Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

aphasic t1_j943j0f wrote

Reply to comment by Interesting-Month-56 in Why are fevers cyclical? by Key-Marionberry-9854

It's also worth mentioning that the human immune system is an insane rube goldberg machine where almost every pathway has multiple mechanisms of negative feedback regulation. It's almost universal that when your cells sense a cytokine produced by a viral infection, like interferon gamma, they respond to it (inflammation, fever, antiviral gene transcription, etc), but they also up-regulate genes that serve to dampen the cell's response to interferon. If you put a cell in a steady state amount of cytokine, it will usually have a strong initial response, followed by a damping of the signal. There are a lot of mechanisms by which this happens (down-regulating the receptor, up-regulating the inhibitors of the receptor, etc.)

560

DorkRockGalactic t1_j94xkxv wrote

Chaos into order, via evolution.

It's like a core metaphor for everything we are and know.

132

assidreemz t1_j953rl6 wrote

Yea it’s really cool to think about. Entropy is one of my favorite words.

39

thechilipepper0 t1_j979hne wrote

I tried to explain it to an MFA once. It’s surprisingly difficult to describe in simple terms

4

Felted_Grape t1_j9egi9o wrote

I like to imagine we are a little backwards swirl going to order in the grand big swirl pattern that overall tends towards entropy.

1

DorkRockGalactic t1_j9gouep wrote

That's a good analogy really.

With all the random stuff happening, it's possible for things to order themselves by random chance. Earth life happened to order itself just the right way to self replicate and thrive on our island of stability where there are energy gradients to exploit.

2

SavannahInChicago t1_j96u3o4 wrote

I am currently studying anatomy. Calling the body itself a rube goldberg machine sounds so accurate.

7