That sounds like a literal conspiracy theory to me.
Here’s a few questions for you:
Could one be of the honest opinion that those authors have fringe views? And could those views really be on the fringe among the community of epidemiologists? And can one express this view in good faith genuinely believing it to be true, or is it necessarily to be considered a dishonest statement done to stifle opponents?
Yes. They are proposing a theory wherein people conspired against them personally. It is literally a conspiracy theory. It is also a false one, seeing as (a) their views, or views like theirs were considered, and (b) labeling people is not how how merits of views are investigated, nor verdicts over such declared. But it would be a conspiracy theory either way.
And the terminally “muzzled” are somehow able to keep finding venues in which to vent their opinions. Even in the mainstream media, which is purported to deliberately engage in oppressing opposing views. Weird.
But enough about Covid. In other completely on the table, rational, and not at all fringe or delusional news, Tailor Swift could be a military intelligence operative trying to subvert the west:
Ahh but they’re not suggesting anything. They’re just posing a question. Or actually, they’re just letting someone else pose the question while holding a camera to their face.
“If you’re a public health person…you attach zero value to whether this actually totally disrupts people’s lives, ruins the economy.”
Yes, if you are a public health professional, that is your job.
If you are a firefighter, you do what is necessary to put out the fire before greater damage is done.
Meanwhile, people died.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S075333222301853X
That scene, where as Simba assumes Pride Rock after defeating his evil usurper uncle and the dry season ends, and all the grass lushes out of the ground and the animals come back - that’s… well for one, it’s not literal. But, more importantly here, it’s not something that literally happens. Nature at large is not concerned enough with the petty minutia of monkey (or cat, as it were) morals, or, indeed, politics. It does not favour the righteous, nor punish the wicked, nor does it decide which is which based on what team they pledged themselves to.
This is a reason why, when COVID hit, despite some of the highest population densities, and despite how little was known about it, or how to prevent or fight it, simply because of how early those days were, China was among the first to get it under control, and lost the fewest lives per capita. Because, for better or for worse, they don’t have a system of multiple parties that need to negotiate and compromise on every triviality, and their government could frankly stand to be more concerned about the legal rights of its citizens. But interpersonal morals, principles of liberty or individuality, economic or social freedom, all of these are for how we deal with one another. When it comes to a species-level threat, they mean nothing, because the virus does not respect them. The more resources we waste on philosophizing on what is or is not an acceptable compromise against our politics, how much ground we are willing to cede to those wearing the colours that do not match ours, the fewer resources we leave ourselves to deal with the actual problem of the day.
Those who see what in actuality are threats, like COVID, as naught but an opportunity for themselves to grow some social clout are, in my humble opinion, part of the threat. Those who let themselves sway by their flowery rhetoric in the petty hopes of ending up on what ever they think is “the right side of history” need to stop confusing cartoons for real life and grow up. And people will die until they do.
I posted the video clip for my amusement to see (at least one faction) of the peaceful “science” crowd provide the cover for Fauci, which was oh-so predictable.
Really? Is that a Peaceful “scientific” claim or an actual scientific claim? You’ve done the analysis? Is it actually 1/200+?
Which is the one, and which is the 200+?
It would seem from the video that the one would be Fauci’s declaration, “I wasn’t leaning totally strongly one way or the other.”
and
the several (I guess it’s possible they do number 200+) others were him strongly or very strongly feeling that it was a spillover from an animal species.
It seems most likely that Fauci now wants us to believe in the one (“I wasn’t leaning totally strongly one way or the other.”) and 'memory hole" (as Briahna might say) all of the others. Isn’t that what is referred to as ‘gaslighting’?
And you are suggesting? That we should believe his 200+ statements of the past over his current one?
Can’t speak for Rumraket, but I, for one, if asked, would suggest to go with what the data indicates. If some talking head says what it indicates, so be it. If they say something else, so be that, too. If what it indicates changes as we are completing the picture over time, we go with what’s consistent with the latest state of the database. What is the case does not change with anybody’s words or opinions. I suggest we quit worrying about whom to believe when, and focus instead on whether the belief in question is consistent with the currently available data.
