One thing that the COVID-19 pandemic has revealed is the affinity between the antivaccine movement and conspiracy theorists who deny the severity of COVID-19 and the necessity of the public health measures instituted to slow the spread of SARS-CoV-2 (the coronavirus that causes COVID-19). This affinity and alliance between antivaxxers and anti-lockdown protesters and COVID-19 conspiracy theorists who, for example, blame the 5G rollout for COVID-19 came as a surprise to many, but not to those of us who’ve been following the antivaccine movement for a long time. The reason, of course, that the antivaccine movement is based on a conspiracy theory, what I like to refer to as the central conspiracy theory of the antivaccine movement, and groups of conspiracy theorists tend to be attracted to each other, and COVID-19 has been a magnet for medical conspiracy theories. So it comes as no surprise that yet another not-so-dynamic duo of antivaccine propagandists, Amy Becker and Mark Blaxill, have decided to lie with statistics about excess death statistics during the COVID-19 pandemic in order to blame vaccines for killing babies. No, wait. That’s not exactly right. What they’ve done is to note that there has been a decrease in infant deaths during the lockdowns instituted as a response to the pandemic and claim that that indicates that vaccines were killing babies before the pandemic, because, to antivaxxers, whatever happens, be it good or bad, is always an indication that vaccines are bad. Always. It’s their default. These living examples of the Dunning-Kruger effect lay out their “case” (such as it is) in an article posted to Health Choice, Blaxill’s antivaccine group, entitled Why are so many fewer children dying?
The grammar pedant in me can’t help but note the very awkward construction of the title (“so many fewer” just sounds odd). Before I dig in to the ignorance and ridiculousness of the arguments presented, first, let’s look at the authors. We’ve met Mark Blaxill (who’s prior antivaccine group was Safeminds), for instance, on multiple prior occasions, be it when he was promoting horrible antivaccine studies, promoting antivaccine misinformation among the Somali immigrant community in Minnesota who were in the midst of a massive measles outbreak because affluent white antivaxxers had promoted Andrew Wakefield’s MMR pseudoscience among them, or appearing in antivaccine propaganda films. As for Amy Becker, I don’t recall having heard of her before. Unfortunately, because it’s a not-uncommon name I wasn’t able to find out much about her. What I do know is that Health Choice is an antivaccine group whose leadership includes a veritable cornucopia of antivaccine activists, including, for example, Mark Blaxill, Wayne Rohde, Teresa Conrick, Mary Holland, Kim Rossi, John Stone, Jennifer Larson, and Anne Dachel. It’s a veritable who’s who of second tier antivaxxers (first tier antivaxxers including people like Del Bigtree, Andrew Wakefield, and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.).
This brings us to the paper itself. I will admit one thing, though. I was surprised that Blaxill actually admitted the severity of the pandemic in the introductory paragraph:
Covid-19 is a serious public health issue, but the breathless reporting among the media of positive tests and an ever-rising death toll does little to instruct us about the true nature of the virus and the unprecedented steps taken to prevent its impact. As in many complex and pervasive health phenomena, there are many ways to measure health effects, but in our view the proper measure of impact is not a narrow or intermediate metric, but rather total health outcomes. In the case of a pandemic virus affecting large populations and where the immediate concern is sharp increases in deaths, the best measure of outcomes is not a selective measure of deaths somehow attributed to the disease but instead is deaths from all causes. For perspective, these deaths must be compared to historical death rates from all causes in prior years (Percent of Expected Deaths). As we will show, a balanced view of the broader American Covid19 experience demonstrates both the scale and variability of its negative outcomes in older Americans, especially the elderly, but also some unexpected positives. Surprisingly, U.S. mortality rates have declined among young people during the lockdown, especially among infants. These trends have gone largely unnoticed and remain unexplained.
You can see here that Becker and Blaxill are laying the groundwork to blame vaccines. Indeed, as soon as I saw that last sentence, I knew that the answer to the “mystery” of why mortality has declined among young people would be because they are not getting vaccines because so many pediatrics offices were closed to all but urgent issues and emergencies. Becker and Blaxill then follow with a series of graphs that are a beautiful of example of JAQing off. (You don’t know what that means? Read this.) The first two graphs are relatively straightforward graphs of total deaths per week during the pandemic, with the much higher death toll during the same period in 2020 representing excess deaths over the number expected for a the same time of the year compared to past years. Those excess deaths were almost certainly mostly due to COVID-19. At least Becker and Blaxill admit that COVID-19 has been much, much worse than a typical flu season:
Attributing a Cause of Death (COD) to COVID-19 is not always clear-cut, due to significant overlap among COVID-19, Pneumonia, Influenza, and presumably other primary CODs.
That said, the spike in deaths officially attributed to COVID-19 occurred in tandem with the spike in all-cause deaths, leaving little doubt that Covid19 was the main contributor to the excess of expected deaths between March 22 and May 9.
At least in this 8-week period, the Covid19 pandemic was considerably worse than a typical flu season. To the extent that all-cause deaths fell back to expected levels during May, the excess mortality attributable to the pandemic has passed.
And:
Many states actually saw lower than expected deaths during the period. To be sure, an excess death rate of 5% for the entire U.S. is considerable but also far short of the apocalyptic narrative the pandemic has received. Greater-than-expected death rates were heavily concentrated in the Northeastern corridor. New York City and its surrounding area, including New Jersey, New York State (although possibly not upstate New York), Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland and the District of Columbia have so far comprised 6 of top 8 jurisdictions with excess all-cause deaths. New York City was hit especially hard. In a typical spring, New York City could expect 700-800 all-cause deaths per week. From mid-March to mid-May, that number spiked sharply, by ten times that amount, reaching over 7500 deaths in the peak week ending April 11.
Maybe that was true a month ago, but, as we know from recent headlines, as COVID-19 cases are falling in states like New York, New Jersey, Michigan, and other states that were hit early, COVID-19 cases have been climbing in Arizona, Texas, Florida, and other states that have reopened, and these increases can’t be attributed just to increased testing, with some states setting records for new COVID-19 cases:
This is the situation as only two states, New York and Michigan, are on track to get COVID-19 under control.
Besides a detour into figures showing what can only be called “Well, duh!” observations, such as that the greatest toll in excess deaths likely due to COVID-19 has been among people over 65, something that has been known since January or February, Becker and Blaxill try to make this argument:
To the extent that policies have varied across the states, it is not clear that the imposition and/or presence of stringent lock-down policies had much to do with the variation in excess deaths. Less stringent lockdown policies were not associated with higher death rates. In fact, the 5 states that chose not to impose a lockdown are among the roughly 20 jurisdictions with no excess deaths at all.
Several states with the most aggressive lockdowns, including California, Maine, Minnesota and Pennsylvania showed almost no excess deaths effect. Despite huge population centers, California looked nothing like New York City and State. Maine, a mostly rural state, imposed among the more draconian policies with essentially no reason. Minnesota followed a far more aggressive lockdown policy than its neighboring states of Iowa, South Dakota, North Dakota and Wisconsin. Yet it’s Covid19 deaths were among the most concentrated in the country: roughly 80% of Minnesota’s Covid19 deaths occurred among the infirm elderly who were residents of long-term care facilities.
Did aggressive lockdowns stave off the worst-case scenario, preventing vulnerable states from becoming disaster areas like New York City? No controlled experiment will give us that answer. Pennsylvania makes the best case for that argument, with an early excess death pattern that resembled its neighbors in the Northeaster corridor but saw that rate drop precipitously by early April.—. But Pennsylvania is also an unusual geographic unit, with its largest city, Philadelphia, lying on the coast and separated from the western part of the state and its second largest city, Pittsburgh, by the Appalachian Mountains. This anomaly makes it difficult to draw clear conclusions from Pennsylvania’s Covid19 curve.
I have two observations here. First, Becker and Blaxill seem to have left Michigan out, which is odd, given that it’s one of the states on track to control coronavirus, and it imposed one of the more rigid lockdowns as COVID-19 cases were climbing in the second half of March, while being among the slower states to start easing the lockdown and reopenining. (Indeed, hair and nail salons only just opened this week, allowing a certain blogger to get his first haircut since February.). More importantly, Becker and Blaxill are making an argument that it is far too early to make. Again, the pandemic is not done with us yet. In brief, it’s too early to say that lockdowns didn’t decrease excess deaths due to COVID-19 because we don’t know the overall death tolls yet, and the more recent datapoints are incomplete because of that lag in reporting. Indeed, the CDC sources that Beck and Blaxill cite tell you that the numbers of deaths are likely large underestimates because it takes a long time for states and localities to report mortality data to the CDC, as the CDC itself tells anyone using the data:
The provisional counts for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) deaths are based on a current flow of mortality data in the National Vital Statistics System. National provisional counts include deaths occurring within the 50 states and the District of Columbia that have been received and coded as of the date specified. It is important to note that it can take several weeks for death records to be submitted to National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), processed, coded, and tabulated. Therefore, the data shown on this page may be incomplete, and will likely not include all deaths that occurred during a given time period, especially for the more recent time periods.
And:
Provisional counts are weighted to account for potential underreporting in the most recent weeks. However, data for the most recent week(s) are still likely to be incomplete. Only about 60% of deaths are reported within 10 days of the date of death, and there is considerable variation by jurisdiction and age. The completeness of provisional data varies by cause of death and by age group. However, the weights applied do not account for this variability. Therefore, the predicted numbers of deaths may be too low for some age groups and causes of death. For example, provisional data on deaths among younger age groups is typically less complete than among older age groups. Predicted counts may therefore be too low among the younger age groups. More detail about the methods, weighting, data, and limitations can be found in the Technical Notes.
In other words, again, it’s almost certainly too early to draw any firm conclusions like what Beck and Blaxill are trying to draw. Becker and Blaxill acknowledge the second cautionary note by the CDC in an endnote and state that they “deliberately excluded the most recent four weeks of available data.” However, they also say that the charts were for the week ending May 16, pulled on June 6, which is only three weeks after the end of the last week examined. Given that the CDC notes that the potential for underestimation of the number of deaths per week due to incomplete data is worse for exactly the age groups that Becker and Blaxill are trying to use to blame vaccines for SIDS, I can’t help but question their methodology even more. Also, without a statistical analysis, we’re just looking at a trend that might or might not exist. Everything Becker and Blaxill did was based on just “eyeballing” the charts; it wasn’t based on anything resembling a rigorous analysis.
All of this, including the sloppy analysis, the JAQing off, the rampant speculation, however, is just a buildup to the main point that Becker and Blaxill want to make, the “climax” of their incompetent analyses of COVID-19 death statistics. In doing so, they provide the rope with which their argument can be easily hanged:
But the pandemic experience has brought on a surprising effect on this expected death rate among children. Starting in early March, expected deaths began a sharp decline, from an expected level of around 700 deaths per week to well under 500 by mid-April and throughout May. As untimely deaths spiked among the elderly in Manhattan nursing homes and in similar settings all over the country, something mysterious was saving the lives of children. As springtime in America came along with massive disruptions in family life amid near universal lockdowns, roughly 30% fewer children died.
Was this a protective effect of school closures? Were teenagers getting themselves into risky situations at a lower rate? No. There was very little effect among school age children or adolescents.
Virtually the entire change came from infants. Somehow, the changing pattern of American life during the lockdowns has been saving the lives of hundreds of infants, over 200 per week.
The first thing that one must note here is that we’re dealing with relatively small numbers, namely because far fewer children than adults die every year. Now, you might wonder why Becker and Blaxill claim that virtually all the decline came from infants. For that, all you need to do is to look at this graph that they reproduce:
So, from between the week of February 1 and May 16, the number of deaths of infants under 1 year old fell from roughly just under 400 a week to around 250 a week, a greater than 35% decline. But what about Becker and Blaxill’s claims that there was “very little” effect among school age children or adolescents? As an absolute number, that’s sort of true, but as a percentage? Not so much. Again, look at the graph. Between the weeks of February 1 and May 16, deaths of children 5-14 years old fell from over 100/week to roughly 75 a week, a fall of close to 25%, not much less than that among infants. During the same time period, among children aged 1-4 years, the number of deaths fell from around 70-90 a week to 50-60 a week, a similar decline. Of course, one thing that has to be noted about these numbers is that they are so small that it’s had to say if this trend is even real, particularly given the lag in reporting that means that later statistics are almost certainly undercounts, because of the several week delay in processing some death certificates. Basically, Becker and Blaxill probably jumped the gun, because they are relying on statistics that are incomplete, the more recent the statistics, the more incomplete. In any event, even if the later statistics hold up, the case Becker and Blaxill are making is not convincing.
None of that stops them from inferring a cause. Those of you who’ve followed the antivaccine movement likely guessed that this was where Becker and Blaxill were going: Straight to what they always go to, vaccines, in this case, the lack of vaccines caused by delayed well-baby visits due to the lockdowns in response to the COVID-19 pandemic:
We have no specific data on the trend in SIDS deaths during the pandemic. We have, however, heard anecdotal reports from emergency room (ER) doctors suggesting some have observed a decline in SIDS. One doctor who says he might see 3 cases of SIDS in a typical week has seen zero cases since the pandemic and associated lockdowns began.
This leap to a conclusion is unsurprising, given the antivaccine myth that vaccines cause sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). They most definitely do not, even though antivaccine cranks love to promote this myth, the Vaccine Court once made a dubious ruling suggesting a link, and grieving mothers who attribute their baby’s SIDS to vaccines make for sympathetic and compelling figures, which is why antivaxxers try to convince mothers who’ve lost babies to SIDS that it was vaccines that caused it. In fact, although it’s very clear that vaccines do not increase the risk of SIDS, it’s actually likely that they decrease the risk of SIDS.
Ignoring all this science, Becker and Blaxill boldly engage in JAQing off over whether vaccines might be responsible for this decline in mortality:
One very clear change that has received publicity is that public health officials are bemoaning the sharp decline in infant vaccinations as parents are not taking their infants into pediatric offices for their regular well-baby checks. In the May 15 issue of the CDC Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR), a group of authors from the CDC and Kaiser Permanente reported a sharp decline in provider orders for vaccines as well as a decline in pediatric vaccine doses administered. (8) These declines began in early march, around the time infant deaths began declining.
Again, when you’re a hammer, everything is a nail, and when you’re an antivaxxer, everything must have something to do with vaccines, particularly if you think you see a correlation between a negative outcome with vaccines or a correlation of a positive outcome with a lack of vaccines.
You know what? If Becker and Blaxill want to include anecdotes, I’ll include one too. It’s from a pediatric intensive care doctor, who responded to a thread on Twitter in which an antivaxxer named Jeff claiming a correlation between decreased infant mortality and decreases in vaccine uptake:
See? This is a potential other explanation for the decline in the number of infant deaths (if, in fact, it turns out to be real, which, given the small numbers involved, it might not be). Another potential explanation is the huge decline in miles driven in automobiles, which likely resulted in a decline in deaths due to auto collisions. Given the small numbers of deaths of children under 14 per week at baseline, it wouldn’t take that much of a decline to partially or completely explain the declines Becker and Blaxill are touting. Of course, antivaxxers like Becker and Blaxill don’t even consider it. Instead, they conclude with a flourish of unfounded speculation:
Covid19 is unique among recent pandemics in that the mortality toll is measurable, real and convincing. It is also nearly certain to be transitory, but that won’t stop the propaganda juggernaut from rolling forward. However, as the saying goes, “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” What no one would have predicted in advance of Covid19 is that the extreme lockdown response has produced a natural experiment that actually calls into question the very actions—widespread, mandated vaccines for all–that the infectious disease and public health community have been pushing for years. We should mourn the deaths of the elderly Manhattan nursing home residents but also take heed of the hundreds of avoided infant deaths. Only with that kind of balance will we draw the proper lessons from the pandemic and the lockdowns that have followed in its wake.
Note the offensive comparison. Sure, many tens of thousands of elderly people have died horrible deaths because of COVID-19, but won’t you think of the children, specifically the several hundred who, for whatever reason, didn’t die because of the lockdown? It’s how antivaxxers think. Again, it’s all about the vaccines, first, foremost, and always. Think of it this way. Even if Becker and Blaxill have a point, they are saying, when you boil down their comparison, that it was worth it to have tens of thousands of elderly people die if it saved at least a ten- to twenty-fold smaller number of children—and “proved” that vaccines cause SIDS, to boot! If you think I’m being uncharitable and don’t think that’s what they meant to infer, then answer me this: Why did they also spend so much verbiage (and two charts) looking at average life expectancy per age cohort and quality-adjusted life-years saved or lost by age group?
The bottom line is that Becker and Blaxill made broad, sweeping generalizations in the form of JAQing off just by “eyeballing” raw figures for which the later numbers are likely to be significant underestimates, all in the service of antivaccine pseudoscience in the form of the myth that vaccines cause SIDS. Antivaxxers have been predicting that SIDS would decline during the lockdown because of the decline in vaccination, and this is their latest pathetic attempt to show it.
490 replies on “Antivaxxers Amy Becker and Mark Blaxill deceptively use COVID-19 death statistics to claim that vaccines cause SIDS”
Thanks for that Orac, it was an interesting read. There is a dark humour in the way they talk about balance at the end, without even a hint of self-awareness. Given the lack of discussion about other potential effects of lockdown or changes in behaviour from just knowing that there was a pandemic and the uncertainty over figures, it does seem utterly indecent to come to such a clear cut conclusion.
With antivaxxers, it’s always about the vaccines. Always. it’s the first and only cause they zero in on, and then they only consider potential other causes to make themselves seem reasonable for having considered them before rejecting them.
The CDC has the database of every child’s medical records both vaccinated and unvaccinated. I heard an interview by one of the authors of this article. He is asking the CDC to compare the death rate from SIDS between children who are vaccinated and unvaccinated. That would truly answer the question once and for all.
A. There is no universal database like that in the U.S.. There are several databases, like VSD.
B. But those studies were done. SIDS was studied and not linked to vaccines.
https://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center/vaccines-and-other-conditions/vaccines-sudden-infant-death-syndrome-sids
Deaths in children in the 30 days after vaccines were also studied more generally, and none were linked to vaccines, either. https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/137/3/e20152970
This is a studied issue, not ignored. Antivaccine activists just don’t like the results.
@Ben:
Two words – confounding factors.
That’s a good one. What are they using as the back end, FoxPro?
Fun fact – over here, with just 1300+ deaths attributed to Covid, the overall mortality has actually declined a little (not by much, so this of course can be just a coincidence). One thing is obviously fewer traffic accidents with less traffic and fewer infections overall, as fewer people left their homes. But there is one more point, raised by MDs – elective and planned surgeries were virtually stopped for at least two months. And when you undergo surgery, there is always this small possibility that something will go horribly wrong. The flip side is of course quality of life on the one hand – and possibility of the underlying condition getting much, much worse in this period and causing untimely death a little further along the line. Still, it’s a point to consider.
The topic of SIDS is a difficult one to discuss. Many people believe or want to believe that it’s some kind of mysterious magical entity that “just is”. Like the Big Electron. And those who want to know what it is always seem to me to have an agenda. I’ve never found a paper on SIDS that I found satisfactory.
If antivaxxers want to use it, they’re bound to make a mess out of it…
My maternal grandmother lost twin boys in a cot death (that’s what SIDS was called in bygone times). There was no routine vaccination then. I do not know the exact year without consulting the family tree, but it was before 1910.
Sorry for the loss to your family of twin boys, who would have been (actually, were) your uncles. I wonder if they had a genetic disorder called MCAD, which accounts for a small percentage of sudden infant deaths. You could find out if you are a carrier of this recessive disorder, though this would not actually prove the cause of death for those two babies.
OT – well, it’s about antivaxers.
An article in Mother Jones about the the political shift of antivaxers
Well, yeah. I’ve been saying this for only five years now, maybe longer. Nice that the media is finally starting to notice.
They have learned how to imitate scientific writing. They’re like children dressing up in their parents’ clothing: they’ve seen it done, sort of know how to do it, but don’t really understand why.
See also: Cargo Cult Science, Echolalia, Khmer Rouge.
If the fall in infant deaths is real, IF, then the fact that there was lockdown must be an important factor in reducing those deaths, the two obvious causes to my mind would be reduced infections and reduced traffic accidents. In fact as soon as I saw the article I thought “reduced infections of all kinds”. but then I am very much in favour of vaccines, my mother had polio in her thirties and had to learn to walk again without the use of her balance muscles which affected her for the rest of her life; such a visible example of the damage that can be done tends to have a profound effect.
Also, more people at home during the lockdown watching over the sleeping little baby.
Here are the stats from 2017 these are for the year. Traffic accidents is a mute point there were 90. Most accidents happen IN THE HOME not in day cares or outside because parents are often distracted and there are far more dangers in the home… day cares have tight regulations. Murders would likely be up since child abuse is up. even if you erase ALL other disease it would not account for the large decrease in deaths. Everyone is making assumptions in this response without looking at the data:
#Sudden infant death syndrome (R95) 1360
Other symptoms, signs and abnormal clinical and laboratory findings, not elsewhere classified (R00-R53,R55-R94,R96-R99) 1319
Motor vehicle accidents (V02-V04,V09.0,V09.2,V12-V14,V19.0-V19.2,V19.4-V19.6,V20-V79,V80.3-V80.5,V81.0-V81.1,V82.0-V82.1,V83-V86,V87.0-V87.8,V88.0-V88.8,V89.0,V89.2) 90
Accidental drowning and submersion (W65-W74) 41
Accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed (W75) 946
Other accidental suffocation and strangulation (W76-W77,W81-W84) 115
Accidental inhalation and ingestion of food or other objects causing obstruction of respiratory tract (W78-W80) 42
Accidents caused by exposure to smoke, fire and flames (X00-X09) 15
Accidental poisoning and exposure to noxious substances (X40-X49) 10
Other and unspecified accidents (W20-W31,W35-W64,W85-W99,X10-X39,X50-X59) 39
Assault (homicide) by hanging, strangulation and suffocation (X91) 26
Assault (homicide) by discharge of firearms (U01.4,X93-X95) 12
Neglect, abandonment and other maltreatment syndromes (Y06-Y07) 76
Assault (homicide) by other and unspecified means (U01.0-U01.3,U01.5-*U01.9,X85-X90,X92,X96-X99,Y00-Y05,Y08-Y09) 187
#Complications of medical and surgical care (Y40-Y84) 14
#Acute upper respiratory infections (J00-J06) 12
#Influenza and pneumonia (J09-J18) 158
#Acute bronchitis and acute bronchiolitis (J20-J21) 42
#Meningitis (G00,G03) 47
Certain infectious and parasitic diseases (A00-B99) 515
A. It’s not clear what your basis is for saying most accidents are in the home. I haven’t found support for that.
B. You’re right about car accidents for infants, but not for the other age groups.
C. The main unintentional injury for infants is suffocation. That, too, is not something vaccines would cause.
D. Note that the commenters are making it clear they’re raising possibilities they know are untested, mostly discussing options knowing they can’t draw conclusions. In contrast, the anti-vaccine writers did conclude.
So I would agree commenters here cannot conclude, but the criticism of the anti-vaccine paper is still valid.
For those looking for it, here is the link that, I suspect, the commenter drew on.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr68/nvsr68_09-508.pdf
Points about closure/lack of utilization of day care centers and diminished travel/fewer outdoor activities during the pandemic are well taken.
Might there also be a correlation between fewer child deaths and the possibility that parents less harried by work responsibilities and who have been spending lots more time at home are more attentive care-givers?
My thoughts exactly! Such as checking the positions of infants in cribs…….
My apologies, I just posted the same last point as you before reading your post.
They have learned to imitate scientific writing. They are like children dressing up in their parents’ clothing: they’ve seen it done, sorta know how to do it, but don’t really understand why.
Blaxill came onto the scene with this, I understand. It’s his signature approach.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11339848/
Note that this same dynamic duo claimed in late March that total deaths have gone down. https://www.facebook.com/1503016366/posts/10216502331779807/?d=n
To give the most generous interpretation, at least they are sufficiently reality focused they had to admit COVID-19 kills, even if they tried to fib it off as “only in old people.”
Their believers took their lack of evidence re SIDS and ran with it under the heading of “they showed SIDS decreased without vaccines.” (And really, there is evidence on SIDS and vaccines. It doesn’t support them).
I’m still trying to understand why they thought “one anonymous doctor who said he saw no sids where he usually sees three” would appear as valid evidence to external observers (and I read the way the report is written as they trying to appeal to those outside the circle of believers).
How in the world would an ER physician see 3 SIDS deaths per week? I am in a 4 Pediatrician practice and we haven’t had a child die of SIDS in probably a decade or more.
An excellent question. I should have picked up on that. I just looked it up, and there are only around 2,500 SIDS deaths a year in the US, which would be only less than 50 a week for the entire country. For any one ER doc to see three cases a week would be incredible, as that would be more than 6% of the entire number of SIDS deaths in the entire country.
Call Erin Brockovich.
yes …sids… back in 1977 my 14 month old little boy passed was said this thing called sids?? no other answer was available back then ..as of now not much more factually know from what i can see& after half a life time of living with the memory of the day….but as a baby back then he had vacanations of the day & what ever the protocols that took place from his berth till his death …..so too me with out proof of what went wrong in any other area ….i would be thinking im a anti vaccer….. for sure but what ever it was he stopped breathing & his heart stopped beating?????? so comes back too what caused it ????? somebody tell me….cheers ,,,happy bob from oz …8
@ robert walton
What you’ll find in the literature will be statistical truthes at most. You’ll never be able to get a truth statement there about what happened to your kid in particular. It will give you indications, and will raise more questions than it will yield answers.
Do not engage in hopeless Quests.
The fact that you cannot derive statistical truth from anecdotal evidence has a corollary: you cannot derive anecdotal truth from statistical evidence. There will always be a mismatch you won’t be able to bridge.
@ F68.10,
The statistics are all whacked out & apparently our anecdotes are worth nothing of value at all. What about etiological evidence? Such as an activated immune system.
Not a Hopeless Quest; a Life’s Quest. Anniversary of her death is coming up on June 21.
