During my time getting an advanced degree I spent a lot of time learning about RNA and that contributed to COVID discourse being so disconcerting. It wasn't my first time learning about RNA vaccines, I worked with human applications of Ivermectin, and I even looked at an old textbook that had a chapter about coronaviruses and fears about possible mutations.

I learned about cool shit like interfering RNA (RNAi) and how you need RNAi to have proper growth of hands in the womb. There was this theory that DNA and protein are just convenient ways for RNA to express itself. There was this theory about "the RNA World" that was the original self-replicating nucleic acid. I learned that only ~2% of the human genome accounts for protein translation and some of it encodes RNA and we (aren't/weren't) sure what they were for. That section was really cool. It was kind of cool to get to the point where we were talking about viruses and RNA because it took all the building blocks that went all the way back to high school biology and physics as necessary building blocks to get to these awesome ideas about the nature of biology.