Does Smallpox have a right to live?

Question

What has a right to live?

Does this right to live include things that may kill us? Smallpox for example. Do the animals or insects that carry disease have a right to live? What about Malaria?

Who decides?

Answer 1

I think the world is a wonderfully complex place in which every organism depends upon the rich pattern of organisms and fossil resources surrounding it. Organisms each play their part in this pattern by feeding on other organisms, defending themselves against other organisms and sometimes by cooperating with other organisms. These behaviours are seen at every level of organism and contribute to maintaining balance and diversity.

Human organisms are part of this pattern but we have unusual powers of intelligence and versatility. We can use these powers to enrich our lives but we can also use it to disturb and unbalance the natural patterns.

I think that defending ourselves against smallpox is a natural and sensible thing to do but that it would be unwise to eradicate it altogether. The unintended consequences are unknown and we might find some way of making good use of this organism in the future. At the very least it should be carefully preserved and maintained in secure laboratories and I am glad to say that is what is happening. I would want the same approach to malaria if we ever came close to eradicating it.

As for animals or insects that carry disease, I think that the unintended consequences are probably more immediate the higher up the chain you go. We need to learn to live in harmony with nature rather than seek to dominate it. Wipe out one animal and you will be plagued by another. The same goes for insects and diseases. Sensible defence and avoidance tactics are one thing (Mosquito nets and improved nutrition can achieve a great deal in avoiding and building resistence to disease.) but eradication is foolish.

Organic farmers demonstrate that living in harmony with nature rather than seeking to dominate it is the most consistently successful policy.

Answer 2

This is a very good question because ultimately isn't it about extinction if we don't live with the environment that sustains all life? It isn't political or commercial, if we don't look after this planet, our children and theirs will not thrive or survive. This is all the sciences that dictate this.

Our jobs as stewards of the planet is to building and develop sustainably meaning no impact on future generations. If we eradicate anything, the domino effect of that on any eco system has to be catastrophic.

That is why the argument on global warming. If we change weather, everything changes with it including eco systems, health and economy.

We are supposed to live within nature or look out. Naysayers of global warming need to understand my motive in saying global warming is real and alarming. My job is to ensure sustainability from an environmental perspective because all of our children's lives are at risk.

Curtis Bennett of Thermografix Consulting Corporation is the only scientist in the world that completed an extensive education to compliment his background in thermography. The point is there is over 17,000 hours of specialized temperature imaging taking professionals outside the calculator so we can meet objectives.

Thermografix and associates sole purpose of the research is to let us see beyond our visible spectrum.

The web page I will refer here is a long read, I believe it is about 13 pages of the most advanced temperature imaging in the world because the professionals have the science within curriculum to back it up. This will let you see what is being taken forward to governments, environmental groups, legal groups, health group as an unprecedented environmental emergency. The images you will see are a very brief look at many years of objective science. Go to http://www.thermoguy.com/globalwarming-heatgain.html and see the cause of weather change and the domino effect of?

We need to smarten up because there isn't a place for the rich and famous to hang out where the atmosphere is nice, we are in this together. Economy can NEVER take precedence over environment, try living without it.

The answer is humans decide who has the right to live by our interaction environmentally. We are just to dense to understand we will die as well.

Very good question.

Answer 3

Technically smalpox is a virus (2 actually). Viruses are only RNA strands that can replicate once in a host cell and are not technically alive.

As for malaria (a bacteria), since we can encode DNA sequences, I see no sense in worrying about eliminating it as it (or smallpox) could likely be re-constituted should a need arise in the future.

Answer 4

Does the red herring you just posted have a right to live? It's not a matter of right to live. I'm all in favor of exterminating disease in the general population. However, what would happen if a terrorist group got hold of a culture and threatened to release it (or just went ahead and released it)? Without a culture from which to make antibodies, we'd be SOL. On the other hand, that's one way to solve the overpopulation problem ....

Answer 5

You are talking about two very different things, when you talk about smallpox, and disease carring insects or animals.

