which is your favourite parasite? mine would probablz be Thisbe Irena, a caterpillar that uses pheromones and other structures to take over ant colonies.

Mankind

The amoeba, extremely popular! ;-)

My brother! (not)

Erm, did you know tapeworms used to be sold as weight loss drugs?

Sick! THat should be illeagal! They have to take poison after to kill the tapeworms when they're done, and that can't be that good either!

This is in the early 1900s.

Did you know that athlete's foot, is a type of ringworm.

wolfson said in post # :

Did you know that athlete's foot, is a type of ringworm.

I'm fairly certain it's caused by fungus.

all I know is that topical steroids of cortisone base are used to treat it, and it itches like son of a female dog!

ringworm, despite the name, is a fungus and so is atheletes foot.

Damn. This parasite's more cunning than I thought

I thought parasites wouldn't be able to think.

Actually, I think the best parasite is the bird that sits in a croc's mouth and picks the bits from between it's teeth.

Cap'n Refsmmat said in post # :

Actually, I think the best parasite is the bird that sits in a croc's mouth and picks the bits from between it's teeth.

That's not parasitism, it's commensalism.

 

Literally meaning "eating at the same table", in this relationship one species derives benefit (the bird) and the other is unaffected.

 

If you demonstrate that the croc derives benefit from having its teeth and gums cleaned, it's a mutualistic relationship.

I'm getting my symbiotic relationships mixed up.

All right then, leeches!

the same thing can be seen on Sharks in certain bodies of water where little tiny fish attach themselves to its body and effectively clean the surface layer, that shark doesn`t eat them though it COULD if they didn`t do him favors

 

I wouldn't mind if I had a parasite or whatever that cleaned the food off my face.

well sadly, we`re constrained to personal hygeine, sorry and all that

The average human has around 180 species of parasite living on and in them.

 

Eugh.

Sayonara³ said in post # :

The average human has around 180 species of parasite living on and in them.

 

Eugh.

 

I don't see why that's an 'eugh', we've got enormous numbers of critters in general.

 

As they don't really affect us in any meaningful way (would you change your lifestyle if you were told that having not known? (assuming you're not an oxygen tent based crazy of course)) I don't see why any tastebased comment should apply, since they for all intents and purposes don't exist.

actualy MOST of the parasites we do have inside and out, do us more good than harm

and there`s a few that we`de be totaly PHUKED without

YT2095 said in post # :

actualy MOST of the parasites we do have inside and out, do us more good than harm

and there`s a few that we`de be totaly PHUKED without

 

If we'd be 'phuked' without them, then they're not exactly parasites are they?

MrL_JaKiri said in post # :

I don't see why that's an 'eugh', we've got enormous numbers of critters in general.

 

As they don't really affect us in any meaningful way (would you change your lifestyle if you were told that having not known? (assuming you're not an oxygen tent based crazy of course)) I don't see why any tastebased comment should apply, since they for all intents and purposes don't exist.

You won't being saying that if you suffer from an immunodefficiency at some point in the future.

 

You'll say things like "Oh bloody hell. Killed by a plasmodium, how embarassing."

Sayonara³ said in post # :

You won't being saying that if you suffer from an immunodefficiency at some point in the future.

 

You'll say things like "Oh bloody hell. Killed by a plasmodium, how embarassing."

 

I don't see how that's more embarassing than being killed by a virus.

 

A virus isn't even alive for god's sake.

You know, E coli lives in us, and is beneficial, till there's too much of it.

MrL_JaKiri said in post # :

I don't see how that's more embarassing than being killed by a virus.

 

A virus isn't even alive for god's sake.

Virus also deserves an EUGH.

 

I did not elevate the eughness of parasites above the eughness of anything else, so I don't see where this argument is going.