I can’t argue with that, and I totally agree. And I, without the least hesitation, acknowledge no ability to adjudicate on the data. That means the data concerning the origins of the virus. I don’t have a dog in this fight — the fight about the origin.
But I do care about the trustworthiness of those who would attempt to inform me.
The willingness to divert attention from what is clearly shown in the video clip I linked to is very telling. How can anyone provide cover for Fauci’s claim
Fauci has given me reason to be doubtful about his unvarnished honesty. And the diversion from the intent of the video gives me reason to doubt the candor of a faction here. Can you not at least lament the incongruent positions shown here from Fauci? What reason have you to cover for him?
No, if you are a public health professional, your job is to perform a risk/benefit analysis not for individual people but for the whole population you are in charge of. And according to this standard, Collins, Fauci & al failed, miserably.
For the record, here is Collins’ mea culpa:
The public health people — we talked about this earlier and this really important point — if you’re a public health person and you’re trying to make a decision, you have this very narrow view of what the right decision is. And that is something that will save a life; it doesn’t matter what else happens. So you attach infinite value to stopping the disease and saving a life. You attach zero value to whether this actually totally disrupts people’s lives, ruins the economy, and has many kids kept out of school in a way that they never quite recover from. So, yeah, collateral damage. This is a public health mindset and I think a lot of us involved in trying to make those recommendations had that mindset and that was really unfortunate. It’s another mistake we made.
Emphasis mine
Totally. You knew it down to the last word and letter.
No, like you I just watched the youtube video you linked. Which showed a man contradicting himself once.
But you’re welcome to enlighten me. What is the real number? 1:43, 1:1000?
Are you okay?
Bravo, you seem to have got at least what was the implied contradiction from the video.
Could he be talking about different moments in time? Is it possible that he, like the authors of the proximal origins paper, initially leaned nowhere in particular at the origin of the pandemic (due to a lack of data), but over time became much more convinced of the zoonotic origins hypothesis?
I humbly ask, you being the Fauci scholar of the forum, seeing as how you are sure to be aware of the exact context and specific nature and phrasing of the questions he was asked in the few clips of him we see in the video you linked.
I am suggesting that if we are to determine whether he is, in fact, gaslighting, we first make sure we have the context of the questions posed to him correct. Is that too much to ask a fair-minded Christian audience member such as yourself?
You can read, can you not? Granted, not everything a given paper says is going to be perfectly clear to a lay reader like you or I, but that’s not to say we have no ability to understand any of it. If nothing else, we can collect the publications, scale their weight by the number of citations over a given time period, assess in vague terms what the consensus is. We can see if at least the numbers check out as far as we can tell, we can review what restrictions the authors put to their conclusions, what controls they employed, how much or how little they claim, and we can turn to the authors themselves, or to text books and encyclopedias, to find out whether what we think may be an obvious oversight is not in fact some triviality settled by the community long before our time.
“Do your own research” is a silly, superficial mantra, that overlooks a lot of nuance if read too literally. While we may not be qualified to perform our own experiments or draw our own conclusions from but a tiny window into a world vast enough for people to spend their entire lives beyond our views within, we can read the literature, formulate questions and seek answers. The least we can do is check whether a source we are asked to trust reports accurately on the work they are citing. And if we are going to go to the primary source anyway, we might as well skip the middle man altogether. There is no need to trust any news outlet, or political actor, or government official. Just because we cannot do some of the science ourselves doesn’t make it unavailable to us altogether, and most certainly scrutinizing the news is no means of closing our gap to it.
Hey I actually agree with you here. And I actually think that’s what public health officials do. Cost-benefit analyses, that will often err on the side of caution when data is sparse.
But not even sure whether to believe Collins meant the words he said. I consider it very much on the table that he’s so stupidly naive he thinks he can ingratiate himself with people like you by an overly simplistic take on owning up to a mistake he didn’t even really make in the way he characterizes it.
Okay maybe Collins isn’t that stupid at all and knows exactly how to appeal to evangelicals. Insert the parable of witnessing a frozen waterfall on his early morning run or whatever the hell it was.
