hi! you're the only biochemist i know so i have to ask this
my aunt recently got really into this holistic-sounding thing called healing immunity by transfer factors, tied to a very fishy company, 4life. in my understanding, they're preying on the lack of scientific proof that something /doesnt/ work to convince people that it /does/, based on reports of 'clients' that miraculously healed from various conditions from minor allergies to literally cancer, as well as preventing/curing >autism< 💀 problem is, she totally believes this bulshit and is giving them tons of money and trying to get the whole family to try it too
as a biochemist, I was wondering if you ever stumbled across transfer factors, know about any recent research on this field, or know the scientific explanation for why this is a load of baloney
thank you!
I’m familiar with transfer factors. A transfer factor is a chemical compound (often a protein) that is taken from an organism after it develops immunity against a disease. It’s part of immune cell signaling- it’s how your immune cells talk to each other.
But that’s the issue with pseudoscience. Oftentimes, they take something that has a small fraction of truth to it and then completely invent the rest.
Here’s the rest: transfer factors are often incredibly specific. So specific, in fact, that just two strains of the exact same bacteria could lead to two completely different factors being generated in response to them. Also, two different people infected by the exact same illness could generate different antibodies/transfer factors in response. Your immune system is as unique as your fingerprints.
Even if you took the antibodies/transfer factors from one person immune to a disease and injected them into someone currently afflicted by the disease, there’s no guarantee that it’ll make them immune as well. Cell signaling compounds are essentially words in the language your body uses to communicate with itself- and who knows if other people’s cells speak the same language?
For all you know, that transfer factor is telling your body something it might misunderstand completely. What if it “mishears” what that factor is trying to say? You could trigger an unwanted immune response! And that could potentially be even worse than just developing immunity naturally through exposure.
The field of transfer factors is still rudimentary- all of the real (actually scientific) research on injecting people with transfer factors to boost immunity is still very much in its experimental phase. Any company alleging to sell transfer factors to boost immunity is scamming you. Not even real medical companies are doing that yet, and if they could, they would. You know how money hungry pharmaceutical companies are.
Here’s one thing that’s certain: transfer factors cannot cure non immunity/infection related issues. Autism isn’t caused by a pathogen, how can your body develop an immune response to it when there’s nothing to fight? And regarding cancer, there’s already an existing field to treat cancer using your immune system: it’s called immunotherapy. And that will be given to you by a doctor, not some random company trying to sell glorified supplements. And for allergies? Get some antihistamines and an EpiPen.
The best way to boost your immune system is already available: vaccines. Vaccines prompt your body to make ITS OWN transfer factors and antibodies, which guarantees your cells will understand what those factors mean. And the transfer factors your body makes for itself will always be safer and more effective.
Real science beats pseudoscience.
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Please I need to see the ship kids? Is Laios a good uncle? Do they have scales/feathers or sharp teeth? Horns? Claws? (This series has me in a chokehold rn)
*SQUEEZES YOU IN MY GRASP*
I had to put everything under the cut because this is a hella long post so everyone else just look at these cute farcille babies and rock on
HI HOWDY!! Laios is obsessed with these little freaks (he would never call them that though cause he would literally die for them if needed) He’s essentially been right by Falin and Marcille’s side since day one when it came to the babies! He’s a surprisingly good uncle but definitely that one where he gives the kids gifts that the parents are like “YEAH NO- he’s 8 he doesn’t need a crossbow”
He definitely gives the kids little trinkets he gets from foreign dignitaries since I don’t picture Laios really liking all the gifts and gold and money people will give him to butter him up when he catches onto it. The cool monster stuff stays with him though, but he’ll let the kids look at anything cool he gets that he decides to keep for his personal collection. I like to imagine that when he holds them he always keeps them to the side of his hip, real mom type stance when he’s holding them.
Secondly, GREAT QUESTION!! They have a little bit of both! Haru (the cream colored baby) has feathery down covering his ears, chest, and wings as well as basically anywhere else that he isn’t scaly or covered in soon to be thought flesh. He’s more of a dragon from the waist down but bird from the waist up like Falin was.
His sister Haize (the apple red one) has the most scales! (But the least feathers out of the pair) Haize has more of that traditional dragon look and unlike Haru, she’s dragon basically to the neck up. She has scrawny little forearms that aren’t quite attuned to walking yet but once she grows they’ll become a lot more useful for the crawling around stage of her infancy! Haru will often try to climb on her back because he wants to be fast too- he’s only a little guy but he still hates that she got the extra limb genes where he didn’t.
