Re: H1N5 (and Bakker's virus extinction hypothesis)

[Phil Bigelow <bigelowp@juno.com>]

On Fri, 12 May 2006 19:42:39 -0600 frank bliss <frank@blissnet.com>
writes:
> Isn't the bug H5N1?
> FB


Yup.
My bad.  It's H5N1.

<pb>
--




> 
> On May 12, 2006, at 4:56 AM, Phil Bigelow wrote:
> 
> >
> > 
> http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2006-05-11-bird-flu-fears_x.htm
> >
> > As I follow the H1N5 stories over the last couple years, I keep  
> > thinking
> > back to Bakker's "viral" mass extinction hypothesis for non-avian
> > dinosaurs.
> >
> > Although this particular strain of bird flu is deadly to birds, it 
> is
> > only deadly to certain species.  Other avian species seem to only 
> play
> > the role of unaffected carriers.  And even though certain bird 
> species
> > have very high mortality rates, we are not seeing entire species 
> on  
> > the
> > brink of extinction because of H1N5.
> >
> > The closest living relatives of Neoaves are the crocs, gators, 
> and
> > caimans.  Does H1N5 infect and kill these taxa too? (Cladistic  
> > bracketing
> > comes into effect here.  Would a paleovirus that kills _T. rex_es  
> 
> > also be
> > deadly to _Pachycephalosaurus_es..eses?).
> >
> > Although the spread of H1N5 may be a poor model to test Bakker's
> > extinction hypothesis, it seems to be the best real-world model 
> we
> > currently have.  And as far as I can tell, this bird pandemic 
> shows no
> > evidence of being catastrophic to tweeters.
> >
> > What elements are present in Bakker's hypothesis that are missing  
> 
> > in the
> > H1N5 scenario?
> >
> > <pb>
> > --
> >
> >
> 
> 
> 


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