this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2021
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COVID-19 Pandemic
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That was interesting, thanks. So table 2 has to looked at together with table 3 and 4. But the same information shown much more clearly in figure 2 on pages 17 and 18.
And page 12 is a fairly good summary, there's not much I could add to that. Do you agree with page 12 or is there another way of looking at it?
Table 2, 3 and 4 are about different aspects. Table 2 deals with cases testing positive without going into severity of disease while Table 3 and 4 deal only with data about severe cases and terminal ones. Figure 2 makes bar charts of parts of these tables, which maybe clarifying for some.
While it puts the maths right, Page 12 is outright misleading about possible causes. The interpretations therein are carefully worded to guide the uninitiated reader to look away from the vaccines themselves as cause of anything bad.
Another pertinent aspect is that only table 2 (and corresponding figure on page 17) has data relevant to the spread of the virus itself and how vaccination is affecting it; and it does appear that covid is spreading faster in the vaccinated, at least for higher age groups.
While Table 3 and 4 may hint that vaccines are reducing serious illness and deaths, the virus has already proven that it mutates and faster spreading of it will ultimately accelerate mutations and Table 3 and 4 will progressively look worse with passage of time.
yes i agree with most of that. i think most people who are interested in this stuff, and are scientifically literate, will be familiar with those problems, and are still pro vaccine. just a couple of things.
what's a better interpretation than page 12? it sounded fine to me.
this is real world data, not a randomised trial. there are lots of confounding factors. this kind of record is no substitute for a rigorous research study.
Literacy doesn't make people any less opinionated. Nor do opinions affect truth. Opinions only affect individual and collective decisions. For instance, if Titanic is sinking, no amount of opinions or voting against the fact of sinking will make any difference to the fact that it is sinking. Opinions only affect what people will do while it is sinking. Similarly, what people think about vaccines doesn't affect vaccines' actual impact.
To put my position on record:
Now, as for the two specific points you raised:
There is much to be skeptical about, but we are collectively grasping on straws. Not the finest hour of mankind.
Then, you're leaving the responsibility to individuals, not taking it on yourself. If as president you force everyone to take a vaccine and that vaccine causes 1% of people to die, you are personally responsible for those deaths. If you make it optional, and most people take it, and some of them die, they are individually responsible.
But politicians think they are smarter than most people, which they are not. Most unusually stupid people think they are unusually intelligent. That leads to politicians having this arrogance that they can, and should, make personal decisions for other people.
2 and 3. The people who say that are just ignorant. The details of vaccine risks are online. You can understand them better than the average politician. They cause heart attacks, and other stuff I forget, in some tiny fraction of people. But in the case of covid, getting vaccinated is much safer than not.
That's the kind of question with no real answer. You can say, evil money and power and corruption, or because of dire emergency, or because vaccines are the best most effective remedy, or because of foolish short-sighted politicians and group think. All these answers are correct. You can argue which one is more correct, you can argue than forever and never convince anyone. Some people do!
While the position I expressed above pertains to vaccines, I am generally aligned with voluntaryism and hold that coersion is wrong in all matters. Being non-voluntary, after all, is the only thing that differentiates rape from sex, and scam from trade.
I feel we are both in harmony on points 1 to 4. I disagree on point 5. Real answers do exist even if we haven't agreed upon them as yet. Public debate, even social media debate, is a way to form, refine or change opinions of individuals, ideally. Let us not treat it as anything less.
Yes great. But I still insist there's two separate problems. Firstly yes you're raping/scamming the very people who pay your salary. Or as I'd put it, stripping their civil rights (in many territories the measures which were taken are actually illegal/unconstitutional).
But the second thing is that it is counterproductive. For example in France the government first banned wearing masks, then enforced it. They first enforced all children goin to school, then enforced all children stopping school.
If they had not done that, many people would have started wearing masks and stopped going to school much earlier. Many lives would have been saved. The best government action would have been to do nothing and allow people to decide for themselves. By relying on the collective intelligence of society, you get a better outcome than relying on your own intelligence. To think otherwise is just the arrogance of the stupid.
But don't get me started on that can of worms, the credibility/competence of governance in Frenace.