Will you get the vaccine?

[Nihil Obstat]

On 7/12/2021 at 12:00 PM, Peace said:

 

It does not have to be an all or nothing thing though. My trust of my doctor is multi faceted. He had helped me many times in the past (including with a somewhat mysterious bordering on life threatening illness), he has not made any mistakes in my care in the past, and his approach has always seemed prima facie reasonable based on my common sense and base level of knowledge. If he sent me to surgery for pink eye I would definitely be very suspicious, and a good portion of that suspicion would come from the underlying fact that until now he has been kind, competent, and successful (both with myself for the last 17 years, for my siblings, for my parents, and my wife).

We do not operate in theoretical vacuums. We can and must use practical training when we evaluate these things. The fact that some doctors are incompetent and strongly profit driven makes us aware that these things are possibilities, but it does not necessarily entail that our default approach to medicine ought to be adversarial.

3 hours ago, Peace said:

 

Interesting. What do you mean?

This is what I have seen, more and more in the last few years. Person A makes a claim of some fact. Person B is ideologically opposed to Person A, and immediately contradicts everything Person A just said. Was Person A correct, or Person B? It should be a question of fact, but now it is not. Now the polity is lining up into their ideological camps and they agree with Person A or B based on their pre-existing ideological beliefs.

The truth content of the claim is secondary, or maybe not relevant at all. Your facts come from your ideological allies.

 

That is why the fake news trope is such a joke. If you are a conservative, CNN and MSNBC are fake news. If you are progressive, Fox and Brietbart are fake news. Heuristic thinking has become completely detached from a fundamental respect for what is actually true. It is not about learning the truth, it is about crushing your opponent.

[Mercedes]

1 hour ago, Nihil Obstat said:

It does not have to be an all or nothing thing though. My trust of my doctor is multi faceted. He had helped me many times in the past (including with a somewhat mysterious bordering on life threatening illness), he has not made any mistakes in my care in the past, and his approach has always seemed prima facie reasonable based on my common sense and base level of knowledge. If he sent me to surgery for pink eye I would definitely be very suspicious, and a good portion of that suspicion would come from the underlying fact that until now he has been kind, competent, and successful (both with myself for the last 17 years, for my siblings, for my parents, and my wife).

We do not operate in theoretical vacuums. We can and must use practical training when we evaluate these things. The fact that some doctors are incompetent and strongly profit driven makes us aware that these things are possibilities, but it does not necessarily entail that our default approach to medicine ought to be adversarial.

This is what I have seen, more and more in the last few years. Person A makes a claim of some fact. Person B is ideologically opposed to Person A, and immediately contradicts everything Person A just said. Was Person A correct, or Person B? It should be a question of fact, but now it is not. Now the polity is lining up into their ideological camps and they agree with Person A or B based on their pre-existing ideological beliefs.

The truth content of the claim is secondary, or maybe not relevant at all. Your facts come from your ideological allies.

 

That is why the fake news trope is such a joke. If you are a conservative, CNN and MSNBC are fake news. If you are progressive, Fox and Brietbart are fake news. Heuristic thinking has become completely detached from a fundamental respect for what is actually true. It is not about learning the truth, it is about crushing your opponent.

It's uplifting to see such a common sense, decent logic, expression of things these days.  

[Nihil Obstat]

25 minutes ago, Mercedes said:

It's uplifting to see such a common sense, decent logic, expression of things these days.  

It is because I am an affluent white cisgender heterosexual western male. It comes naturally to us. 

Nobody take that seriously please.

[Peace]

On 7/12/2021 at 10:05 PM, Nihil Obstat said:

Doctors do screw up, even good ones, and people are harmed as a result. That is a necessary consequence of the whole endeavour. On the granular level I tend to think that if you do not trust your doctor, you ought to find a new one, although it is at least in some part my good fortune to have grown up affluent and in a country with excellent healthcare, that this is always an option for me.

On the broader level, we have to ask: does the medical establishment do more good than harm? Are doctors both well intentioned and competent most of the time?

There is a general rule, and there are notable exceptions to the rule that always ought to be recognized and inquired into. But I think there is a human tendency to focus on fears and outliers. COVID has been especially hard because there has been so much that was (and is) unknown. Many legitimate concerns turned out not to materialize, and many things we thought were secure turned out not to be. Nothing should be overlooked, but nothing should be blown out if proportion either.

 

The politicization of knowledge and truth is, I think, extremely frightening.

 

3 hours ago, Ice_nine said:

Did you watch the trial? I really don't feel like much more energy on this if we're not even referring to the same data so to speak.

I watched a lot of it, but I didn't take notes. I don't remember everything I watched verbatim, I just remember a lot of things that at the time gave me paused and seemed like reasonable doubt.

