My thoughts on "following the science"

maybe delete this? wrote:

Whenever the risk is non-zero, one must make a judgment about the level of risk that is acceptable.

You're looking at this from an individual perspective. From a public health perspective it makes sense to follow some common set of guidelines, which is to say that the acceptable level of risk regarding a communicable disease is in part a community decision not a strictly individual decision.

. . . This is one of the main arguments with the people who say "follow the science." Of course this is not science. These are statistics.

This is nonsensical semantic hairsplitting. There is very little science without statistics, particularly epidemiology.

Highlighted where you went wrong. It's very early on. "Follow the science" is not "The science is objectively correct all the time." It's more like, "The science, meaning the thousands of men and women who have dedicated their lives to research and study in this particular field, should dictate the guidelines for how we react." Everyone wants to disparage the science by saying it's not perfect. Well no duh it's not perfect, but it's still 1000x better than what your individual, uneducated brain thinks. Should we follow a thousand experts or should we follow Bill from down the block who thinks masks are dumb?

maybe delete this? wrote:. Nevertheless, that is the debate that we should be having. Unfortunately, "follow the science" is often used to shut down debate. At best, it is a non-sequitur in the discussion we need to have. The science can only tell us what the level of risk might be; people still need to decide what to do with the data.

Excellent post. I’ve said all along that allowing the most risk-averse in society dictate our response is absurd. There are people who will mask forever. That’s fine, but I shouldn’t be expected to do the same in the name of protecting their (to my mind) unreasonable level of sensitivity.

Public health people have one goal: reduction of COVID impact to the lowest possible level. That’s fine, but it comes into conflict with other goals/values that people like me find more important: freedom, normalcy, etc.

So you can “believe in science” and also disregard the suggestions made by that science. Masks may play some marginal role in reducing transmission, but I value the freedom and normalcy of enjoying mask-free life more than I care about avoiding COVID or reducing it to the lowest possible level.

It is possible, through vaccination, strict N95 masking, and personal isolation to reduce your own risk of contracting COVID to very near zero. If that’s how you choose to live, that’s fine with me, but I don’t think I should be compelled or guilted into changing my behavior to accommodate this level of COVID-phobia.

I got my vax and booster, but I won’t wear a mask. I find the former an acceptably nonintrusive way to reduce risk, but the latter too intrusive to justify.

Yes, we know you put yourself above others. We get that about you.

Telling other people they need to sacrifice their own happiness because it makes you more comfortable is the epitome of selfishness.

You are putting yourself above me, not the other way around.

I'll just say first that I love the original post. I feel like a kindred spirit...this minority hiding in the shadows of logic and diplomacy.

I do have a question though, about the choice of "non-zero" being the landmark. I imagine its basically true that nothing is "non-zero." There is always an exception, a revisions, an outlier. Doesn't that mean that science never has a role to play if "non-zero" is the landmark? Newton's rules don't apply in quantum mechanics, the speed of light was recently increased by aiming a laser through plasma.

I would argue that "non-zero," in this case, ignoring the social and moral debate, is not an appropriate landmark. IF, for example, 1 person of every 2 billion vaccinated died as a result of the vaccine, and none of those remaining 1.9999 billion died of Covid, wouldn't the decision to be vaccinated fall within "following the science?" That is my question to the OP.

Another thought is around a 1:2,000,000,000 type of scenario. We may not even have the methods to detect numbers that small, or larger. If we did not have sophisticated monitoring, we would miss that 1 case, and the OP's whole thesis would crumble. Conversely, we could assume we missed some cases and it is 3:2,000,000,000, for example.

While I like the original concept, I struggle with it when just one exception in an infinite sample size completely changes the result. Interesting.

so super safe wrote:

hunter wheres the coke wrote:

Yes, we know you put yourself above others. We get that about you.

Telling other people they need to sacrifice their own happiness because it makes you more comfortable is the epitome of selfishness.

You are putting yourself above me, not the other way around.

If wearing a mask is sacrificing your happiness, that's your problem. I don't go against societal norms and safety precautions and then claim that they were making me unhappy and therefore it's justified. Sorry officer, I'm just not happy unless I can drive 100 down this freeway.

fisky wrote:

Jocebert wrote:

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/12/05/1059828993/data-vaccine-misinformation-trump-counties-covid-death-rate

This article mentions Phil Valentine, a conservative radio host who died from covid. I regret not calling his show to explain the promising effects of vitamin D, but since I'm not an expert, I didn't think he'd give me enough air time to cover the material. It never occurred to me that even if I didn't get much time, it might have changed Phil's approach to covid and he might have started taking vitamin D himself. Valentine was taking ivermectin, but ivermectin by itself (or HCQ by itself) isn't highly protective. They need to be combined with several other therapeutics. I don't know if Valentine knew that. OTOH, vitamin D is therapeutic by itself if it is taken long enough to build up D levels to greater than 30. That can take 6-8 months even at relatively high daily doses.

