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[Bumber]

If roaches really are going to be the survivors, they should be all over the Chernobyl exclusion zone.

Were there roaches there before the incident? I assume northern Ukraine is one of those colder areas.

[dragdeler]

If roaches really are going to be the survivors, they should be all over the Chernobyl exclusion zone.

Were there roaches there before the incident? I assume northern Ukraine is one of those colder areas.

Oh I get how you could come to this misunderstanding... See, I misrepresented what he was going to say.

[feelotraveller]

So far I haven't seen any evidence that cockroaches fare very well once humans are gone from an area.

4500+ species say otherwise.    It is quite clear that Elgar is talking about only one or two species of cockroaches.  Many others thrive without more than incidental contact with humans.

With Chernobyl it seems there is a wider phenomenon happening.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depopulation_of_cockroaches_in_post-Soviet_states  (Google must be censoring this since it is one of the top hits in Duck Duck Go for 'chernobyl cockroaches', unless you just failed to mention it.)

Whether cockroaches will inherit the earth is a separate question from the reason for them not doing so being their purported dependency on human civilisiation - just so as different parts of the conversation don't get confused.  Certainly the issue of a nuclear winter may stop them, if temperatures world-wide drop below the freezing threshold the majority of cockroaches are going to have a hard time.

[Reelya]

4500+ species say otherwise.

But only 6 of them have actually spread out. And as I said, when people talk about cockroaches taking over the world, they're not really talking about native bush cockroaches that live in rotting logs in the forest. Those ones are going to keep sitting there in their rotting logs nuclear war or no nuclear war.

People are talking about the few species of cockroaches that spread along with humans. The other ~4494 species aren't actually any good at colonizing human habitats. What nuclear war would do is leave the forest roaches pretty much unchanged (or around a lot less if the forests are destroyed), while destroying the main food source the city roach species survive on. We current have massive operations that harvest plant matter and bring it into the cities, the roaches live off the scraps from this process. If we go, so does the constant influx of bio-matter.

http://www.bio.miami.edu/tom/courses/bil160/bil160goods/16_rKselection.html
Also, the city roaches are r-selection strategists. When the big crunch happens, their population strategy will actually be a detriment, so you'd expect to see K-selection strategists taking over. One thought is that ants are more likely to take over rather than roaches. Ants live underground, which means they may have less radiation exposure. Ants are very efficient and currently we artificially keep ants out in a way we don't for roaches. So if there is excess food after a nuclear war then you'd expect to see a big growth in the number of ants, and thus less food for other species such as roaches.
 

[feelotraveller]

4500+ species say otherwise.

But only 6 of them have actually spread out. And as I said, when people talk about cockroaches taking over the world, they're not really talking about native bush cockroaches that live in rotting logs in the forest. Those ones are going to keep sitting there in their rotting logs nuclear war or no nuclear war.

People are talking about the few species of cockroaches that spread along with humans. The other ~4494 species aren't actually any good at colonizing human habitats. What nuclear war would do is leave the forest roaches pretty much unchanged (or around a lot less if the forests are destroyed), while destroying the main food source the city roach species survive on. We current have massive operations that harvest plant matter and bring it into the cities, the roaches live off the scraps from this process. If we go, so does the constant influx of bio-matter.

I don't think that any specific form of cockroach is invoked and could not find anything like this in the origin of the meme.  Just like when I talk of 'birds flying' it does not mean that they have to be pigeons or seagulls.  Now, it may be the case the when someone says birds flying I think of a dove and you think of a hawk but the saying itself does not invoke either.

Of those cockroaches that have spread with human civilisation only one can be said to be dependent on humans (whether for food supply or otherwise) since all the others still have wild populations that succesfully inhabit non-human environs.

Ha ha you have managed not one but two substantial edits while I was replying (or maybe more, can't be bothered checking).  Wish I had a record of those if only for humours sake.

[Reelya]

I'd argue that most people actually do mean the city cockroaches, for the simple reason that almost nobody knows there are 4500 species of cockroaches living in the forests. It's likely that substantially less than 1% of people on Earth have even heard about that.

 It doesn't come up, precisely because only a very small number of people know about those even existing. The vast majority of people only know about the common types of cockroaches, so when they make a statement about cockroaches, that's what they're referring to. They're referring to what's familiar, they're not making a statement where you go "well technically that also applies to all these other species you've never heard of, because scientists also happen to class them under the name cockroach".

There's a different between what a term "technically" means and what someone speaking that word is actually trying to say, or understands the phrase to mean. It's pretty likely that nobody who ever said "cockroaches are going to take over the world" specifically thought or even knew about the thousands of obscure related species that live in forests.

[feelotraveller]

I'd argue that most people actually do mean the city cockroaches, for the simple reason that almost nobody knows there are 4500 species of cockroaches living in the forests. It's likely that substantially less than 1% of people on Earth have even heard about that.

