A thought struck me tonight, the kind of thought that I need to put on [paper] so that it might escape me and be free rather than wrestle with my need for sleep later.

Why are there no good viruses? I mean surely it would be evolutionarily advantageous to be of benefit to your host (like some symbiotic parasites are)? Es[ecially if you have the misfortune of not being able to replicate yourself. And there's the simple answer by its very nature a virus misuses its host to [self] perpetuate causing damage and thus all viruses *must* be detrimental to their hosts...

or must they?

well no

after all a virus is simply a DNA strand wrapped in a protective coating. so if a virus was to be beneficial to the host organism then the information stored within its DNA segment would have to be beneficial to that organism and in the process of the virus attempting to self-replicate via a cell belonging to a host the result might in fact be a hybrid cell of the two information strands combined - the viral code and the host code. or to take the story back a bit surely then the origin of life is merely the meeting of two (and subsequently more) viruses with syntropic relationships rather than entropic. Suggesting that the basis of evolution might not be random mutation but the product of synergetic mutations. i.e. beneficient viruses develop into complex lifeforms whilst malignant viruses experience statis whilst causing degeneration in other organisms. Perhaps even (if not now then at the early stages of life) the entire process of natural selection rather than being the product of random mutations was in fact non-organisms evolving due to a simple truth evident even at levels beneath that of life (not just consciousness) - being good is its own reward. A leap to far for some I know but if morality is thus evident in the very start of life - in fact evident in matter that is not techically even alive then matter itself must iself obey the simplest of morals - after all given the strength of the call to entropy one might say that the calls for syntropy so evident around us in stars, planets and life itself the only conclusion to be made is that the universe itself (if matter is) must surely be a moral place where evil/entropy may like the common cold never be cured but their presence is demanded in order for good/syntopy to flourish.

hmmm I believe it is a good thing I never pursued my interest in science I've just managed to turn an insight into the nature of biological development into a case for God...nothing new there I suppose but if I'm spouting nonsense how come we don't go up with wellness the way we go down with illness? The only answer is that we do, and perhaps "going up with wellness" is merely evolution in action (aka god working through and within us).

so go forth catch a warm and evolve. After all the synonym for the latin word virus is anima - and just that is what we are - animals, moral animals because life itself is a moral process