You'd better read the full article instead of talking of ivermectin.

Anybody still believing in ivermectin is a covidiot.

To the OP

Your argument can be summed up as “we’re all gonna die anyways, why not”

I don’t know what to say other than it’s an extremely selfish and narrow minded view of the world. We have a duty as human beings to protect and maintain each other’s health and well-being as much as our own.

ViperDom wrote:

For those waiting for long term info:

1. Define "Long Term" for this particular situation. (without this you simply have an infinite excuse to maintain position which IMO is unreasonable.)

2. Define the results of this long term info that would be acceptable to you.

3. Of ALL the acceptable medical assistance you and your loved ones have utilized in your lifetime including(but not limited to) drugs, therapies, supplements, vaccines, ect...

How much research did you do on long term data Prior to utilizing these things?

1. I've repeatedly said that by April 2022, 100 million Americans will have been vaccinated for one year. If the health data of the vaccinated and unvaccinated were reported transparently to the public, that should be long enough, in my opinion, for any severe long-term effects to begin to show up.

2. I would like to see data on all the most likely health issues, looking at vaccinated vs unvaccinated vs historical trends. Further, I'd like to see a breakdown of the above by age group. These issues include ER visits, hospitalizations, deaths, and new diagnoses of diseases of the heart, other organs, blood, respiratory system, and immune system.

3. To my knowledge, I have never taken a drug, supplement, or therapy that did not have at least five year track record... with the exception of the UroLift prostate procedure that I waited from one year to its three year history before pursuing. Unknown side effects began to occur after that period that adversely affected me. Today, this side effect is known and it would have affected my decision to have the procedure. I have never gotten a newly approved vaccine.

So TL;DR... I want to see at least one year of data on so many millions of people that any adverse effects will be hard to hide. Should the CDD/public health leaders continue to suppress reports as they are doing now, one year will not be enough.

So why’d they change the definition of what “it” is? Perhaps it does not confer immunity as traditional definition stated. Science needs rules. You can’t change the goalposts to fit your conclusion.

Kyle Warner. Look him up.

Excellent post Fisky! I agree and concur 100%.

Jocebert wrote:

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/12/05/1059828993/data-vaccine-misinformation-trump-counties-covid-death-rate

This is a nice example of stupid people struggling with causation and correlation...

maybe delete this? wrote:The people who say "follow the science" are implying that they are making an objective decision, not a subjective value judgment. The implication is that science has "the answer," an objective answer regarding things like whether or not to get vaccines or whether or not to wear a mask. This is not true.

....

Seen from this angle, people who decide not to get the vaccine because there is a possibility of complications are actually acting in a scientific manner. According to scientific evidence, the risk of complications from a vaccine is not zero. They have decided that they do not want to take that risk.

I thought you were going to make an argument about government policy. Politicians talk about "following the science." Individuals generally either agree with the public health objective or not. I don't think science necessarily comes into it.

fisky wrote:

maybe delete this? wrote:

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The people who say "follow the science" are implying that they are making an objective decision, not a subjective value judgment. The implication is that science has "the answer," an objective answer regarding things like whether or not to get vaccines or whether or not to wear a mask. This is not true.

The risk of getting Covid if you are unvaccinated is non-zero.

The risk of getting Covid if you are vaccinated is non-zero.

The risk of a complication from getting a vaccine is non-zero.

These three statements are all scientific facts.

....But perhaps we should follow the statistics.

LetsRun, for all its faults, is one of the few places we can have an open discussion. Sadly, it's marred by trolls on both sides of the debate. .

Hilariously wrong. Mods have a blatant bias for favouring antivaxxer rhetoric and BS. They don’t even try to hide it

Leading cause of death and doesn't need massive lifestyle changes to change like heart disease or cancer. Literally just takes the vaccine to slow it down.

Alan

ldbfhjjjhmj wrote:

While I like the original concept, I struggle with it when just one exception in an infinite sample size completely changes the result. Interesting.

I think you’re missing the point, which is that the “trust science!” people often frame this as a purely scientific issue in which any policy that scientifically reduces risk is ergo a worthwhile policy, whereas the actual debate is around defining what an “acceptable” level of risk is, which is obviously an intensely personal, arbitrary, unscientific, and highly political thing to define.

Which is to say, we largely (at least on the more intellectual sides of the debate) aren’t fighting about science at all, we are fighting about politics.

hunter wheres the coke wrote:

If wearing a mask is sacrificing your happiness, that's your problem. I don't go against societal norms and safety precautions and then claim that they were making me unhappy and therefore it's justified. Sorry officer, I'm just not happy unless I can drive 100 down this freeway.

I don’t think there’s exactly an overwhelming amount of science to show that I, a 3x vaccinated person, put you, a 3x vaccinated person, during a fleeting interaction in a grocery store, at a substantial degree of risk of serious injury or death by not wearing a mask.