 It doesn't come up, precisely because only a very small number of people know about those even existing. The vast majority of people only know about the common types of cockroaches, so when they make a statement about cockroaches, that's what they're referring to. They're referring to what's familiar, they're not making a statement where you go "well technically that also applies to all these other species you've never heard of, because scientists also happen to class them under the name cockroach".

There's a different between what a term "technically" means and what someone speaking that word is actually trying to say, or understands the phrase to mean. It's pretty likely that nobody who ever said "cockroaches are going to take over the world" specifically thought or even knew about the thousands of obscure related species that live in forests.

Oh the hyperbolae!

All it needs for your argument to fail is for one person to think of American cockroaches rather than Gerrman cockroackes, no need for obscure cockroaches.

(And by the by there is something a bit more serious going on than 'scientists also happen to class them under the name cockroach' - that is there is an exercise of reason at work rather than an arbitrary rhetoric.)

[If someone knows how to search for the number of edits on a post I would truly be very curious.]

[scourge728]

I know I wasn't aware of the majority of cockroaches and was thinking about the one usually used in movies, I believe it's from Madagascar

[Max™]

It's alarming that there is such an easy to accept brain bug that makes people assume apocalypses are likely and imminent when their own existence implies that they are obviously part of a chain of survivors extending back into deep time.

As for nuclear winter, I kinda figured it was a given for most people to know that it would require an extremely limited nuclear exchange nowadays, and the math of nuclear warfare doesn't really favor such things anymore. We had an example of their use back when literally nobody else was able to do so, but nowadays you'd need to get an extremely limited accidental launch with perfectly sane responses based on perfect information to prevent retaliation, and that isn't going to happen. Full scale exchanges these days aren't a matter of counting deaths, they're about considering the possibility of edge case survivors, like maybe folks in the ISS or a few subs would be able to be properly horrified at what we did to ourselves before dying off from radiation, resource exhaustion, taking their own lives or others, and ultimately even an edge case survivor wouldn't be able to rebuild a population before senescence kicks in.

There was a brief period in the 60's where you may have gotten something like fragmentary civilizations surviving, but we went so far past that point that despite literal decades of drawing down our stockpiles we're still totally fucked if they ever get used, so good news, if roaches did survive, nobody is going to notice!

[Reelya]

I'd argue that most people actually do mean the city cockroaches, for the simple reason that almost nobody knows there are 4500 species of cockroaches living in the forests. It's likely that substantially less than 1% of people on Earth have even heard about that.

 It doesn't come up, precisely because only a very small number of people know about those even existing. The vast majority of people only know about the common types of cockroaches, so when they make a statement about cockroaches, that's what they're referring to. They're referring to what's familiar, they're not making a statement where you go "well technically that also applies to all these other species you've never heard of, because scientists also happen to class them under the name cockroach".

There's a different between what a term "technically" means and what someone speaking that word is actually trying to say, or understands the phrase to mean. It's pretty likely that nobody who ever said "cockroaches are going to take over the world" specifically thought or even knew about the thousands of obscure related species that live in forests.

Oh the hyperbolae!

All it needs for your argument to fail is for one person to think of American cockroaches rather than Gerrman cockroackes, no need for obscure cockroaches.

(And by the by there is something a bit more serious going on than 'scientists also happen to class them under the name cockroach' - that is there is an exercise of reason at work rather than an arbitrary rhetoric.)

[If someone knows how to search for the number of edits on a post I would truly be very curious.]

Huh, there are 6 widespread species of cockroaches associated with humans, and the American cockroach is one of them, that was already included. Here's an actual expert making the same general point:

https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/would-cockroaches-really-survive-a-nuclear-apocalypse

Professor Elgar says the feral American and German species of cockroach – the ones you might recognise from your kitchen nooks and crannies – have given the rest of the species a bad rap.

“I think our view of cockroaches is informed by our frequent interaction with the American and German cockroaches, which have spread throughout the world,” Professor Elgar says. “Their habit of basically acting as an unpaid house cleaner horrifies people.”

when people think "cockroaches" they are in fact thinking about those familiar species. Normal people who say "cockroach" aren't in fact referring to all members of a certain genus, in the scientific sense.\

Cockroaches feed off the detritus of other living organisms, however; so Professor Elgar questions whether they would be able to thrive without humans and other animals.

Tell this guy he's wrong.

“For a while they’ll be able to eat dead bodies and other decaying material but, if everything else has died, eventually there won’t be any food. And they’re not going to make much of a living,” Professor Elgar says.

[feelotraveller]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'd argue that most people actually do mean the city cockroaches, for the simple reason that almost nobody knows there are 4500 species of cockroaches living in the forests. It's likely that substantially less than 1% of people on Earth have even heard about that.

 It doesn't come up, precisely because only a very small number of people know about those even existing. The vast majority of people only know about the common types of cockroaches, so when they make a statement about cockroaches, that's what they're referring to. They're referring to what's familiar, they're not making a statement where you go "well technically that also applies to all these other species you've never heard of, because scientists also happen to class them under the name cockroach".