Yes. Shouldn’t that be obvious to all? Or are we going to pretend that epidemiologist got lots of training in grad school about how various public health decisions will affect the economy, the mental health of children, etc. etc.?
I can’t imagine the tremendous demands and stresses upon people like Drs. Collins and Fauci who were dealing with such an enormous crisis while also trying to navigate a runaway political freight train and even a steady stream of death threats against oneself and extended family—and all while working for a President who truly believed that “Let’s investigate using bleach to treat COVID” was wise advice that they needed from him and as their ultimate “boss.” And as we saw in the media headlines at that time: (e.g., Trump on coronavirus: 'People are really surprised I understand this stuff' )
"Trump on coronavirus: ‘People are really surprised I understand this stuff’.
During a visit to the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday, President Trump touted his own understanding of the coronavirus outbreak.
“Maybe I have natural ability,” he said, referring to a “super-genius” relative who was a scientist.
Oh, yeah. His epidemiological expertise was dazzling!
{RANT ALERT!}
It sounded like the kind of tripe that North Korean media feeds daily to their readers about Kim John Un. According to their propaganda, he’s a polymath genius with godlike abilities. PBS is running a documentary this week following a family’s dangerous journey out of North Korea and it includes revealing interviews with family members. Even after safely in South Korea the elderly grandmother finds it difficult to overcome the brainwashing of tales of how brilliant, benevolent, and even generous Kim John Un is. (I was also not previously aware that a major reason North Korea bans the Bible is because their propaganda has co-opted the Ten Commandments and various descriptions and sayings of Jesus to apply them to Kim John Un and his predecessors.) I fear that North Koreans share something very dangerous in common with far too many far-right Americans: the belief that their “fearless leader” is omniscient.
Imagine having a boss during such a crisis who thinks and behaves like a bratty third-grader but thinks himself an expert. We’re talking territory way way past any Kruger-Dunning Effect. We’re talking mind-boggling ignorance that is still being “bomb-shelled” by jaw-dropping revelations from various tell-all accounts published by former administration staff and Washington insiders. (I’ve been reading some of them this week.) Despite years of unfathomable nonsense I still find myself shocked to the core at times. I recall those pandemic days with horror and can’t help but compare them to some kind of really bizarre dystopian sci-fy novel.
Obviously, I would expect Drs. Fauci and Collins to look back and think, “Wow. If I had it all to do over again, I would have done X,Y, and Z differently.” Of course they would. Can’t we allow them to be human? Meanwhile, I actually know people who think the aforementioned are evil monsters and should be sent to prison (or even executed) for imagined “COVID crimes.” Nightmarish—and yet that is what our society has fallen into. I get very depressed when I think about all this. (Also meanwhile, real life lawyers who passed the BAR exam actually argued in court this week that a president should have all encompassing immunities which should only be challengeable by a Senate impeachment trial controlled by the president’s own party.)
In the Old Testament the most devastating news was met with “sackcloth and ashes” and the ripping of one’s garments in absolute grief and desolation. I felt that way this week whenever I read news reports.
I used to consider myself relatively conservative, politically speaking. But I no longer describe myself as “conservative” or “Republican” or even “patriotic” or “evangelical” because all of these terms have become so far removed from what they used to mean.
[I had back surgery this morning and am on heavy pain meds but they’re still not enough to “mellow me out” on these topics. I’m living in a bizarro-world where the lunatics are running far more than the asylums. Will I ever wake up from this nightmare?]
There isn’t really a scientific point at all you are trying to make, is there, Sam?
You posted a blatant clickbait video of a report that took Republican claims, lacking a full transcript, about what occured in a closed session, as its jumping off point, made fake outrage over the change from “unlikely” to its close synonym “improbable”, and gives every appearace of being a frothy confection of bullshit (a “santorum”?).
And you are offended that it received a less-than-fullsome reception here?
You are a fairly blatant and repetitive troll Sam. And although I no more expect you to stop trolling than I would expect your fellow Climate-troll Roger Pielke Jr “to keep his mouth shut” when there are climate scientists to be defamed, I see no point in taking you seriously.