Both have wings though the down that Haru has makes it a bit difficult for him to fly, though he really grows to enjoy flapping and the flutter of his wings! Haize has more sleek featherless dragon wings which make her flight process a bit easier, though her longer body means that her flying is quite silly (it’s like when you pick a cat up by their middle and they just dangle, imagine that but with flight and her trying to tuck her limbs in to have less weight pulling her down). Both have claws on their dragon halves as well as spikes/spines on their backs though only Haize has been born with the making for clawed hands, Haru grows into his later in life!
Really Falin and Marcille are glad that the kids are in relative captivity, Haru’s inherited the “head empty, no thoughts, tee hee” touden genes and they’re like 75 percent certain that he would get eaten if natural selection had its way - assuming Haize didn’t protect him ofc. Haru is very sleepy as a baby while Haize is very cranky. She likes to sleep on her back but her itty bitty dragon wings get cramped when she does and sleeping on her side isn’t as a comfy. Aside from that she just likes attention and being with her parents which is tough due to their jobs.
Haru has colic due to the light magic that manifests in his stomach pouch organ! He was born with an organ similar to the one red dragons have that allows them to breathe fire! It allows him to conjure and manifest light and can be weaponized if a dragon knows what they’re doing. Really it’s much more useful as bioluminescence for dragons who dwell in darker dungeons as it allows them to lure in prey and the pouch’s brightness grows as a dragon approaches somewhere stacked with mana and magic which is an easy way to find enemies or food! Typically light dragons are very powerful but a rare find as they’re often incredibly soft and unable to protect themselves as babies as well as their newly born pouches which let off a lot of glow due to basically incubating for a year or so and refuse to dampen until they learn to properly dispel their magic via spells. Not to mention how easy of a target it is for their obvious weak spot, one bad slash to the tummy and ur done.
Most dragon babies learn early as having that much magic in you hurts a LOT but Haru takes a lot while to learn it, though Falin soon learns that pressing on his stomach and conjuring her own light magic to siphon Haru’s own eases a lot of his tummy aches and pains.
(I got way more facts about these guys so if you wanna know more just send another ask!! :]!! /gen)
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Announcing Gweathney week 2024!
Gweathney week will span from July 7th-July 14th! I'll accept anything (art, writing, etc.), and late submissions are completely allowed! The only thing that i'll say is no nsfw/anything problematic. Tag whatever you make for this with #gweathneyweek2024, but you can also mention me! Have fun!
REBLOGS > LIKES (so more people can see this!)
(with rizz)
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE DO IT I WILL STARE AT YOUR GUYS WORK FOR HOURS AND LOVE IT DEARLY IT WOULD MEAN SO MUCH TO ME WAUGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH/pos
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Been obsessing over the fact that my old oc, Artie, and Kinitopet are like so one in the same it's actually crazy.
Pink AI that's friendly on the surface, is actually really clingy and obsessive at times. Lonely and really just trying to fulfill a core objective as set by their creator or other influences, someone or something that they look up to as a godly figure maybe.
They both act as your friendly AI assistant, Artie is just for a specific program, while Kinito just gets to be his own thing.
Both want you to stay with them. Both will go out of their way to do things to make sure that happens.
they are so silly to me, and i love them
Also I found an old sketch from way back that somehow mimics the literal same plot beats to the ending portion of kinitopet and that threw me for a loop. Too bad it was only a concept sketch.
ohhh i love sentient silly ai so much... ohhh i love themmmmmm
something something sentience of ai is inherently a tragedy or something like that.
thank you for listening to me ramble. ahem.
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tired of people being like "yall dont talk about dolph" "yall dont talk about sarah" the answer is right there look at both of them
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7:14
Going with the idea that others has before me.
If you have any questions of my OCs,, please please ask me. It can be towards me or like "(to (flor/sebastian/etc), ANAKT Garden/guardian's house)" yk!!
I love talking. I love talking about OCs.
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Okay. First of all.
WOAH THAT'S A LOT OF PEOPLE.
I did NOT expect 74 people to vote in the poll 😭🙏🙏🙏 (what the hell, where the fuck did y'all come from?????)
Second of all,,
TIME TO TALK ABOUT THESE FUCKERS 😈🔥🔥🔥🔥‼️💯
Just to state it here before I start yapping my ever living soul out, Shiver is an eastern tall-man, Frye is a beast-man (like Izutsumi) and Big Man is a kobold. I can get a bit more into their designs and headcanons in another post, but today I want to focus on the lore.