I have no strong desire to really convince anyone either way. I've got bills to pay and other shiz to do. But if someone didn't even watch at least some of the trial, there is absolutely no reason to even have the discussion in the first.

His knee wasn't on his neck for 8 minutes. That's just factually not true. Maybe that makes no difference to you but to me it's just evidence you were not aware of the particulars of the case.

The analogy of the 90 year-old lady fails because the amount of "reasonable force" changes quite drastically. Floyd was a big dude. A 200+ male, even high and with a heart problem, is a much more difficult restraint than a 90 year old lady, or a skinny 15 year old boy.

And that really matters because the second degree murder charge requires "intention to inflict bodily harm." Sometimes in the commission of a restraint, injuries or death occur. That doesn't mean the harm was intended. If you put a 90 year old woman on the ground, it's a lot harder to prove you weren't trying to cause harm because restraining a 90 year old woman is a lot easier than restraining a large human male.

If you have a problem with the neck restraint, take that up with the MPD. Let me remind you, this was a victory for THE STATE. It was literally the State of Minnesota v. Chauvin. They train their officers and authorize them to use this "non-lethal" restraint, and then when ish went sideways wiped their hands clean of the whole affair.

I disagree. Explain why there should be an inverse correlation between time and deliberation and the gravity of a given case. It seems like the opposite should be true.

 

There was more than one tape. That one tape was allowed to proliferate and dominate our collective psyche. I thought Derek Chauvin was an obvious murderer and sociopath. He still might be those things. I only say this to point out that I too was swept up in the emotion of the national moment.

Also recall that I said I was open to a manslaughter charge. Even if Chauvin had made a bad decision because of adrenaline or whatever he is still responsible for his actions.

Perhaps I should have been clearer. It's not so much an issue of guilt, it's about having a little grace to say, or even just to understand, that after you wrestle someone who is large and uncooperative, who has been yelling about not being able to breathe, and you have a crowd of people around you screaming at you  . . . that maybe you wouldn't make the best decision either.

Like it or not, the state has a legal right to use violence that is not permitted to us mere plebs. You can make a moral argument against that, sure, but that's the way it is broski. 

But again, let me reiterate, THE STATE WON THIS CASE. Sorry, had to say it extra loud for the people in the back.

Of course not, but in many criminal charges intent matters. What is reasonably going through someone's mind matters. That's why Kenneth Walker was not charged for firing at officers because it seemed like a reasonable fear response. And the officer who shot into another apartment was charged because, in a tough situation, he made an error that could have been deadly. That's why the officer who reached for her taser will likely be charged because she made a mistake under fight-or-flight.

It's not about fearing for your life even. Imagine you just got done wrestling a large person to the ground. You thought you might be hurt, now the threat seems to be eliminated. OK. But it DOES take a while for your physiology to reset itself after a violent confrontation. And when you have bystanders screaming at you, it will probably take longer for things to return to baseline.

But to reiterate I'm not saying that adrenaline eliminates all potential guilt, but it is part of the context in determining intent.

 

7 hours ago, Nihil Obstat said:

It does not have to be an all or nothing thing though. My trust of my doctor is multi faceted. He had helped me many times in the past (including with a somewhat mysterious bordering on life threatening illness), he has not made any mistakes in my care in the past, and his approach has always seemed prima facie reasonable based on my common sense and base level of knowledge. If he sent me to surgery for pink eye I would definitely be very suspicious, and a good portion of that suspicion would come from the underlying fact that until now he has been kind, competent, and successful (both with myself for the last 17 years, for my siblings, for my parents, and my wife).

We do not operate in theoretical vacuums. We can and must use practical training when we evaluate these things. The fact that some doctors are incompetent and strongly profit driven makes us aware that these things are possibilities, but it does not necessarily entail that our default approach to medicine ought to be adversarial.

Glad to hear that you have someone who has been good to you. I'm guessing that different people will view the medical industry through a different lens based on their own personal experiences. I don't treat all situations the same, or with equal levels of suspicion. My primary care physician is someone I have known for few years now and I have a good relationship with. I can say that she's not primarily in it for the money and I do feel that she honestly has my best interest in mind. But yeah generally with her we will actually sit down and even have almost like "brain-storming" sessions every now and then to see what I can be doing better to keep myself healthy.

