Covid vsccine

Also, the general public wants to believe that "science" transcends everything else.  They want to believe that modern science is not leashed to politics, that continued funding is not contingent on following acceptable results, that activists don't permeate science at all levels, that academia doesn't actively discourage student research that doesn't enrich the institution in cash or prestige, or that students are actively discouraged by staff and by testing from following avenues of thought that aren't accepted as mainstream.

I wrote a paper back in college about the contributions of volcanic emissions to GHG (greenhouse gas) atmospheric concentrations.  I got a D on the paper.  The professor did not have any particular technical reason to give me a D as I had cited all my work from publicly available (at the time) data.  He just didn't like that my conclusion was that volcanism (sea floor and land-based) emissions could explain a large part of atmospheric GHG concentrations.  He was an unabashed warming activist and he graded his classes as such.  Anyone who thought otherwise was graded poorly and anyone who followed his beliefs were given A's.  As fresh and young minds love adoration, this grooms children to follow certain beliefs seeking the attention it brings.

I know that folks in this thread love the romantic view of white lab coats unselfishly working for the betterment of mankind, but the truth is that science is painfully slow to accept new ideas and most in the fields tend to resist "change" that would invalidate their works.  I've seen it first hand.  History is full of stories of the status-quo destroying those seen by the majority as outliers but some need to hold dear to that feeling that modern science isn't full of dogma.

You didn't say that, but the approach is there. Honestly, no one on this forum has the ability to actually evaluate his point on anything other than whether or not we think his resume gives him credibility.

And I'm sorry my friend. As far as I'm concerned he has no scientific papers on his website. This is kind of the thing. A scientific paper isn't a paper written in technical jargon. You might say he has several opinion papers, or editorials, or even white papers. But there's zero peer review. Zero accountability. He can write whatever he likes, say whatever he likes, and self-publish. And that's great, that's ok. But we shoudn't pretend this is the same level as something published in Nature, or Science. For example, Nature is prestigious enough that they reject something like 60% of papers submitted to them without review. They only end up publishing something like 7-8% of the 10,000+ papers they get a year...and those are kind of pre-selected by the authors who think they have a shot at getting published. On the other hand, Vanden Bossche's website publishes 100% of the content Vanden Bossche submits without any review or editing by anyone but Vanden Bossche. 


But those links 100% reject Vanden Bossche's position. He's saying that implementing this vaccine is worse than doing nothing. They're saying that doing nothing is worse than half measures which are worse than fully vaccinating.

And, to be completely frank - my estimation of the average person's ability to consume, analyze, and digest scientific information has been extremely damaged in this pandemic. I've observed over and over again factually incorrect media representations of papers get spread far and wide. A combination of Dunning-Kruger, basic credulity, selection/confirmation bias, and generally insufficient understanding of technical matters has lead to pop-politics and pop-science articles completely butchering conclusions based on a sketchy or even intentionally misrepresented skim of an abstract -- and then going viral. On my university forum, which is essentially all college graduates, people routinely confuse some of the most basic concepts CFR vs IFR, or R0, or how death certificates are coded, or even basic statistics like p numbers and how null-hypotheses work. This tells me that no... absolutely not. The average person is not capable of researching and drawing their own conclusions with any kind of high qualiy outcome. Roughly 1/3 of the population has a college degree, and 94% have a high school education. Researching and analysis of papers frequently isn't taught even at the bachelor's level. Even with a moment of thinking it is unreasonable to expect the average person to be able to do this, just as much as it is unreasonable to expect the average person to be able to do basic calculus. I took five years of calculus and advanced math, and I can't do calculus any more! Researching and analysis is a skill, something that is learned. Reading and understanding papers is a skill in and of itself. Reading and understanding highly technical content outside of your field is a challenge even if it's something you do every day.

Half of the time when people say they're going to "do their own research" that doesn't mean looking at scientific papers, but firing up the google machine or facebook. We know this will happily indulge your selection bias for as long as you keep clicking and absolutely won't result in a balanced overview of all of the information.


