Boats

[Digit]

All you need is a "carrier."

I have to disagree there Min. The incubation period for Bubonic plague is such that any crew would be dead before they were anywhere near completing their voyage.

[Minimalist]

But there is no indication that they brought bubonic plague.

But any member of the crew could have had the flu (for example) and not died from it...instead passing it on to other crew members. Then all you need do is deposit the virus among an undefended population and sit back and watch the carnage.

[Cognito]

But any member of the crew could have had the flu (for example) and not died from it...instead passing it on to other crew members. Then all you need do is deposit the virus among an undefended population and sit back and watch the carnage.

European visitors could certainly make one way trips long before Columbus figured out how to return and a boatload of common cold and flu could actually decimate population centers. Native Americans probably destroyed visiting traders because of the obvious relationship between strangers and fatal disease.

[john]

All -

Hang on a minute here............

There is a difference between gradual, temporal dissemination

Of a population, say, fr. instance, the progress of the Solutreans

To North Am.,

VS the abrupt introduction of Smallpox the the NW American coastal tribes by European strangers

Which wiped out 60-70 % of the population in less than a year.

My point is, if a population expands gradually, its antibodies

Expand with it.

You bring in an outside source, whether an "outside" population or a new mutation,

And it is of course potentially catastrophic.

This is a roll of the genetic dice, whether

Half a million years ago or 200 years ago.

The Bubonic Plague - "Black Death" - is a good example

Of rolling the dice of a new mutation.


Now, the really scary thing is that given modern transportation, a

New mutation can literally circle the globe within 24 hours.

We saw the distant early warning symptoms with SARS.


If a really, really, bad bug

Which relies on either pulmonary transmission,

Or, for example, mosquito (bloodborn parasitic transmission)

Comes down the road at us, we might just as well

"Bend over and kiss our ass goodbye."

Because it will be that fast and that total,

Given our present geographic population compression.







hoka hey


john

[Sam Salmon]

And tobaco and other plants weren't brought back.

Maybe not to Europe, but they did get brought back: to Egypt. The hair of 35% of some 700 Egyptian mummies, dating between 500 and 1500 BC, examined by the University of Munich, proved contaminated with tobacco, cannabis, opium, and cocaine.
So the Egyptian upper classes were junkies! So there must have been a regular supply... trade!

That is complete bunk-there are less polite words but I won't use them here.

[Minimalist]

Wasn't the suggestion made that the marijuana contamination came from the Faculty Lounge?

[Sam Salmon]

Wasn't the suggestion made that the marijuana contamination came from the Faculty Lounge?

Plus the fact that Cocaine wasn't synthesised until 1898.

[War Arrow]

Plus the fact that Cocaine wasn't synthesised until 1898.

AHA! I knew there was something fishy about that particular claim!

[Digit]

Which returns me to my hobby horse!
If Cocaine was not synthesised till 1898 you would have thought that those who claimed to have found it in the mummies would have checked with someone first before publication!
In my youth this sealed box manner of working was the curse of archaeology and resulted in numerous errors.

[Cognito]

Time out on cocaine. Yes, it was synthesized in 1898 but the coca plant has been chewed in the Andes for thousands of years. The active ingredient is cocaine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coca

In spite of the above, I do not believe the Egyptians were importing coca leaves from South America - there are other explanations for its appearance in mummies - ranging from bad science to alternative plants available in Africa. Maybe Eric Clapton could weigh in on this?

[Cognito]

There is a difference between gradual, temporal dissemination
Of a population, say, fr. instance, the progress of the Solutreans to North Am., vs the abrupt introduction of Smallpox the the NW American coastal tribes by European strangers which wiped out 60-70 % of the population in less than a year.

John, there are additional considerations to your argument. The biggest killer in the Americas was smallpox, a relatively recent disease that jumped to humans from cattle or monkeys.

http://www.uic.edu/classes/osci/osci590 ... 0World.htm

Jared Diamond in Guns, Germs and Steel does a decent job of explaining why New World populations succumbed to Eurasian diseases - they had little or no immunity to livestock pathogens.

If Phoenicians were exploring the Americas, they wouldn't be bringing smallpox since it became pandemic after the Crusades. Same story with cholera and who knows how many other diseases. Obviously, prior to the raising of livestock those diseases were rare. The Solutreans probably wouldn't bring anything into the Americas that the existing population didn't already have.

Diamond also brings up a point similar to what Min also raised: the Americas became somewhat of a "filtered" laboratory since seriously infected crews would tend to die before they finished the lengthy trip. Not everyone, but most everyone.

Europeans brought their cattle with them. Read about DeSoto's trip into the southeast - the most damage was done by his herd of pigs. He encountered significant native american populations that that had totally disappeared a few decades later.

[dannan14]

If Phoenicians were exploring the Americas, they wouldn't be bringing smallpox since it became pandemic after the Crusades. Same story with cholera and who knows how many other diseases. Obviously, prior to the raising of livestock those diseases were rare. The Solutreans probably wouldn't bring anything into the Americas that the existing population didn't already have.

Right, in Africa and the Americas parasites were the most common and deadly pathogens so thore peoples were more susceptible to bacteria and viruses. Close proximity to animals over many generations caused Europeans to build immune systems around bacteria and viruses. i think i got that from '1491' but at the moment i can't recall.

[Minimalist]

I seem to recall that some Egyptian mummies bear small pox scars, though. I'll go looking for a reference after I make my early morning rounds of all my other boards.

[Digit]

all my other boards.

So who else puts up with you Min?

[Minimalist]

http://captporridge.com/bb/index.php

http://www.evilbible.com/BB3/index.php

http://www.cvatheists.org/forum/index.php

http://eastcoastsportsfans.com/index.php?act=idx

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/index.php

http://jesusneverexisted.org/jne/forum/ ... tion=forum

http://www.outsidethegarden.com.ns128.a ... y-view.asp

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=288

Then there is Arch's board...which he has asked me to keep private...and since it's basically just he and I arguing like normal, that's fine.

What can I say? I'm retired.