SIGH Christine, this has been explained to you before. Anecdotes are not data and memory is notoriously fallible. After Wakefield’s “case study” numerous people came forward and claimed that their children regressed straight after receiving their vaccinations. Yet when the children’s records were reviewed, in most cases there were clear signs of problems before the vaccines. The parents had edited their memories to fit the “hypothesis”.
w.r.t vaccines and SIDS, Professor Peter Fleming, the creator of “Back to sleep” and perhaps the World’s foremost expert on SIDS, investigated the question. His conclusion? No link. Other studies found a slight inverse correlation.
Vaccines do not cause SIDS.
@ christine kincaid
“Not a Hopeless Quest”
That’s the kind of statement where I would have a lot to say, some disparaging, some not at all disparaging. But not on a blog, and not in written form. But to put it simply: just wish you’d take it a bit more easy. Not the kind of statements you’d likely welcome, but I have reasons for them. Which I won’t lay down on a blog, and not in written form.
To you and to Bob:
@ christine kincaid
“The statistics are all whacked out & apparently our anecdotes are worth nothing of value at all.”
The statistics are “all whacked out” because it’s crazy stuff to carry proper and thorough investigations into issues such as SIDS at almost every level. You could throw shitloads of money to that issue and still get little more than “whacked out” statistics. The issue is crazily complicated. At least, that’s my feeling from my experience reading on the topic.
Anecdotes cannot be considered valuable in such matters. It’s too sensitive. Doesn’t mean that anecdotes should not be collected and compiled, but they absolutely shouldn’t be taken as evidence. And if there is the slightest risk that anecdotes could be mistaken as evidence, they won’t — really — be collected and compiled. The basic assumption in such matters is Everybody Lies.
And with respect to SIDS, there also are issues that no one would willingly dare look into; so as hard as it may be for you to hear and for me to admit, some secrets are best left as secrets…
“What about etiological evidence? Such as an activated immune system.”
SIDS is a syndrome that is defined without reference to etiology. It cannot be otherwise as what it captures as a logico-scientific category is something where etiology is not presumed to be anything specific. It describes circumstances… I looked at some papers investigating etiology of SIDS. Very little can be extracted from them that would give more than fuzzy probabilistic answers and shady statistical uncertainty. The best course of action with SIDS is to provide guidelines to avoid it. But how much can SIDS be compressed with such guidelines is something I wouldn’t put too much hope into.
We should already be quite happy that infant mortality — SIDS “not included” — has considerably declined over time. This is Good ®. Hard to do any better for the moment without Good Intents Backfiring. SIDS is here to stay. Vaccines or no vaccines.
What Julian said.
In fact, there’s an entire area of cognitive psychology concerning eyewitness testimony ( see Loftus). It is highly malleable as trial lawyers know only too well.
Concerning vaccines, one family used videos of their daughter prior to vaccinations to illustrate how “normal” ( unaffected?) she was but experts saw many of the early indicators of autism in the video and they lost the case. ( see Cedillo autism).
Recall can be very selective and transmutable : it is not a video recording.
@ Robert,
“There is convincing evidence that slight infection and an activated immune system are involved in SIDS. One common thread may be the dysregulation of inflammatory responses to apparently mild infections, leading to a cytokine storm that contributes to death.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513388/#:~:text=There%20is%20convincing%20evidence%20that,storm%20that%20contributes%20to%20death.
Vaccines can cause a cytokine storm. Did your sweet boy “apparently” have an “apparently mild infection?”. Because my sweet girl did not. She just had vaccines, less than 24 hours before she died.
And now they say there is a convincing evidence that an activated immune system is involved in SIDS.
My children’s pediatrician always delayed vaccines if they were sick. No “apparently” about it.
Vaccines can cause a cytokine storm
So can alien abductions.
You left out she was a premature twin, medically-fragile and you pulled her off oxygen. But it’s the vaccines, sheesh.
@ Christine Kincaid
You link to a chapter that doesn’t once mention vaccines. They, for instance, discuss full blown bacterial infections. Since you, as i’ve pointed out over and over, don’t understand how vaccines work, don’t understand the basics of immunology which does include cytokines and infections, you don’t understand why it is highly unlikely that a vaccine would cause a cytokine storm. Despite what you choose to believe, there is little to NO evidence that vaccines cause cytokine storms.
So, when you write: “Vaccines can cause a cytokine storm.” It is not science; but your world of fantasy.
It has to be vaccines in your mind, so if it isn’t cytokine storms, I’m sure you will come up with something else.
I’m sorry to hear of your loss. As other commenters have indicated, it basically means they have no idea why your son passed. The pain of it lasts forever. The ‘back to sleep’ positioning has reduced the number of such deaths since 1977, even if we still don’t know why some babies die.
Condolences, Robert Walton, for the sad loss of your baby. The memories remain. Genetic testing has advanced dramatically in the past 43 years. Perhaps by now, an answer would be found in the DNA, if a sample were available.
A few things…
Blaxill in involved in Health Choice, the Canary Party ( silent: not chirping of late) and AoA. Anti-vaxxers like to join groups such as Katie Wright ( Safe Minds, Children’s Health Defense) and Cathy Jameson ( AoA, TMR). It’s a way to make their numbers look stronger- lots of groups with the same members.. Dachel also has her own website. The others are on AoA often.
MI, NY and NJ are reducing Covid numbers: I read last week that NJ’s R number went from 5.39, March 21, to 0.66 last week.
People drove so much less that certain auto insurers are giving customers rate reductions of 15% for the months involved.
Writing about SIDS will probably bring out a certain anti-vaxxer. Oh joy!
I can understand why deaths of several ages groups might have declined in many areas: no one was doing much for 3 months! NYC was virtually shut down – you can find images of the empty streets and tourist traps which usually teem with activity. Shopping was cut drastically and mass transit declined precipitously Less people working. Perhaps people who drank stayed home. Less traffic to kill pedestrians and bike riders. It’s actually amazing how people cooperated.Unlike other places.
But of course, anti-vaxxers will turn it all into an indictment of vaccines.
.
Hi Denice!
“Writing about SIDS will probably bring out a certain anti-vaxxer. Oh joy!”
Antivaxxers love dead children so much, that they wish there were more of them.
That’s why they celebrated when Japan stopped vaccinating for pertussis because they thought that 2 children might have been harmed by a vaccine – 41 children then died the next year of that disease.
Robert C…”Antivaxxers love dead children so much, that they wish there were more of them.” Man you’re sick!!!
People for safe vaccines “antivaxxers” just want double blind placebos for vaccines so we know they are safe. Also we want to get away from the government vaccine courts that US taxpayers pay money out for harm to children and allow the pharmaceutical companies to be liable when they cause damage. Let’s create a free market economy for the pharmaceutical industry.
If you search this blog you will find that these studies exist. This twitter thread also links to many. https://twitter.com/dfreedman7/status/1200561196035969024?s=20
Antivaccine activists reject them, just as they reject the studies on vaccines and autism or SIDS because it’s not about the evidence. They just want to blame vaccines.
Well, if you want to even the playing field, how about a loser-pays system?
This can’t be overstated enough- the numbers they are using are incomplete because of the delays in compiling the death certificate data.
Based on my own rough analysis of the NVSS data, about 10% of total weekly deaths still aren’t included a month later, and about 3% are still missing after two months. This alone can explain away many of the trends regarding reduced mortality.
The good news is that it won’t take long for their paper to become obsolete. The numbers will be updated over time to reveal which trends are, in fact, real. As Dorit Reiss alluded to, the antivaxxers/conspiracy theorists can no longer use this data to pretend that overall mortality has gone down. Any who did are now roundly refuted by their own sources.
It’d be cool if they’d gone and done a more in-depth to that one doctor the article cited who sees about three cases of SIDS a week. He’s handling somewhere in the range of 5-10% of the entire US’s SIDS patients, and is thus, presumably, real knowledgeable on the subject.
Time to call the RCMP (well whatever the US equivalent is).
Yes it would be extraordinary for one doctor to be responsible for 10% of all SIDS deaths in the US.
Shades of Fred Shipman.
Despite seeing excellent take downs of both the Hooker and Blaxill anti-vax “papers” here, I’m left as a pediatrician with a very bad vibe fueled largely by what I perceive as an increasing public distrust of medical science that has grown with the pandemic. Parents aren’t bringing children in for vaccines (including infants) but since a lot of those parents and kids are staying at home it’s helping prevent outbreaks of infections like pertussis and measles (but we can’t stay at home forever). Once schools and day cares fully restart, those 2 incubators of infection will fuel measles and perussis outbreaks (and when that happens AVers will holler this is PROOFZ vaccines don’t work). But in the meanwhile AVers have seized upon the moment for these 2 “papers” as well as lay the foundation for spreading FUD about any SARS-CoV-2 vaccine that is released. I keep seeing the Hooker paper all over and I’m sure the Blaxill paper will spread on social media just as much. I fear it’s going to be difficult to convince parents to catch their children up on vaccines and that will leave us very precarious just like the UK was after Wakefraud’s 1998 Lancet paper came out.
I have a college friend who’s been somewhat … vaccine complainy? (Her kids still get their shots, but she often ask why in ways that make it clear she would rather they didn’t have to.) and she shared an article about exactly what you’ve said here, that kids are falling behind, with the comment “but it’s just boosters…”
Yes Vicky, it is boosters, for you and your kids, and you will take them to catch up. But a lot of vulnerable kids won’t get caught up. Or they really needed that booster.
And then there are all the kids in other parts of the world that are seeing VPD outbreaks because all the vaccine campaigns have been canceled.
Damn COVID.
@ JustaTech–ICYMI, there was a very sad NYT article 5 days ago about how COVID-19 is making it very hard to vaccinate in poorer countries (esp in Africa) due to both needed control measures d/t the pandemic but also because a rumor started that SARS-CoV-2 vaccines were going to be tested without consent in Africa. Horrible rumor that has put lots of parents there off all vaccines. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/14/health/coronavirus-vaccines-measles.html
Please correct me if I’m wrong, but it appears that the annual influenza season could explain quite a lot of the decline in pediatric mortality between February and May. Just look at these figures: on average some 150 pediatric deaths annually, almost all between December and April, typically peaking in February, followed by a steady decline.
This would also explain the drop in mortality in other age groups.
At least this is a much better explanation than VaccinesDidIt.
from The Recount; CBS News:
Dr Fauci decries the current trend of anti-science and mistrust of authority which contributes to cavalier attitudes about contracting the virus, He cites anti-vaxxers as well as freedom fanatics.
Maybe that’s why the curves form the EU and US look so different.
From Cheezburger. #15:
Earnest Attempts That Truly Missed The Mark
Hey! #11 is valid!
My landlord had guages, freon, and saddle valves — I would adjust the pressure of the $79 lowes air conditioner per the changing seasons, reverse the unit, put high speed squirrel cage blower from microwave/range on the outside (ducted with cardboard and metal tape) — It kept a couple rooms nice and toasty all winter. On the occasions that it did freeze up*, I still got the 500 watts off the compressor which is now inside.
*interestingly enough, it is not so much the temperature but the humidity (well; dew point, actually) combined. It was cold cold that one winter. One extra cold night I recall, it was pumping out heat just fine with it 21F outside.
If you think 21F is “extra cold,” I suggest you check out the Hawk wind in Chicago.
I should have qualified that was a low temp that my makeshift heat pump still worked (still pretty cold for around here).
I don’t know from 30F below. Fuck me running. Teens and single didgets (without ‘wind chill’) is pretty rare here. There is a saying around here: “That is as cold as a witch’s titty in a brass braw doing pushups in the snow in January.”
r/nooffensewickans
[…] imitable Orac in his luscious takedown of this pseudoscience paper wrote about the same […]
Hi Orac, thanks for taking this on. Larry Cook and a couple of his colleagues were touting this idea back in March, usually passed around in meme form, with wording like,
Another source that got passed around (also around the 3rd week in March) was from an person who claimed expertise because she was a medical transcriptionist, who claimed she usually sees records from a SIDS case every few weeks, and she hadn’t seen any since “the quarantine began”. THAT got passed around a lot.
Yeah, that nameless transcriptionist must be pals with the nameless ER doc and also transcribe 10’s of thousand of encounter visits daily. Gimme a break.
VAERS (CDC Wonder) results for reports filed for adverse events after vaccination filtered only in section #9, dates vaccinated March 2019-May 2019: 8,541 total events. Deaths: 13.
VAERS (CDC Wonder) results for reports filed for adverse events after vaccination filtered only in section #9, dates vaccinated March 2020-May 2020: 846 total events. Deaths: 0.
I know that means nothing, except that maybe when people don’t get actual vaccines; their imaginary reactions & deaths stop occurring.
It’s always interesting when antivaxers cite VAERS reports as proof of vaccine-related injuries.
It’s even more interesting that, despite believing the CDC is an evil lying agency engaging in a massive coverup, they happily accept CDC data as accurate when it suits their purposes.
Assuming her figures are accurate (seeing that this is Christine, such an assumption is risky), has she considered that for those vaccinated in the last few months, it takes time to 1) file reports of adverse events allegedly connected to vaccines, and 2) have those reports processed and results reported by the CDC, which has quite a lot of work on its hands currently, so that 3) the 2020 figures are probably nowhere near as complete as for the corresponding period in 2019, which would account for at least some of the observed differences.
Maybe personal injury lawyers are too busy now with lawsuits related to COVID-19 treatment to file dubious reports with VAERS.
I would add that she is right, at the least, that when babies don’t get vaccinated – and we know less people are vaccinated during COViD-19, for several reasons, including the fact that doctors offices are closed and people are afraid – such SIDS deaths and issues that arise won’t be blamed on vaccines, and won’t be filed with VAERS, so you would see less VAERS reports. Without vaccines, there’s no temporal connections to confuse with causal connection. Doesn’t mean the issues aren’t happening, just that there’s no basis to report them to VAERS.
It also doesn’t mean vaccines caused any of the issues in the reports from the previous period.
It’s like the dishonest anti-vaccine claim that after Japan stopped vaccinating infants until the age of 2 SIDS deaths stopped, which is based on the number of claims filed for compensation for SIDS after vaccines. Of course there won’t be such claims after vaccines if vaccines are after two, because SIDS applies to infant under one. Doesn’t mean SIDS cases stopped or dropped. They didn’t.
https://blog.drwile.com/vaccines-actually-protect-against-sudden-infant-death-syndrome-sids/
Funayama M., et al. “Autopsy cases of sudden unexpected infant deaths examined at the Tokyo medical examiner’s office, 1964-1993” Am J Forensic Med Pathol. 1996;17(1):32-7
@ DB,
You are absolutely correct. Many reports will be filed as 2020 trudges on. Enough to compensate for an almost 8,000 count discrepancy? Probably not. Also; reports from 2019 will continue to file in here & there as well.
Indeed.
No doubt we will see the anti-vaxxers turn up with data from VAERS showing fewer deaths reported during the pandemic as sure evidence that vaccines kill children.
Given that you can’t tell the difference between the phrases “paralytic polio” and “non-polio paralysis,” I don’t exactly place any trust in your ability to collect information, let alone analyze it.
@ Christine Kincaid
Another possibility that you never considered is, if a child doesn’t get vaccinated; but develops any of a number of serious conditions or even dies, then parents won’t report it to VAERS. Again, you fail to understand Post Hoc Ergo Prompter Hoc. People, partially due to what they focus on, attribute problems to whatever their selective perception remembers/focuses on.
Or, quite simply during the lockdown, kids are less exposed to infection, less likely to be in car accidents, etc. And I also explained numerous times in other comments that lightening does strike twice in the same place, even three or four times. So if kids get sick, die, and at same age, a number get vaccinated, doesn’t mean vaccines in any way responsible.
An example I gave previously. 800,000 people have heart attacks in U.S. every years, 365,000 die. So, how many had a heart attack right after eating eggs for breakfast or cereal or . . .?
For open-minded, I highly recommend a fun book to read: David J Hand’s “The Improbability Principle: Why Coincidences, Miracles, And Rare Events Happen Every Day.
@Joel:
I guess one of the things I would say about improbable events and coincidences is that even if you can prove with statistics that they’re random, who’s to say that there isn’t something interesting or meaningful in the randomness itself? I mean, maybe, say, Loki, operates in the world through randomness. It would be entirely appropriate. (I’m a Lokean as well as a Buddhist; with regard to Loki, you can’t choose your family, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Yeah, I can be batsh!t crazy, oh well.)
I was going to say something about how Freya played “Love is a Battlefield” this Yule by means of a random playlist, but I though better of it. (Look, these things are entirely subjective, idk, it’s hard to argue with a madman.)
I’d say this was dumb even for you but it’s you. If no one is getting a vaccine, then how do they blame their “injury” on said non-existent vaccine?
Or they blame the vaccines they got themselves. The socalled ‘injuries’ will keep happening, but they find another way to blame vaccines for everything.
Did anyone else notice that Becker and Blaxill don’t think the millions of deaths from the AIDS pandemic were measurable, real, or convincing:
I’d put my money on “not real” or “not convincing,” because I don’t think the authors care about gay men or Africans, just as they clearly don’t care about the elderly.
I may be overly cynical, but I don’t see any reason to think they care about any deaths or harms they cannot blame on vaccines in some way.
Sadly, I think you’re just being realistic. Look at the way they mock people who lose their children to things like whooping cough or SSPE.
@ Dorit,
I did not filter for SIDS. I did not filter even by symptom.
So what if a year goes by & decreased infant mortality appears for this time period proves to be reality; not a fluke?
And what if a year goes by & still no reports of SIDS on VAERS from this period of distancing?
(actually; there will be two from June for sure, as two families I know of have reported losing infants within 36 hrs from vaccines in June)
I don’t think my point depends on SIDS. I gave the Japanese as an example of the tactic.
When children aren’t vaccinated, deaths from car accidents, cancer, unrelated infections and other things not caused by vaccines are also not going to be reported to VAERS, because reports to VAERS reflect things that happened under vaccines, caused by them or not (or in some cases, things someone read on the internet about vaccines).
We do have studies of deaths after vaccines. They don’t really support the anti-vaccine desire to blame vaccines for them. E.g.: https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/137/3/e20152970
If the end result is decline in mortality in all age groups under 18, what would you say?
@ F68.10,
thank you.
“Antivaxxers have been predicting that SIDS would decline during the lockdown because of the decline in vaccination, and this is their latest pathetic attempt to show it.” This will be something that can be verified when statistics for SIDS deaths during this period are available. If it were to be the case that SIDS deaths had a statistically significant decline during the lockdown, what would you think?
I think a decline in deaths generally should be researched.
But the question whether there’s a link between vaccines and SIDS has been studied. There is none. It’s not an unknown. https://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center/vaccines-and-other-conditions/vaccines-sudden-infant-death-syndrome-sids
The anti-vaccine activists simply reject that data because it doesn’t fit their beliefs.
I agree,if the decline in infant deaths is real and not illusory then it ought to be researched.
I would think we should look for things that were different during the lockdown than at other times, looking particularly at things that haven’t already been shown not to cause SIDS.
Throw out anything where there’s no plausible connection. If you can think of a reason that the lack of professional hockey games on Canadian television might be relevant, include it, but that’s not where I’d start looking.
Also: if it turns out a year from now that SIDS deaths increased during the lockdown, what would you think?
I would disagree that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”. There is research, but like most research, it’s not as conclusive enough to make such a broad statement.
If it turned out there had been an increase in SIDS during the pandemic, my response would be the same – we should research it and try to figure out why that happened.
@ Beth
“There is research, but like most research, it’s not as conclusive enough to make such a broad statement.”
But it’s seemingly conclusive enough to consider that it’s worth vaccinating.
I do often feel that medicine operates in a manner that could be summed up as: “We try this. We check what we can to see that things do not go wrong. Item by item. But checking that overall everything is really really fine would be too complicated and would stop us from action”. It’s a way for the medical world to avoid analysis paralysis (they have little choice in the matter, mind you…).
The downside is that they confuse “the parameters we’ve been checking are OK” with “everything’s OK”. That mismatch is likely what explains the discrepancy of perception you, as a statistician, have comparatively to doctors who have to believe they know how to take action on available evidence.
If Dorit’s statement had been “all the parameters we checked with respect to a putative vaccine link to SIDS are OK”, you’d likely have less issues with Dorit’s statement.
Beth, I went to Google Scholar and entered the search phrase “vaccines and sids”. Over 4000 results, some dating back to the 1990’s, were returned.
How much more conclusive do you want the evidence to be?
Beth continues Just Asking Questions and rejecting the answers.
It’s what she does.
Hoping that after the “appropriate amount of time”; the decrease in infant mortality is looked at closely. Really close.
In 1950, US infant mortality was at 29.2. Single highest COD was prematurity with a death rate of 6.5. Nothing remotely close to describing SIDS as a COD. Pertussis as a COD in infants had been dropping, without a vaccine; from a rate of 1.0 in 1941 to 0.2 in 1950.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsus/vsus_1950_1.pdf PAGE 276.
US infant mortality rate is now 5.6 but the SIDS death rate is 35.4 (2017).
Death rate from Pertussis without a vaccine was 0.2. wtf.
”In 1950, US infant mortality was at 29.2…US infant mortality rate is now 5.6”
Gotta be the vaccines, right?
Whooping cough was widely vaccinated against starting the in mid-1940s. So that drop you see is from vaccination.
Also, you’re giving a death rate per 100,000 for SIDS, and a per 1,000 for 1950’s whooping cough. That means that in the 1950 — when a vaccine was available! — the comparable death rate for whooping cough was 20, not .2. Does it tell you anything that you have to distort facts to make your argument? The death of your daughter was a tragedy, but the death of other people’s children won’t make your pain any less.
Babies also do not die of SIDS at a rate of over 35 out of 1000 live births today. The rate is 35 per 100,000 births, while the 1950 rate in her source is out of a 1000.
https://www.cdc.gov/sids/data.htm
And although the term SIDS is new, the phenomenon was known for years, just not called that. Her attempt to say its new is problematic.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/vaxopedia.org/2018/05/26/was-sids-discovered-only-after-we-began-vaccinating-kids/amp/
Anti-vaxxers like anecdotes so here’s one:
my cousin was supposed to have a baby around New Year’s 2005 BUT she had an emergency C-section in mid October.. Her daughter had a few issues ( GI, heart) but came home after several weeks. She had no further problems and is now a teenager.
Now, how often did pre term infants like her survive years ago?
–Research shows that Preterm Infants at Greater Risk for SIDS Rutgers.edu June 2017. They discuss the need for parental education before leaving hospital
— in Pediatrics July 20117,.Ostfeld et al. Pre-term is a strong risk for SIDS
Decline in SIUD as GA increases
In recent years, more older women have riskier pregnancies, more IVF, more early preterm babies, more interventions BUT
It’s the Vaccines!!!
SIDS as a separate COD was not proposed as such until the late 1960’s, so it would not be listed as a COD in the 1950’s. (“The term sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) was first proposed in 1969 in order to focus attention on a subgroup of infants with similar clinical features whose deaths occurred unexpectedly in the postnatal period….the term SIDS was only accepted as an official diagnosis on death certificates in 1971, with the term “sudden infant death” being allocated a separate code (coding number 798.0) in the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Diseases in 1979” (from Chapter 2: Sudden Infant Death Syndrome: An Overview, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513399/))
Something hilarious:
AoA today:
Thermometers Break All Former Weapons Rules In Schools
imagine a Karen saying:
” My son got in trouble for pointing his fingers to ‘shoot’ a class mate and you let these school employees POINT THERMOMETERS at innocent children?”
HOW DARE YOU!!!
Perhaps over at AoA they think there is still mercury in thermometers. The way they think there is still mercury in vaccines?
@ Christine Kincaid
So, now you want to compare 1950s infant deaths to today’s. First, low birth weight and especially low birthweight children usually did NOT survive in 1950. In addition, neither did newborns with other birth defects. We didn’t have neonatal intensive care units in 1950. The first American newborn intensive care unit, designed by Louis Gluck, was opened in October 1960 at Yale New Haven Hospital. Second, you ignore that starting in 1990s the number of SIDS cases has plummeted, despite adding two more vaccines to child schedules. From 130 per 100,000 Live Births to 40 per 100,000 Live Births.
See: CDC Trends in Sudden Unexpected Infant Death by Cause, 1990-2017. Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/sids/data.htm#cause
You write: “In 1950, US infant mortality was at 29.2. Single highest COD was prematurity with a death rate of 6.5. Nothing remotely close to describing SIDS as a COD. Pertussis as a COD in infants had been dropping, without a vaccine; from a rate of 1.0 in 1941 to 0.2 in 1950.”
First, “In 2017, the infant mortality rate in the United States was 5.8 deaths per 1,000 live births.” (CDC Infant Mortality. Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/maternalinfanthealth/infantmortality.htm
So, the total number of deaths per 1,000 is 1/5 those of 1950 and lower than 1950s prematurity deaths. As for pertussis deaths decreasing, yep, pertussis is a bacteria and antibiotics saved most lives. However, death is not the only criteria to judge the effectiveness of a vaccine. The first petussis vaccine was developed in the 1930s, but became available in the 1940s. Cases started to decline with the release of the vaccine (CDC. Pertussis (Whooping Cough). Reported NNDSS pertussis cases: 1922-2018. Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/pertussis/surv-reporting.html )
Pertussis is known as the 100 day cough as fits of coughing can last that long.
Pertussis can cause serious illness in people of all ages and can even be life-threatening, especially in babies.
Approximately half of babies less than 1 year old who get pertussis need treatment in the hospital.
Let’s look at SIDS more closely. The following is from National Academy of Sciences (1991). Adverse Effects of Pertussis and Rubella Vaccines. Available at: https://www.nap.edu/catalog/1815/adverse-effects-of-pertussis-and-rubella-vaccines [note pdf download is free, just sign up]:
SIDS was not given a separate diagnostic category until 1969, so we don’t really know how prevalent it was before then.
“Prior to the 1960s, little was known about the epidemiology of the sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Deaths that occurred suddenly and unexpectedly were generally certified as being due to another cause of death such as pneumonitis rather than an unknown cause (Peterson, 1980). In an international conference in 1969, SIDS became defined as “the sudden death of any infant or young child, which is unexpected by history, and in which a thorough postmortem examination fails to demonstrate an adequate cause of death” (Bergman et al., 1970, p. 18). [However] “It was not until 1975 that the coding of such deaths was modified, so that these deaths could be classified specifically as SIDS.” The use of a standard definition and the specific classification of SIDS as a distinct syndrome has facilitated identification of such cases, permitting the emergence of the descriptive epidemiology of SIDS in the 1970s and 1980s.