I mean, maybe it shows but I have written and published several papers. It just doesn't work like that. Contrarian views are published all the time. People try to replicate studies and often post follow-up papers criticizing others. There is an entire field of study that does nothing but secondary review and meta-analysis of results. People have made careers out of poking holes in other papers. And there are basically research dollars available for any potentially-publishable idea. And even more last year, there was basically money for anyone trying anything that could be related to covid.


What is "the system"? Is it the US Government? Or the EU Government? Or Imperial College? Or Pfizer? Or Stanford? or or or? There are millions and millions of people participating in this, all with varying views, ideas, varying financial motivations, and that's great. That's a good thing. It's just like the open market, it's capitalism for ideas. Funding flows to success, funding flows to promise, funding flows to innovation.

There's no shadowy cabal secretly hoping to kill millions of people to turn a profit. And even if we assume the worst about companies Pfizer, Moderna, or J&J, we have multiple vaccine manufacturers from multiple countries pursuing multiple different avenues - competing in the open market. That helps to stomp out bad actors and keep the whole thing honest.

I disagree about the effort educating ourselves. I am not educated on this. I've read maybe five papers on the vaccines, and I only skimmed them. When I was doing research I'd thoroughly read and take notes and cite sixty or so papers for a publication, often reading through those papers citations as well. Writing a journal paper, even a simple one, takes weeks. And that was in my field, something I worked full time on. That's what it takes to be educated in technical matters, especially technical matters that are on the cutting edge and new information is coming out literally every day. Being educated on this to say I have an informed opinion beyond saying - yeah, the FDA is on the ball and they approved this for emergency use - is completely beyond my ability and absolutely beyond my time.

I never said not to listen to outliers. I said that we should not grant equal time to outliers simply because they exist. Just like there's no sense in giving equal consideration (and honestly, any consideration) to people who believe the earth is flat, or that the moon landings were faked, or that 9/11 was an inside job because "jet fuel doesn't melt steel." This doesn't mean outliers are conspiracy nuts. But some are.

A note about data. Data is neither correct nor incorrect. It simply is. It is information. Data may be misunderstood, misapplied, or misinterpreted. But even "bad" data has informatoin in it ("bad" readings tell you for example your tool is not measuring correctly). So of course, do not ignore data. But freely ignore bad analysis once you understand that it is bad. We must, at some point. Resources are finite.


My friend this is simply nonsensical. All scientific papers are based on the research of others - of course. That's why they all have references. As are all patents based off of prior art. But likewise all are new territory by definition. Even a meta-analysis or review of the literature is providing new information. Otherwise they wouldn't be published. No one publishes old hat.


So where was the paper ultimately published? Just because Nature rejects a paper doesn't mean it doesn't get published. Having a paper in Nature is like winning the superbowl. The majority of researchers will never publish in a journal with an impact factor anywhere close to that. Do you know that's why Nature turned it down? I can't imagine that would be put in writing. And your group's data, the result of your work, is yours. Was this published? What happened to it? I'm not saying any of this isn't true, I'm saying I don't understand the outcome.

(PS I am not a proponent of AGW and am aware of the issues with datasets, correction bias, etc.)


This is a basic non sequitur. Simply because one paper was politically influenced doesn't mean any others are. Very bad generalization. Obviously many of the papers have been extensively cited and read, and have driven treatment, vaccination, understanding of the virus itself, better understanding of the disease and its spread, etc. ad nauseam.


Again this follows a basic misunderstanding of how research works. You have multiple universities, countries, all with conflicting geopolitical aims and goals, all with disparate interests, all competing for impact factor, publications, notoriety. "Political significance" in the US means something very different than in Germany, than in China, than in Japan.

“Science” in the western world, gets corrupted by good-ol-human nature. Biases, greed, peer pressure, politics, group think, money, ego, fear etc etc. It doesn’t take a secret cabal of Illuminati shadow figures. People, on their own, are more than enough to screw this stuff up.

I’m not saying it’s all garbage, or that “science” can’t be trusted out right. But a healthy dose of skepticism, a good understanding of history, and decent understanding of group dynamics is needed.