It allllllll roots back to Shiver and Frye's fathers, who were friends since lord knows when. They were a team of burglars, looters, thieves, whatever you may call them, but in the end of the day just let it be clear that they were BAD. And they engaged in BAD shit, like looting corpses in dungeons and stealing from people's houses.
One day, they hit a huge one, they got into the house of this really rich dude that turned out to traffic beast men and other illegal creatures. And the rich being rich and caring about their richness, the security was top notch, and let's just say they struggled to get out of the place alive. BUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They left in NO WAY empty handed.
While looting the place, Frye's father found a kobold cub, chained up inside a cage in the corner beside other creatures likely being sold illegally. He brought the cub with him, and after almost getting their asses turned into kebabs by traps everywhere, the two companions were like "holy FUCK i ain't ever ever ever doing this shit again man.,.,. Wgart the ehll,,,,,, I'm getting too old for this, hell naw!!!!!!!" and decided to settle down as (this time legal) and functioning members of society. Shiver's father opened a dojo, while Frye's father opened a restaurant.
However, the rich guy who owned the house was PISSED (and also happened to be a black magic user......... woah how unlucky of them) and as revenge for stealing his wealth and freeing their beast men, cursed Frye's expecting father, mending the soul of his firstborn with the soul of a monster. And alas, that's how the critter was born😋🙏🔥💯😭
So yeah!!!!!!! Frye is a beast man just like Izutsumi is a beast man. They're the same typa monster, pretty much, except that Frye is a leopard instead of a housecat.
Anyway, back to the kobold pup; you guessed it, BIG MAN (or Big Dog?), being raised in the Onaga's restaurant, was always raised around the kitchen, both because he was genuinely interested in watching people cook and because he hoped to get food that fell from the floor lmfao-- as years went by, he started working as a server, apprentice, and eventually assistant chef of the family-ran restaurant. (So yeah, Biggie is the party's chef!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He also has an incredible sense of smell when it comes to cooking btw, both because of genuine talent and because of his race).
Ironic to his early years as a burglar, Shiver's dad grew to become quite the overprotective father once his daughter started growing up, wanting her to do anything but follow his steps and become a criminal before the age of 20. That backfired though, because she started running off to hang out with Frye causing all sorts of trouble (and eventually dragged Big Dog into it all too). The three were raised almost like siblings, and later on joined together as a party and continued to cause all sorts of troubles inside dungeons, where they eventually bumped into the other idols and started this whoooole story years later.
(They weren't all like their fathers though, instead of keeping the money they got from dungeons to themselves they gave it to the poor, much like their canon bandit dynamics.)
Anyway, that's the end of the yapping session, I hope y'all enjoyed (and if you did, please enjoy this page I doodled while blasting ToyBox in my headphones 🦄🙏 perhaps I'll outline and color this one day, but not now because it's 1:30 in the morning while I'm typing this out.)
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So everyone has a specific style. Like, Skwisgaar and Nathan shave, while everyone else has well kept facial hair. Eveyone has pants/jeans, except you. You all wear boots, except Pickles. You, Toki and Nathan have regular sleeves, and Pickles and Skwisgaar went sleeveless. Skwisgaar is the only one with a belt.
Did you all come together and decide on a look and then deviate from that? What made you go for that signature William Murderface outfit?
I've been wearing this shit since Magnus has been in the band! But really, I think the longer we lived with each other, the more we picked up from one another. Or figured out what we liked, what suited us the most.
Like, Nathan never used to wear boots, but Skwisgaar and I sold him on the idea because it is much more metal.
There wasn't much thought put behind our outfits, honestly. The one thing we all agreed to agree on was music, but if we took after each other or decided to change something up, then fuckin' whatever.
Honestly, I just fucking hate jeans. They make me chafe, even when I was a lot smaller and fuckin' ratty. And growing up in the south, where jeans were just like, a thing? They were just way too hot for me.
The vest? C'mon. You can't go wrong with a good vest and smooth baseline.
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THOUGHTS ON THIS SERIES??
oh my thoughts are. SO MIXED about this series being made
I’m,, sorta scared for it because I’m pretty sure they’re all basing the series on the original run Spiderman-Noir: 2008 and like YAY!!! YIPPEE!!! BECAUSE NOBODY KNOWS OF THAT!!!! but also. Noir Peter is a child in that??? It’s hinted that he’s around like 15-17 or even younger??? WHY IS NICK CAGE PLAYING A CHILD 😭😭😭 I’m more of shaking in my little boots because I don’t trust Sony’s liveaction MCU but. HEYYYY i’ll watch it when it comes out! With horror.
