Thoughts in Pixel form

May I not with perfect confidence congratulate my country and society at large on the beholding—an antidote that is capable of extirpating from the earth a disease which is every hour devouring its victims; a disease that has ever been considered as the severest scourge of the human race! –Edward Jenner

What would the ultimate goal of the medical field look like if there ever came a day where all viruses and diseases were completely eradicated from the face of the earth? No more colds, itchy throats, headaches, stomachaches, cancer, tuberculosis, hepatitis, or AIDS. What would happen to the human body and its immune system? Would we live in a utopia free from the worry of getting sick or would we fear a greater threat living within our own bodies?

It may be a goal that some may look at and think, “It can never be done” –similar to the attitudes that surrounded such pioneers as the Wright brothers or the invention of the telephone. We live on a planet that is ever changing, and though we may be years away from a virus free society, the research and manpower behind this cause is a booming enterprise. What would happen to the funding if the race ever was completed? What would the focus shift to?

The human body is a very complex structure with built in virus detection software and hardware that is light-years ahead of any super computer that exist today or may ever exist in the future. These systems are ever ready to deploy a defensive attack on any malicious viruses that breach the units’ outer walls. They are dynamic and learn to become resistant to specific threads or combinations of viruses. Ultimately, we cannot survive without these defensive tools, that is, unless there wasn’t anything to fight against. In that case, would our immune system simply fade away?

Though at first, living in a virus free society may seem like the greatest thing that could happen to humanity, eventually we would become so susceptible to any slight change in the atmosphere the entire race would come tumbling down. Imagine it this way; a computer operating system develops (and guarantees) a 100% virus free experience, both online and offline. This super system is un-hackable, dependable, and works at lightning speeds. Over a course of a few generations, this system becomes the sole monopoly in the industry, no other exist. The firewalls come down, there is no longer any need for virus protection, or any software of the like—utopia has arrived. Yet, during this time, the system has become so internally weak it has become susceptible to the smallest dust particle that it comes in contact with. Not viruses per se, but normal allergens that exist in the environment. What was once fixable with a simple disk utility run through has now confused the system from its normal operations. It has no blue print knowledge in how to execute a function to resolve the issue and therefore is overtaken.

It may be a far-fetched idea now, but just like the first settlers had grown immune to what eventually helped turn the tables in the early days of the New World, being virus free is not the best way to be.