A 23-foot-long male minke whale that was found dead in the Hamptons appears to have died of an infectious disease prior to reaching the shore, according to marine biologists. The Atlantic Marine Conservation Society, a Hampton Bays-based nonprofit organization that responds to marine wildlife strandings, performed a necropsy on the whale, which was found to be thin and have no food in its digestive system. That and other evidence led experts to believe the whale died of a disease that has claimed other minke whales.