Omicron: Adapt or perish.

Omicron.   It sounds like a Hasbro Transformer toy.   And transform is what pathogens do.  In at least five earthly ways.  Change is a fundamental factor natural to all life forms.  Those that don’t change perish.  It’s unfortunate that people’s minds and our governments are so resistant to change.  Or at least appropriately adapting to this permanent and persistent threat of microbial evolution. 

An inevitable evolution that is accelerated by multiple natural and human-created factors.

Remember these.

1.       Natural errors in the reproduction of both DNA and RNA.

2.       Microbial sex (they don’t mate but they can share genetic segments).

3.       Intentional changes engineered by human experimentation.

4.       Errors made during that engineering.

5.       Unintentional changes from human-made chemicals induced into their environment.

6.       Maybe God’s intentional genetic manipulations that are intended to teach humans to take care of one another.

It’s been said that war is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.  We obviously suck remembering history.

Covid19 is trying to teach us science.  Most learned.  Others died.

Now Omicron is teaching us Latin.  And one of the fundamentals of evolution.  Things change.  Microbes change rapidly.   Those infected either adapt or perish.   

This virus now plaguing us (and many others) will continue to crank out variants until our Sun expands and sterilizes all life on earth.  What we really need is a military-minded approach to addressing this evolving threat. 

We need to quickly get over this conservative habit of resisting change.  We must permanently adopt a strategy of adapting ourselves and our lives instead of believing our old ways will suffice.   And this applies to any number of things threatening our freedoms and security.  Serious threats that are accelerating with each new technology.  We had hoped new technologies would bring us together into a more perfect union.  But new technologies have only made things worse.  From Facebook to vaccines, to electric cars.  They are distracting or entertaining us to the point we refuse to consider the existential threats to our civilization.   

We have all pledged ‘liberty and justice for all’ and now that united we survive... divided we are all going down.   Yet we fret over Critic Race Theory, abortion, or the meaning of the 2^nd Amendment.

The US military offers a comprehensive approach to addressing any threat.  An approach that is extremely useful if we are serious about addressing serious threats.  It consists of four fundamentals.  1) Early detection.  2) Rapid response.  3) Research and development. And 4) prevention. 

It’s near impossible however for the military to use the law of force to prevent any problem. Deterrence only goes so far in the age of suicide bombers.  Prevention meanwhile, appears to be an un-American word, and militaries aren’t trained for such wise actions, except in applying it to protecting the health of their own soldiers. And that is the greatest challenge during any war.  But preventing wars is impossible when the law of force is the military's primary mission.  Preempting war is the best they can manage.  But that’s only a delay and usually just prolongs the inevitable return to other sides relying on force.

Biven the exponential growth of the power of technology, relying on force will inevitably lead to a war that ends us.  The Great War (‘the war to end all wars’) turned out to be the ‘peace’ that ended all peace.

Now with biological and cyber weapons in the mix biosecurity and cybersecurity are both oxymorons.

The human capacity to engineer bioweapons to kill or disable a particular genetic group is possible.  I would say inevitable.  Humanity's best chance is focusing on early detection which seems like a no-brainer.  As well as rapid response. 

Unfortunately,  both of these require a massive amount of science and funding.  Two things a significant number of policymakers reject.   And our government’s only capacity for a rapid response usually ends up being the wrong response (See 2003 invasion of Iraq).  

It is worth considering a fundamental aspect of all life on this amazing planet.  The three most complex and complicated systems in the known universe are 1) the environment, 2) our immune system, and 3) the human brain.  Understanding that each of these is fundamentally connected to our species capacity to survive -- and thrive.  And ultimately the sustainability of our species for generations to come.

Here's where understanding and acting on principles are vital.  And there are three basic principle types.

1.        Fundamental principles (the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God).

2.        Alternative Principles (those good ideas our minds invent to protect what we think is important and may have initially worked in the past.  Concepts like “peace through strength”.  Or ‘Peace through disarmament’.  Or, “market forces will take care of it’ or “love is all we need’. 

3.       Insane principles:  Principles we continue to defend regardless of how many times they have failed us.   National Sovereignty.   Democracy.  Prayer.  Hope.  Technology. 

The things that we rely on for our daily lives, health, work, transportation, banking, energy...come from people who engineered these things using the Laws of Nature.    To the degree that groups of people practice the Laws of Nature’s God is the degree, they can survive and thrive together.

Obviously, to the degree that our governments, religions, and economic models remain dysfunctional -- is the degree to which these organizing institutions relied on the other two principle types.

Humanity's greatest threat is not pathogens, climate change, war, or asteroids.  It remains our persistent reliance on trusting the second two sets of principles.  Principles that repeatedly fail us.     

What is so hard about understanding and following the golden rule.  And understanding that nature is our ultimate infrastructure we depend on for every aspect of our freedom and security.  Yet we think it is something outside of ourselves.  Something there for our exploitation.    

If our species or civilization doesn’t make it.  Our failure of distinguishing between these principles and failing to act responsibly with them will be the reason. 

If “We hold these truths to be self-evident”.   Why do we swear to protect the Constitution...instead of the truth that we are all created with inalienable rights...to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness...which requires virtuous, responsible, and healthy people?   Abiding by fundamental principles.

We need to adopt the fundamental principles handed up to us from the Declaration of Intendance.  Those self ’evident truths, prefaced by “the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God”.   It is a transformation we must make before wars, pathogens, or resistance to change ends us.