A number of investigators have reported seasonal variations in SIDS mortality rates, with a relative increase in frequency in winter months (Golding et al., 1985). Predictors of SIDS include individual characteristics (male sex, low birth weight, multiple births, and black race), maternal characteristics (young age, low education, and cigarette smoking), and low family income (Haglund and Cnattingius, 1990; Hoffman et al., 1987; Kraus et al., 1989). Rates in blacks have consistently been reported to be higher than those in whites; however, in one analysis (Kraus et al., 1989), this difference disappeared after controlling for maternal education and family income.
It is noteworthy that some of the factors associated with SIDS, such as low
birth weight, young maternal age, and black race, are also associated with
delaying early childhood immunization past the recommended age (Hoffman et al., 1987; Walker et al., 1987). The influence of such delays on the time of occurrence of SIDS in relation to the time of DPT immunization would depend on the specific ages over which such delays occurred. The effect could be to cause children to be immunized at ages associated with either higher or lower than expected rates of SIDS, and thus produce spurious direct or inverse associations, respectively, between SIDS and DPT immunization.
Conclusion [based on extensive review of research studies]
The evidence does not indicate a causal relation between DPT vaccine and
SIDS. Studies showing a temporal relation between these events are consistent with the expected occurrence of SIDS over the age range in which DPT immunization typically occurs.”
So, once more you show your dishonesty by cherry-picking some numbers, ignoring others. And you still haven’t responded to any of my comments that totally refuted claims made by you, e.g., increases in non-polio acute flaccid paralysis in India, etc.
Since no one trusts anything you say, why do you keep at it?
Really, there’s a very simple number we can look at to understand risk. The current death rate of infants who contract whooping cough is 1 in 200, or 5 in 1000. That’s not including that massive amount of damage that whooping cough can do without killing you, but we’re going with simple right now. The total death rate for infants in the US in 2017 was 5.8 in 1000, with the top three causes being birth defects, preterm birth/low birth weight and pregnancy complications.
(Obviously, this is a simplification of the whole situation, but antivaxxers have made it clear that nuance is beyond them).
Those numbers aren’t comparable, though, and I have no idea what point you’re trying to make. That they aren’t comparable is clear from subtracting 5 from 5.8. If pertussis–or anything else–was causing 5/6 of all infant deaths, it would be the commonest cause of infant mortality. The appropriate comparison for “infants who contract whooping cough” isn’t infants who die because of birth defects, but all infants. (Similarly for preterm birth and pregnancy complications)
The only thing I can get out of those numbers is that, now that we have a vaccine, whooping cough isn’t one of the top three causes of infant mortality.
Vicki, um, that IS all infants. 5.8 per 1000 live births is our total infant death rate in the US, with the top three contributors to that 5.8 being things that have nothing to do with infant vaccines. Simply put, even if we pretend that some number of current infant deaths were caused by infant vaccines, vaccination is much safer than the diseases it prevents and infant death rate is a very weak argument against vaccines. And since studies show vaccines don’t cause the ultimately small number of deaths that antivaxxers want to claim, there’s no argument there to be found against vaccines.
Does that help explain the point I was going for?
@ F68.10: “But it’s seemingly conclusive enough to consider that it’s worth vaccinating.”
Depends on the risks of both the vaccine and the disease, including the probability of contracting the disease. IMO, the risks of vaccination are well worth the benefits for the majority of vaccines. I part company with many here with not coming to the same conclusion for all vaccines and allowing that people with different values (such as religious objections) may legitimately come to different conclusions than I have.
@ F68.10: “The downside is that they confuse “the parameters we’ve been checking are OK” with “everything’s OK”. That mismatch is likely what explains the discrepancy of perception you, as a statistician, have comparatively to doctors who have to believe they know how to take action on available evidence.”
Yes, that’s accurate.
@ Julian Frost: “Over 4000 results, some dating back to the 1990’s, were returned. How much more conclusive do you want the evidence to be?”
Conclusive doesn’t depend solely on the total number of research studies, but their content. How much agreement is there across those 4000 different studies? The link provided by Dorit only listed studies that showed no conclusive relationship. Studies listed on anti-vax sites have different conclusions. That’s why the evidence isn’t sufficient to support a broad generalization such as vaccines have “already been shown not to cause SIDS”.
”IMO, the risks of vaccination are well worth the benefits for the majority of vaccines. I part company with many here with not coming to the same conclusion for all vaccines”
So, which vaccines are on the Beth Approved Schedule and which fail to make the grade?
Should be simple enough to answer.
@ Dangerous Bacon
“So, which vaccines are on the Beth Approved Schedule and which fail to make the grade?”
JAQing off, Dangerous Bacon? So unlike you… Careful: Beth seems to be JAQing off on a Super Saiyan level. Maybe you should acknowledge your limitations.
@ Beth
First, the studies listed on antivax websites are retracted studies, studies with questionable/flawed methodology, studies that did not make it through the peer-review process, etc. And even if one or two studies cited by antivaxxers were well-done, science doesn’t rely on one or two studies. Even a “perfectly” conducted placebo-controlled double-blind randomized trial can draw a false result because blinded randomization doesn’t ensure that one eliminates some unmeasured factor affecting one group more than another. A simple example. Imagine a bowl with 100 marbles, 10 red and 90 green. Blindfolded, one places a sample, 20 in each group. Do it over and over again and the average will be 2 red and 8 green in each group; but one could actually get even all 10 red in one group and all green in the other group. This is where statistics comes in. However, that is why we look at all studies, look at their methodologies, and then summarize because the chance that one or more unmeasured factors would always be in one group as opposed to another becomes Infinitesimal
Second, the studies supporting vaccines have been reviewed, have been used in meta-analyses, even included in comprehensive reviews by the Institute of Medicine. And these reviews have found strong concordance between the studies.
As for your claim: “That’s why the evidence isn’t sufficient to support a broad generalization such as vaccines have “already been shown not to cause SIDS”.”
As I explained above, SIDS wasn’t even a category prior to 1975, so we don’t have any idea how many children died from it. If one goes back to early 20th Century and even further back, infant mortality was quite high. And even further back in time, even higher, before mass vaccinations. And you ignore that SIDS cases have plummeted while we have added two more vaccines.
And you are making one of the typical flawed assumptions, that we haven’t proved the null hypothesis. The null hypothesis with vaccine safety studies is simply that no difference exists between vaccinated and non vaccinated on some adverse measure(s). When a study finds no difference, no matter how many studies, all one sees is one can’t reject the null hypothesis; but it doesn’t prove it true. One can hypothesize numerous reasons no difference was found; e.g., sample size not large enough, definition/criteria for adverse event not reliable/accurate, and on and on it goes.
Basically, you and other antivaxxers will NEVER accept, regardless of how many studies, regardless of how well done, that vaccines not associated with ASD or SIDS. Your approach falls more under the banner of religion than science.
There are several flaws in antivaxxers approach, among them are:
Compared to what? In the case of SIDS, ignoring the inverse relationship between plummeting cases and increased vaccinations and that historically we don’t know how many cases of SIDS prior to 1975.
Ignoring/downplaying the harms from the vaccine-preventable diseases, e.g., the oral polio vaccine was found to have caused a dozen or so cases per year; but without it, there would have been 10,000 or more. Any rational person would go for vaccines. If one applied grossly exaggerating adverse events to all medicine, in fact, even foods, we would be in real trouble. People do suffer various adverse events from antibiotics; e.g., anaphylactic shock, liver damage, etc.; but when used properly antibiotics literally save 10 of thousands of lives for every serious adverse event. I could give numerous examples.
You really don’t know how vaccines work; that is, you don’t understand immunology, microbiology, epidemiology, and biostatistics.
So, bottom line, you literally don’t know what you are talking about; but I doubt anything will change your mind.
However, as I’ve suggested numerous times on this blog, if you have even an inkling of open-mindedness, start with Lauren Sompayrac’s “How the Immune System Works (6th edition). Available at: amazon.com or, perhaps, earlier editions at your public library.
Note that I give the link to the National Academy of Medicines review of vaccines and SIDS above.
And as for some vaccines may be OK; but others not, which ones NOT? Pertussis with 100 day cough, sometimes brain damage from hard jerk of head, vision damage, many hospitalized, and deaths. How about rotavirus, prior to vaccine, 50,000 hospitalizations per year, 30 – 50 deaths, and, though intussusception found with first rotavirus vaccine, the actual virus causes a much larger number.
I’m going to identify what I’m responding to in your post by numbering the paragraphs
Paragraph 1: Thanks for the statistics lesson, but I have a reasonable grasp of the subject. I did my Ph.D. dissertation on null hypotheses of non-equivalence. Yes, we want to look at all studies, not just cherry pick the ones with conclusions we like. Which is how your statement “And even if one or two studies cited by antivaxxers were well-done, science doesn’t rely on one or two studies.” comes across to me.
Paragraph 2: Could you provide a cite for meta-analysis of studies looking at SIDS and vaccines? I haven’t seen one for that particular issue. Assuming it exists, you have a valid point in favor of consensus
Paragraph 3-5: “typical flawed assumptions, that we haven’t proved the null hypothesis” Why do you consider it a ‘flawed assumption’. If the power computation is provided, it will tell us the certainty with which we can conclude the null is true. IIRC, one of the studies in the link Dorit provided mentioned a power <= 80% for a detectible difference of 2x. Without that information, all we can conclude is that we did not show a statistically significant difference, not that the null hypothesis is true.
Paragraph 6: Here you move to the personal disparaging remarks, sweeping me in with anti-vaxxers, when I have made it clear that I believe vaccination works and that for most recommended vaccines, agree that the benefit is worth the risk. I suspect it’s because you recognize that what I said was correct. Sweeping generations such as vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS” are not supported by the available evidence despite the plethora of studies concluding they found no relationship between the two.
Paragraph 7-8: In the piece being discussed, they did comparisons (Fig 14) of 2020 with 2014 to 2019. That seems quite reasonable. Something related to the pandemic and our response to it is clearly resulting in fewer <18 deaths. But as you pointed out, we don’t know why this is occurring and other plausible explanations are apparent. It could be one or more of those. It will, of course be interesting, to see how the official SIDS results compare when those statistics are available. 2014 to 2019 compared with 2020 would a reasonable set. We could look at it farther back, but SIDS has been steadily decreasing for years. I believe the ‘back to sleep’ movement gets most of the credit for that.
Paragraph 9: What have I said that you feel was “Ignoring/downplaying the harms from the vaccine-preventable diseases”
Paragraph 10-11: More personally disparaging remarks.
Paragraph 12: It’s nice of you to add to my reading list. Would you like me to give you some suggestions regarding statistics books?
Paragraph 13: Actually, no I hadn’t noted that. I don’t read all replies to Christine. Sometimes people are quite mean to her and I don’t like reading that. But I went back and found it. Thanks. It has a link to the publicly available database. I bookmarked it so I can use it later. At some point we should have reliable statistics for SIDS deaths during the pandemic and can look at see. Like you, I suspect it will not be more than a small portion of the decline in deaths. It’s always nice to verify one’s assumptions.
Paragraph 13: All of them are OK. Unlike actual anti-vaxxers (I don’t consider myself anti-vax), I wouldn’t deny other people the right to make use of them. I just don’t always find the risk/benefit to me personally to be worth it. I like making my own decisions about such matters and I don’t mind sharing my reasons. I haven’t had but a couple of flu vaccines since I quit teaching. When I was teaching, I felt the risk of my getting the flu was high enough that the vaccine was worthwhile. Now that I have relatively little exposure to the public, my risk is low and I often don’t bother. Pertussis was one I got my kids, the DPT actually. Rotovirus was only recently approved when my youngest was born (1999 – he’s officially an adult now). I was not inclined to risk a new vaccine for a disease I never heard of before my doctor told me about the vaccine for it. BTW, that vaccine was recalled shortly after I declined it.
Which goes to show the sensitivity of postmarketing surveillance — that was an ~0.015% increase in the chance of intussusception.
Studies listed on anti-vax sites have different conclusions. That’s why the evidence isn’t sufficient to support a broad generalization
“Lying liars cherry-pick evidence and ignore everything they don’t like, so we must do the same.”
@ Smut
Yeah. I have real real trouble following Beth on that one…
Please provide the quantitative checklist for scoring “agreement.”
@ Beth
You write: “If the power computation is provided, it will tell us the certainty with which we can conclude the null is true.”
Nope, one can NEVER prove the null hypothesis, just not reject it. I could care less what you claim your education is. Besides having a M.S. in biometry, I have had three courses in Philosophy of Science (basically how one makes causal judgments) and umpteen courses in research methods, including social psychology, experimental psychology, educational psychology and epidemiology. Believe what you want; but science/research doesn’t give “certainty” only probabilities; but at some point the probabilities reach a level that one has to make a decision.
You write: “I suspect it’s because you recognize that what I said was correct. Sweeping generations such as vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS” are not supported by the available evidence despite the plethora of studies concluding they found no relationship between the two.”
Nope, not even close. You are NOT correct. And you ignore the fact that SIDS wasn’t even a diagnosis prior to 1970s, so impossible to claim that vaccines increased it and you ignore that adding two vaccines occurred at the same time that SIDS cases plummeted.
You write: “I just don’t always find the risk/benefit to me personally to be worth it. . . Now that I have relatively little exposure to the public, my risk is low.”
Thanks, now we know that you don’t consider yourself part of a community. If you don’t vaccinate yourself or your kids, maybe your genetics will give a mild case of some vaccine-preventable disease; but you could pass it on to someone not as fortunate. Vaccinations are both for the individual and the COMMUNITY. Americans tend to emphasize rights; but in a community, rights are balanced with responsibilities/obligations. “Relatively low exposure.” Wow, it only takes one exposure to get an airborne infection or to pass it on.
You write about the rotavirus vaccine: “BTW, that vaccine was recalled shortly after I declined it.” And as I explained, I and others disagree with it being recalled. They found a few cases of Intussusception; but the natural virus causes a higher number of cases. So, in the time between its withdrawal and approval of another rotavirus vaccine, six years, since 30 – 50 kids a year died from it, 50,000 per year were hospitalized, we had 180 – 300 deaths and 300,000 hospitalizations, including a higher number of cases of intussusception that would have been caused by the vaccine. So, due partly to antivaxxers, 180 – 300 deaths, 300,000 hospitalizations, and a number of cases of intussusception. Intussusception is not good; but most cases can be remedied with surgery, though a small number die; but, again, more from the natural virus.
You write: “Could you provide a cite for meta-analysis of studies looking at SIDS and vaccines? I haven’t seen one for that particular issue. Assuming it exists, you have a valid point in favor of consensus.”
Yep:
M M T Vennemann 1 , M Höffgen, T Bajanowski, H-W Hense, E A Mitchell (2007 Jun 21). Do Immunisations Reduce the Risk for SIDS? A Meta-Analysis. Vaccine; 25(26): 4875-4879.
“Conclusions: Immunisations are associated with a halving of the risk of SIDS. There are biological reasons why this association may be causal, but other factors, such as the healthy vaccinee effect, may be important. Immunisations should be part of the SIDS prevention campaigns.”
And besides the above, the Institute of Medicine has carried out a number of comprehensive reports on various aspects of vaccine safety. Each gives details of literature search, analyses of each study included, etc. Meta-analyses are nice; but good information syntheses can also be excellent. By the way, I took a graduate course in Information Synthesis & Meta-Analysis.
You can find ALL the Institute of Medicine’s Vaccine Safety Reports at:
https://www.nap.edu/search/?rpp=20&ft=1&term=vaccine+safety&pubtype=Consensus+Study+Reports
And as I explained above, they can ALL be downloaded free as pdfs
So, read the IOM on SIDS and read the above meta-analysis; but i doubt it will change your mind. You claim you aren’t an antivaccinationists; but you appear to think like they do, black and white, “certainty” null hypothesis true. I repeat, science doesn’t deal with certainties, so you give yourself away. If you really have a PhD in statistics doesn’t mean you understand research. My MS in biometry (biostatistics) degree was mainly various courses in applied statistics; but also courses in mathematical statistics. To this day I really don’t understand how some stats converge weakly in infinity and others strongly, something mathematical statisticians understand; but the ones I dealt with didn’t understand causal analyses.
And if you really want to understand vaccines, again, I suggest Lauren Sompayrac’s “How the Immune System Works (6th Edition).” I’ve several 850 pages undergraduate immunology texts; but his 160 page book was all I really needed. If you don’t understand how the immune system works, then you really don’t understand vaccines.
I’m curious, can you give the complete title of your dissertation, maybe I can find it online, Dissertation Abstracts. It’s been over 40 years since I studied statistics; but I’m curious, that is, if you are even telling the truth?
Again, I’ll number the paragraphs I’m responding to, not include the quotes from my post:
Paragraph 1: Of course, we NEVER prove the alternative is true either, we merely accept it as being true with a specified probability, usually 95% or better. Power computations provide a similar quantification of the certainly that the null is actually true. I quite understand that science only gives probabilities. When I said was “ the certainty with which we can conclude the null is true”, that refers to a quantification of the certainly, which is typically lower than the 95% that we reject the null with. I am not claiming 100% certainty. Why do you perceive my post as claiming certainty?
Paragraph 2: I’m sorry, but I’m not following why you think your statement shows I am incorrect regarding my statement. Just saying I’m not correct without explaining why isn’t going to convince me I’m wrong. I have never claimed that vaccines increased SIDS. I’ve only claimed that we can’t, based on the available evidence conclude that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”. There are not equivalent statements. Why do you perceive them that way?
Paragraph 3: You asked me to explain why I disagree in some cases with recommendations. I did so. You don’t have to agree, but opting not to get a flu vaccine is not symbolic of one’s commitment to one’s community. You might want to reconsider some of the assumptions you are making about people who feel differently than you do regarding vaccines.
Paragraph 4: You asked me to give examples and explain my reasoning. I declined it at the time because I judged the risk of a new vaccine to be higher than was claimed and the risk of the disease for my child to be very low. You can disagree with it the use of the term “recalled”, but it was temporarily pulled off the market and reformulated be safer which validates my assessment that the risk was higher than was claimed at the time.
Paragraph 5-10: While not a large enough set of studies to be conclusive on that point by itself, that meta-analysis does provide a valid point in favor of consensus. Thanks for the link.
Paragraph 11: “you appear to think like they do, black and white, “certainty” null hypothesis true”
What have I said to give you this impression? You are correct that science doesn’t deal in certainties. Even when we reject the null and accept the alternative, we haven’t proved the alternative true, merely provided a level of certainty that we have made the correct decision. Power computations allow us to make similar statements about the probability of the null being true. I’m not sure why you seem to consistently assume I’m making an error regarding this issue when I am trying to correct this exact error made earlier in this thread – i.e. when people make the claim that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”, they are expressing certainty that the null is true, not only for the studies that failed to reject the null, but for the broader null that there is no causal relationship between vaccines (plural) despite many of the studies being limited to one particular vaccination.
Paragraph 12: Since you chose to repeat this recommendation, I’ll repeat my response. It’s nice of you to add to my reading list. Would you like me to give you some suggestions regarding statistics books?
Paragraph 13: Title: Equivalence testing for mean vectors of multivariate normal populations” It’s available from my University at https://soar.wichita.edu/handle/10057/5407
I’ve answered your questions and ignored your disparaging personal comments.
Now, can you please answer my questions in this post and the previous one. I’ve asked why you misinterpreted what I’ve written on several specific points so that I can, in the future, be clearer in my future writing on the subject.
@ Beth
Thanks for link to your Dissertation. As I thought, from a mathematical point of view. And your degrees all in mathematics. So, no indication you have EVER studied “causal analyses”, or any applied research courses. Recommending some statistics books to me won’t change that I have both studied statistics and real world research methods.
Paragraph 1: Do you know about Type 1 and Type 2 errors? “In statistical hypothesis testing, a type I error is the rejection of a true null hypothesis, while a type II error is the non-rejection of a false null hypothesis. Much of statistical theory revolves around the minimization of one or both of these errors, though the complete elimination of either is a statistical impossibility for non-deterministic algorithms.” (Wikipedia. Type 1 and Type 2 errors). So, once again, you can’t “prove” the null hypothesis. And in some cases, the null hypotheses is simply a statistical artifact. For instance, when they tested hydroxychloroquine, remdesivir, etc. they certainly weren’t trying to “prove” a null hypothesis, i.e., that is they didn’t work; but in the midst of a pandemic, were trying to develop successful treatments. Is it possible that in a world of billions of people that a small number have some genetic predisposition/anomaly that, for instance, despite now overwhelming evidence, hydroxychloroquine might help them? Impossible to know, so can’t say NEVER will work. But we know that the risks much higher using.
Paragraph 2: You write: “I have never claimed that vaccines increased SIDS. I’ve only claimed that we can’t, based on the available evidence conclude that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”. There are not equivalent statements.”
“We can’t, based on the available evidence conclude that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”. There are not equivalent statements.”
Wow, if they have not been shown not to cause SIDS, at least the English language I speak means that the possibility they cause SIDS exists and, thus, increase SIDS. And, even without the meta-analysis, I gave you, for instance, a comprehensive review of SIDS and vaccines by the Institute of Medicine. If you reject their report, basically it wouldn’t matter if they had found 1,000 studies, all not finding a relationship, you would continue to question if a relationship existed. In other words, appears nothing will change your mind. And, despite education in mathematical statistics, have you ever taken a single course in epidemiology, education or social psychological research methods, or philosophy of science?
By the way, have you ever downloaded any of the studies that found no relationship and found any methodological flaws????
Paragraph 3: You write: “opting not to get a flu vaccine is not symbolic of one’s commitment to one’s community.”
If one is an antivaxxer and/or someone who foolishly discounts the risks of flu, maybe you’re just ignorant, otherwise, picking and choosing when or if your behaviors display a commitment to society is questionable. If you actually took the time to research flu, it can be devastating for old people, people with autoimmune diseases or currently undergoing chemotherapy which suppresses often the immune system. How could you be sure you NEVER interacted with one of them, e.g., in supermarket, etc.?
Paragraph 4: You write: “it was temporarily pulled off the market and reformulated be safer which validates my assessment that the risk was higher than was claimed at the time.”
So, you ignored what I wrote. The risk was actually lower because intussusception occurs much more often from the natural virus, so if the goal was to reduce intussusception, removing the vaccine was NOT a good choice, plus, the 50,000 hospitalizations and 30 – 50 deaths prevented by the vaccine. So, what did you base your “assessment that the risk was higher than was claimed at the time?” Did you, for instance, a PubMed search of rotavirus? Or even go to the CDC website? Nope, as far as I can tell, your assessment was based on ignorance.
Paragraph 11: You write: “when people make the claim that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”, they are expressing certainty that the null is true, not only for the studies that failed to reject the null, but for the broader null that there is no causal relationship between vaccines (plural) despite many of the studies being limited to one particular vaccination.”
First, you continue to ignore that cases of SIDS plummeted from mid-1990s at the same time they added two more vaccines. Second, you continue to ignore that SIDS wasn’t even a diagnostic category before 1975, so we have no baseline to decide if it even had been increasing, especially when infant mortality was high before vaccines. And you ignore that the consensus is based on many well-done studies. At some point a decision has to be made. Let’s for sake of argument believe that SIDS can be cause, rarely, by vaccines. So what do we do? Do we stop vaccinating? Then for every rare case of SIDS we will have literally millions of kids suffering, 100s of thousands hospitalized, 10s of thousands permanently disabled, and thousands dead. We don’t need to make a claim that the null hypothesis is “true”, just that vaccines overwhelmingly confer a benefit. If some parents, despite the overwhelming evidence, decide not to vaccinate, gradually we will lose herd immunity and more and more kids will suffer. So, the evidence is OVERWHELMING that the probability that vaccines DON’T cause or contribute to SIDS is extremely high.
You write: “I’ve asked why you misinterpreted what I’ve written on several specific points so that I can, in the future, be clearer in my future writing on the subject.”
I don’t think I misinterpreted anything you wrote. Anyone following this exchange want to chime in?
The book I recommended will allow you to go from mathematical statistics to the real world of how vaccines work.
But, just for fun, I’ll add a few more books:
Merwyn Susser (1973). Causal Thinking in the Health Sciences: Concepts and Strategies in Epidemiology. Oxford University Press. Used copies available on amazon.com. In my opinion, the best book on causal thinking ever.
Abraham Kaplan (1964). The Conduct of Inquiry: Methodology for Behavioral Science. Reprint paperback available at amazon.com
Donald T. Campbell (1988). Methodology and Epistemology for Social Sciences: Selected Papers. University of Chicago Press.
Kenneth J. Rothman & Sander Greenland (1998). Modern Epidemiology (Second Edition). Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. [especially Chapter 2: Causation and Causal Inference] I had first edition in class; but purchased and read second edition. Now out a third edition.
I should point out that I only had three semesters of Calculus and one of Linear Algebra. I got A’s but only because I worked my butt off. I’m not a natural at math. And, after getting my MPH I got a job; but continued to take courses to get my M.S. in biometry. However, I actually took ALL required courses for MS in epidemiology as well and even audited some doctoral level seminars (when I audit anything I do ALL the reading, make all the classes, etc).
And some of the Mathematical Stat books I had were (can’t find one of them. I moved a lot):
William Mendenhall, Dennis D. Wackerly & Richard L. Scheaffer (1990) Mathematical Statistics with Applications (Fourth Edition). PWS-Kent. I had an earlier edition; but purchased this later one and read it.
Raymond H. Myers & Janet S. Milton (1991). A First Course in the Theory of Linear Statistical Models. PWS-Kent. While on faculty of nearby medical school, I audited the course.
H. M. Blalock jr. (1985). Causal Models in the Social Sciences (Second Edition). ALDINE.
Judah Rosenblatt & Stoughton (1997). Mathematical Analysis for Modeling. CRC Press. Note I was friends with Rosenblatt, great guy, great teacher, and great statistician. He gave me the book which I went through with his help on the phone. I would NOT even attempted it if he had not been so patient with me.
