A virus, at heart, is information, a packet of data that benefits from being shared. The information at stake is genetic: instructions to make more virus. Unlike a truly living organism, a virus cannot replicate on its own; it cannot move, grow, persist or perpetuate. It needs a host. The viral code breaks into a living cell, hijacks the genetic machinery and instructs it to produce new code — new virus. President Donald Trump has characterized the response to the pandemic as a “medical war,” and described the virus behind it as, by turns, “genius,” a “hidden enemy” and “a monster.” It would be more accurate to say that we find ourselves at odds with a microscopic photocopy machine. Not even...
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