For example, I know lots of scientific people that don’t think rationally the second fear enters the equation.

For what it’s worth I think both sides of this debate have made excellent points too. Too often we frame these arguments in a binary fashion. You’re right or wrong, but in reality we’re all a little right and a little wrong. We can’t afford to look at things so black and white. I could give examples but I’m too lazy, and I’m at work...

And if that "noise" actually has a good, solid case to make that "hey dickheads, I'm not noise, I'm valid", then the case should be able to be made with actual scientific rigor, and the burden for making the case is squarely on the person/entity making the "noisy" claims.  

Please don't link me to stuff like this.  The "system" I referred to is the medical system.  I'm a pretty straight shooter, no need to infer anything into what I'm saying.  I don't know why the articles I shared have become such a sticking point, I know they don't support Bossche's point of view.  The point of sharing them was to show accomplished people can look at the current situation with differing perspectives, that's all.  Some think we should vaccinate(both doses) as quickly as possible, some think giving the first dose to as many people as possible is the way to go and others think we shouldn't vaccinate at all.  I guess only time will tell on all that.  

I would just like to reiterate, my feelings about this come from my own personal experience(I was nearly killed 10 years ago due to medical malpractice for what it's worth), not from any conspiracy or political persuasion(I feel politically homeless to be completely honest).  The mainstream medical system works amazingly well for most people but when you are one of the unlucky few that it fails it will change your life(and your perspective) forever.  It is why I am more inclined to be open to listening to some alternative medical points of view.  I owe my life to the few doctors that were willing to look at things differently in my situation. 

Unfortunately it's been proven that not everyone is capable of doing their own research and drawing their own conclusions. QAnon was a bunch of adults doing their own "research" and look how that turned out. Flat earthers are adults doing their own research. Some people think an internet meme or a random youtube video carries as much or more weight than a peer-reviewed academic study. Because if someone said something on the internet, it must be true, right?

Unfortunately there's been some false vaccine misinformation regurgitated in this very thread by adults doing their own research. Some of the same misinformation that has been spreading everywhere else via social media memes.

I don't really care if people are skeptical, or want more information, or have their own opinions. What bothers me is when people base their skepticism or opinions off of falsehoods, and I'm happy to see those falsehoods get called out and challenged each and every time.

Sorry, that sentence wasn't clear. What I meant was, even if people say that, it isn't borne out by how they live their lives, because it is untenable. They may mistrust institutions in particular, but they don't actually mistrust institutions in general. It's not possible. The majority of the time modern people treat institutions in general with the presumption of trustworthiness. People don't ignore ingredients labels on Campbell's soup, and they assume that those ingredients are in fact what is in the can. Most places take credit cards and personal checks. They assume the sign outside of the business corresponds loosely to what the business does. They don't independently do a design review on their car. They trust antivirus products. They go to the ER if they break a bone. They drive over bridges and live in houses and fly in planes designed by others.

And look, most people believe that the earth rotates around the sun with almost zero personal empirical evidence. People believe objects are made up of atoms they can't observe. They accept that solid objects are in fact a myth even while they sit on one. So in some respects most people believe institutions against their own intuition and experience!

You're painting with a pretty broad brush there......  How do you even pick it up in the morning....?

Likewise, Josh!

I don't have two hours to watch this video, sorry. Is there an transcript? I looked at the topical timestamps in the bottom, and it really doesn't seem like the two sides talked about the same topics.

I'm fine with everything in this thread being challenged, I think it's healthy for us.  My only point was that no one among us is qualified to be an authority on this particular subject so let's not act like that's the case.  This is an open discussion, not a lecture.  So, when we start talking about how some people aren't capable of doing their own research, that makes me pretty uncomfortable.  I fully acknowledge that we have different strengths and abilities...and no offense to anyone here but I haven't seen any geniuses shining bright, standing out from the crowd.  I mean we're all involved in the music business to some degree, so really how smart could any of us be? 😂  Seriously though, I appreciate the group we have here and the different perspectives.