chasewnelson

@chasewnelson@fediscience.org

Scientist at NCI-NIH, AMNH | Bioinformatics, cancer, evolution, viruses | Singing, coffee, books, lifting | Views my own | he/他 📍Taipei, Taiwan & Michigan, USA

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chasewnelson, to random

Taiwan: VOTE!

chasewnelson, to random

Facing a Merry Iso-lation this year.

SARS-CoV-2 is rampant globally: USA wastewater levels are soaring, and Taiwan reports ~5 deaths daily. Yet such news is confined to press releases nobody reads. This approach might aid the short-term economy, but it’s not improving our lives.

chasewnelson, to random

Great advice for commenting R code:

“Use comments to explain the /why/ of your code, not the how or what. ...

Figuring out why something was done is much more difficult...

For data analysis code, use comments to explain your overall plan of attack and record important insights as you encounter them. There’s no way to re-capture this knowledge from the code itself” (pp. 32-3).

#R

chasewnelson, to Taiwan

If the people of wanted to become part of , they’d be perfectly capable of saying so.

chasewnelson,

@brecht
Thank you. To me, this view misses the critical distinction between ROC and PRC. It also contradicts polls showing, e.g., ~18% favoring the KMT presidential candidate but only ~8% favoring unification — they’re related but not synonymous. For comparison, >5% of the US population probably believes the moon landing was fake, vaccines don’t work, and climate change isn’t real.

chasewnelson, to random

Wearing a mask does not make it OK to be sick in public.

If you must go out, a mask is better than no mask. But the mask only reduces the probability of infecting others, and becomes less effective the longer you breathe shared air.

You are still putting others at risk.

chasewnelson,

@PieterPeach agreed on all counts! Could you help me see how my post contradicted that? Here in Taiwan (and possibly elsewhere), there is an emerging culture of going out for social gatherings when you’re sick — just so long as you wear a mask. Masks are treated as a panacea and failsafe, and used to justify attending voluntary public gatherings, rather than what they are: a good and helpful but imperfect way to lessen risk. Thus, “If you must go out…”.

chasewnelson, to random

“U.S. COVID infections are hovering near levels of the pandemic’s first peak in 2020, and approaching the Delta peak of late 2021, according to wastewater surveillance and modeling by forecasters.” https://fortune.com/well/2023/09/16/united-states-covid-levels-approach-first-pandemic-peak-2020-who-urges-vaccination-boosters-high-risk/

chasewnelson, to Taiwan

Many in liken ’s behavior to stalking, unable to be held back by a restraining order.

Similarly, the United Nations position on Taiwan bears an uncomfortable resemblance to trafficking, where China claims to be the guardian and convinces authorities to reject Taiwan’s travel docs. 1/2

chasewnelson,

Specifically, China uses its power at the UN to 1) claim it represents Taiwan while 2) barring entry for Taiwan passport holders. The effect is total silencing of the victim, who has no recourse.

What is reprehensible for individuals should be reprehensible for nations. 2/2

chasewnelson, to random

‘This analysis reveals that the greatest co-mingling of viral and animal material involves species that were almost certainly not infected by SARS-CoV-2, such as fish... raccoon dogs are one of the species with the least co-mingling of their genetic material and SARS-CoV-2.’

— @jbloom_lab, Virus Evolution https://academic.oup.com/ve/article/9/2/vead050/7249794

chasewnelson, to random

Hot off the press and fresh from the mail — the second edition of R for Data Science by Wickham, Çetinkaya-Rundel, and Grolemund!

The first edition revolutionized my work and has become a book I recommend frequently. I’m so excited to see what the update has in store!

chasewnelson, to Taiwan

’s Ministry of Transportation has announced that motorists fully stopping for all pedestrians is ‘too strict’.

For passing pedestrians, police claim they will ‘continue’ enforcing a minimum gap of 3 meters — roughly the length of a small car.

https://focustaiwan.tw/society/202306220008

chasewnelson, to random

Over 1,000 lab accidents were reported from 2008 to 2012.

Epidemiologist @mlipsitch: research benefits should outweigh risks; on Twitter he notes that Pandora’s Gamble by @alisonannyoung documents a “near-universal impulse to keep incidents and accidents quiet despite compelling societal benefits of transparency.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/10/opinion/we-could-easily-make-risky-virological-research-safer.html

chasewnelson, to random

Praise for Mutation, Randomness, & Evolution by @arlin — a crucial, perhaps paradigm-shifting, work on the mechanisms of biological .

As I read, I find myself repeatedly thinking, “exactly!” and “people need to know this!”

An ongoing thread of highlights. 🧵

chasewnelson,

The most fundamental point is that determines which options are available in evolution.

He calls mutation a “dispositional factor” causing certain outcomes to happen more often than others.

Just one familiar example is CpG sites, which often have elevated C>T rates.

chasewnelson,

Arlin uses the following wonderful analogy, which all should consider.

classically treats as a ‘buffet’—lots of options, already available.

Instead, it may be more like a ‘sushi conveyor’—limited options at any one time, you must wait, you get what you get.

chasewnelson, to random

OUT TODAY in Tumour Virus Research:

Nearly everyone gets . Most infections are cleared by the immune system, but a small fraction go on to cause ~5% of all cancers. is revealing why.

Lisa Mirabello & I review the latest. 1/8
🔗https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666679023000058

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