- A participant shared a cautionary anecdote about a failed Czech attempt to develop an inactivated-virus COVID-19 vaccine, noting that the project started late, lacked a clinical-trial plan, and may have produced only a paper claiming success.  
- Discussion of ultra-high-bandwidth neural interfaces: nmz787 argued that MHz–GHz sampling (ECG/EEG/RF/implant) is becoming technically feasible and cited a 2019 UPenn paper showing 2–21 ns per-nucleotide dwell times in nanopore recordings—5–50× faster than 10 MHz bandwidth can resolve.  
- fenn countered that the real goal is simply resolving single-neuron spikes and warned that analogies to THz vision (human eyes, snakes) risk sounding “cranky.”  
- L29Ah asked how viruses selectively package their genomes; superkuh linked a PNAS study showing that a small protein nucleus must first form on viral RNA before capsid assembly, and L29Ah followed up with a Nature Communications paper on DNA-virus packaging.  
- fenn noted that mis-packaging events can transfer “wrong” DNA between cells, with long-term evolutionary consequences.  
- A detailed risk-benefit analysis of COVID-19 vaccination was posted: for a mid-40s healthy adult, infection fatality is ~1/500–1/1000, while mRNA-vaccine serious-event incidence is <1/40 000; for 70-year-olds the ratio improves ~1600-fold.  
- Long-COVID estimates were highlighted: ~10–20 % of infections yield months-long symptoms, and a German cardiac-MRI study (JAMA Cardiology) found elevated cardiology biomarkers in 70 % of patients (including 18 % asymptomatic), suggesting long-term heart damage regardless of symptom severity.  
- The discussion concluded that vaccination (including Sputnik V) markedly reduces both individual risk and onward transmission, making it the dominant rational choice.