Larry V. Hedges & Ingram Olkin (1985). Statistical Methods for Meta-Analysis. Academic Press.
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blockquote>”[T]he complete elimination of either is a statistical impossibility for non-deterministic algorithms.”
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blockquote>
That seems like an odd thing to leave lying around in a W—dia entry (without a direct reference; No. 2 is a short 1975 paper about hemoglobin binding that seems to be completely inexplicable). What about deterministic algorithms? This is supposed to be NP-hard, or something?
Sorry to interrupt, but this just strikes me as odd.
@ Joel
“As I thought, from a mathematical point of view. And your degrees all in mathematics.”
That’s bigotry.
Tired of the “You’re a mathematician. I’m a doctor. I’m better than you” Gambit. Had it all my life thrown at me. The part I like best is when doctors claim they can think of Reality based on Evidence while you can’t because you rely on Logic.
I’ve always been fascinated by this Anti-Logic streak in Modern Skepticism.
I’d rather be Anti-Science than Anti-Logic anyday.
Rant
Makes me want to send free money to Scientology. Gratis.
@ Joel
“And, despite education in mathematical statistics, have you ever taken a single course in epidemiology, education or social psychological research methods, or philosophy of science?”
Oh no… Not this one…
Please stop Joel, or I’m going to start to call you “Mommy”…
@ Joel
“I don’t think I misinterpreted anything you wrote. Anyone following this exchange want to chime in?”
Well, I’ll chime in and quote one of my university professors in survival analysis. A practitioner. He told me that if there’s one group of professionals he refuses to work with, it’s medical doctors.
I giggled when I heard that one. Uncontrollably.
Because I wouldn’t want to either…
Luckily the Weibull distribution, very much used in survival analysis, was invented by a guy working in the arms industry. So it’s not like we’re sentenced to work for know-it-all doctors all the time.
Waiting for Beth to tell us which vaccines she supports and which she doesn’t. Remote history about her kids doesn’t qualify.
Note for F68.10: JAQing off is advancing a position surreptitiously by phrasing it in the form of a question. Of course, when one does it often enough (as in Beth’s case) the tactic becomes obvious to everyone.
@ Dangerous Bacon
“Note for F68.10: JAQing off is advancing a position surreptitiously by phrasing it in the form of a question.”
OK. So the point that makes you not “JAQing off” is that you were not surreptitiously but blatantly advancing a position by phrasing it in the form of a question?
If you do mind me asking…
More seriously: I’ll have a turn at Just Asking Questions to Beth when I’ll find a bit of free time.
How am I ”blatantly advancing a position” by asking Beth what vaccines she supports and which she doesn’t?*
You’ve got a ways to go to descend to Christine’s level of reading comprehension, but this is not a good start. 🙂
*Beth, who has a long history here and on SBM of antivaccine advocacy, yesterday said: “IMO, the risks of vaccination are well worth the benefits for the majority of vaccines. I part company with many here with not coming to the same conclusion for all vaccines”. It’d be interesting and possibly even educational if she was willing to explain which vaccines she accepts. Not that it’s likely she will, as JAQing off seems to be more fun for her.
@ Dangerous Bacon
“You’ve got a ways to go to descend to Christine’s level of reading comprehension, but this is not a good start.”
Operation Mindfuck is Religious Duty for Discordians.
“It’d be interesting and possibly even educational if she was willing to explain which vaccines she accepts.”
Well, personally, I do not mind vaccines in any way — nor do I care that much — but I do question the wisdom of always pushing for more and more prophylaxis in society. I do not like the way it goes. So this is a blanket statement I make towards medicine in general and not vaccines in particular. But I also would raise the question on the least useful — and not necessarily the most “dangerous” — vaccines if I were asked to, though I would not tune in to Del Bigtree’s show even if I were threatened into it with imminent murder.
It’s the social value of all vaccines cumulatively that I have trouble buying, and it’s a corollary of a much more general feeling I have towards medical interventions in general. Safety doesn’t bother me too much. Social value assessment of cumulative prophylactic interventions much more (I do have the feeling that the public is sometimes emotionally blackmailed into accepting them – the Horrible Human Being Gambit), and moral hazard in medical matters generally much more: I’m fine being sick if I’m more or less responsible for that situation; but I do mind jerks telling me that I was Born Sick and am Ordered to be Well and that they are my Saviour. Feels a lot like the Dogma of Original Sin to me, and I’m not willing to take any of that nonsense any more from anyone, doctors included. Well, doctors specifically, in fact…
So Beth’s statement can be held without reference to any specific vaccine. Therefore, it’s not entirely conceivable that your question could be based on false assumptions; and I therefore abide by discordians’ ternary logic: and claim that the correct answer to your question, at least in my view, is:
Mu!
I haven’t been able to pinpoint Beth’s position on vaccines in general (though I do acknowledge that she has a slant), so I take for the time being what she says at face value: the question of religious view and of freedom of consciousness on vaccines is indeed one I believe is not taken seriously enough. As long as it doesn’t endanger herd immunity. Is that “antivaccine advocacy” in your eyes? Seems so. (I just answered that question myself to avoid JAQing off too much. Do not thank me. It’s perfectly natural.)
She is known for repeating the same ol’ trope questions. She comes in to “politely” inquire, gets a full answer, then does not accept that answer, it is explained again, she moves a few goal posts, then we ignore and she goes away. Then a few weeks later she repeats with the same ol’ trope questions… and we repeat the cycle.
@ Chris:
OT
But I know how you appreciate the accuracy of journalism at Natural News:
is it true? Black Lives Matter terrorists raping in Seattle
Be our Woman on the Scene.
(Joking)
Although, truthfully, anti-vaxxers and woo-proponents quote NN as reliable..
There does seem to be quite a bit of panic over six blocks of one moderate sized city. It consists to about three blocks of street that are blocked, and a park. There are no Black Lives Matter terrorists.
There are, however, some homeless tents that have set up in one part of the park because those people figured it was safer. Though one person tried to take advantage of a deaf woman. Then there are couple of idiots who use the movement to cause havoc. If you read below you will see both acts were stopped:
https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2020/06/19/43938596/chop-medic-intervened-in-a-sexual-assault-in-cal-anderson
There have been instances of alt-right folks coming in trying to create problems:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/6/18/1954215/-Welcome-to-CHOP-An-open-community-but-targeted-for-violence-by-Trump-and-his-fanboys
There was some idiot with a gun in the wee hours who managed to kill a young man who had just graduated from high school, and injured another man. There are lots of rumors, but very little actual data on what actually happened. As per normal each witness (including the police) all have different versions of what happened. That one will require patience.
@ DB,
So SIDS is the fault of inattentive parents? Smh.
Yeah if only I hadn’t fallen asleep after that 12 hour shift & trying to make her comfortable as she shrieked until 2 am with that weird piercing scream.
After hours triage pediatrician “Oh that irritability is NORMAL if she was vaccinated today”.
@ Beth,
Back to Sleep also works to lower mortality rates of epileptics due to SUDEP.
My guess is that vaccination is inducing seizure like activity in infants & the Back to Sleep campaign mitigated the incidence of mortality.
Your guesses appear to be strongly motivated by your desire to blame vaccines for your tragic loss.
Note that there is no evidence or support for that belief. In fact, there are studies that looked at whether vaccines cause SIDS and found that they did not.
@ Smut Clyde,
“Vaccines can cause a cytokine storm
So can alien abductions."
Thanks for lending your expertise to the matter.
You are welcome to provide evidence that vaccines cause cytokine storms. We know that some diseases that vaccines protect against do.
[…] Antivaxxers Amy Becker and Mark Blaxill deceptively use COVID-19 death statistics to claim that vacc… […]
I especially like how this author claims that a “massive” measles outbreak occured when in reality there were a reported 65 cases and ZERO deaths according to my own research on the CDC website. He really likes to pick and choose the links he provides.
@ Amanda Hozgang
Measles disappeared from the U.S. in 1990s; but, along with rise of antivaxxers, again we have cases. While you might not think 65 cases amounts to much, each and every one could have needed hospitalization, suffered permanent disability; e.g., brain damage, loss of hearing, or death. Yep, didn’t happen to any of them; but if 65 cases where there were none, could be harbinger for many more.
During the 1950s with less than half our current population, well over one million children per year got measles, most just suffered for a week or so, and, at the time, majority of mothers were housewives, nowadays, with many women working, staying home for a week with a child can affect ones economy (which it did during 1950s for poor families where women HAD to work) and the kid, would, of course, miss school. However, in the 1950s there were an average of 45,000 hospitalizations and 450 – 500 deaths. Without the vaccine, during the past 60 years we would have experienced, assuming population growth, a total of around 1.5 million hospitalizations, 4 – 5,000 deaths, and around 10,000 with permanent disabilities.
So, yep, 65 might not sound like much; but from 0 to 65 is a warning.
As usual, typical antivaxxer ignores what the world would be like without the vaccine. Ignorant of immunology, microbiology, epidemiology, the history and current status of vaccine-preventable diseases (many just a plane flight away)
You misspelled “147” (under 2015) and forgot the 159 in Quebec.
At least there’s the second-chance drawing for SSPE.
@ Christine Kincaid
Did you read what I wrote above on SIDS? Did you even try to read the IOM report or the article I gave?
This is just more proof that you ignore anything and everything and just keep on posting your unscientific fantasy beliefs.
And, once again, you have consistently ignored what I have written refuting claims made by you.
Quite simply, you are a combination of stupid and dishonest. A perfect combination.
@ Dorit,
My guess is that the studies are conducted by those motivated to deny any signal from vaccines to SIDS.
@ Christine Kincaid
You write: “My guess is that the studies are conducted by those motivated to deny any signal from vaccines to SIDS.”
First, as I’ve written numerous times, studies on vaccine safety have been carried out in numerous nations with different cultures, histories, political, economic, educational systems. Do you really think that all the researchers, MDs, epidemiologists, etc. would endanger the health of their nation’s children?
As for your guess, basically, you believe you are absolutely right, you can’t discredit the studies by going through their sampling, design, statistics, etc., so the only choice you have left is to attack the researchers. You really are stupid, dishonest, and suffer from delusions of grandeur, that is, that what you choose to believe is absolutely right, so others must be dishonest. Get help!
And you still ignore what I wrote above about SIDS. And I’m certain you didn’t download and read the IOM report or the article I referenced. After all, why bother when you know you are right, so all else must be lies.
You are truly a despicable excuse for a human being.
My guess is that you are wearing major blinders because you can’t see past your own agenda, and would be better off not spending the anniversary of your daughter’s death on this website. Seriously, it’s both that and Father’s Day. Go spend time with your family.
At risk of sounding, conservative or parochial ( perish the thought!)..
I think that CK’s frequent responses are symptomatic of her issues rather than standard commentary on a blog thus commenters who respond to her should be aware that they may possibly be not discouraging her to behave in this fashion when it might be advantageous instead to encourage other outlets such as professional counselling or therapy. Have any of the anti-vax mothers Orac surveys improved their lots in life- or their children’s- an iota through endless posts. pages, comments and books written over the years? Or do they become more deeply entrenched in the mire of unrealistic beliefs and lost causes? As I mentioned previously, if these beliefs are so reality-based, why can no one ever find a single, accredited university that teaches a course in them? Why does a single, fact-based news source not entertain them? Why instead do opportunistic quacks and distraught, uneducated parents comprise their base?
Is it all a plot? Or a florid phantasmagoria of imagination run wild?
Given that it’s both Father’s Day and the anniversary of her daughter’s death, and she’s posted here multiple time, I suspect you may be right.
You’re probably right, Denice, and that’s a good reason to stop addressing her.
I’m not quite sure how to balance it with not letting her mislead readers unfamiliar. Maybe we should have one person, whoever gets there first, respond once when she comment reminding readers and then stopping. That’s not an instruction to anyone, just thinking it out.
@Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH
The replies have bottomed out so I can’t reply to your post. I’ll quote the bits I’m responding to from your most recent post.
“So, no indication you have EVER studied “causal analyses”, or any applied research courses. ” Why yes, I have taken such courses. Do you want to see my transcript too? It appears you only wanted to see my dissertation in order to make some disparaging personal remarks.
“Do you know about Type 1 and Type 2 errors?…So, once again, you can’t “prove” the null hypothesis. ” Yes I do understand the difference between type I and type II errors. Why do you continue to misinterpret me as claiming the null hypothesis can be proven when I’ve repeated stated the opposite?
“If one is an antivaxxer and/or someone who foolishly discounts the risks of flu, maybe you’re just ignorant, otherwise, picking and choosing when or if your behaviors display a commitment to society is questionable. If you actually took the time to research flu, it can be devastating for old people, people with autoimmune diseases or currently undergoing chemotherapy which suppresses often the immune system. How could you be sure you NEVER interacted with one of them, e.g., in supermarket, etc.?” I can’t be sure. Neither can you. Moreover, we can’t know whether it would have been any different had I gotten the flu vaccine every year. I get vaccines because I think it will benefit me to do so. If I don’t think the benefit to me is worth the costs, then the tiny additional benefit to herd immunity isn’t sufficient to change that evaluation. Disparaging me personally because I made a different decision that you think best is not a persuasive argument. You asked me to explain my reasoning. I did so. Then you attacked me for it. This is not nice behavior on your part.
“if they have not been shown not to cause SIDS, at least the English language I speak means that the possibility they cause SIDS exists and, thus, increase SIDS. ” Yes, the possibility exists. That’s different from claiming that vaccines increase SIDS. Why are you insisting that the two statements are equivalent when they are not and claiming I said the second rather than realizing I was saying the first. I find it odd that the same error you keep accusing me of making is apparently unrecognized by you when it’s your claim that the null hypothesis must be true and no relationship exists.
If you reject their report, basically it wouldn’t matter if they had found 1,000 studies” I didn’t reject their report. I said that the number of studies they included (I think it was 9) was insufficient to provide conclusive evidence regarding a consensus. Do you think that should be sufficient to claim consensus when someone else above claimed there were more than 4000 published articles on the issue?
“By the way, have you ever downloaded any of the studies that found no relationship and found any methodological flaws????” Methodological flaws, no. I generally look closely at the statistical analysis rather than methods because statistic analysis is an area where I can spot flaws while methods I’m not as well versed in.
So, you ignored what I wrote.” Yes. It wasn’t pertinent to my analysis at that time. As I said, you can disagree, but you did ask me for my reasoning. I provided it. I didn’t trust the CDC committee risk assessment for a brand new vaccine because all members of the committee at that time had waivers filed for conflict of interest with pharmaceutical companies. The fact that they later removed and reformulated that vaccine shows that, in fact, I was correct on the point of their risk assessment of the vaccine being too low at that time.
“First, you continue to ignore that cases of SIDS plummeted from mid-1990s at the same time they added two more vaccines. Second, you continue to ignore that SIDS wasn’t even a diagnostic category before 1975, so we have no baseline to decide if it even had been increasing, especially when infant mortality was high before vaccines. ” This does not make sense to me. How can we know that cases of SIDS plummeted from the mid 1990’s if SIDS wasn’t even a diagnostic category before 1975 so we have no baseline to decide if it even had been increasing? Either we can make an assessment as to whether it has gone up or down since we started tracking or we can’t conclude that cases of SIDS plummeted from the mid 1990’s. Personally I think we can conclude that it has plummeted. Likewise, when statistics are available, I think we’ll be able to conclude whether or not SIDS plummeted during the lockdown. Even if it did, that wouldn’t mean we conclude vaccines were the reason. It would only mean we need to investigate why it happened. More likely, it will show that SIDS did not decline dramatically, but we won’t know for sure until the data is available.
“What do we do? Do we stop vaccinating?” My answer is we study the situation (which we have and continue to do so) and no, we don’t stop vaccinating.
I don’t think I misinterpreted anything you wrote.” I’ve given a number of examples of where you have misinterpreted me and asked why. I’ll list them again:
What have I said that you feel was “Ignoring/downplaying the harms from the vaccine-preventable diseases”Why do you perceive my post as claiming certainty?
“you appear to think like they do, black and white, “certainty” null hypothesis true” What have I said to give you this impression?
and from earlier in this post:
Why do you continue to misinterpret me as claiming the null hypothesis can be proven when I’ve repeated stated the opposite?
Just use the most recent reply button.
@ Beth
You write: “So, no indication you have EVER studied “causal analyses”, or any applied research courses. ” Why yes, I have taken such courses. Do you want to see my transcript too? It appears you only wanted to see my dissertation in order to make some disparaging personal remarks AND “By the way, have you ever downloaded any of the studies that found no relationship and found any methodological flaws????” Methodological flaws, no. I generally look closely at the statistical analysis rather than methods because statistic analysis is an area where I can spot flaws while methods I’m not as well versed in.”
First, I said your dissertation appeared to be quite good, not exactly disparaging. Second, if you took any courses in causal analysis, what you have written in your comments indicate you didn’t learn much from them. Especially you state you don’t understand methodology which is, at least in all the courses and books I read the key to causal analysis. So, have you looked at a number of the studies that found no association between vaccines and SIDS? And, if so, please, what statistical problems did you find?
I don’t need your transcript but just for fun, I gave a list of some of the texts I’ve had in courses, please list the texts you used in your “causal” course(s).
You write: “Moreover, we can’t know whether it would have been any different had I gotten the flu vaccine every year. I get vaccines because I think it will benefit me to do so. If I don’t think the benefit to me is worth the costs, then the tiny additional benefit to herd immunity isn’t sufficient to change that evaluation.”
So, tell me, how much time have you devoted to studying flu, its history, etc.? I have read probably a dozen books on flu, many chapters, and hundreds of journal articles. Maybe your getting the flu shot won’t benefit herd immunity much; but you could still pass it on to someone vulnerable and if more people think like you, then we lose herd immunity. You really are a selfish self-centered person. At least be honest and admit it.
You write: ““if they have not been shown not to cause SIDS, at least the English language I speak means that the possibility they cause SIDS exists and, thus, increase SIDS. ” Yes, the possibility exists. That’s different from claiming that vaccines increase SIDS. Why are you insisting that the two statements are equivalent when they are not and claiming I said the second rather than realizing I was saying the first. I find it odd that the same error you keep accusing me of making is apparently unrecognized by you when it’s your claim that the null hypothesis must be true and no relationship exists.”
You wrote: “I have never claimed that vaccines increased SIDS. I’ve only claimed that we can’t, based on the available evidence conclude that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”. There are not equivalent statements.”
You are really sick or, despite being good at math, stupid because they are equivalent, at least in the English language I learned. Above you clearly are claiming that vaccines may cause SIDS, since, according to you they have not been shown not to cause SIDS.
You write: “The fact that they later removed and reformulated that vaccine [rotavirus] shows that, in fact, I was correct on the point of their risk assessment of the vaccine being too low at that time.”
You really are incredibly stupid. I explained that due partly to public pressures the vaccine was withdrawn; but the risk from the vaccine was far lower than from the actual disease, which, in your tremendous stupidity, you probably don’t know that almost every child got rotavirus once and sometimes more than once. I repeat, the risk from the vaccine, intussusception was lower than the risk of intussusception from the actual virus and the vaccine prevented 50,000 hospitalization per year and 30 – 50 deaths. How in hell do you read from this that their risk assessment for withdrawing it was too low????
You write: “Likewise, when statistics are available, I think we’ll be able to conclude whether or not SIDS plummeted during the lockdown.”
No, it won’t for several reasons. One, SIDS apparently is seasonal, at least cases higher at certain times of the year, so will depend partly on how long the lockdown continues. Second, as others have written, with lockdown parents may be devoting more time and attention to children. And I doubt it will have “plummeted” a term I used when it dropped from 130 to 40 per 100,000 in a little less than 15 years while adding two vaccines. What you write just proves that you still don’t want to rule out vaccines, despite the OVERWHELMING research. Did you even download the free pdf of IOM report?
You write: “Why do you continue to misinterpret me as claiming the null hypothesis can be proven when I’ve repeated stated the opposite?”
I didn’t say that; but that your approach to keep questioning studies, a mass of them that found no association between vaccines and SIDS made clear that you don’t trust all the research that has been done, so you want more and more and more. Which implies that, despite what you say, more or less, you believe that NO research can ever “prove” that vaccines don’t cause some cases of SIDS. And you claimed that researchers were claiming that the null hypothesis had been proved which I clear debunked with a detailed explanation.
Stop making a fool of yourself, As I explained humbly to F68.10, I’m not good at math; but have had during my lifetime a number of top researchers ask me about methods, etc. And to add, I never developed a real career, partly because I lived in five different nations, and partly because I never could make up my mind to focus narrowly on one topic. Even today I am currently reading a new edition of immunology text, reviewing chapters in undergraduate microbiology book that I did some proof reading and editorial suggestions (my name in acknowledgments of two microbiology books), reading probably best book ever debunking racial differences in intelligence, Stephen J. Gould’s “Mismeasure of Man (2nd edition)” which I read years ago and reading some of Karl Marx works that show he would NEVER have approved of Stalin or the Soviet Union. He was a humanist who wanted to enable people, all people to reach their potential. So, hard for me to focus, though last few years I have devoted a lot of time and effort into writing papers supporting vaccines, some with 150 references, though I may have read twice as many in preparation.
You are tiresome. You’ve made it clear that the large number of well-done studies on vaccines and SIDS not enough for you. You’ve made it clear that you still want more studies. You’ve even stated that you don’t know much about methodology, so how in hell can you decide that all the studies weren’t enough?
Oh, by the way I was one of two people who edited an introductory biostatistics textbook, applied statistics, not mathematical.
And can you explain to me why some stats converge weakly in infinity and others strongly?
If you don’t like being called stupid, I suggest you stop commenting on this blog as I doubt you will change.
“First, I said your dissertation appeared to be quite good, not exactly disparaging.” That would be a valid point if you had said that in the previous post. But you didn’t.
And following up with more disparaging personal remarks doesn’t exactly bolster your point.
“You really are a selfish self-centered person. At least be honest and admit it.”
Nice attempt at shaming. Yes, I am selfish. So are you. We are human. All humans are selfish. I’m also generous and giving and contribute to my community. For example, I’ve donated more than 10 gallons of whole blood to the Red Cross. We differ in regard to whether the cost/benefit ratio of receiving voluntary flu vacations is substantially changed by the benefit to the community – i.e. herd immunity. That’s a different value judgement, not a moral failing.
“You are tiresome.”
“You are really sick or, despite being good at math, stupid”
“You really are incredibly stupid”
“Stop making a fool of yourself”
“If you don’t like being called stupid, I suggest you stop commenting on this blog as I doubt you will change.”
This recent post has nearly exceeded my tolerance with regard to the ratio of substantive points to disparaging personal remarks.
“I gave a list of some of the texts I’ve had in courses, please list the texts you used in your “causal” course(s).”
“And can you explain to me why some stats converge weakly in infinity and others strongly?”
If you want me to answer any more of your questions, you need to answer mine first and back-off the disparaging personal remarks. Here they are again, along with yet another misinterpretation of what I wrote from this post.
What have I said that you feel was “Ignoring/downplaying the harms from the vaccine-preventable diseases?
Why did you perceive my post as claiming certainty?
“you appear to think like they do, black and white, “certainty” null hypothesis true”
What have I said to give you this impression?
Here’s another misinterpretation: You’ve made it clear that the large number of well-done studies on vaccines and SIDS not enough for you.
No, I’m not complaining the studies are not enough. I’m complaining about people making claims that exceed the scope of the evidence. Not researchers making that claim, as researchers are usually careful about that, but people on this blog.
Of course, if you think I’m too tiresome and stupid to converse with, that’s totally your decision. I don’t stop posting because people insult me. But I do stop interacting with posters when their insults exceed their conversational value.
I see that Kant reference sailed right over your head.
I’m not a big Kant fan overall, but this simply captures the wholesale absence any ethico-moral system.
^ A quick refresher suggests to me that Hume would also take a dim view of routine.
^^ “this” routine
@ Narad
“I’m not a big Kant fan overall, but this simply captures the wholesale absence any ethico-moral system.”
I also tend to think that this moral assessment is wrong. If she simply stated that she is lazy or malevolent, I’d go “OK”. But not assuming lazyness or malevolence, this is hard to understand. Because, yes, on this I agree with Joel: the stakes are not personal but collective.
@ F68.10
As I’ve written in previous comments: I consider myself reasonably intelligent and well educated, well read; but if someone gave me several plans for building a bridge, I could NOT reasonably decide which one is best plan because I’ve NEVER studied structural engineering.
I have friends who studied theoretical physics, brilliant, far more intelligent than I am; but they admitted they could not work in applied physics. While one doesn’t necessarily need a degree, it is STUPID, very STUPID to think you or anyone else, regardless of how intelligent you are and how educated you are in specific subjects, that without even attempting to learn the basics of other subjects to think you have any capability to discuss. Just one bit short of our current President who doesn’t need anyone with expertise since he considers himself an intuitive genius.
And, if you didn’t notice, I also rebutted what Beth wrote. Beth has given absolutely NO evidence that she has attempted to learn how vaccine work, e.g., basics of immunology, or to learn how causal arguments are made, nor the methodologies of epidemiology, social psychology, etc. In fact, I looked at her dissertation, appears quite good; but reference list entirely mathematical. And she ignored everything I wrote about SIDS, regurgitating that just because there are a number of studies showing no association with vaccines, doesn’t mean there isn’t one. In other words, I doubt if anything will change her mind. And when I explained why mistake to remove first rotavirus vaccine, she had decided it was even more dangerous, based on what? Not any research, e.g., PubMed or even CDC. So, yep, having three degrees in math quite impressive; but not when she makes absurd claims about other disciplines.
By the way, just to be honest, as I wrote, I took three courses in Calculus. Each course I purchased books by The Research and Education Association, e.g, The Calculus Problem Solver, good succinct explanations and problems worked out clearly step by step. I also purchased Calculus for Dummies. I worked my butt off and was often in instructors office. However, bicycling home from final exam for Calculus 3, I was crying, certain I had flunked. A few days later the course instructor called to congratulate me. I had gotten the highest score, not only for my class; but, since it was a school-wide, exam, for the entire school, probably 3 or 4 other classes. Sweat and determination paid off; but, though I remember basic concepts, I couldn’t solve Calculus problems today. Math is just not my forte; but when it comes to epidemiology, social psychology, I still get calls from colleagues for help. From when I started university, I decided long before the semester began which course scared me the most, bought the textbook if I could find out which one was to be used or equivalent books and began studying during the summer or over the four week Christmas break. So, the course that I was most scare of, I usually got good grades, not because I am super smart; but simply hard work and reasonable level of intelligence.