I do however note with amusement that the topics of your trolling seem to parrot those of the MAGA Morons and their Moron-in-Chief. So, not even original. 
This particular quote in not particularly relevant to my comment. I just wanted to include your quote of mine, and maybe a bit of your commentary on it. There is very little, if anything in your comment on which I find myself disagreeing.
There seems to be a bit of a contradiction in
but taking it totally literally (this quote of yours) you are really only critical of “Do you own research” when it is read to literally. Sure. But it can be ignore that you encourage ‘doing my own research’ when that phrase is seen as I mean it to be seen.
sounds quite a bit like research.
But my main point is that you miss my point. As I said,
I really don’t care about the origin.
What I wish is that Peaceful Science was a forum in which I could trust the group not to spin, obfuscate, and deflect.
I think I first came here after hearing @swamidass and Michael Behe debate at Texas A&M (on YouTube) I’d have easily given the debate to Behe, but as already acknowledged, much of the science was likely over my head.But even now, just from memory a few years back I can recall 3 things. 1) Rats and mice vs. man and chimpanzee, 2) textbooks and something about “Miller–Urey experiment” and 3) Josh putting of any detail to a question by Jim Tour until the following day. But those are just memories from 2 ish years ago. But, as I recall @swamidass spoke rather glowingly of Peaceful Science. I looked forward to checking it out. But it sure didn’t take long for me to conclude that the discussions were little better, if any, than what could usually be found in the comments to YouTube videos. With the exception perhaps of Professor Dave, who openly admits to “blocking very liberally.”
Evidence that the interactions can be quite terrible is seen when @swamidass has to issue specific ‘be on good behavior’ instructions when a particularly treasured guest appears.
I do like to be able to give evidence to the crazed expectation of expecting much more than a lot of partisan claptrap here. I think that the willingness here (this discussion board) to accept that the virus may have come from a lab is summed up well in a piece in Haaretz (segment following)
“We were demonized publicly for a year or more for saying the obvious,” Weinstein says, “which was that the evidence such as it is, all points to the lab and there’s no evidence that points to a natural origin so far. For pointing that out, we were portrayed as conspiracy theorists.”
By whom?
“Many media outlets, news organizations, so-called ‘fact checkers,’ social media platforms and thousands of individual people. All those who made this point that the lab leak was a possibility, were portrayed as conspiracy theorists. Then suddenly for no reason – there was no change at all in the evidence – but suddenly upon the publication of Nicholas Wade’s piece the tide turned and suddenly it became possible for anyone to discuss this hypothesis out loud without being demonized. Which I found bewildering. Literally nothing new had emerged, it was just another presentation, there had been many prior presentations that had gone through the evidence, but suddenly it was like somebody had given people the green light to think for themselves.”
How does one make sense of what is in the last paragraph from the words “Then suddenly” to the end of the quoted section.
I’m quite certain that the same motivations for the former demonization are at work in the minds of many here.
How else would one explain the tripe response from one interaction above, where a commenter suggest a 1 to 200+ ratio. I ask if that ratio was real and then I’m challenged to figure out the ratio. I don’t care about the ratio. 1 to 1 suits my purposes.
Wow! Unbelievable! Well maybe not so much. But I get censured for the mention of Trump, Double standard in clear view here. 
Can I be a MAGA Moron and despise Trump? If not, you might consider checking your assumptions.
You should not assume that I pay close enough attention to your witless drivel to notice who you do, or don’t “mention”.
My point was that the witless drivel you are spouting isn’t even original, with Trump merely being the most prominent of the figures you are parroting.
Easily. Just like I’m sure that there were fascists in the first half of the 20th Century who despised Hitler (or Mussolini).
Taking a more recent example, I rather doubt if DeSantis likes Trump much any more, but that doesn’t stop him from aping Trump’s MAGA positions.
But none of this quibbling detracts from the point that your video, and your trolling, is worthless.
Do you mean I posted a link that I wanted people to click? Wow. Your crystal ball worked on that one.
Offended? Not really. I expected nothing less.
If being a troll means holding a mirror up to shameless partisan piffle is trolling, guilty there too.
