At 08:45 PM 12/31/03 -0500, John Kelsey wrote:

You do know she's been trying the same scheme for several hundred

thousand

years, right? As an artist, I think she's in a creative decline. Ebola is picturesque and flashy, but not all that scary unless your funeral rites involve lots of contact with the blood of your dearly departed.

I think E. is a bit more contagious than you recognize. It just hasn't had the chance to play in dense pops. AIDS is

more subtle, rather like syphlus before good antibiotics, but it's not her best work.

Yeah but the meatbots do love to spread it, and here you again fail to recognize Her subtlety. Even SARS is Yet Another Coughed Contagion. If I recall

correctly, smallpox got 90% of the American Indians who were exposed, and measles killed something like 1/3 of Roman citizens.

Smallpox would reduce real estate prices by 1/3 at least, possibly more in cities. An interesting question is what decline (and what rate of decline) west.civ. can tolerate these days. Still, looking at the Roman Empire (aka paleo-cons) disease isn't necessary, though it sure helps. Famine and war are pretty good cards in Her Hands too. Guns, germs, and steel, baby.