First I'll adress smallpox. No, I do not think it has a right to "live". The countries that hold the last of the smallpox need to destroy every bit of it.

Unfortunatly since the collapse of the Soviet Union nobody really knows who controls the smallpox.

Smallpox is the ONLY disease to ever be sucessfully wiped out (althought there are "cousin" types of smallpox still alive in the wild).

Once it was wiped out, and the two big countries (U.S.A. & U.S.S.R.) held onto some of it, it became a weapon of mass destruction. It's no longer a disease...it's a weapon.

I am one of the very last people to recieve a smallpox vaccine. There are now two generations of people who have no vaccine, and no immunity from contact with the disease.

Since they insist on holding onto it, and keeping alive in labs, they need to continue to offer the smallpox vaccine to people. Yet you can no longer get the vaccine, because it does not exsit in the human population. That's true...just in labs waiting to be unleashed.

Insects that carry disease. Yes, they have a right to live. Harsh as they are, they are a way for nature to control populations (both human and other animals). Predators cannot do everything to control populations.

Disease spreading insects do a more efficient, and thorough job of suddenly reducing populations to more stable levels.

It's not that I like them, nor the suffering they bring. I just think they are part of nature. Think of it this way...almost everyone I know likes Tundra Swans. Gorgeous birds, who doesn't like the white majesty of a swan? Tundra swans lay their eggs on the tundra of Alaska. They hatch their cygnets out there. The cygnets grow up fast, eating mosquitoes that live on the tundra by the millions. If you sprayed to kill the mosquitoes, you'd also doom the baby swans (and other birds) to starve to death.

Of course that doesn't mean I'm not going to try and prevent mosquitoes from munching on my horses, and possibly giving them West Nile virus. I'll kill the little bugger too, every chance I get. However the few I manage to swat with my hands is not even a drop in the bucket.

An animal that is carring a disease often need to be killed. Just last month, I read about a town in Alaska that was attacked by rabid wolves. They hade to destroy a large number of the towns dogs to prevent the spread, and of course this also ment guarding children outside on their way to school. So of course that spread needs to be reasonably controlled, with the extermination of that pack of wolves. Besides death by rabies is a sad, painful, drawn out death.

However this does NOT mean entire bat collonies should be wiped out, because they are potential carriers of rabies.
Carriers of disease of course are different than animals that have contracted the diease. Bats of lived with rabies so long they are sometimes (but not always) carriers of rabies. This is because they are building up a natural immunity to rabies. So they can spread it to other animals (which does happen at times), but not actually get sick themselves.

However the bennifit bats do, with the millions of tons of insects they eat every evening far outwieghs the possible chance they will infect another animal with rabies.

It's all a tricky balancing act, to try and carve out a reasonable nitch in this world. I don't want my horses to die of West Nile virus, so I encourage insect eating birds to my property, and vaccinate my horses, as well at trying to provide no habitat for mosquitoes.

Every animal & plant carves out it's nitch in nature, and tries to out-compete it's neighbors.

~Garnet
Homesteading/Farming over 20 years

Answer 6

The poor smallpox bubby oohh laaa laaa he he he he!!!
Um I think it does have the right to live, until proven guilty of contempt for the life of all animals (read human). In so mentioning; if it is proven beyoond all reasonable doubt that smallpox is indeed guilty of murder, then off with its tentacles.
Just messing around he he he

Answer 7

Nothing has a right to live. Sometimes it benefits us to eradicate things we don't like, other times it doesn't. I don't think that seals complain about their rights when an orca comes and kills them for fun.

Answer 8

yes for sure every creature has right to live. it is beacues americans donot know how the disease is caused. they just blame every disease to one or the other organism.
(wonderful answerJSB Thank you.) that should satisfy the asker !!

Answer 9

Wow, for someone who asks such marvelously open ended questions you get some incredibly dumb responses.

Why stop progress?

My answer: Jesus.

Answer 10

do you, you fool?