But there are other situations that I run into, when I am much more disinclined to be trustful, especially when I have to visit the ER or stay at a big hospital. To a lot of those folks, I am not even a real human being, or at least it almost never feels like I am treated that way. I'm just a list of symptoms written down on a piece of paper, and a patient XYZ on the egregious bill sent to my insurance provider. Those folks don't know me and they don't care about me. If I am lucky the doctor who wants to subject me to X or Y procedure, will stop by my room for a whole 5 minutes to introduce himself and tell me what he has decided based on data that his grunt has collected. Here is when I generally resist and take a lot more active control over my medical care. I've refused certain procedures that I thought were unnecessary. Unhooked myself and walked right out of the hospital on more than one occasion. But its like I know my condition because I have researched it myself. I know that there different treatment options, some of which are a lot more painful than others, and that I don't just have to blindly accept whatever some guy in a white jacket has concluded after reviewing my chart for a whole five minutes, and who has barely even spoken to me about my concerns or desires.

7 hours ago, Nihil Obstat said:

This is what I have seen, more and more in the last few years. Person A makes a claim of some fact. Person B is ideologically opposed to Person A, and immediately contradicts everything Person A just said. Was Person A correct, or Person B? It should be a question of fact, but now it is not. Now the polity is lining up into their ideological camps and they agree with Person A or B based on their pre-existing ideological beliefs.

The truth content of the claim is secondary, or maybe not relevant at all. Your facts come from your ideological allies.

That is why the fake news trope is such a joke. If you are a conservative, CNN and MSNBC are fake news. If you are progressive, Fox and Brietbart are fake news. Heuristic thinking has become completely detached from a fundamental respect for what is actually true. It is not about learning the truth, it is about crushing your opponent.

Got it yeah I totally agree. When I went to go live overseas for about 5 years and came back, this is one of the big changes that I noticed that was pretty disheartening. Before I felt like I could actually turn on a news channel, and get some objective facts, or at least the pros and cons with respect to any given issue from any major news source. But now its literally like, to get a fair and balanced take of any situation or issue, I have to watch the conservative channel cover the issue, then watch the liberal channel to cover the issue, and then maybe somehow be able to figure out the actual facts from both sides. But moreso what I do now when I just want to get some objective information, is that I'll just try to read some foreign news sources that are covering the US. Those can be a bit biased too, but not nearly as skewed as the US news is nowadays. . .

6 hours ago, Nihil Obstat said:

It is because I am an affluent white cisgender heterosexual western male. It comes naturally to us. 

This is one of the most classist, racist, homophobic, and sexist statements ever to disgrace the phine pages of Phatmass.

Shame on you, sir. Shame.

[Nihil Obstat]

2 hours ago, Peace said:

 

This is one of the most classist, racist, homophobic, and sexist statements ever to disgrace the phine pages of Phatmass.

Shame on you, sir. Shame.

Will, since you are generally speaking a conservative, I believe you are contractually obligated to be in favour of classism, racism, homophobia, and sexism. Progressives are against those things, so they must be virtuous.

[dUSt]

Me, my wife and our oldest kid are all vaccinated. My dad won't get vaccinated and even refuses to fly until the mask mandate is over. What a weirdo. lol

[Norseman82]

On 6/16/2021 at 5:50 PM, ardillacid said:

There’s no circumstance at this point that I would get the vaccine. 
 

As it were, Mother Nature hath bestowed on me natural immunity as I already have had the ---------- COVID (edited to give the actual scientific name and not the racially inflammatory one) and successfully defeated it. 

How long ago did you have it?  Do you have your antibody levels tested on a periodic basis?  The reason I ask is that when I was speaking to my doctor he mentioned he had COVID early on and has his antibodies tested monthly, and he has a good level because he gets exposed to it while doing his rounds.

[StellaMaris]

I'm really happy I got Pfizer, just need my second shot!

[hakutaku]

I made a graph about the vaccine!

https://zerobomb.github.io/chart.html

I got the vaccination data from the household pulse surveys:

https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2021/demo/hhp/hhp33.html

and the death data from John Hopkins dataset.

 

Edited August 2, 2021 by hakutaku
including data sources

[fides' Jack]

On 5/11/2021 at 11:14 AM, Monoxide said:

You can still carry the disease, don't forget that! If you're worried about exposing people keep your precautions.

The CDC says you can still carry the disease if you're vaccinated, too, which makes this a complete lie:

 

On 5/10/2021 at 7:03 PM, cruciatacara said:

I am sorry for those who don't get vaccinated and then become carriers for the disease, even they never have symptoms - they are endangering so many others.

 

On 7/14/2021 at 9:54 PM, dUSt said:

Me, my wife and our oldest kid are all vaccinated. My dad won't get vaccinated and even refuses to fly until the mask mandate is over. What a weirdo. lol

Praise God for people like your dad!

On 7/11/2021 at 8:00 AM, Nunsuch said:

The places where Covid is spiking are were vaccination rates are lowest. Those who are contracting the disease are almost exclusively those who are not vaccinated.

This is false.  There are many scientific studies showing that it's not only false, but directly contrary to what is true, that those who are vaccinated are more likely to be infected by covid, and it's also more dangerous for them.  This is exactly what CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News want you to believe, but it's contrary to actual science.