There's a different between what a term "technically" means and what someone speaking that word is actually trying to say, or understands the phrase to mean. It's pretty likely that nobody who ever said "cockroaches are going to take over the world" specifically thought or even knew about the thousands of obscure related species that live in forests.

Oh the hyperbolae!

All it needs for your argument to fail is for one person to think of American cockroaches rather than Gerrman cockroackes, no need for obscure cockroaches.

(And by the by there is something a bit more serious going on than 'scientists also happen to class them under the name cockroach' - that is there is an exercise of reason at work rather than an arbitrary rhetoric.)

[If someone knows how to search for the number of edits on a post I would truly be very curious.]

Huh, there are 6 widespread species of cockroaches associated with humans, and the American cockroach is one of them, that was already included. Here's an actual expert making the same general point:

https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/would-cockroaches-really-survive-a-nuclear-apocalypse

Professor Elgar says the feral American and German species of cockroach – the ones you might recognise from your kitchen nooks and crannies – have given the rest of the species a bad rap.

“I think our view of cockroaches is informed by our frequent interaction with the American and German cockroaches, which have spread throughout the world,” Professor Elgar says. “Their habit of basically acting as an unpaid house cleaner horrifies people.”

when people think "cockroaches" they are in fact thinking about those familiar species. Normal people who say "cockroach" aren't in fact referring to all members of a certain genus, in the scientific sense.\

Cockroaches feed off the detritus of other living organisms, however; so Professor Elgar questions whether they would be able to thrive without humans and other animals.

Tell this guy he's wrong.

“For a while they’ll be able to eat dead bodies and other decaying material but, if everything else has died, eventually there won’t be any food. And they’re not going to make much of a living,” Professor Elgar says.

You are missing the argument again.  Yes American cockroaches thrive as a pest cohabiting with humans.  But they are not dependent on us (as a species) since there are viable populations in the wild.  Or to quote myself, from the post previous to the one you cite:

Of those cockroaches that have spread with human civilisation only one can be said to be dependent on humans (whether for food supply or otherwise) since all the others still have wild populations that succesfully inhabit non-human environs.

To be specific, the german cockroach is the 'dependent' one and is largely thought unable to survive independent of human habitation.

Actually there is not much to tell the guy he is wrong about.  Sure the common conception of cockroaches as a whole has been shaped by their frequent encounter as a pest but this is a transfer of attributes not a subsumption under a particular type.  It's similar to us thinking that all birds fly because we frequently see ones that do - that is how 'our view is informed' so that cockroaches have 'a bad rap'.

Nor is the proposition that certain species would not 'thrive' without human habitation questionable; it's a page or two back but I said as much:

Even in the case of urban cockroaches I suspect that they are not 'dependent' on the urban environment but merely thrive under those conditions

Indeed, putting it this way implies that the species will survive to an extent without humans.

But the final quote is hilarious - in terms of your argument -
If 'everything else has died' then the cockroaches have inherited the earth.

Not sure why I would want to tell this guy he is wrong. 

[wierd]

https://amonitoring.ru/article/onemore_steam_eop_0day/

New steam 0day.

Also, steam issued fix not very good. Not sure if my acl fully fixes or not.

I will look more into filesys perms for new vuln. Give a bit.

OK, if I am reading the exploit overview properly, there is poor security on the bin folder inside steam's install location.  This allows an attacker to rename the bin folder, then create a symlink to a location that they control, and give a malicious substitution for steamclient.dll

That dll gets executed with elevated privs, so this gives a way in for a would-be attacker.


Since the exploit involves the creation of a symlink, (either directly to the steamclient.dll, or to the bin folder that contains it), a filesystem ACL should fix it.


....  YEEUP.  Looks like Valve does not understand that full control priv does not belong on limited user in programfiles folders...  Give me a bit to experiment with suitable locked down privs.



OK, Steam client seems perfectly fine with removing write, modify, delete, modify ACL, and take ownership permissions from limited user on the bin folder and contents. Not sure why Valve granted them in the first place.


more edit

Steam client is bitchy about the steam folder being writable. I can still (somehow) rename the bin folder even after setting an ACL that should prevent it. I am investigating further.

[wierd]

*sigh*

I have spent quite a bit of time trying to get steam to play nice here.  It wont. If you revoke certain permissions, it thinks it needs to do an update and then fails. If you enable those permissions but disable others, it asserts it cant run for various reasons.

Valve just doesn't grok "limited user." 

[Magistrum]

The 100day patch will be good. Maybe.

[Iduno]

*sigh*

I have spent quite a bit of time trying to get steam to play nice here.  It wont. If you revoke certain permissions, it thinks it needs to do an update and then fails. If you enable those permissions but disable others, it asserts it cant run for various reasons.

Valve just doesn't grok "limited user."

It's sounding like it's as much smug incompetence as malice. They're Valve, so it's probably a bit of both, but still.