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Question, aside from time factor why didn't Lloyd make a modern way of sewage/plumbing? Was there a different skill that he needed?
well, thing is, modern plumbing is like. really hard to make. we take it for granted but it's,,, a lot of work lol
lloyd did want to implement it but it would've taken him years and a lot of money to do it, things he simply could not afford
It'd have been nice if I could build a modern sewage system in each household where they can directly throw their waste.
But he didn't have the technology to do so and lacked money, time and labor. A bitter smile appeared on Lloyd's face as he looked at the ongoing construction. To be honest, he wanted to create a modern sewage system, just like the one in South Korea, if he could. It would allow the water used at homes to pass through the sewers and the people to flush their toilets. Clean and sleek. Lloyd wanted to devise a method wherein people could deal with the waste without extra effort or care.
But that's impossible here.
To construct a modern sewage system, Lloyd had to connect the residential facility with underground pipes. But the current situation made it impossible for him to do so. Soon, the freezing winter would turn the Prona River into a giant block of ice. The accumulated bodily waste there signaled a large-scale epidemic. So, the sewers had to be constructed before the plague, leaving Lloyd no time to build and connect houses with pipes. He would need at least several years to perfect such a thorough system.
again! modern plumbing is a bit of a marvel of engineering! implementing it in a fantasy world without any of the technological advantages of the modern world would've been pretty hard! and lloyd is not even a civil engineer, he was just studying to become one! the fact he managed to build a sewage system that worked as well as it did in such a relatively short amount of time is already goddamn amazing.
perhaps later on, when he had plenty of free time and money to get bored with just lazing around, maybe he got sufficiently annoyed with not having running water in his house and decided to do something about it! but we have no way of knowing about it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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re: "good girl" i think they say it once randomly as a joke and its just one of those things that gets him wayyy more than they expected it would. so now its their secret weapon and they use it very sparingly and every single time he gets super embarrassed about it but it works ill tell you what.
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Lhokta Lore
The Lhokta Star Cluster holds three solar systems together: The Mordician System, the home of humans who over the years have explored, colonized and categorized the Cluster, was eventually abandoned after its resources had been exhausted. The Oneira System, lush with life and magic, successfully expelled Mordician influence but not before years of war brought its previously isolated planets together in a bid for survival. Finally, the Pyrrhic system, rich with resources but sparsely populated, became a refuge for Mordicians fleeing the collapse of their empire.
(This is a promised lore dump for an OC universe of mine that has,,, wayyy too much worldbuilding going on for its own good. The rest is under a read more because! It’s long! Also fair warning before you proceed further, it’s by no means a finished product, so be gentle. But also! I would love to discuss it with folks if they find it interesting because it’s definitely a constantly growing thing and having people to bounce ideas off of is fun and the info here is honestly only the tip of the iceberg, i fear)
Timeline:
Magic:
The Elsewhither is a plane of existence which sits atop and weaves through the world of the Lhokta Cluster. Gods make their home here, carving out parts of the wild realm of pure magic to create domains which they rule. All magic hails from the Elsewhither. Most commonly, magic is drawn from the Elsewhither through devotion to a god. Druids gain power from deities to whom they pledge fealty, or make a deal. Gods, whose existence is dependent on the belief of their followers, are often eager to strike such deals to ensure their continued survival. Some magic is drawn from the Elsewhither by nature of proximity. There are places where the plane bleeds into the material world of Lhokta, and there are demigods who pull it closer by merely existing. Those who have this kind of special relationship with the Elsewhither are rare, but possess an innate ability to see the Veil—the partition between the material plane and the Elsewhither—and manipulate it to cast magic. Lastly, there is the study of the language of the gods. When known to and studied by mortals, this language can allow them access to some level of magical ability.
Key Planets
The Oneira System:
⁽ᵗʰᶦˢ ˢʸˢᵗᵉᵐ, ᶦⁿ ᵖᵃʳᵗᶦᶜᵘˡᵃʳ, ᶦˢ ᵐʸ ᵇᵃᵇʸ ˢᵒ ᶦᶠ ʸᵒᵘ ᵗʰᶦⁿᵏ ʸᵒᵘ ˢᵉᵉ ᶠᵃᵛᵒʳᶦᵗᶦˢᵐ ᵇᵉᶦⁿᵍ ᵉˣʰᶦᵇᶦᵗᵉᵈ,,, ʸᵒᵘ’ʳᵉ ʳᶦᵍʰᵗ⁾
Menaea: The largest surviving human colony in the Oneira System, Menaea is also the seat of power for the Oneiran Delegation. Its development has been closely watched, and shepherded by the neighboring planet of Faerie. This is where the Delegation meets, as well as the Council of Seven, which seats a Septenary from each of the six Menaean provinces, as well as one representative from the neighboring planet of Halou. The Menaean Septenaries are also sovereign leaders of their respective province and aren’t elected. Most Delegate positions have also lapsed into a kind of lazy inheritance, but a few delegates are still elected. This includes the Septenary from Halou, who serves a seven year term before an election is held on their homeworld. Menaea is seen as a hub of culture and the academic study of magic.
