Le_Forgeron wrote:
> But virii are not unicelluar organism. They are very far from even being
> one.

That's why I said "for sufficiently loose definitions of unicelluar". 
They're certainly a "cell" in the original sense of the word "little room". 
They have walls, and a content.

> Virii are more like toxin: a chain of molecules, with the added bonus
> that when encountering the right cells, they get replicated by the cells

Well, there's a small collection of chemicals with a distinct boundary that 
self-replicate in the right environment. I think that's close enough to 
"alive" for purposes of advertising.

> Breaking a cell is easy, as the OP says.

Yep.

> Breaking a molecule requires to have an actual chemical reaction, which
> usually means exhausting the reacting components. Moreover, you cannot
> break a molecule and hope that the results will not be a toxic 

They're unlikely to self-replicate after you break them, tho.

> would break a virus would also usually break far more easily the
> components of your cells.

We *are* talking about Dettol, right?

"Like other household cleaners, Dettol is poisonous and should not be ingested."

So, yeah, but that's a *good* thing.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Serving Suggestion:
     "Don't serve this any more. It's awful."

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Nekar Xenos wrote:
> Are viruses and germs the same thing?

Generally not. A virus is basically a little bottle of DNA that replicates 
by injecting itself (with the help of the "bottle" part) into a complete 
cell. The cell then gets hijacked by the virus DNA into creating more viruses.

A "germ" usually refers to something that includes the ability to replicate 
all by itself.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Serving Suggestion:
     "Don't serve this any more. It's awful."

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Le_Forgeron <lef### [at] freefr> wrote:
> But virii are not unicelluar organism. They are very far from even being
> one.
> Virii are more like toxin: a chain of molecules, with the added bonus
> that when encountering the right cells, they get replicated by the cells
> (usually at the cost of the other functions of the cell, which induce
> the exhaustion of the cell and its death).

  I wouldn't say they are like toxins, nor are they "very far from even
being a cell". Virii have genetic material in the form of DNA or RNA, as
well as a protein coating. That's way, way more complex than a simple
chemical compound such as a toxin.

  Prions also replicate (well, kind of), but are way simpler than virii
because they are, basically, just one single protein and has no genetic
material at all.

  But even proteins are way more complicated than simple chemical compounds
such as toxins.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 15/11/2010 07:02 PM, Warp wrote:

>    But even proteins are way more complicated than simple chemical compounds
> such as toxins.

Except, of course, for those proteins that /are/ toxins. ;-)

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On 14/11/2010 06:06 PM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> And it /really/ irritates me when they pretend to be all scientific.

"New Pantene with amino-peptide serum *nourishes* hair from root to tip."

Well, what a lot of sciency-sounding words. It must be science! Right? 
Right???

1. "serum" refers to a component of blood, or more generally any clear 
bodily fluid. I would be very surprised if hair conditioner contains any 
such thing.

2. "amino" refers presumably to the amino acids, the building blocks of 
life. Quite why these would be useful for making your hair look nice is 
entirely unclear.

3. "peptide" is a short chain of amino acids. In other words, a 
mini-protein. (Actually the distinction between a protein and a peptide 
is somewhat arbitrary.) Again, it is not clear why this is useful.

4. Hair is provably dead. You cannot "nourish" something that isn't 
alive. (Although people do sometimes speak of shoe polish "nourishing" 
the leather and keeping it supple.)

In short, all the sciency words are really there just to make it sound 
more impressive. Since you don't actually /eat/ hair conditioner, the 
manufacturers are not required to state what is actually in this stuff. 
I highly doubt it contains anything as expensive as amino acids or 
peptide chains. And if it did, I'm not sure what useful purpose that 
would actually serve.

