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To: T L Comiskey who wrote (13772)	11/9/2000 11:09:09 PM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 65232

Nice post Tim..... agree Ö¿Ö

To: T L Comiskey who wrote (13772)	11/9/2000 11:38:23 PM
From: brightness00	Respond to of 65232

Tim, Read your own penecillin article, "The biggest problem was producing enough penicillin." The initial discovery itself, always over-emphasized by scholars with a biase towards government funded research and amature historians keen on the serendipitous nature of that particular incident, was nowhere nearly as important as the underlying industrial infrastructure that was necessary for mass producing it so that millions lives could be saved by it. It was so precious that as late as at the end of WWII, penecillin vials were traded on overseas black markets as a currency not unlike gold bullions and diamonds. Not to mention that penicillin itself is toxic to nearly a quarter of the population; it would take years of mundane commercial research to come up with other antibiotics for people who are allergic to it and diseases that quickly adapted to it; plus the commercially viable processes to make all the myriads of antibiotics affordable to patients all over the world. Do you think it was a co-incidence that out of the dozens of antibiotics that are invented in the middle of last century (that was responsible for prolonging life expectancy for almost two decades on average the world over), not a single useful one was invented in the socialist/communist countries then accounting for over two thirds of world's population? Speaking of the historical significance of invention vs. a market infrastructure available to exploit it, do you know that steam engine was first stumbled upon by ancient Greeks? The sponsor's response to the inventor was something like, "what am I supposed to do with all my rowing slaves?" Without a fluid and efficient capital market to exploit new inventions, they seldomly get to benefit the humanity. As for the tone of my previous post, it was not my intention to insult Rose. I was however very offended by the anti-market statement she was making, which IMNSHO, was extremely short-sighted and patronizing. Considering how much human suffering such anti-market socialist miscaculations brought about the world over through much of last century (over one hundred million deaths through starvation alone at last counting, not including the on-going one in North Korea), I consider my response to it (not her) fully justified. Jim