Faerie: No other planet is so closely interwoven with the Elsewhither. Its inhabitants include the fey, split roughly into the Seelie and Unseelie Courts; the dragons, which exist both as wild dragons and those domesticated by the Seelie Court; and the giants, which live in tentative peace with the fey every since they collaborated to defeat Mordician colonists. Aside from the giants, all creatures living on Faerie are deeply magical and immortal. Fey come in all kinds of shapes and sizes, from the Sylphs to pixies to Red Caps. Sylphs make up the majority of the actual Seelie Court, though other kinds of fey are aligned with the court, and the Fey Queen herself is a Sylph. Fey have an innate connection with the Elsewhither, the Veil and magic. Sylphs also traditionally take a bondmate in a dragon, which grows with them and acts as a magical conduit. They hold an event called the Wild Hunt where a contender is chosen to hunt a stag through the feywild. The Snarl denotes parts of the feywild where the Elsewhither practically breaks through onto the material plane, leaving the feywild even wilder and thriving with unpredictable magic.
Halou: The third planet in the ‘Central Ring,’ Halou holds more power than most other planets in the Oneira system. It is a heavily forested planet, populated by Audaxians (spider folks), Alethians (snake folks), and Therons (bird folks).
Nochta: A planet of balance, Nochta has always been ruled by two god-brothers, one of order and fate and the other of chaos and free will. Aisa, the god of fate, had consolidated power and killed his brother bringing a suffocating stasis to the planet. He saw in the future one opportunity to once again bring his world glory, or else destroy it, and had a child with a mortal queen. Unfortunately, balance could not be restored before colonization by Mordis turned the planet into a husk of its former self. (This planet is mostly notable for being the homeworld of Maire, the child of Aisa, another OC)
Tarsus: The birthplace of vampires. Tarsus is a rocky, mountainous and inhospitable planet. A cult to the goddess Malochre was cursed with vampirism and then subsequently drained the planet of all life aside from themselves. While the curse—or disease, depending on who you ask—has long since spread from its planetary confines, those who live there and are still devoted to their goddess consider themselves to be the only true vampires, while all the rest are lowly parasites. They call themselves the Children of Malochre.
Quoah: A mining colony of Menaea and Faerie in the Outskirts, the people of Quoah are overworked, disadvantaged and poor. This particular colony is notable mostly for being the birth place of Erastos Arsinoe (an OC of mine who becomes their delegate and then gets up to a lot of mischief and mess)
The Mordician System:
Mordis: The human homeworld, once a marvel of scientific progress, eventually turns to a hollow shell of itself. It was the hub of human colonization efforts, stretching itself in all directions as colonists were sent to both of its neighboring systems. In the reckless pursuit of progress, the planet became completely inhospitable to life and its sprawling empire collapsed, retreating to Pyrrhus in the Pyrrhic System.
The Pyrrhic System:
Pyrrhus: Rising from the ashes of Mordis’ failure, Pyrrhus is a hub for human civilization that appears destined to make all the same mistakes again. It exists as a cyberpunk dystopia, with layers of undercity accumulating in the dark as those with power ceaselessly build upwards. Eventually, the expansion spills from the containment of their planet.
Torr: A mining colony and high security prison, this planet has been commandeered by the Pyrrhic government as a way to handle the vampirism problem that ravages all of the systems. A tidally locked planet, the mines are built on the half of the planet trapped in eternal daylight, making it (nearly) impossible for its prisoners and workforce to escape.
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I am so beyond ready to quit this job. Wednesday cannot come fast enough.
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ooooh I just saw ur regression question thing
what are you thoughts about questions 17 and 18 for a regressed house
In response to this post
Question 17: do they prefer to play indoors or outdoors?
House is an indoor kid. Between his leg and fear of being discovered as a little, he almost always regresses inside, preferable at home. He lives when it rains, it almost always means a movie day and snuggles from Wilson
Question 18: Do they take naps?
Bro is far too little to not need naps... however, if you asked him, he would say no. He detests naps and so usually just plays until he gets tired enough to just fall asleep wherever he is. If that's almost always at 3 is his and Wilsons business and only his and Wilson's business.
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