I especially like the advert for the shampoo enriched with vitamin-D (I 
think) which promotes healthy hair. And then one of the chemists pointed 
out that /actually/ it's there to make the shampoo emulsify nicely. They 
just use a vitamin because it's naturally occurring and hence easy to 
get hold of. ;-)

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> "New Pantene with amino-peptide serum *nourishes* hair from root to tip."
>
> Well, what a lot of sciency-sounding words. It must be science! Right? 
> Right???
>
> In short, all the sciency words are really there just to make it sound 
> more impressive.

IIRC Panthenol actually does something useful regarding hair.

> Since you don't actually /eat/ hair conditioner, the manufacturers are not 
> required to state what is actually in this stuff.

AFAIK they are required to put ingredients on the label.  And as there is a 
real possibility it could go in your mouth there are strict controls on what 
they can and can't put in there (same as why you can only use certain 
approved materials and inks for food packaging).

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On 16/11/2010 01:01 PM, scott wrote:
>> "New Pantene with amino-peptide serum *nourishes* hair from root to tip."
>>
>> Well, what a lot of sciency-sounding words. It must be science! Right?
>> Right???
>>
>> In short, all the sciency words are really there just to make it sound
>> more impressive.
>
> IIRC Panthenol actually does something useful regarding hair.

Who mentioned panthenol?

>> Since you don't actually /eat/ hair conditioner, the manufacturers are
>> not required to state what is actually in this stuff.
>
> AFAIK they are required to put ingredients on the label. And as there is
> a real possibility it could go in your mouth there are strict controls
> on what they can and can't put in there (same as why you can only use
> certain approved materials and inks for food packaging).

Oh, I'm sure they aren't allowed to put anything really toxic in there. 
But, as far as I'm aware, they're not required to *tell* the consumer 
what they actually put in. (I'm sure Phil could tell us...)

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>>> "New Pantene with amino-peptide serum *nourishes* hair from root to 
>>> tip."
>>
>> IIRC Panthenol actually does something useful regarding hair.
>
> Who mentioned panthenol?

Isn't that where the brand name comes from?

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>>>> "New Pantene with amino-peptide serum *nourishes* hair from root to
>>>> tip."
>>>
>>> IIRC Panthenol actually does something useful regarding hair.
>>
>> Who mentioned panthenol?
>
> Isn't that where the brand name comes from?

Apparently Pentene's original shampoo product did contain panthenol, 
yes. However, their current advertisements make no mention of it. 
Instead they waffle on about "pro-vitamins" and "amino-peptide serum" 
and so forth.

Interestingly, if you check out their website, they conspicuously 
refrain from making any statements about what's in the product. And they 
carefully use expressions like "healthy looking" (as opposed to 
"healthy"). One wonders if the website is complying with a different set 
of advertising standards or something...

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On 11/16/2010 7:35 AM, Invisible wrote:
>>>>> "New Pantene with amino-peptide serum *nourishes* hair from root to
>>>>> tip."
>>>>
>>>> IIRC Panthenol actually does something useful regarding hair.
>>>
>>> Who mentioned panthenol?
>>
>> Isn't that where the brand name comes from?
>
> Apparently Pentene's original shampoo product did contain panthenol,
> yes. However, their current advertisements make no mention of it.
> Instead they waffle on about "pro-vitamins" and "amino-peptide serum"
> and so forth.
>
> Interestingly, if you check out their website, they conspicuously
> refrain from making any statements about what's in the product. And they
> carefully use expressions like "healthy looking" (as opposed to
> "healthy"). One wonders if the website is complying with a different set
> of advertising standards or something...
Hair care products: The first "altie medicine" product. Pretty much all 
of them work alike, with minor differences, blind tests find the "cheap" 
ones may even work better, without all the crap in them, in many cases, 
but unless you dump useless stuff in, or put "healthish" on the bottle, 
the "I want the $30 bottle!" people won't buy either the product, or 
the, basically, scam.

-- 
void main () {

     if version = "Vista" {
       call slow_by_half();
       call DRM_everything();
     }
     call functional_code();
   }
   else
     call crash_windows();
}

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