as far as wasps go (not white anglo saxon protestants) we have the european and the paper wasp. our main pest problems besides visiting American presidents (some us would have loved to spray that insidious insect) is the cane toad, the rabbit, the fox, the cat and dog, and a few noxious weeds namely lantana. the cane toad is probably the worst because many of the native species only recognise it as a frog and if they try to eat it they die.
the cat comes a close second because they are such good predators and again the native fauna doesn't recognise them as a threat till its to late. consequently they grow enormous 2 to 3 times the size of Tiddles and about 10 times as fierce..

Sol I just googled "african bee in australia" and the only thing it came up with was about african hive beetles destroying australian bee hives. cheers P.S to Graham I noticed your watching this thread, Look out Springboks the Wallabies are angry and seek revenge

Of course the Wallabies are angry

I suppose now that we got Eddie Jones on our side, you gonna sneak in some "Jerusalem Wasps", "some 2 - 3 times bigger than normal cats", "cane toads", red back spiders" etc to infiltrate and weaken our team from the inside

We also got a few noxious weeds here, but they generally get smoked here

Just remember that when somebody is angry and seeking revenge he is at his weekest ........

Back on topic ...........

you think Jones is an asset,
no its more sinister than African Bee's. he's a spy!!!! your boy's will be knobbled....

I just had a horrible thought --- what if this is a genetically engineered virus intended to be the apian version of HIV?

I think your fears are unwarranted Nebula, I mean the end of bee's is the end of us, and even Dr Evil wouldn't wipe out all humanity as well as himself.

That's probably the strangest thing about this whole story. The symptoms of bees with IAPV are markedly different from those exhibited by the "CCD bees" in the US. And this difference is being nonchalantly dismissed out of hand because this one scientist Holmes speculated about a POSSIBLE mutation. But since when did one scientist's "speculation", based on who knows what data, become the basis of our further assumptions?

Ordinarily, different symptoms would lead people to assume that a different disease is involved. The "mutated virus" seems a bit of a far-fetched possibility here, especially as the IAPV symptoms of shivering wings and paralysis are so distinct. In most of the CCD cases the bee husks are never found, the symptom is merely the abandoned hive with just the queen there.

So hey, maybe this is some kind of a "worker's rebellion" for the bees? That seems just as likely as the "mutated virus" theory at this point. The bees simply don't want to work any more for the over-fed queen, they want to make a better life for themselves where they can be free, hehe. Very poignant, we should all follow the example.

Sol

I suppose now that we got Eddie Jones on our side, you gonna sneak in some "Jerusalem Wasps", "some 2 - 3 times bigger than normal cats", "cane toads", red back spiders" etc to infiltrate and weaken our team from the inside
Back on topic ...........[/quote]

And I thought that H.G. Wells was just being playful when he wrote "The Food Of the Gods"!