And your response to Dangerous Bacon:
“the question of religious view and of freedom of consciousness on vaccines is indeed one I believe is not taken seriously enough. As long as it doesn’t endanger herd immunity. Is that “antivaccine advocacy” in your eyes? Seems so.”
First, it does endanger herd immunity in areas with a significant number of certain religions. Second, religious freedom doesn’t exist in a vacuum; but in a state and in return one has to recognize that certain freedoms are not absolute. As several of our leading jurists have said throughout history: “The Constitution is NOT a suicide pact.” Even extreme religious groups like the Amish have agreed to be vaccinated when pointed out it could endanger their non-Amish neighbors, though antivaxxers are wrong that they did not vaccinate and had no kids with ASD. Third, at least in the U.S. parents don’t have absolute rights. If they put their children in danger then society can step in. And, despite what antivaxxers choose to believe, overwhelming evidence says they put their children and other children in danger. Fourth, most antivaccinationists first decided against vaccines, then looked for excuses, e.g., religion. All of the major religions support vaccinations. But, I repeat, in a community rights have to be balanced with responsibilities/obligations. Tutoring a non-vaccinated kid at home doesn’t rule out infecting someone when out shopping or in a public park.
So, as I’ve noticed, you really don’t always know what you are talking about; but then you take a few points out of context and compensate for your ignorance by going on the attack. Oh well.
@ Joel
“As I’ve written in previous comments: I consider myself reasonably intelligent and well educated, well read; but if someone gave me several plans for building a bridge, I could NOT reasonably decide which one is best plan because I’ve NEVER studied structural engineering.”
Yeah. And I do not consider myself a doctor, but the fact that everybody around me has been claiming for ages that I’m so brilliant that I must be sick — and please fucking do not write this kind of fucking weird scientific ravings in medical records, docs, m’kay? — when I couldn’t care less about being “brilliant” has been a bit… annoying. And this kind of shit has been thrown at me as if I’ve had some kind of oversized ego by people too obsessed with their medical ravings to observe that I did not care about being “intelligent”. And now, again, when I’m more than fed up about this kind of nonsense concerning “intelligence” and dumb shit like that, it gets thrown back at me, again, because I dare contradict a doctor.
Why am I bloody NOT surprised?
“I have friends who studied theoretical physics, brilliant, far more intelligent than I am; but they admitted they could not work in applied physics. While one doesn’t necessarily need a degree, it is STUPID, very STUPID to think you or anyone else, regardless of how intelligent you are and how educated you are in specific subjects, that without even attempting to learn the basics of other subjects to think you have any capability to discuss.”
Never claimed that.
“Just one bit short of our current President who doesn’t need anyone with expertise since he considers himself an intuitive genius.”
He’s an ass. So what?
“And, if you didn’t notice, I also rebutted what Beth wrote. Beth has given absolutely NO evidence that she has attempted to learn how vaccine work, e.g., basics of immunology, or to learn how causal arguments are made, nor the methodologies of epidemiology, social psychology, etc.”
That’s precisely a point to which I have avoided to reply. Until now. But here goes: You do NOT need knowledge in these areas anyways when you’re making a statement about statistics. If there is a statistical flaw, it doesn’t matter whether we’re talking aliens, paleohistory or whatever bloody else. And yes, medical matters included. Period.
Doesn’t mean statistics shouldn’t be contextualised and expertise not considered. But when doctors explain statistics to statisticians, they also tend to make a mess. That’s precisely one of the reasons my university professor does not want to work with medical doctors. He has experience of them denying, bitching over and twisting statistical results because of the moral weight of the implications of statistical findings in medical matters and because of the outrageous peer pressure medical doctors put on themselves collectively. The end result is that they cannot hold two ideas at the same time in their heads. And do not tell me that’s not true: I was born out of the womb of a medical doctor, socialised all my life with her daddy doctor, her buddy doctors and we had all the crazy nonsense when she tried to force some of her kids into med school. These people, medical doctors, form a Cult of Health where you’re not allowed to think differently. People like me and Beth, whatever her pro-vax or anti-vax positions may be, are trained to hold two different ideas in our minds. And as long as medical doctors do not get it straight that it is legitimate to hold two different ideas in one’s mind at the same time, sorry, but we’ll be having the upper hand in these matters. And medical doctors will need statisticians to tell them “No; it’s not because you want to cure people that you are right; and drop the bullshit with conspiracy-theory-mongering and the victimisation that no-one-likes-medical-doctors-because-they-defend-science”. Precisely because statisticians can hold two ideas at the same time in their heads. Doesn’t matter what the underlying biology or social science or psychology is or not. At all. Because rigor is not something one can negotiate with.
“In fact, I looked at her dissertation, appears quite good; but reference list entirely mathematical.”
So????? Is it another kind of Axiom-Shaming? Like mathematicians do not understand Reality because they think Deductively? That’s precisely the kind of bigotry that, I’m sorry, I cannot stand anymore. Reread the history of statistics, from the discovery of the gaussian distribution to almost any discovery in statistics. Almost each time, they are heavily intertwined with reality-based very concrete issue. Stop being afraid of special functions: mathematical symbols are not friggin’ hieroglyphs!
I’ll now cut the chase down to the point I’m interested in. Sorry for not treating your message exhaustively.
“First, it does endanger herd immunity in areas with a significant number of certain religions. Second, religious freedom doesn’t exist in a vacuum […] All of the major religions support vaccinations. But, I repeat, in a community rights have to be balanced with responsibilities/obligations. Tutoring a non-vaccinated kid at home doesn’t rule out infecting someone when out shopping or in a public park.”
Yep. I tend to agree with all that. But get a few facts straight: 1. “Freedom of conscience” is not “obligation to follow a religion and be bound by whatever religious authority” doctors fancy “negotiating” with. 2. Freedom of conscience is neither freedom of speech and even less freedom to do whatever you want. 3. Doesn’t change the fact that freedom of conscience is a cornerstone of modern civilisation and that we should tread only respectfully over it. 4. Something that obviously medical doctors have a few “problems” with. 5. And something that some of us are bullied over with the buzzword “Science” to despicable extents.
So while I do recognize the problems with respecting freedom of conscience, a point I made explicitly by precisely making the point that it should not endanger herd immunity and a point you do not seem to recognize I made, I do maintain that as a society, we should strive at guaranteeing that freedom of conscience in medical matters. A point I maintain is severely overlooked under a dubious double-bind of “informed consent” where in many instances neither consent nor information are goals that doctors feel obliged to abide by. MARK MY WORDS.
“So, as I’ve noticed, you really don’t always know what you are talking about”
I believe I’m going to watch snuff movies to pass the anger at that kind of statement, which is much much more than insulting. Or engage in pathological self-soothing. I very well understand what the stakes of freedom of conscience are in medical matters. If I did not, I’d be dead.
“But then you take a few points out of context and compensate for your ignorance by going on the attack. Oh well.”
Avoid strawmaning me, because I really do not enjoy writing comments such as this one.
But as to “going on the attack”, yeah, I have an axe to grind. I never made any bones about it. Now please do not hand me the stick to get beaten: you’re obviously someone that deserves respect for many reasons — a point I made with Tom — and I do not enjoy having too harsh words towards someone I do appreciate.
You OK, F?
@ F68.10
Why do you keep referring to doctors, at least sounds like you are mad at medical doctors. I am NOT a medical doctor. I have a PhD. I do NOT treat patients. If I did I would end up in jail. And I guess you missed that I actually have an MS in applied statistics; but did take courses in mathematical statistics, and only did well because I worked my ass off. I am NOT good at mathematics. So what the hell are you talking about?
I write comments on this blog basically for two reasons:
to debunk those who make unscientific and illogical claims, not ex, make better decisions.
as an old man, suffering insomnia, outlived almost all my friends, feels good to still be able to refute with science and logic others.
And as I’ve written before, sometimes you really make good contributions to the discussion, including linking to papers; but sometimes, as just above, you take a part of what I wrote and ignore the rest. So, I’ve both been critical towards you and also appreciative; but I started by pointing out that Beth’s training was in mathematics, then explained how what she wrote was wrong. Now she claims she has had courses in causal thinking; but if she did, she doesn’t give any indication she learned from them.
<a href=”https://www.google.com/search?ei=oSTwXvCJIcWWwbkP3oCDEA&q=site%3Axkcd.com+mathematicians+-site%3Aforums.xkcd.com>Anyway….
^ Sorry, I’m <a href="fixing that one (I hope).
Time for the hairshirt. Concentrate, concentrate… Please.
@Joel:
I don’t think my friend F is mistaking you for a medical doctor; he has issues with the medical system in general, and I do too, a degree. Specifically I have issues with psychiatry, although not so far as to be anti-psychiatry. (In fact I do find it to be a necessary… well, not evil, but it’s a complicated relationship.) It’s a field that, imo, is over-deterministic and claims to understand and know more than it does. And shrinks tend to overestimate their competence and knowledge and often have a God complex. In fact, the shrink I was seeing when I was living in Vancouver messed around with my meds and that probably didn’t help matters; careening into a manic episode isn’t even in itself fun, let alone the fallout and the depression that seems to come afterward for me, which is worse, at least for me, than one that comes along on its own.
(Specifically, she was like “If you’ve ever had a manic episode, why are you on an SSRI at all?” and took me off the moderate dose of Celexa I was on. I mean, yeah, sure, but of all the SSRIs, Celexa actually tends to have a sedating effect. Like, come on, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, especially in a new situation and with a bunch of other stuff going on. Yeah, very smart.)
@:F
Yeah, the whole very-high-IQ myths. Familiar. I’m pretty sure that’s not my problem, it’s probably the almost implausible barrage of traumatic events, the unfortunate psychiatric problems, socioeconomic factors, etc. (I do not come from a privileged background at all.) Personally I don’t even put much stock in IQ, it’s a goofy GD metric with all kinds of problems (see The Mismeasure of Man, which Joel mentioned). But I’m pretty certain that all of that nonsense has been debunked.
I do recall suffering from what the Australians call the “tall poppy syndrome”; being accused of thinking I was special or better or whatever because I was smart, when I really didn’t. I mean, it did kind of get to the point where I did feel a bit of reactive resentment or something. Idk. Whatever.
Man, the discontinuation of clonazepam has not been going well for me.
Yeah, benzo withdrawal is a b!tch from what I’ve heard. Not only that, it can be deadly. I wonder if it hasn’t f*cked me up on release from psych wards, tbh; they like to keep you doped up on that kind of stuff when you’re manic, although moreso Ativan if memory serves. This last stint I was taking the PRN Klonopin twice a day just to cope with being in there (the places in this state are just awful, although this place was at least better than the one in Yakima proper, which is a low GD bar.)
Probably not enough or for long enough for proper withdrawals though, although the use and abrupt discontinuation doesn’t seem like a good idea for some reason.
They also do all kinds of goofy sh!t with your meds in there, although it could have been worse. Tbh I probably could have been on the Geodon longer than I was after I got out, but I’m pretty good at at least outwardly feigning sanity for my own reasons.
@ Narad
I’m fine. Listening to E. Tonne did manage to soothe me.
@ JP
Yep. You’re mostly right about me.
@ Joel
Sorry. Got carried away. And, yeah, I thought you were a medical doctor. My bad. Apologies… I tend to “see them everywhere”. And I’m usually not that wrong when detecting them: I just need to overhear discussions in a bar or a cafe, and the medical ones ring in my ears in much the same way a bat’s sonar detects insects. 360° panoramic detection ability. Works well in crowded and noisy environments. I just wish I had this lizard man fetish instead… Oh, well… the world’s not perfect.
But mad at the medical system? Yeah. “Slightly”. A “tad”.
And for the record, I try to stay clear as much as possible from medical literature nowadays. As much as I would revel in diving into the SIDS literature as I did in the past, I believe it’s wiser for me to refrain from reading things on such topics for a year or two.
And please never insinuate that I believe myself more intelligent or more important than anyone else. I never did, never wanted to, and I’ve suffered awfully from these kind of dumber than dumb allegations in the past. Maim me anyday instead.
But your reasons to fight nonsense are very much honourable. Please keep it up.
I just wish I had this lizard man fetish instead… Oh, well… the world’s not perfect.
It’s funny; I hadn’t thought about David Icke in years, and a video (by a psychologist, not a psychiatrist, whose channel I kind of like) popped up on YouTube earlier today and I watched it. (Don’t read too much into coincidences, JP). Ha. Hey, who says I can’t notice them, the thought police?
It was pretty entertaining, the beginning and the end part in particular, and made me feel a little better about myself in a way. I mean, four percent of Americans believe in this stuff, at least to some extent. And I’m crazy? Come on.
I just believe in gods and Bodhisattvas and synchronicity and some other weird sh!t. Totally different. Much saner.
Further adventures aboard the Crazy Train:
Mr. Reason-Logic-Compassion-SCIENCE, James Lyons-Weiler is promoting (on Facebook) the meme that having people wear face masks to limit spread of Covid-19 violates OSHA’s requirement for air to be at least 19.5% oxygen.
Never mind that the surgical and cloth masks that you wear in stores and other public places are loose-fitting so that it’s virtually impossible to become hypoxic wearing them. L-W has apparently decided that discomfort while mask-wearing is a sign that you’re about to pass out from lack of oxygen.
L-W is also on the verge of a giant transformation of Science.
“I am so excited about what we have in the Unbreaking Science pipeline… You won’t believe how central YOU all are to obliterating all that is wrong with Science… I am buzzing on it…. !!!!”
How many people are becoming actively delusional during this pandemic?
Well, they may be the actively delusional at AoA, PRN, the HIghWire and Natural News
HOWEVER
they may be counterbalanced by BLM and K-pop/ other youngsters trolling the Donald by signing up for rally tickets they never used. Perhaps being cooped up for a few months led them to take serious actions. .
@ Dangerous Bacon
Basically you are right; but I have N-95 masks and if I tried to jog with them, would be a potential problem; but even in my hometown one is not required to wear any mask while jogging, etc. And, even being in my mid 70s, when I go shopping I often have mask on for an hour or more, only problem my glasses sometimes fog up.
And most, as you point out are wearing cloth masks which allow air in better than N-95; but reduce droplets somewhat, which is the goal.
So, again, Lyons-Wyler is wrong; but what else is new about him????
Wait, @lifemedguru? Really?
While wearing my cloth masks, occasionally I start to feel like it’s difficult to breathe. But it improves immensely when I stop or slow down and mindfully focus on breathing in and out at a slower pace. I don’t really understand it, but I found a way to work through the discomfort without panicking or ripping off the mask. I highly doubt it’s due to insufficient oxygen.
@ Kaia Rose
Good for you. I forgot to mention that a couple of times I have worn my mask for over one mile walk. I have amazon.com orders delivered to an amazon locker at a 7/11 so they won’t be stolen off my front porch. When I walk my dog 5 am and 9 pm few people on street so don’t wear mask, if come across any, just cross street; but when walk to amazon locker, middle of day, so wear mask. I walk fairly fast for an old codger and coming home carrying 10 lb package; but no problem breathing.
I’m sure with time you will get used to the mask and concentrating on slow rhythmic breathing from lower abdomen is the way to go.
Beth: “I get vaccines because I think it will benefit me to do so.”
What vaccines? What vaccines do you think provide sufficient benefit?
“If I don’t think the benefit to me is worth the costs, then the tiny additional benefit to herd immunity isn’t sufficient to change that evaluation.”
What vaccines do you think don’t provide benefits “worth the costs”?*
As Orac has noted, those who repeatedly make antivax statements deny that they are antivax, but consistently evade or ignore the question of which vaccines (if any) they support. Beth follows the classic pattern here.
C’mon, Beth – educate us!
*Scoffing at the “tiny additional benefit to herd immunity” from a single person’s vaccination is akin to a person saying it’s worthless for them to vote, seeing that it has an insignificant effect on the outcome of a race. In the case of both voting and vaccination, promoting organized apathy or outright hostility to community participation can have a significant impact.
@ Dangerous Bacon
Well said. Better than I could have said it.
Yep, the impression Beth gives is she is an antivaxxer. Most of them don’t deny that “some” vaccines confer “some” benefit; but then always find some excuse. Hers is that no matter how many studies have been done, not enough and she contradicts herself. Oh well.
Orac,
I won’t linger long on your list of ‘quacks’. I too have somewhat against the teachings of Mike Adams, and others of questionable veracity, but my reasons are seldom in common with yours. I’m posting under the article about Antivaxxers, but I’m more interested in the subtext of the entire site, including any shared problems we may have with an infected cultural context.
I might start with your non illustrated position on psychiatry, giving it a pass by implication, that if it wasn’t a Scientological reproach, it might be okay. Psychiatry by itself is a vaguery that has something to do with the mind, logic, and social behavior. Until it is specified as a particular method in accord with a particular theory of the mind, logic, and social behavior, there is nothing but a world of assumptions to be baffled with. It’s about qualifying no matter what generality we begin with. If we classify Scientology as a religion should we associate it with monotheism or polytheism, neither, or, whatever? What is your problem with Scientology and how does that tie into your assessment of quackery?
Unfortunately, quackery is like ‘conspiracy theory’, only in the sense that they are meant to be derogatory and thereby lazily avoid the work of meaningfully exposing the fault of bad ideas, which are ever at hand to degrade our life. The mindless use of the term conspiracy theory is seldom meant otherwise than derogatory, and the fact that it can be used, with enough prefacing, as a judgment neutral reference to a conspiracy related problem, lends more to aid in it’s chronic, popular, and plausibly deniable erroneous use. The most prominent implied corollary of the negative use of CT is: There are no big conspiracies and if you think so, you are mentally unhealthy. The smaller, local, criminal conspiracies, are best handled by law enforcement, but as we use it, as we do our best to fool you, that the proper exclusive domain of CT is mental health, another term that merely sounds innocuous.
Quackery is the pet derogation term for ideas that do not conform to medical authority. There’s more than a little resonance between quackery and heresy. If that is allowed to stand for a minute, a direct corollary may be posited that Institutional Medicine along with it’s ancillary, Institutional Psychiatry, may provide the material that strongly suggests that ‘Olympus’ is now the base for a modernized polytheism. I try to comport with the idea that polytheism is superior to monotheism, but isn’t enough to offset the tyranny that theism of any sort generates. The kind of power that gets practiced by the devotees of theism is not the kind that requires recognition and consent before application.
The true purpose of the Covidiot 19 Movement cannot wisely be baldly stated. It can however be stated speculatively. I’ve been talking about the unreasonable power that requires a certain kind of organic constitution to defeat. This must be unequivocal in it’s denouncement of tyranny in all it’s disguise of hidden ways. If it reforms to disguise itself as a helping hand, that disguise must be exposed. Tyranny is still found in the sacred cows that are neither sacred nor cows, but when criticized, can evoke a violent reaction as if they were literal. If someone in a white lab coat and a draped stethoscope, orders me to take some sort of medicine, and if my refusal is responded to by force, then we have an example of medical tyranny.
By associating antivaxxers with conspiracy theorists you are attempting to create a refutation by association with a loaded term: conspiracy theory in general, and this in tandem with a particular one that denies the severity of Covid 19. That won’t work if people start realizing that our better theories are some of the best clues we have; when they speak up in defense of a term that is innocuous on it’s own and will be upheld or discarded according to evidence. That all conspiracy theories are not equal, and if you can name some that are obviously ridiculous, it won’t help when the trial shows up the ones that were well made and can be discarded as no longer necessary.
Tyranny is always a conspiracy. What we name the King’s conspiracy, the King names divine right, an exclusive regal prerogative. Once the Kingdom is overturned and the idea of rule by just law is instituted, the usual way for monarchy to regain it’s power is through subterfuge, espionage, infiltration, propaganda, deceit, false flags and only after all that, literal armies that come out of hiding. Now, what better strategy for the re-establishment of monarchical tyranny than to make conspiracy, if not a dunce-cap for resistance, or a scarlet letter for a ‘psychiatric condition’, then an archaic notion that only applies to some historical episodes, and criminality that exists on a comparatively microscopic level. When we speculate about world domination and plans to drastically reduce population, how do they not get an easy way, when many don’t even believe that conspiracies of scale are possible?
@ Metatoast
“Unfortunately, quackery is like ‘conspiracy theory’, only in the sense that they are meant to be derogatory and thereby lazily avoid the work of meaningfully exposing the fault of bad ideas, which are ever at hand to degrade our life.”
I, at one time, thought that indeed, “quackery” and “conspiracy theory” were derogatory terms that were used in a rather cavalier fashion. And for “conspiracy theory” I still have a beef with that term.
However, I did realize some years before stumbling on Orac’s blog that, no, there really are very dangerous conspiracy loons. And that they do have real world and damaging impact when it comes to public health. As much as I question the wisdom of the mindframe behind some public health policies, one thing I am sure of is that you cannot let conspiracy theorists influence public health policy. The real world damage would be very much consequential.
As to quacks, the kind of Mike Addams or Gary Null nonsense seems to me to be pretty much US-specific. Much more dangerous are quacks that have MD credentials and that operate within an institutional framework. These need not be at first conspiracy theorists, but the way they and their opinions reverberate in the public opinion is through conspiracy theorists. Didier Raoult is a case in point.
Anti-psychiatry also is a case in point of the above paragraph. I’ll never forgive doctors for their sweep generalisations into lumping me in whatever category they fancied. But when I heard the word “antipsychiatry” thrown at me, I had a look at what it was. And originally, it is a movement of doctors. Not patients. And they have the quack warning signs all over them. Patients usually do not have the time, the leisure, nor the interest to dive into that literature… Yet, they are equated by psychiatrists as “antipsychiatry” because it’s easier to put disgruntled patients that do not like violence thrown up on them as “antipsychiatry”. It’s a Convenient Mental Box. The reality is that, personally, I do not see many differences between psychiatry and anti-psychiatry as it is originally formulated: they both are a way to spin a narrative on patients. I reject them both for essentially that reason (and others).
Why endorse Science in Medicine? Simply because there is no other possible choice: Medicine based on anything else than Science is bound to be a disaster. Doesn’t mean that doctors are always right. But quacks have no reason to be right, and they are a real threat to correct healthcare delivery. As to conspiracy theorists, they are on a Unholy Alliance and Crusade with quacks. That’s why both are real problems, and not merely derogatory terms as I initially thought.
And antivaxxers have obviously crossed the line more than one time.
Oo-ee-oo.
What if someone at a grocery store refuses you entry for not wearing a mask?
Ohh, what a givaway!
https://twitter.com/KarluskaP/status/1274851202690318337
^^that whole thread exemplifies the problem here. This is what the base are pumping out.
https://i.postimg.cc/fLR9rp4m/Sheeple.png
@ Narad
“What if someone at a grocery store refuses you entry for not wearing a mask?”
That is obviously not the same situation. The stakes are very much not the same.
I’d never bitch around against someone expecting me to respect his privacy, autonomy, sense of safety, or property. I may disagree and engage a conversation, but that’s it.
Someone trying to force his value system concerning health on someone else is an entirely different matter. General statement that is completely independent of the discussion concerning vaccines.
Yes, sometimes force is necessary in medicine. Recognising that fact is not agreeing to the idea that doctors are the only relevant judges of their actions. That would be a free pass for them to impose their value system on others. That can spiral into “tyranny”.
Topics concerned by medical force: euthanasia and end of life policies, organ harvesting, war on drugs, forced sterilisation, moral “reeducation” through psychiatry, homosexuality, infant intersex surgeries, medieval mistreatment of autistic kids and their mothers in France. That’s the first off the top of my head where I believe doctors should be accountable and not hide behind variations of the “you’re frightened of the needle argument”.
Gimme a break with your needle and do me a favour: grab that icepick instead.
Honestly, I just do not get it why people focus so negatively on vaccines given some of the most blatant instances of “tyranny”.
<
blockquote>That is obviously not the same situation. The stakes are very much not the same.
In one sense, sure, but Metatoast was painting with a very broad brush:
“This must be unequivocal in it’s denouncement of tyranny in all it’s [sic] disguise of hidden ways. If it reforms to disguise itself as a helping hand, that disguise must be exposed.”
Perhaps “Pollocking” would be a better metaphor
I don’t really see a lot of this in the U.S., which is the perspective I’m stuck with in this context. Buck v. Bell is long gong, and “conversion therapy” is on its way out in the most populous states. I am shocked that a 15-year-old received intersex surgery, but that seems as though it must have been a parental choice — which would call for some “reeducation” — but New York State at least has had legislation introduced that would ban the practice on infants.
The war on drugs seems misplaced here, as do organ donation (there’s a good baclofen story here, BTW) and “euthanasia,” depending on whether you’re referring to prohibition or limited availability.* That leaves inpatient psychiatry, which I’ve acknowledged on multiple occasions is, in my experience, widely reliant on coercion.