Edited August 10, 2021 by fides' Jack

[Nunsuch]

46 minutes ago, fides' Jack said:

The CDC says you can still carry the disease if you're vaccinated, too, which makes this a complete lie:

 

 

Praise God for people like your dad!

This is false.  There are many scientific studies showing that it's not only false, but directly contrary to what is true, that those who are vaccinated are more likely to be infected by covid, and it's also more dangerous for them.  This is exactly what CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News want you to believe, but it's contrary to actual science.

It is not a lie, and it is almost a month old. The best information now is that those who are severely ill--to the point of needing hospitalization or facing death--are over 98% from the unvaccinated population.  THAT is the "actual science." Do not accuse me of lying when that is what you are promoting. One more thing: I don't believe news networks; I believe the actual experts whom they have on air. There is a big difference.

[fides' Jack]

3 hours ago, Nunsuch said:

It is not a lie, and it is almost a month old. The best information now is that those who are severely ill--to the point of needing hospitalization or facing death--are over 98% from the unvaccinated population.  THAT is the "actual science." Do not accuse me of lying when that is what you are promoting. One more thing: I don't believe news networks; I believe the actual experts whom they have on air. There is a big difference.

I'm not accusing you of lying.  But I do believe you are perpetuating a lie.  You're not lying if you believe it, which I think you do.

Right now, all the major media sources and the government and the so-called "experts" and big tech are all on the same side.  

Many of them should be tried for crimes against humanity.

The 98% figure is a lie.

[Nunsuch]

Just now, fides' Jack said:

I'm not accusing you of lying.  But I do believe you are perpetuating a lie.  You're not lying if you believe it, which I think you do.

Right now, all the major media sources and the government and the so-called "experts" and big tech are all on the same side.  

Many of them should be tried for crimes against humanity.

The 98% figure is a lie.

As I tell my college students, you saying something doesn't make it so. Simply asserting that things are lies doesn't make them untrue. If you want me to believe you, please share either your medical or your research credentials, and provide actual evidence for your claims, so I can substantively assess what you proclaim. If you can't or won't do this, then you have zero credibility, as opposed to double-blind peer reviewed studies, and experts with verifiable credentials and replicable analyses. You are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts. And the reason those you reference are all on the same "side" is because it is both factual and verifiable. It's not a matter of ideology.

[fides' Jack]

Just now, Nunsuch said:

As I tell my college students, you saying something doesn't make it so. Simply asserting that things are lies doesn't make them untrue. If you want me to believe you, please share either your medical or your research credentials, and provide actual evidence for your claims, so I can substantively assess what you proclaim. If you can't or won't do this, then you have zero credibility, as opposed to double-blind peer reviewed studies, and experts with verifiable credentials and replicable analyses. You are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts. And the reason those you reference are all on the same "side" is because it is both factual and verifiable. It's not a matter of ideology.

That makes a lot of sense now.  The education system is also owned by the left.  That doesn't work in your favor.

I have seen dozens and dozens of international studies coming out refuting just about everything that Fauci and the CDC have been saying since this whole thing started.  You can look them up just as easily as I did.  Me posting them here isn't going to sway you.  I've already posted a whole lot of stuff, which was mostly received negatively.  So I fall under the "won't do this" category, and if you want to think that means I have zero credibility, more power to you.

That being said, answer me two questions:

1.  Is it EVER ok to silence scientists who disagree with the official government narrative?  If the answer is yes, then it's not science.  If your answer is no, then you have to explain why this has been going on to literally hundreds of people who were considered experts before this debacle.  This is one of the chief reasons I will NOT toe the line on this.  

2.  Does it make sense to take a "vaccine", which was developed using a relatively-new technology, which has never been given approval for use on humans before, and a technology which, when tested on animals in the previous decade or so, failed spectacularly and caused the animals' deaths, and which was pushed forward under Trump's administration (who many people think is literally worse than Hitler), by a private pharmaceutical company that has profited billions of dollars off of it (based on their own public admissions of earnings), which has never even sold ANY product or vaccine before, which has no responsibility for any ill-effects stemming from the "vaccine",  when many of the safety measures were simply ignored in order to get it done faster, again with a technology that's never been approved for human use before, and which we know has caused tens of thousands of deaths at this point (those are CDC official numbers now), when there are alternative treatments that are largely effective outside of vaccinations, at a point when morality has failed more than any other time in history (if you're going to distrust the system, now is the time to do it), etc...?  These are the non-disputed facts.  If you answer "yes", you lack any and all common-sense, and I think I'll pray for your students.

[Nunsuch]

Bless your heart.... SO glad you know more about everything than... anyone. Enjoy your self-assurance. Bye!