*htt_s://www.deathwithdignity.org/learn/access/
@ Narad
I’m not going to go in a detailed discussion of each of these, so briefly: Euthanasia is still practiced off-the-record and this is no real secret, merely a taboo, but the fact that it’s a taboo means it’s discretionary, which is wrong. On the other hand, I do have a beef with the influence of religious convictions when it comes to end-of-life matters with quite a number of doctors, who do retain the right to oppose any form of choice by patients in these matters. The mere fact that I know my end-of-life depends on the whims of doctors makes me want to end my life right here on the spot. When it comes to organ harvesting, I do have a beef with the law in France that essentially denies you any choice about the matter. Though I’m not at all religious, I do believe that I should be allowed some “payback time” by not allowing my organs to be harvested. If there’s one reason I’d have to chain smoke and binge-drink me to death, it would be this one: make my organs worthless. Concerning the war on drugs, the 1970 law in France declares any kind of illegal addiction as a disease and legitimates forced treatment in the absence of any other motivation. 1970 “Hippies are the Devil” unupdated mentality at work. Nice way to declare that people are a danger to themselves by legislating it. I love it when governments legislate on truth. Wish I could legislate on the value of pi. As a discordian, I’d choose pi to be 5. Figures for forced sterilisation are hard to come by, but the practice has been going on for quite some time with very little publicity. It’s not far away back in time. Some lawsuits at the ECHR are ongoing, and the nerve required for a forcibly sterilised mental patient to get their case up there is on itself the kind of ordeal I find despicable to impose on someone else. Doctors should be ashamed of doubling down and playing Holier Than Thou on these matters to avoid responsibility. But forced sterilisation, and may I add, stealth sterilisation, is the kind of issues where absence of proof is not proof of absence. So we always know about it with a lag and it always seems that it has disappeared up to the point where, uh, no, it hasn’t disappeared… Why is this even allowed to happen in the first place? (Rhetorical question: I know the answers…). Inpatient psychiatry, well… Did I ever mention that on the hospitalisation administrative forms I gathered for hospitalisations she herself triggered on the ground that Genius-Kid-In-Normale-Sup-Polytechnique-Is-Having-A-Hard-Time-In-School-And-Should-Be-Taken-Out-The-System-For-His-Own-Good-And-Provided-Sheltered-Occupation (still boggles my mind that doctors are so gullible as to believe shit like that), it is written in my psychiatrist-mother’s handwriting that she is my personal doctor? Do not believe I did so up to now. Every doctor I met in a practicing capacity seems to believe this behaviour is perfectly normal and admirable. Every non-doctor in my social circle I’ve shown this document to (and other wider shit too) has had a clear-cut reaction: “She’s crazy!”. I believe that sums up my opinion on inpatient psychiatry and echoes quite a number of concerns JP has concerning the loss of rights and the extent to which “not being able to care for oneself” can be twisted and distorted to fit fantasies of persons to whom society grants the right to decide what is true or not on your behalf on the grounds that “They Care”. Bullshit. Challenge these assumptions? That’s paranoïa. Challenge that notion? That’s anti-science. Call them freaks? You’re a scientologist. This kind of nonsense can go quite far, and had I caught on warning signs and now know what I know about medicine and psychiatry, I’d have killed myself as a kid without hesitation. Message to people who make a habit out of sectioning multiple family members: learn to mind your business for a change. Message to scientists: Have a look at the behaviour of some family members to see if “mental illness runs in families” may have more than one meaning… if that’s not too “antipsychiatry” for you… wouldn’t want to challenge too many assumptions of these Heirs to Galileo from the raving hellpits of solitary confinment. That would be disgraceful… Homosexuality has been depenalised and demedicalised. Doesn’t change the fact that old habits die hard, and that psychoanalysts that are practicing psychoanalysis under the guise of practicing psychiatry in my country have “beliefs” and “opinions” that they do not voice too loudly. And given the fact that homosexuals have a higher rate of suicide, how can you deny that it’s an illness? That’s it’s not any more in the classifications? How naïve of you! I can’t believe I heard the shit that I heard on these topics… But hey! That’s the privilege of having been raised by a one of “Them”: Lizard-Shrink-Greyface-Telepath-Know-It-All-Holier-Than-Thou-Tree-Of-Knowledge. Not a Joo though. (Recovering) Far Right Christian. Guess I forgot to include the Joos in my Grand Unified Medical Conspiracy. They do not quite fit in… having trouble “connecting the dots” with Joos…Intersex surgeries are a complicated topic. But the fact that kids and families have been bullshitted “for their own good” and lied to on that matter astounds me. And the obstacles these kids faced to get hold of their records are more than despicable. “Medical secret” doesn’t mean hiding shit to patients to such an extent. It’s supposed to protect patients’ privacy. Not doctor’s comfort. It should be clear to anyone. The fact that it’s not is problematic. I won’t go into the french autism “debate” as I’d blow fuses to the rythm of a trigger-happy kalashnikov. Not gonna do it.
Doctors have real power. The fact that claiming it is considered a conspiracy theory drives me furious.
“If someone in a white lab coat and a draped stethoscope, orders me to take some sort of medicine,”
If you are concerned about this, and in the USA, then you need to fill out some paperwork with your durable medical power of attorney so that you will not be treated if unconscious.
Adults, with rare exceptions, are allowed to refuse medical care in the USA, even if it is to their obvious detriment. The exceptions are 1) if they are a danger to others by spreading a serious contagious disease (maybe one person per decade is confined for not taking their TB meds?) and 2) if the adult is not competent and a danger to themselves (this is a separate and serious topic best left to others here).
Now, you may be denied entrance to a private space, or not permitted to work in a specific location or field, if you, say, choose not to get a specific vaccine, but that’s the other side of freedom. Other people’s freedom matters too.
2) if the adult is not competent and a danger to themselves (this is a separate and serious topic best left to others here).
Ah. Yeah. Complicated. “Unable to care for self” is very broad and vague, and if you’ve ever been involuntarily admitted before, and if later on down the road somebody is “concerned” about you, in you go, pretty much. It’s surprising how many basic rights you essentially lose once that happens.
“Danger to self or others” varies from state to state; some states take it very literally, in that it has to be imminent and serious danger, like you literally have a gun and you’re about to shoot yourself, or similar type of thing with regard to others. Some states make it quite a bit easier to read people’s minds and have them admitted.
For instance, this last time I was involuntarily admitted, it was basically because I was saying some weird stuff, people massively overreacted, and I ended up seeing the same mental health system under which I’d been admitted before. I honestly could easily have been talked into chilling out and staying put and getting some outpatient treatment with stuff that had worked before; that’s basically what I wanted to do at that point anyway, like, I essentially wanted to do laundry and get some rest. But the two-bit mental health crisis responder was very confrontational, among other things.
Right, JP, which is why I didn’t want to go into it because I don’t actually know very much besides what you’ve shared and a few other folks I know. I know it happens and that theory rarely matches practice.
But I didn’t want to leave it out because that’s disingenuous.
But I think it’s far more likely that MetaToast is talking about the first instance, which is still really rare.
(Glad you’re away from Yakima, their COVID rate is scary.)
Yeah, I can’t help but worry about the people stuck in the places in and just outside of Yakima; if they’re not death traps already, I wouldn’t be surprised if they became so. I mean, you have to ask to be let into the bathroom, which is where you can wash your hands. I suppose they can set up other sanitation means, but it’s kind of hard to imagine that it wouldn’t be a transmission epicenter anyway, for a whole lot of reasons. I mean, at least the staff can go home, and the “providers” especially are a lot better off.
Honestly, being back home here is almost an ideal place to be. This county has had very few cases, and almost all of them have been in the town two and a half hours away that’s adjacent to Yakima County. What’s more, we’re way outside of any town at all, up on the mountain, and we only go into town for stuff like grocery shopping. (And even the towns are pretty “safe,” although I definitely wear a mask and use hand sanitizer before and after in and all that stuff.)
What if someone at a grocery store refuses you entry for not wearing a mask?
Yeah, Narad, I really don’t see any connection here at all, or very little. Being asked (or required, whatever) to wear a mask to enter a grocery store or a clinic or whatever bears no resemblance to being forced under threat of violence or violently forced to take a medication (as an adult, let’s say, with no agency, possibly captive.) That you’d equate the two is really surprising to me.
Now, vaccination is analogous to the mask situation, at this point in time in this country, with routine vaccinations; kids have to be vaccinated to go to school. (Well, of course, it’s being chipped away at.) That makes sense. But it’s not what was brought up.
There are several issues to unpack here. One of them is what is “force” and the other would include what is a medicine.
Without writing a book, as someone who teaches public health law I want to make it clear that there are some circumstances in which it is legal to force medicine onto someone. There are conditions for doing that, but it’s been done in the U.S. – up to and including locking people up and forcing them to take it – though it’s very, very rare. Where it usually comes up is for people with infectious tuberculosis who resist taking antibiotics for the duration. Sometimes, they resist because they are mentally ill. This is tricky, but the courts generally allow it, among other things because tuberculosis is, in fact, dangerous, the treatment is both in the interest of the person and in the public interest, and is the standard of care. Even there, however, usually courts would look for whether authorities tried less coercive means first – and authorities usually do, because, well, it’s more efficient to have voluntary compliance.
This is a boiling down a lot of material into one paragraph, and I’m happy to elaborate.
That is obviously different from a private actor – a store – setting safety conditions for entry, or even a state mandating masks in stores.
But I think my point is that the question whether an imposition on liberty is permissible depends on quite a few things, and the level of imposition is one of them, but not always the determinative one.
Well, there’s physical force, which I’ve been subject to, very unpleasantly (and unnecessarily, which happens a lot more than it should), although I don’t feel like telling the story at the moment. And then there’s the threat of said physical force if one doesn’t comply, while being captive, or the threat of being continued to be held captive, which I see as pure coercion.
If you haven’t been subject to this kind of thing and extensively witnessed it and also known people who’ve had the same experience it can be hard to believe just how prevalent it is and how deep it goes within the system, I think. It’s not a thing of the past.
Were not the first ‘anti-spitting’ laws enacted over that? Spitting on the sidewalk and taking spitoons out of movie theaters.
I veiw the mask issue in the same light only now the ‘spit’ is airborne (when not caught in droplet form via a covering).
Moreso, even; I suppose there are ‘persons’ who go about licking pavement but it is probably less common than getting Canadians to lick light poles.
But, you know, I’ve been around the block, you do what you know they want you to do, you say what they know they want you to say. Which I guess is a bit of a marker of sanity of a certain sort in itself, or maybe just cleverness, who knows. Still my own personal hell.
Still would cry (secretly, because you know if they see you doing it it’ll just be a mark against you) because I didn’t know when I would get out.
I actually read a book a few years back by a psychiatrist called, I think, Committed, in which she said she had decided against ever using involuntary treatment ever again except in the most extreme cases because it pretty much invariably does more harm than good; for one thing, it creates a great deal of mistrust and can destroy relationships.
I hear ya, JP. Cohersion.
Go in voluntarily, county-paid lackey fucks up your meds and tries to hand you a fistfull of prozac because they are both named ‘Tim’. ‘Orderlies’ are called because you won’t take your meds. Scuffle. Next day, note on the door warning of ambiguity. Boom — involuntary commitment.
In a town poisoned by both nerve gas canisters and Monsanto, Get exposed to the most fantastic stupidity as ‘group therapy’ — ‘therapist’ was wife of a southern bubba cop and did not like my takedown on her view of cannabis — mandatory attendance.
Get gut bacteria ruined, get fat, get a prolapsed asshole because fucktards would not allow a magnesium supplement which I had been taking six years prior. Get prescribed wrong meds because telemedicine mistook Deplin (folate) for Depakote (valproic acid) — Got told if I don’t take what the doctor says I’d never get out. Grew tits (prolactin >> 70). Got out the very day my disability was denied because the forms I was signing every year were not to protect my ass from the IRS but my employer’s (contract work).
Dad is still a trumptard.
@ Tim
“Grew tits (prolactin >> 70).”
Ah! I now remember our exchange on the topic of the hormones, the bowling alley and the Big Lebowski.
Makes a bit more sense now…
Please bear in mind that I was trying to elicit something specific from Metatron.
@F68.10
Well, they didn’t grow ‘that much’ before I yeeted the shit away. But there was sensitivity in the nipple/areola — and some retrograde ejaculation. The culprit was mostly risperidone, I think. Nasty stuff. I would have prescribed myself cannibis.
Did anything come of the estogen pach study for the ‘rona?
Asking for a friend.
@ JP
“for one thing, it [involuntary treatment] creates a great deal of mistrust and can destroy relationships.”
I won’t believe that one without an RCT. And we have to double-check whether such an RCT would be ethical with respect to equipoise. We’re not Nazis…
I think that the subject of mask wearing is an important one to understand the tyrannical power that can order the entire world to hide their face, all in the name of public health, which presumes the existence of submicroscopic things that infect and cause disease with malice. These things, what exosome theory superficially denotes as tiny balls of protein being emitted from cells, are the same things that are named viruses, which are so tiny that the wearing of masks as a prophylactic is equivalent to using chain-link fencing as mosquito netting. The critical difference between exosome theory and viral, is the attribution of benign purpose vs. the attribution of malice.
I read Orac’s article titled: There’s No Such Thing As a Virus. Because I know I could be wrong about things that seem solidly true, I owe it to the cause of truth to examine any evidence which may force me to admit that I was wrong, when and if I am. He doesn’t use the term exosome theory, but that is basically what he is ridiculing. He states: “How on earth can one look at the overwhelming evidence from many different disciplines that confirm germ theory and deny its validity?” This 9min. video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDDE3PH5SA0&feature=youtu.be is really good at clarifying what exosome theory is because it’s a comparison of the two theories, viral and exosome, and there are simply more aspects of what researchers discovered that comport with exosome theory than with viral.
There is, as of yet, no certain way for researchers to assemble a plausible genome sequence that makes any sense out the RNA and DNA fragments found in a sample. As I understand it, the Polymerase Chain Reaction test does not complete the genome sequencing, but only amplifies by cycles of doubling, the RNA and DNA fragments. These are not assembled, and as being detached from the complete genome from which they came, these partial sequences of genetic code are meaningless. Except generally according to where the sample was taken, the origins of the fragments are unknown. We have been bemused by a fictional pathogen that is little more than extremely detailed artwork. The Internet is full of renditions of the Corona virus that if dissociated from the dominant narrative of viral disease vectors, are actually quite beautiful. And this is not to say that something lethal isn’t being used to make a fictional, natural, bat jumping pandemic seem plausible, as well as to exacerbate the fears that belong with considering the enormous arsenal of biological, lab created, gain of function, weapons.
There’s one more thing that belongs here: What I’m trying to get to is not to discredit science in general, or make light of the biological intrigue, but warn that the greater threat is of a political/medical and conspiratorial nature. Hardcore public health measures are showing more affinity with a footloose military, militarized terroristic police departments and a willingness to violate fundamental rights in the name of protection. Where will the courage come from to resist the hateful call to obedience?
@ Joel
I always appreciate your comments. I don’t always understand everything, but I’ve learned a fair amount, too. I especially appreciate your book recommendations, in particular the one about the immune system. So thank you.
Also, congrats on your success in your advanced math courses. I struggle with math, too, and it’s always inspiring to read about someone doing well after really applying themselves to strengthen a perceived weakness. I have a few online math courses to take, nowhere near as advanced as calculus, and though I’m nervous, I’ll be working my rear off to do the best I can.
Learning a bit about research methodology was an eye-opening experience, and I want to keep learning more to better understand what I’m looking at. I always read the methodology section after the abstract. I realized that I really need to learn more about statistics. Is there a book you might recommend for a beginner? Maybe I need to see if there’s a Complete Idiot’s Guide to Statistics….
Anyway, thanks again for all that you share with us. I’m pretty much a lurker here, but this lurker appreciates your input. It’s clear that you put a lot of time into it. Thank you.
@ Kaia Rose
Thanks for congrats on my ‘success” in advanced math courses; but the first three courses in Calculus are actually undergraduate lower division courses. I would NEVER have dared attempt upper division undergraduate courses. in math. As Dirty Harry said: “A man should know his limits.”
While I haven’t read her Statistics for Dummies book, I did read Deborah Rumsey’s Probability for Dummies and thought it quite good as an introduction, so I would suggest you try Statistics for Dummies. Actually the Probability for Dummies might be worth your while as well. Though they say “for Dummies”, they aren’t; so expect to take a lot of time and effort to go through either of them; but I’m sure you will succeed. What many people don’t realize is almost all of modern day life is based on statistics.
As for the immunology book. I love it and hope you do as well.
Thank you so much for the recommendations, especially the one about probability; how could I have forgotten probability! I had lumped them together, methinks. Oh, the things one doesn’t know they don’t know. 🙂 I don’t doubt that they will be challenging books, despite the ‘dummies’ name, but I’m up for it! I’ll likely struggle, but I think it’ll be worth the time and work. Added to my Wish List!
It’s funny that you said that “what many people don’t realize is almost all of modern day life is based on statistics.” I’ve been really getting this strong feeling that statistics is/are something I need to know more about, because I keep seeing its applications everywhere. While noticing that my knowledge on the subject is woefully inadequate.
“Making Sense of Research” by Martha Brown Menard has been such a valuable book for me. I’m still learning from it.
Metatoast: “The most prominent implied corollary of the negative use of CT is: There are no big conspiracies and if you think so, you are mentally unhealthy…That all conspiracy theories are not equal, and if you can name some that are obviously ridiculous, it won’t help when the trial shows up the ones that were well made and can be discarded as no longer necessary.”
Can you name any that were generated by amateur conspiracy theorists and promulgated on the Internet, that turned out to be true? What conspiracies involving many thousands or millions of people working in secret and having massive resources to support them were unraveled by Internet sleuths? In what cases have conspiracy theories implying that the people orchestrating them are harming themselves as well as the public been proven?
Those are the sorts of conspiracy theories we laboriously and repeatedly debunk (and laugh at). They’re a waste of people’s time, degrade confidence in valuable institutions and programs, and often serve as a means of propagating hatred.
Give that some thought.
“There’s more than a little resonance between quackery and heresy.”
Ah, the old “your science is just religion, hahaha!”
Requiring evidence and not faith to support a medical intervention is the opposite of religion.
OT — I love that phrase ‘Internet sleuths.’ It makes me think of Scooby-Doo and the Mystery Machine. Scooby sleuths! Your phrase led to a wonderful mental image that made me laugh.
@ Dangerous Bacon
“Ah, the old “your science is just religion, hahaha!””
Yeah, I’ve debunked this Tu Quoque Fallacy numerous times, typically with theocrats bemoaning science. The way this Tu Quoque is instrumentalised can boil down to downright stupidity masquerading behind smug smartness. Makes theocrats feel smart when they attempt to corner science proponents. Intellectually Bonkers but Rhetorically Efficient.
That argument indeed clearly is bogus.
What is not bogus, however, is that scientific positions can turn over time into dogmatic systems (psychoanalysis in France for instance). And that no matter what, violence can be and still is attached to the notion of differing opinions (just turn on your TV or whatever Window onto the World you fetishize). So there is a case to made for the analogy, though not just by anyone and not just anyhow.
Epistemology is indeed tied to power structures. Always have been and always will be. The only valid question is how criticism is managed within these social arrangements.
@ Metatoast
Required reading on this specific Tu Quoque Fallacy and on Dogmatism in Epistemological Systems and Power Structures. Not exactly a document that supports conspiracy theorists, mind you. But one that will sharpen your understanding of the issue. The only document I consider worth reading on that issue, in fact, though it’s a really tough read. But well worth it if you get to the end.
@ F68.10
Yep, when reading on health care in France, astonished that they have been leaders in immunology; but still go to psychoanalysts. Besides my research degrees, I doubled down and took all the courses, practicum, and one year internship to become clinical psychologists in Sweden, even licensed there once-upon-a-time. I did it mainly because many researchers in designing studies, questionnaires, etc, conducting interviews, lack certain perspectives. So, we studied psychoanalysis, cognitive psychology, behavioral analysis, etc. I loved psychoanalysis, not for its credibility; but its creativity, in some respects better than reading various mythologies.
Another French “quirk” is preferring individual pills for each medicine, whereas I preferred to down one pill, as I think most American do as well.
I can’t really know what your experiences have been with doctors; but from my own experiences and working with them, basically there are good doctors, excellent doctors, mediocre doctors, bad doctors, and everything in between. I assume NOTHING when meeting with a new doctor; but several times it was the first and last meeting and I even have walked out in middle of exam, clearly telling them why.
An excellent book by Professor of Medicine at Harvard, Jerome Groopman’s “How Doctors Think”. I think you will like it.
The best doctors I have had when I first met them asked me to describe my problem. I asked if they had looked at my medical record, they replied, no, want to get their own impression, not rely on others. And then they took their time answering my questions and explaining things.
One other book that I think you will like is: Lynn Payer’s “Medicine & Culture.” Explains, for instance, why American doctors “act” often, whereas, doctors in other nations/cultures, primum no nocere, first do no harm. American culture is one where we often have to do something. Much more in book. Fun read.
To Dangerous Bacon,
Metatoast: “The most prominent implied corollary of the negative use of CT is: There are no big conspiracies and if you think so, you are mentally unhealthy…That all conspiracy theories are not equal, and if you can name some that are obviously ridiculous, it won’t help when the trial shows up the ones that were well made and can be discarded as no longer necessary.”
DB: “Can you name any that were generated by amateur conspiracy theorists and promulgated on the Internet, that turned out to be true?”…
Your questions are stipulated in a way that unnecessarily confine the range of possible answers. Why should the list of possible examples of conspiracy theories, that opinion finds useful and relevant, be confined to those provided by amateurs? But, perhaps you did not intend to make a distraction out of the question of relevancy pertaining to an irrelevant dichotomy.
What if there is technically no such thing as a true conspiracy theory, since the rigors of truth do not apply to theory but only to those statements of fact, that perhaps a succession of theories had significantly contributed to. I don’t think there are many that would wear that label on there own accord. I don’t consider myself a conspiracy theorist, though I think the idea is worth defending, but only when not used pejoratively. What people label me with is beyond my control. We can’t go out anymore without an insult umbrella.
Anyway, thanks for the input, and maybe I can get back to F68.10 and anyone else who replied, later.
What scoffers like Metatoast fail to note is that there IS a way to determine where the line between SBM and quackery lies:
can a method be shown to work ( i.e. treat illness, relieve symptoms) through adequately controlled research studies? If it alleviates symptoms/ “cures” the problem, it’s SBM, if doesn’t ( after repeated studies) it’s not.
Suppose patients suffer from anxiety – which interferes with their life and causes them distress- different studies try diverse approaches: a new medication designed for this purpose, talk therapy, exercise and meditation. IF any ( or all) of these techniques work, not because of unaccounted for factors or because the researcher gamed the study, then they are considered SBM. Of course, we would need to see replication, large trials etc. There’s no religious test: it’s not about heresy or bad philosophical underpinnings. It’s about whether it WORKS or not.
Because quacks gotta quack- usually loudly- they appropriate the trappings of SBM, cargo cult wise, in order to convince their followers that their methods work and cause relief. They often achieve these aims through shoddy research: using self-report, inadequate controls for confounding variables, lack of blinding, placebo effect and general prevarication. There are loads of studies that show that vaccines cause autism BUT they haven’ been replicated by outside researchers, they rely upon parental reportage or include downright trickery ( Wakefield).
Now suppose that a study showed that a vaccine caused a serious problem, SBM would have to ( to remain SB) re-test that situation and account for the problem. It simply isn’t a matter of
faith or belief. AND -btw- research has shown that occasionally/ rarely vaccines DO cause problems. which leads to further research, changes in formulation or warnings. Research has illustrated that rare events occur ( such as with rotavirus/ intertussception , narcolepsy in some subjects, cat injection site carcinoma, Guillain Barre Syndrome). Events as rare as 1 in 10,000 have been accounted for because of research not philosophical condemnation. SBM can also discern when common practice by doctors DOESN’T work or when pharmaceutical products ARE NOT effective or cause complications . The same methods criticise both standard practice medicine and quacks. Orac and Dr Goldacre are equal opportunity critics. There are such things as “over diagnosis and “over-treatment” as well as treatments that don’t work or cause minimal relief at greater cost or risk..
@ Denice Walter
Yep, vaccines have been found to cause rare albeit serious conditions; but the problem with antivaxxers is that they grossly exaggerate the occurrence of these and, at the same time, ignore the ravages of the vaccine-preventable diseases. For instance, a few cases of attenuated polio vaccine caused paralysis vs without a vaccine, 10,000 or more. And the oral vaccine wasn’t removed until a new killed vaccine was available that was equally effective. Another example is Guillain Barre from flu vaccine. GB much higher from actual flu, plus add in hospitalizations, deaths, etc.
I really like Goldacre, his books and articles usually have extensive reference lists. He does his homework.
If anti vaccination approaches were used, we would NOT have antibiotics. Penicillin literally saved 100s of thousands of lives; but didn’t help with gram negative bacteria and caused, for instance, in some patients anaphylactic shock.
We wouldn’t use seat belts because they only prevent about 50% of deaths and serious disabilities and have been a couple of deaths from and small number of damaged kidneys and bladders.
And they go back to beginnings, so we wouldn’t have organ transplants, e.g, first heart transplants didn’t work; but, a few years ago I met a man who ran 10 k, 20 years after a heart transplant.
@ Beth (2020 Jun 22)
First, congratulations on being a 10 gallon blood donor, so am I, actually approaching 15 gallons, even donated twice during the pandemic, despite being in my mid-70s. I donate to local blood bank, not Red Cross, just because I started there.
You write: “Yes, I am selfish. So are you. We are human. All humans are selfish.”
True; but there are degrees of selfishness.
You write: “We differ in regard to whether the cost/benefit ratio of receiving voluntary flu vacations is substantially changed by the benefit to the community – i.e. herd immunity. That’s a different value judgement, not a moral failing.”
I’ve asked several times, so again, have you actually researched the flu, e.g., PubMed, CDC website, etc. If not, how in hell can you claim to determine a cost/benefit analysis. And we live in societies where sometimes we have to defer to authorities. Despite your arrogance at thinking you know best, the CDC and WHO have many experienced knowledgeable people on flu. Without any research, you decide. As I’ve pointed out, we have rights and we have obligations. You seem to think your rights trump your obligations.
So, you made it quite clear that your decision NOT to get the flu vaccine was solely based on risk to you. One of the ancient Jewish sages, Rabbi Hillel said: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me; but if I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, when? Basically, yep, we think often about ourselves first; but as the risk of a flu shot is minuscule and you have NOT given any indication you have ever researched the flu, PubMed, CDC website, your decision was solely based on your unscientific self, no thought to others. I am simply citing what you said.
You write: ““First, I said your dissertation appeared to be quite good, not exactly disparaging.” That would be a valid point if you had said that in the previous post. But you didn’t.” (June 22, 2020 at 11:36 am)
I thought I had written in response to you that I thought your dissertation quite good; but actually wrote in response to F68.10: “In fact, I looked at her dissertation, appears quite good; but reference list entirely mathematical.” (Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: June 21, 2020 at 7:03 pm) So, I guess you aren’t following the entire exchange of comments; but I did write what I claimed before my previous comment.
You sound like a parrot, repeating the same things and ignoring my responses.
You write: “No, I’m not complaining the studies are not enough. I’m complaining about people making claims that exceed the scope of the evidence. Not researchers making that claim, as researchers are usually careful about that, but people on this blog.ng about people making claims that exceed the scope of the evidence.”
Yikes, you wrote: “I have never claimed that vaccines increased SIDS. I’ve only claimed that we can’t, based on the available evidence conclude that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”. There are not equivalent statements.”
What you wrote, not others. And it clearly indicates that still possible vaccines could cause/contribute to SIDS. You really are either stupid and/or dishonest as you keep denying what you clearly stated.
And you continue to ignore what I wrote about the withdrawal of the first rotavirus vaccine. Namely, that your unresearched claim that it was withdrawn because it was actually worse than presented was WRONG.
You write: “What have I said that you feel was “Ignoring/downplaying the harms from the vaccine-preventable diseases?”
Yikes again. Flu, rotavirus, both you ignore the risks, don’t even discuss them; but, with rotavirus vaccine exaggerated the problems with the original vaccine and ignored what I wrote.
Would someone monitoring this exchange please go through my responses to Beth and see if I haven’t nuanced/explained many of my comments, that she seems to not have understood, etc.
Once more, you keep parroting, taking out of context, or just ignoring what I wrote. Yep, I think you exceedingly illogical, STUPID.
Last year I got my first flu shot, because I qualified for it, reaching 60. If it wouldn’t be of use for me (never have gotten the flu) at least it was an extra way to protect my dad, who is 91. Yes, he got his flu shot as well, but they don’t always work well in old people, so me getting a flu shot was an extra protection.
And no, my dad never gets ill as well (except for some CVA’s and this year a brain-infarct), but I’m rather on the save side.
@ Renate
Don’t quite understand “qualified for it.” I’ve been getting flu shot since in my 30s. CDC recommends for everyone over 6 months of age. Most of my health plans covered it, but if they didn’t, one could get it at any drug store, Costco, Walmart, etc. at a low cost.
As for you have never gotten the flu, doesn’t mean you won’t get it. I’ve NEVER been in a car accident as an adult. Since I was almost killed in one at 7 years of age, I am extremely cautious vigilant driver which lowers the risk; but never becomes zero. Same with your dad, he may not have gotten it previously; but each flu season’s strain differs and there are no guarantees.
As I’ve written the risk from flu shot minuscule and even if doesn’t stop one from getting it, often reduces severity, reduces risk of hospitalization and death, lowers number of viruses shed, so lowers risk for others.
By the way, did you get the high-dose version of flu vaccine. As one gets older, immune system doesn’t respond as well, so high-dose gives better protection. I keep up on research and minute I heard about it I asked my physician to get it for me, he did, and shortly thereafter my health plan offered it.
ADDENDUM
You probably are unaware of a Japanese study that following program to give flu vaccine to children deaths and hospitalizations of seniors from flu went down. Yep, flu isn’t usually a serious problem for most children; but they can give it to those with autoimmune diseases and seniors. You probably are also unaware that it is estimated as many as 1/3 of people infected with flu are asymptomatic. So, they can for week or so give it to others, completely unaware. Children even worse because they can, even asymptomatic, shed flu virus for up to two weeks.
And you probably don’t understand that even if flu vaccine doesn’t protect an individual from getting it, can result in reduced severity, reduced risk of hospitalization, and reduced risk of death, plus less viral shedding putting others at risk.
Above just the tip of the iceberg of what you most probably DON”T KNOW.
JAH “First, congratulations on being a 10 gallon blood donor, so am I, actually approaching 15 gallons, even donated twice during the pandemic, despite being in my mid-70s. I donate to local blood bank, not Red Cross, just because I started there.”
Congratulations to you too. I’m only at about 11 gallons. I haven’t been able to donate much the last few years due to some health issues making me ineligible.
JAH “I’ve asked several times, so again, have you actually researched the flu, e.g., PubMed, CDC website, etc. If not, how in hell can you claim to determine a cost/benefit analysis.”
While I doubt whatever studies I’ve read would be sufficient to satisfy you as long as my opinion remains different, but yes, I’ve read quite a bit. Enough to know that the efficacy of the flu vaccine is rarely sufficient to obtain herd immunity even if we had 100% vaccine uptake.
JAH “And we live in societies where sometimes we have to defer to authorities. Despite your arrogance at thinking you know best, the CDC and WHO have many experienced knowledgeable people on flu.”
That is true, but with regard to vaccines, the risks of contracting the disease is also dependent on individual circumstances, while the authorities make their recommendations based on the assumption that without the vaccine, the individual will contract the disease. I take my individual circumstances into account when making my decisions, which is why they can occasionally differ from the universal recommendations.
JAH “Without any research, you decide. As I’ve pointed out, we have rights and we have obligations. You seem to think your rights trump your obligations.”
No, I merely disagree with you regarding the obligations of the individual with respect to vaccines. I do not see it at an obligation to society anymore than I see donating blood as an obligation. People can choose to do either for the benefit of society, but neither is an obligation.
JAH “Yikes, you wrote: “I have never claimed that vaccines increased SIDS. I’ve only claimed that we can’t, based on the available evidence conclude that vaccines have been “shown not to cause SIDS”. There are not equivalent statements.”
JAH “What you wrote, not others. And it clearly indicates that still possible vaccines could cause/contribute to SIDS. You really are either stupid and/or dishonest as you keep denying what you clearly stated.”
That statement was in response to your original “you appear to think like they do, black and white, “certainty” null hypothesis true”. I don’t have certainty that the null hypothesis is true, which is what you were accusing me of. That the possibility exists is different from claiming certainty. That was the point I was attempting to make.
I’m not sure why you find concluding the possibility exists to be a debatable point of view. Christine posted a link to scientific study that discusses in depth the possibility of a few particular autopsies of SIDS infants being consistent with a reaction to vaccination and points out that “The possibility that the death resulted from vaccination effects should have received more attention.” It’s not an absurd hypothesis and consensus is not yet established on the matter.
JAH “And you continue to ignore what I wrote about the withdrawal of the first rotavirus vaccine. Namely, that your unresearched claim that it was withdrawn because it was actually worse than presented was WRONG.”
Are you actually stating that the risk level of the vaccine as presented to me prior to the vaccine being withdrawn was the same as after it was withdrawn knowing that it occasionally caused a problem not detected in the licensing studies?
I’ve ignored what you wrote about the risks because it was immaterial to the my decision at the time as that information wasn’t available to me. The facts I was working with then were that the vaccine was new and recommended by a committee with documented bias towards vaccine makers. For a disease I had never heard of prior to being offered the vaccine – i.e. the risk of my child getting the disease was quite low. It wasn’t a particularly difficult decision and the fact that it was withdrawn by my next well baby check-up meant I didn’t get asked a second time and confirmed that I was right to suspect bias on the part of committee recommendations at that time.
I think that there is a real discrepancy between the questions I ask and the ones you are attempting to answer with your data. You are attempting to answer to a high level of precision ‘what are the risks of the rotovirus vaccine as compared with the disease’ as a way of disputing whether my decision 21 years ago was correct. I was attempting to answer “what is the risk if my child gets the vaccine and suffers a severe reaction as a result compared with the risk of contracting a severe case of the disease?” That last part differs significantly for individuals depending on such things as geographic location, family history and lifestyle. The committee making recommendations did not include bias of the committee members as a factor while I did. I made an estimate, not a precise computation. That you claim the vaccine was still a lower risk is immaterial to me even if true. My concern was the bias of the committee making recommendations and the fact that I didn’t trust them to have accurately determined the risks for new vaccines. A decision I feel was vindicated by the withdrawal even if your statistics on the risks are correct.
“Once more, you keep parroting, taking out of context, or just ignoring what I wrote. Yep, I think you exceedingly illogical, STUPID.”
Congratulations on limiting yourself to only one direct insult and placing it at the end of your post.
Given
and effectiveness VE of 40%, the coverage needed for herd immunity is 
, or about 58% (sorry about the lack of CI). Feel free to plug and chug.
^ See also here for a good deal more nuance.
@NARAD Thanks for the links. You’re right. I was thinking influenza had a higher R0 than that. Of course, with such a low number, it also follows that it’s not an obligation for every citizen to get vaccinated.
Dandy! How do separate the groups?
I’m just going to keep pointing at Kant until dawn breaks over Marblehead.
So Orac writes about antivaxers, vaccines & SIDS & now Terrie, Dorit & Denice want to launch a coordinated effort of organized response/non response to MY comments, to mitigate my impact on readers.
Me: An antivaxer who’s daughter died from SIDS, less than 24 hours after vaccines.
Oh but it’s for my own good because Sunday was the anniversary of my daughters death. How noble of you.
Funny how I acknowledged the anniversary & honored my daughters memory on my personal social media page without a mention of vaccines. Funny how I refrained from writing posts about her on antivaxer groups & pages this weekend, where I could have had countless validating replies. Funny how I didn’t exploit her death for the anti vaccine agenda & instead; commented here; a beehive of the provax agenda, where the author of the blog coincidentally wrote about antivaxers, vaccines & SIDS, just before the third week of June.
Yes, I show up here knowing what I will endure, year round, including even this week. No, it’s not a form of emotional ‘suicide by cop’. You will never understand me, stop trying.
If Orac wants to censor my comments, or the responses to them, that’s his call but that won’t help his readers understand the issues much.
@ Christine Kincaid
You still don’t acknowledge the possibility that SIDS following vaccinations could be just random chance, Post Hoc Ergo Prompter Hoc. You still refuse to even consider that lightening can strike twice in the same place, David Hand’s “The Improbability Principle: Why Coincidences, Miracles, and Rare Events Happen Every Day.” And you have given NO indication you actually understand how vaccines work, i.e. immunology basics.
Nope, you are absolutely sure you are right. And its your ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY that is despicable. Most of us accept we are mere mortals, without God-like certainty; but not you.
You write: “If Orac wants to censor my comments, or the responses to them, that’s his call but that won’t help his readers understand the issues much.”
Actually your comments do help readers to understand the issues because they give me and others opportunity to point out the extreme flaws in reasoning of people like you. And, once again, you have never once tried to refute my refutations of claims made by you; e.g., non-polio acute flaccid paralysis in India. So, shows anyone following this blog how you are incapable of actually defending your position with science, i.e., showing you really researched the topic and understand it.
You are a perfect example of the stupidity of antivaxxers, including their absolute certainty they are right.
[N]ow Terrie, Dorit & Denice want to launch a coordinated effort of organized response/non response to MY comments, to mitigate my impact on readers.
Please, point to where I said such. I simply agreed that replying to you won’t change your mind, and that coming here on the anniversary of your daughter’s death shows how you’re completely fixated. By putting words in my mouth, you show you either lack basic reading comprehension or you’re a liar. Which is it?
@ Terrie:
Why would we ever want to “mitigate” her effect on readers? Sceptics would like to have anti-vaxxers explain themselves so that readers could understand their state of mind and erroneous thought processes. In fact, Orac himself often quotes anti-vaxxers in great detail showing how they confuse correlation with causation and use other fallacies. I don’t see Orac stepping in to stop her or telling his minions to be quiet.
HOWEVER, as a psychologist I DO wonder if it does anyone any good to witness the endless re-hashing of “wrongs committed by SBM to helpless infants”? Does expressing an unrealistic belief lead to its eventual challenging by its purveyor or does it only solidify the belief? EVEN THOUGH a few RI regulars do challenge the misguided ideas with research based facts- it doesn’t change anything..
@Denice – Even if they accept one piece of information you provide, all it does is make them change their story, like it’s a fricking Choose Your Own Adventure book that always leads to the “And that’s why vaccines are evil” ending.
I’ve tried to give CK the benefit of the doubt, when yet another claim by her turns up false and assume innocent mistake. But with at least two incorrect claims on this post alone, I’m really starting to wonder if she’s just taken up outright lying, or if her obsession has rendered her unable to understand basic information. I mean, she tried to claims the rate of SIDS death (35.4) was higher than the total rate of infant death (5.6), because she couldn’t distinguish between per 100,000 and per 1000!
@Terrie
Those are not mutually exclusive answers.
Christine Kincaid, you are clearly in pain. Please get help.
I can’t imagine what you’ve experienced, or what you feel, but you are very clearly in pain. Please, find a support group or grief counseling or whatever will help you, but please, get some help.
Coming here to shout at us isn’t going to change the past, and it clearly isn’t bringing you surcease from your sorrow. Please, find something that brings you peace.
@ JustaTech,
It will always hurt but I am okay now. I suffered almost 20 years of ptsd; dreams of holding children that went still & blue as I rocked them. Waking up screaming & thrashing around. It was during those years that I was in denial. That I did not talk about it. Or think about it.
I do not come here to shout at people. Nothing that happened is anyone here’s fault.
I truly do believe that vaccines are causing cytokine storms & seizure activity in babies with a certain phenotype & this is contributing to SIDS. Genetic predisposition. I think that by not identifying & controlling for that in the research; that the studies are flawed.
I want that changed. I don’t know how to do it but I can’t just do nothing.
I also hate the ‘get help’ stuff. There is nobody that can do that. I do not have the type of personality that can be helped by mental health resources; that has to come from me.
@ Christine Kincaid
“It will always hurt but I am okay now.”
Good. Though it’s always at the back of your mind, isn’t it?
“I suffered almost 20 years of ptsd; dreams of holding children that went still & blue as I rocked them.”
Stuff like that too on my end. Not “holding children” but… stuff…
“Waking up screaming & thrashing around.”
Waking up sweating uncontrollably with tremors. Not screaming or thrashing stuff. But waking up terrorised.
“It was during those years that I was in denial. That I did not talk about it. Or think about it.”
Aaahhhh… “Denial”. A more complicated notion than one may believe it to be. You were likely living a life where something did not compute. Then something happened, likely a semi-brutal revelation plus some decantation time over a 1 or 2 year period, and you got an explanation. Whether right or wrong. That’s the kind of mental process I went through and that I’ve more or less witnessed or read other people going through it.
The problem usually is that it’s very tricky to get things right over this 1 or 2 year period. No one else will or even is really able to help to understand things; and even later on, when your theory is in place, you have trouble putting all your arguments in a format that makes a good case for them, and every rebuttal you encounter (whether or not you that rebuttal is correct, and whether or not your understanding of the rebuttal is correct) never addresses the core points you’re trying to make. Or at least so you feel. That would be “typical”.
“I do not come here to shout at people. Nothing that happened is anyone here’s fault.”
Your behaviour obviously shows that you do not consider the feelings of others on this blog as relevant in any way to the conversation you’re trying to have. And even if some of your behaviour could be or could have been construed as attention whoring, you have internalised that criticism (as per your claim, in a comment of yours I read, that you avoided instrumentalising the fate of your child on social media for the antivaxx cause) and try to focus on the arguments as much as you can. I’ve kind of noticed that. It seems to indicate that you’re trying a way out of your grief without falling into emotional exhuberance. It’s not such an easy ride.
“I truly do believe that vaccines are causing cytokine storms & seizure activity in babies with a certain phenotype & this is contributing to SIDS. Genetic predisposition. I think that by not identifying & controlling for that in the research; that the studies are flawed. I want that changed. I don’t know how to do it but I can’t just do nothing.”
I won’t answer on the science, but will suggest another way to think about things: I do not know precisely what you have in mind for investigations in SIDS. But for instance, if you’d wish for genetic predisposition to be controlled for in research, there are concrete questions to be answered: how could you determine what genetic predisposition you’d wish to evidence as being at risk? What payoff in terms of safety could you expect from such research. At what cost, financially speaking? Is is the lowest hanging fruit? I’m simply suggesting putting yourself in the shoes of someone whose job would be allocating resources to research and to honestly think, dropping your point of view but adopting a neutral one (merely “neutral”, not even pro-vaccine), about what course of action should be adopted. Not expecting an answer: merely a suggestion of something to think about in the back of your head… A background job.
Now. If you can evidence in the status of the research a point that, objectively, is under-researched, you would have a case for me or others to side with you on this specific point. I wouldn’t go antivaxx for so little, but a valid point about an under-researched topic is something I could sympathise with. But I would also warn you that you may be heading for a disappointment should such research proceed. And shifting points of views can also be profitable: for instance, we both agree, perhaps for different reasons, that statistics on SIDS are problematic. Why not try to solve this intermediate problem before going on to the cytokine storm hypothesis?
Moreover. Something that I’m curious of: are you more interested in solving SIDS? Or more interested in limiting vaccination? That’s perhaps a too personal question, so you not need answer here, but it’s perhaps also a good idea for you to ask yourself where your skin really is in that game. And why.
“I also hate the ‘get help’ stuff. There is nobody that can do that. I do not have the type of personality that can be helped by mental health resources; that has to come from me.”
Given that you do not seem to care for emotional support but you want answers, you may benefit from “this kind” of help rather than “that kind” of help. Your call. But finding advice on how to balance your priorities, even your existential ones, can be useful. My advice: 1. Avoid groupthink. You can only benefit by being exposed to new ideas. 2. Do not stay too focalized on an issue if you have a choice in the matter. It can destroy you.
Metatoast: “Why should the list of possible examples of conspiracy theories, that opinion finds useful and relevant, be confined to those provided by amateurs?”
Because the most popular and widespread conspiracy theories (including the ones discussed on this blog) are in fact invented and disseminated by amateurs without relevant knowledge, expertise or critical thinking capacity.
“Genuine” conspiracies triumphantly pointed to by the conspiracy theory crowd eventually become known through professional criminal and/or political investigations, investigative reporting and once in a while through whistleblowers with inside knowledge. Some are not conspiracies at all (for instance, the Tuskeegee Experiment, a revoltingly unethical study whose findings were openly published, but which is continually referred to as a “conspiracy”).
Still waiting for Beth-how-dare-you-call-me-an-antivaxer to let us know which vaccines she supports and which she believes are uncalled-for.
It cannot be accepted that amateurs do what you say without tacitly accepting, as germane to the topic, the dichotomy of amateur/professional. Again, this is distracting because it presents the problem of unraveling the sophistry inherent in the restriction. Neither professional or amateur has any bearing on the truth of the matter which should be the only reason for the inquiry. Truth transcends the question of why one side or the other has any bearing on what should be the criterion for acceptable examples of useful conspiracy theories, as well as those that a significant number consider as solved. If what you deem as amateur is by definition not supported by relevant knowledge, expertise, or critical thinking capacity, in other words the nonsense of a dumb-ass, then why not narrow your query to some qualities that you respect.
At any rate, you have brought up the Tuskegee Experiment as an example of what is touted as a conspiracy, but in your opinion, not. It was most certainly a conspiracy! The victims of this shameful experiment were lied to; promised they were going to get free medical treatment for a bunch of ailments. “The men were told that they were going to get free medical exams, meals, and burial insurance. For those who actually had syphilis, they were never informed of their diagnosis nor given any treatment for it. Additionally, very painful and unnecessary spinal taps were performed on many in the study.”(1) This is a conspiracy against the people that were used in the name of scientific research. It has nothing to do with whether or not any official laws were broken. Whether or not the law can ever be applied universally to matters of morality, is a question for another time, but certainly the idea of conspiracy can be expanded to include what is perhaps not now proscribed in the books. What, by your characterization of the experiments as unethical disallows you from admitting the use of conspiracy in this way?
(1)quote from:
http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2014/04/true-story-behind-appalling-tuskegee-syphilis-experiment/
@ Metatoast
“It cannot be accepted that amateurs do what you say without tacitly accepting, as germane to the topic, the dichotomy of amateur/professional. Again, this is distracting because it presents the problem of unraveling the sophistry inherent in the restriction. Neither professional or amateur has any bearing on the truth of the matter which should be the only reason for the inquiry.”
In theory, you’re right. In practice, there is a world of a difference between what you can expect from David Icke and what you can expect from a investigative journalist. I’m thinking typically of Elise Lucet, who in France is doing investigative journalism, not exactly with a pro-science slant, but investigative journalism nonetheless. She is branded by some as a conspiracy theorist. She’s not. So yes, that dichotomy is very fluid depending on who uses the terminology. But nonetheless, world of a difference between QAnon and Elise Lucet. World of a difference.
“Truth transcends the question of why one side or the other has any bearing on what should be the criterion for acceptable examples of useful conspiracy theories, as well as those that a significant number consider as solved. If what you deem as amateur is by definition not supported by relevant knowledge, expertise, or critical thinking capacity, in other words the nonsense of a dumb-ass, then why not narrow your query to some qualities that you respect.”
In theory, you’re right. In practice, it’s foolish not to use “relevant knowledge, expertise or critical thinking abilities” as a heuristic to discriminate nonsense based on pedigree. It’s merely a first filter. Not the only one.
“At any rate, you have brought up the Tuskegee Experiment as an example of what is touted as a conspiracy, but in your opinion, not. It was most certainly a conspiracy!”
Well, yeah, there always is this semantic fluidity on such matters. What Dangerous Bacon targets are conspiracy theories that assert a cabal of shady men instrumentalising government and deceiving the public. You have examples of such theories: The International Jewish Conspiracy Theory, The Flat Earth Theory that NASA is Hiding Everything, other theories whose logical implications are that researchers are actively falsifying research, such as Global Warming, Rabid Antivaxxers of the Worst Kind, Scientology Nonsense about Clearing the Planet. These obviously fit the template.
The Tuskegee Experiment is not one according to Dangerous Bacon as, as far as I infer from his words, Everything was Out in the Open. There is a bias in this position, in my view, in the sense that were anyone willing to shout out that there was an issue, they likely would have been branded a conspiracy theorist. And the thing is precisely that no one did… The other thing where I disagree with him is that “Out in the Open”, yes, but in rather confidential circles: not everyone reads medical literature for fun. Those who do were much more likely to be doctors. And herein lies the problem in the black and white delineation of the notion of conspiracy based on the “Out in the Open” criterion.
Nonetheless, there is a world of a difference between ravings you now see on the Internet on 5G for instance, and something like the Tuskagee Experiment. 5G FUD is simply hilarious and not credible in any way.
“This is a conspiracy against the people that were used in the name of scientific research.”
Yes, well, maybe you should think twice about what scientific research is and is not, should be and shouldn’t be. You’ll see that people like Orac have precisely called out unethical research of this type. So if someone if blowing the whistle on Tuskagee-like experiment (not the same scale, mind you), it is Orac. Not climate change deniers. Who couldn’t care less. That’s the world of a difference between “professionals” and “amateurs” on such topics. Do you now see the issue?
“It has nothing to do with whether or not any official laws were broken.”
I would tend to agree. For instance, here is a real world 19th century successful conspiracy where no laws were broken. They were the Law. They were the Government.
“Whether or not the law can ever be applied universally to matters of morality, is a question for another time, but certainly the idea of conspiracy can be expanded to include what is perhaps not now proscribed in the books.”
As long as you’re clear with the semantics, you can do hair-splitting on words with me if you wish.
“What, by your characterization of the experiments as unethical disallows you from admitting the use of conspiracy in this way?”
They were not secretly organising to subvert institutions. They were operating within the institutions. They were the institutions. Institutions were crap. And that should be a lesson, in theory: someone who criticises institutions is not a conspiracy theorist on the sole basis of that act. People who equate the notion of criticism with conspiracy theories should also be lampooned… But people who go beyond criticism to disseminate wild ideas, instrumentalising emotions of more ignorant people, and sowing distrust with deceitful arguments in which they themselves believe do earn the Conspiracy Theorist title.
Hi there F68.10
I don’t where this is going to end up since there’s no reply button on your post. I’m using the one left on mine.
If DB is targeting CTs that assert a cabal of shady men instrumentalising government and deceiving the public, I don’t get that there is anything to be ridiculed except maybe the examples you gave; for example, The Flat Earth Theory that NASA is hiding everything. Associating Flat Earth with anything is poison to any idea like ‘NASA is hiding everything.’ Of course hiding everything is impossible but certainly NASA is hiding something. Something like the Apollo Missions were all faked. If you want to discredit any idea just park a Flat Earth meme beside it. Park it alongside the meme of conspiracy theorist. Maybe later we can talk about the unbelievable volume of fakery that’s been foisted on us. Fakery like the current George Floyd psyop. A scripted little movie to rile up a race war. Fake riots in the sense that agents provocateurs were working overtime to make what was already naive, into a spectacle of violence.
The thing of it is, the psyop is becoming totalitarian. It has infected everything we depend on to live a productive and happy life. We have lost face because of moronic obedience. We where masks to protect from some tiny little thing broadcasting with a mighty amplified voice. We are under attack by an evil little copycat after the Wizard of Oz.
One true enemy looks a lot like a gremlin with a hypodermic syringe in hand and duping delight smile, calls himself Cake.
@ Metatoast
“I don’t where this is going to end up since there’s no reply button on your post. I’m using the one left on mine.”
That’s exactly how you should operate.
“If DB is targeting CTs that assert a cabal of shady men instrumentalising government and deceiving the public, I don’t get that there is anything to be ridiculed except maybe the examples you gave; for example, The Flat Earth Theory that NASA is hiding everything. Associating Flat Earth with anything is poison to any idea like ‘NASA is hiding everything.’”
Well, to be honest, I pretty much like Flat Earthers. Did you watch “Behind the curve”?
I mean, I must say I have some admiration for their commitment to their ideas and the effort they put into trying to prove that the Earth is Flat. All this creativity to set up experiments, the pooling of resources… gee! Honestly, I do congratulate them. Even if they are… Flat Wrong.
The Flat Earth Movement is an example. You may laugh at it, but the point is not a humoristic one. It highlights very vividly the issue: I mean, honestly I couldn’t care less if my neighbour believes or wants to believe that the Earth is Flat. Won’t stop him from going to grocery store. He will live a normal life. We may even have a good laugh talking Flat Earth with some white wine at the local café. I wouldn’t go medieval on a flat earther over flat earth if the guy is nice to me. If the white wine is not to his taste, that disagreement over taste would be a much more serious offense…
What I do care about in the Flat Earth Movement is that it showcases the following logic: I “Know” The Earth Is Flat. Therefore NASA is lying. And the logical consequence is a Conspiracy Theory. That is a genuine Conspiracy Theory.
What I have a problem with is the word “Therefore”. Take any other conspiracy theory, even more “serious” ones, and every time, you’ll find a similar “Therefore”. And these are very dangerous. In Flat Earth, it’s so obvious that, yes I do not mind showcasing it. But if I take psychoanalysts like Gerard Pommier in France, an academic, you have exactly the same phenomenon (english subtitles available):
@ Denice Walter
If you have the time, take a look at this video with english subtitles turned on. You may understand a few things to some aspects that are at stake in some medical matters (not all…) that underly some of our discussions…
@ Metatoast
So you have, on a State funded radio in the video above, a journalist, a relatively high-ranking academic, Pommier, and a government official / scientist. And Pommier goes full Conspiracy Theorist in the entire video in a rather elaborate and sophisticated manner. This is much more serious stuff than Flat Earth. Real world consequences. But the logic is the same: It’s the “Therefore”…
It’s not only a chemtrail issue or whatever lizard fantasy one may have. It’s really Anti-Science and damaging. Because medical interventions depend on getting things right. And kids and lives are at stake. That’s the point. The real one.
And at least, as can be witnessed by Behind The Curve, Flat Earthers try to stick to or mimick the experimental method. Kudos to them! Gerard Pommier doesn’t: he explicitly battles against the experimental method. Flat Earthers do not. They just do not grasp a few things. So I may laugh at Flat Earther at times, but I really love them comparatively to much more dangerous loons in academic positions.
For the rest of your comment, I’ll let other people comment… You can expect a backlash from other regulars. Enjoy.
Oh dear. Crank magnetism here we come.
I have zero tolerance for racists and their enablers. You have managed to park yourself neatly under that title.
A genuine conspiracy theory would require no capitalization, and there is no meaning for me when it is. By saying that if we have an example of a genuine Conspiracy Theory we have evidence that its descriptive uncapitalized use has been abandoned in order to use the capitalized version as a category of demeanment. This implies a subtle tacit disclaimer of the destructive power that stems from it’s devious use by those in authority positions that are somehow threatened by the possible investigations brought on by a theory of malfeasance done by conspiracy.
Your insistence in the improper use of the term is not helping our cause to defend and perhaps correct science. The scientific method is lost without the idea of theory, of which it’s credence will suffer by making a mockery of those who pursue justice and truth in the matter of conspiracy.
I will seriously try to find the time to read and watch your recommendations
@Chris Preston,
I think you’ll find if you look, that some of the subjects that I speak about, which you’ve placed under the rubric of crank, where crank magnetism represents a multitude of disrespected subjects that is meant to imply a lack of discriminatory faculties; that there is a unifying theme that orders the appearance of variety into a single folder. Truth, justice, and liberty is that order. Any problem with that?
As for Apollo, coming to terms with the idea that our government could possibly pull off a deception of that magnitude is not easy. Don’t think that I would deny the American people any pride of accomplishment when it’s real and not a stunt. I think it helps to know that the R&D of real technologies for space exploration parted during the phony Apollo Missions, which doesn’t help our sense of accomplishment because we are contemptuously excluded. Here is a humorous article on the subject: http://centerforaninformedamerica.com/moondoggie/
How would exposing, or even under a delusion of exposing the planned instigated aspects of a riot, be racist?
@ Metatoast
“A genuine conspiracy theory would require no capitalization, and there is no meaning for me when it is. By saying that if we have an example of a genuine Conspiracy Theory we have evidence that its descriptive uncapitalized use has been abandoned in order to use the capitalized version as a category of demeanment.”
The only person I’d allow to teach me Good Manners is Nadine de Rothschild.
More seriously: cut the bullshit. Germans Capitalise Everything. I Just Do It The Way I Want.
Now There Is A Reason To Capitalize The Notion Of A Conspiracy Theory. It Is Simply Because Most Of Them Follow A Template. So Without Wanting To Be Too Platonic, I Must Observe That Conspiracy Theories Have This “Therefore” Embedded Within Them. Doesn’t Change The Fact That Conspiracy Theories Are Not All Equal. I’ve Just Shown You In My Previous Post Two Conspiracy Theories That Are Very Different In Implications And Subtlety. The First Blames NASA. The Second Blames Ammerrikah And Yankees For A Scientific Invasion Against Our Pure And Pristine Use Of Humanist Psychoanalysis That Respects Individuality To The Point Of Foreclosing Any Mean of Evaluation Of Its Impact On Patients. Because, Of Course, All Ammerrikans, You Included, Are Fundamentalists Of Scientism, As Opposed To Our Oh! So Subtle French Sociologists Who Know That Sociology Should Use a Different Epistemology And Psychoanalysis Should Too, Otherwise Truth Would Stay Hidden From The Appropriate Means Of Inquiries! Yankees Go Home!
NASA = Greyface = Ammerrikans.
“This implies a subtle tacit disclaimer of the destructive power that stems from it’s devious use by those in authority positions that are somehow threatened by the possible investigations brought on by a theory of malfeasance done by conspiracy.”
I am the first one to claim on this blog that authorities should be subject to stringent criticism. I could give you a shitload of interventions on this very blog where I bemoan the tentation of authorities to legitimate on the grounds that citizens are dumb asses the idea that things should be done technocratically away from the public eye. In France, that problems seems to me pretty much acute.
You won’t be able to corner me with this “You want to accuse people of Conspiracy Theories to legitimate government abuse of authority”. I’m Morally Pure on this aspect of things.
“Your insistence in the improper use of the term is not helping our cause to defend and perhaps correct science.”
I never insisted on you using a word or another. I’ve bitched around on this blog on the notion of Enforced Speech when it comes to Holocaust Denial Laws in France. Again: I’m Morally Pure on this one. Use the words you want. I’ll be available for the semantical hair splitting as time allows me. Be my guest! Invent your language! After all, in Switzerland, swiss germans and specifically walliser make it a point of honour not to speak like anyone else.
“The scientific method is lost without the idea of theory”
Gimme a break. First comes observations. Then conjectures. Then refutations and attempts thereof. What cannot be refuted is what sticks. That’s what we call Science.
That’s the complete opposite of a Conspiracy Theory, where people Want To Believe.
“Of which it’s credence will suffer by making a mockery of those who pursue justice and truth in the matter of conspiracy.”
Conspiracy Theories obfuscate matters, add confusion, add inefficiencies on legitimate enquiries, undermine the work of investigative journalists, and really abhorrent behaviours, like the Tuskegee experiment, go out of public scrutiny because of the Induced White Noise.
They’re a Scourge.
“I will seriously try to find the time to read and watch your recommendations”
Take your time. And do as you will: I’m not here to instruct, discipline or reeducate you. Not my job.
“How would exposing, or even under a delusion of exposing the planned instigated aspects of a riot, be racist?”
If there is a plot, come with evidence. Until then, it is rather safe to assume it is because of an unacknowledged problem with emancipation of black people from their conditions and conditioning. It doesn’t have to be “racist”. Merely insensitive and self-serving. Which can be fine by my standards: I’m insensitive to many things. My brain indeed is fried with respect to my capacity to be shocked by almost anything.
its descriptive uncapitalized use has been abandoned in order to use the capitalized version as a category of demeanment. This implies a subtle tacit disclaimer of the destructive power that stems from it’s devious use by those in authority positions that are somehow threatened by the possible investigations brought on by a theory of malfeasance done by conspiracy.
I thought I can be a pompous git, but I have just been thoroughly out-pomped
Dave McGowan? Now where is my eye roll emoticon again?
Seriously, for the moon landings to have been faked would have required a worldwide conspiracy involving 10s of thousands of people (including my cousin at Honeysuckle Creek). None of the conspiracy theorists have ever provided any firm evidence for it to have been faked. It is all supposition and mostly ignorat supposition at that.
Only a racist could come up with the idea that the death of George Floyd was a staged event created to stoke racial tensions.
https://twitter.com/doctress?lang=en
https://doctroid.wordpress.com/2013/12/05/the-best-of-interrobang-cartel-the-george-hammond-conspiracy/
It’s not a conspiracy; it is flawed methodology.
If I were pregnant & worried if the vaccines my obgyn is trying to give me; it is because I am scared that vaccines won’t be safe for my baby. Right? I am afraid that vaccines might actually kill my baby, right? I might be afraid because a friend got vaccinated while she was pregnant & lost her baby. Or I read on a social media group about 20 moms who’s babies died after they were vaccinated. They said they got vaccinated & delivered a stillborn. Or the baby died shortly thereafter. I will want to know if vaccines are actually safe for my baby.
And you might show me this:
“Infant Hospitalizations and Mortality After Maternal Vaccination”
https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/141/3/e20173310
Because it says this:
“CONCLUSIONS: We found no association between vaccination during pregnancy and risk of infant hospitalization or death in the first 6 months of life. These findings support the safety of current recommendations for influenza and Tdap vaccination during pregnancy.”
But that study will not have addressed my concern & I won’t know this unless I really read into the study. Because of the Methods:
“We included women from the VSD with pregnancies ending in a live birth between January 1, 2004, and June 30, 2014.”
No, we are worried about our baby being born dead. Why have you excluded the stillborn babies? That is exactly one of our biggest fears.
“We excluded pregnancies in which a live vaccine was administered because live vaccines are contraindicated in pregnancy.”
No. Pregnant women have been given live vaccines. If they were not; you would not have to mention that "they' were excluded. A live vaccine is a vaccine; you don't get to declare
'them' safe after eliminating the more dangerous ones.
“We also excluded infants of multiple gestation pregnancies, infants born before 34 weeks’ gestation, and infants with major birth defects because these infants are at a higher risk of hospitalization and death”
No. You just excluded the babies of the women who reported going into preterm labor after being vaccinated. You have not declined to vaccinate women carrying twins; they need to
be included in the study.
So yes, after eliminating all the infants who did die, or are at risk of dying after mom was vaccinated; it might appear as though vaccination of pregnant women does not contribute to infant mortality according to this study. When in reality, this is all the study proves:
“The babies who didn’t die after mom was vaccinated are still alive.” Bravo; AAP.
And you might show me this:
For someone who just bitched about how we’ll never understand you, you like to put words in our mouths.
Or this (which does not cite your chosen target, Sukumaran et al.).
Fortunately, there are plenty of other studies that DID look at the question of whether there is an association between vaccines during pregnancy and stillbirth/miscarriage. Which ALSO show no association.
And while there may be research regarding live vaccines during pregnancy, that’s not something anyone would look for to support it being done – live vaccines are NOT recommended. So that’s irrelevant.
So no, that’s not a study that anyone would provide to reassure a pregnant woman who was concerned about getting her recommended flu and TDAP shots, but there are plenty of other studies that do address her concerns. You on the other hand, are just straw manning.
@ Christine Kincaid
No. The exclusion criteria are necessary to scope the study so that the effects of the vaccines are tested in precise conditions. That’s fine.
When I wrote to Beth that in medicine we check things under given parameters, that’s what I meant. These parameters are therefore OK. And, you can expect the study to hold under mild extensions of these parameters. That’s an important point too.
You cannot check everything. You have to get some windows on Reality, and this is one. And from that window, The Sun Is Shining.
Now, who knows? Maybe there’s a torture chamber hidden in the basement? You never know… but you won’t know that by looking through the window. Because the sun is shining.
Overall, this study refutes the idea that there are reasons to believe vaccines cause problems in this setting. If you want to control for other parameters, you should pick another study. That’s a bit like playing whack-a-mole, though…
But I’m wondering how many horses you have to check to come to the conclusion that it’s likely unicorns do not exist.
(And sorry for the Bob Marley song: you may find the lyrics offensive in your situation, but I couldn’t resist. I love Bob…)
@F68.10,
I like Marley; that did not offend me.
I will look at more studies.
F68.10,
Replying to your comment from 6/23 0204 here, because there is a reply link. This is like the 15th reply I have started today. I keep loosing my laptop. But he’s going to sleep now.
"Waking up sweating uncontrollably with tremors. Not screaming or thrashing
stuff. But waking up terrorised."
Then you know. I am sorry, I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. I can’t elaborate, it would be used against me here but I lost everything trying to stay awake forever.
“I do not know precisely what you have in mind for investigations in SIDS. But for
instance, if you’d wish for genetic predisposition to be controlled for in research,
there are concrete questions to be answered: how could you determine what
genetic predisposition you’d wish to evidence as being at risk? What payoff in
terms of safety could you expect from such research. At what cost, financially
speaking?”
Most states here already do a newborn heelstick test for up to 30 disorders, including CF, hypothyroidism, PKU, galactosemia, severe combined immunodeficiency, sickle cell, HIV, toxoplasmosis, etc …
Why couldn’t the specific variants on genes encoding IL-1, IL-6, IL-10, and TNF-α be tested too? They are thought to be contributing to a genetic vulnerability for SIDS & those pro-inflammatory cytokines are specifically stimulated by vaccination.
The ability to test for susceptibility to adverse vaccine events due to IL-1, IL-6, IL-10, and TNF-α , along with MTHFR & some HLA’s is already available. It has been since at least 2008. Heelsticks on newborns have been done since the 1980s.
But I can’t imagine what it would do for this to be acknowledged NOW, after all this time. Would it change ‘vaccine court’ outcomes retroactively? That would probably be demanded. I don’t think anyone wants to open that can of worms but the alternative is that my baby & those like her become acceptable losses. I’m sorry but I won’t again sacrifice a child for a society that would ask that I sacrifice a child for them.
"And shifting points of views can also be profitable: for instance, we both agree,
perhaps for different reasons, that statistics on SIDS are problematic. Why not
try to solve this intermediate problem before going on to the cytokine storm
hypothesis?"
Yes I agree. You might be surprised what attempts to discuss them are met with. Even if vaccines were not on the table at all, questioning SIDS stats is akin to heresy.
"Something that I’m curious of: are you more interested in solving SIDS? Or
more interested in limiting vaccination?
The problem is that specific variants on genes encoding IL-1, IL-6, IL-10, and TNF-α are also correlated with a genetic vulnerability to autism. Vaccination should NOT be limited for those that don’t have this susceptibility. I have those variants & so does my son. Ironically, he did not retain any antibodies from vaccination anyway. The only one I have been tested for is the MMR & I have no antibodies either. It’s not like we would be deprived of having protection to VPD’s if we were not vaccinated; we don’t have immunity despite being vaccinated. This is where the research is really lacking; I don’t know if others with these variants are the same or not but if they are; they won’t be able to contribute to herd immunity anyway. Why risk SIDS?
"1. Avoid groupthink. You can only benefit by being exposed to new ideas."
I agree; that was my motivation for coming here. That’s why I haven’t left.
Thank you.
My thoughts on this study:
https://journals.lww.com/amjforensicmedicine/Fulltext/2019/09000/Sudden_Infant_Death_After_Vaccination__Survey_of.5.aspx
“Among the 3 cases reported here, features at postmortem examinations were heterogeneous, but similar findings related to the immune system were observed to some degree. Particularly, neutrophil infiltration in the spleen was evident, suggesting that the subjects were affected by hypercytokinemia deriving from an immunological reaction by some infection.”
Infants with "some infections" are not typically immunized while "infected". Do vaccines trigger "immunological reactions"? Or not? I think they do.
“Common features such as splenitis and hemophagocytosis were also evident among the 3 cases. The uncontrollable immune overreaction mainly caused by the activated lymphocytes and histiocytes/macrophages reminded us of hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH), which is clinically similar to macrophage activation syndrome (MAS). Actually, MAS/HLH is characterized by an overwhelming inflammatory reaction attributable to dysfunction of the immune system, accompanied by the continual activation and expression of T lymphocytes and macrophages.26,27 This activation and expression leads to hypersecretion of proinflammatory cytokines, so-called cytokine storm, which might create unfavorable immunological conditions in infants who are affected by inflammation.”
Oh my; there it is again. That cytokine storm.
“Concerning deaths after vaccination, estimation of coincident timing was performed based on epidemiological data obtained over a long period.6 Brotherton et al15 simulated the probability of death coincident with vaccination using vaccination-encountered age in a population of vaccination resisters and the age distribution of SIDS deaths in Australia. They estimated that 1.3% and 2.6% of the infant victims would be expected, by chance, to have some vaccination during the prior 24 and 48 hours, respectively. In the present study, 3 infants (9.4%) were found to have died within 3 days among 32 cases, and 7 (21.9%) were within 7 days, for whom a history of similar repetitive vaccinations was confirmed.”
Well that's quite a discrepancy. 1.3% as compared to 9.4%.
“A collaboration between forensic pathologists and pediatricians is important. In cases 1 and 2, we had contact with the pediatricians who administered vaccinations to the infants. The effects of vaccination were not considered at all for case 3 before the present survey.”
The importance of this cannot be overstated. I am remembering the person here who stated that out of his 4 pediatrician practice; they had not seen a SIDS death for over a decade.
Do you know who informed my daughter's pediatrician about her SIDS death? ME. I did. Months later. Only because I had other children who were his patients.
“In conclusion, there were a couple of SID cases in which the relations to vaccination was suspicious. Particularly, such a relation was observed after combined vaccination of Hib and S. pneumoniae, exhibiting histopathological features similar to MAS/HLH. However, it cannot be stated conclusively that they are related or coincidental deaths. We expect extensive postmortem examinations for SID cases to assess vaccination effects in infants.”
A couple. So a small study. A couple out of 50. But much larger than "one in one million doses". May not I; the mom of a baby who died from SIDS less than 24 hours of immunization,
advocate for "extensive postmortem examinations for SID cases to assess vaccination effects in infants."? Do you think I can do this on Facebook, really? I don't have many resources.
My voice is quiet. Here there are pathologists & pediatricians who are interested in immunizations. I am here because that is where "you" are.
Well that’s quite a discrepancy. 1.3% as compared to 9.4%.
Much like there’s a discrepancy between 24 and 72 hours. (Did you fail to notice that that 9.4% is infants that ” died within 3 days,” or do you just not care about the truth any more?) I would expect a higher jump from 48 to 72 than from 24 to 48, because you cover infants who pass after the weekend, when most offices are closed.
@ Christine Kincaid
First, I did several comments on SIDS which you continue to ignore. Second, not only have SIDS cases been going down; but, aside from vaccination rates, there is a great discrepancy geographically in the United States. See CDC Data and Statistics at: https://www.cdc.gov/sids/data.htm Look at the map and also click on Data Table to see wide differences between states..
They found a small number of cases of SIDs following vaccination. As I wrote and you ignore, given the number of SIDS cases, some will follow vaccinations, Post Hoc Ergo Prompter Hoc. Even the article you refer to found “Of the 32 cases in which any vaccines were administered, 7 infants (21.9%) had received immunization within 7 days of death.”
AND if you were to actually research the literature on SIDS you would find a number of conditions unrelated to vaccines; e.g., Brain defects. Some infants are born with problems that make them more likely to die of SIDS. In many of these babies, the portion of the brain that controls breathing and arousal from sleep hasn’t matured enough to work properly; Low birth weight. Premature birth or being part of a multiple birth increases the likelihood that a baby’s brain hasn’t matured completely, so he or she has less control over such automatic processes as breathing and heart rate; Respiratory infection. Many infants who died of SIDS had recently had a cold, which might contribute to breathing problems..And if they did complete investigations on 100s of SIDS cases and found no indication was vaccines, you would want more studies.
And actually the CDC is looking closely at SIDS (CDC. Learn What CDC Is Doing About Sudden Unexpected Infant Death (SUID). Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/sids/what-CDC-is-doing-SUID.htm?CDC_AA_refVal=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cdc.gov%2Fsids%2FSUIDAbout.htm
See also: CDC. Specimen Submission Guidelines for Pathologic Evaluation of Sudden Unexplained Infant Death with Pathologic or Clinical Suspicion of Infection. Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/ncezid/dhcpp/idpb/specimen-submission/suid.html
And check out: Byard. Chapter 24:The Autopsy and Pathology of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513401/
Or the entire book: Duncan & Byard (2018). SIDS: Sudden infant and early childhood death: The Past, the Present, and the Future. Free download at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513384/pdf/Bookshelf_NBK513384.pdf
And, as my other recent comment shows, you found one study that didn’t look at stiibirths and I found many that did. A clear example of your stupidity and/or dishonesty.
@ Christine Kincaid
So, you refer to one study that didn’t include stillbirths and write: “we are worried about our baby being born dead. Why have you excluded the stillborn babies? That is exactly one of our biggest fears”.
So, you found one study to attack. Well, I did a quick and dirty search for studies that included stillbirths and found too many to cite; but I’ll cite a few, all found NO association with vaccines. Some were even for live vaccines and one study reviewed risks from live vaccines and found none (Laris-González, 2020).
For those monitoring this blog, just one more example of Christine Kincaid’s stupidity and/or dishonestY. When I could so easily find studies looking at stillbirths, why did she refer to one that didn’t???:
References:
Badell ML et al. (2015 Jun). Risks Associated With Smallpox Vaccination in Pregnancy: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. Obstetrics and Gynecology; 125(6): 1439-1451.
Donegan et al. (2014 Jul 11). Safety of pertussis vaccination in pregnant women in UK: observational study. BMJ; 349.
Faber MT et al. (2019 Jan 7). Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes and Infant Mortality After Quadrivalent HPV Vaccination During Pregnancy. Vaccine; 37(2): 265-271.
Furuta M et al. (2017). Efficacy and safety of pertussis vaccination for pregnant women – a systematic review of randomised controlled trials and observational studies. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth.
Getahun D et al. (2019 Mar 22). Association Between Seasonal Influenza Vaccination With Pre- And Postnatal Outcomes. Vaccine; 37(13): 1785-1791.
Gunnes N et al. (2020). Seasonal and pandemic influenza during pregnancy and risk of fetal death: A Norwegian registry‑based cohort study. European Journal of Epidemiology; 35: 371-379.
Harjulehto-Mervaala et al. (1994 Mar). Oral Polio Vaccination During Pregnancy: Lack of Impact on Fetal Development and Perinatal Outcome. Clinical Infectious Diseases; 18(3): 414-20.
Heikinnen T et al. (2012 Sep). Safety of MF59-adjuvanted A/H1N1 influenza vaccine in pregnancy: a comparative cohort study. American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology; 107(3): 177.e1-177.e8.
Khan AI et al. (2019). Safety of a bivalent, killed, whole-cell oral cholera vaccine in pregnant women in Bangladesh: evidence from a randomized placebo-controlled trial. BMC Infectious Diseases.
Laris-González A et al. (2020). Safety of Administering Live Vaccines during Pregnancy: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Pregnancy Outcomes. Vaccines; 8(124).
McHugh L et al. (2020 Feb). Birth Outcomes in Aboriginal Mother-Infant Pairs From the Northern Territory, Australia, Who Received 23-valent Polysaccharide Pneumococcal Vaccination During Pregnancy, 2006-2011: The PneuMum Randomised Controlled Trial. The Australian & New Zealand journal of obstetrics & gynaecology; 60(1): 82-87.
McMillan M et al. (2017 Mar). Safety of Tetanus, Diphtheria, and Pertussis Vaccination During Pregnancy: A Systematic Review. Obstetrics and gynecology; 129(3): 560-573.
Ohfuji S et al. (2020). Safety of influenza vaccination on adverse birth outcomes among pregnant women: A prospective cohort study in Japan. International Journal of Infectious Diseases; 93: 68-76
Omer SB et al. (2020 Jun). Efficacy, duration of protection, birth outcomes, and infant growth associated with influenza vaccination in pregnancy: a pooled analysis of three randomised controlled trials; 8(6): 597-608.
Petousis-Harris H et al. (2019 Oct 11). A Retrospective Cohort Study of Safety Outcomes in New Zealand Infants Exposed to Tdap Vaccine in Utero. Vaccines; 7.
Rowe SL et al. (2019 Jun). Influenza and Pertussis Vaccination of Women During Pregnancy in Victoria, 2015-2017. The Medical journal of Australia; 210(10): 454-462.
Regan AK et al. (2016 May). Seasonal Trivalent Influenza Vaccination During Pregnancy and the Incidence of Stillbirth: Population-Based Retrospective Cohort Study. Clinical Infectious Diseases; 62: 1221-1227.
Salem RA et al. (2015 Jun 9). Impact of Haemophilus Influenzae Type B (Hib) and Viral Influenza Vaccinations in Pregnancy for Improving Maternal, Neonatal and Infant Health Outcomes. The Cochrane database of systematic reviews.
Scheller NM et al. (2017 Mar). Quadrivalent HPV Vaccination and the Risk of Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes. New England Journal of Medicine; 376(13): 1223-1233.
Wang A et al. (2020 Mar 3). Pregnancy Outcomes After Human Papillomavirus Vaccination in Periconceptional Period or During Pregnancy: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. Human vaccines & immunotherapeutics; 16(3): 581-589.
Wentworth P (1966). Studies on placentae and infants from women
vaccinated for smallpox during pregnancy. Journal of Clinical Pathology; 19: 328-330.
Worede DT & Dagnew GW (2019). Determinants of stillbirth in Felege‑Hiwot comprehensive specialized referral hospital, North‑west, Ethiopia, 2019. BMC Research Notes.
Wortman AC et al. (2015 May). Association of Influenza Vaccination on Decreased Stillbirth Rate. American journal of perinatology; 32(6): 571-6.
Zhang Y et al. (2020 Apr 14). Pregnancy Outcomes After a Mass Vaccination Campaign With an Oral Cholera Vaccine: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. BJOG : an international journal of obstetrics and gynaecology; [online ahead of print]
I have to admit, Joel, I wish you’d lay off with the “stupid” thing. There are many people in the world who have low IQ. My cousin has an IQ of ~85, mostly likely from hypoxic birth injury. Plenty of people have called him stupid, because he’s rather gullible and inclined to take anything he’s told at face value. But he’s a decent guy who works hard, cares about others and while he’s never been academically successful, he’s amazing working with his hands. Christine’s issue isn’t her intelligence, it’s her arrogance and conviction that she could never be wrong.
@ Terrie
Someone can be born quite intelligent; but close their minds. That is what I mean by stupid, not innate; but . . . Many intelligent people do stupid things. Her arrogance is just, in my opinion, a cover-up for her subconscious or unconscious awareness that she has closed her mind.
Years ago someone I knew who probably was far more intelligent than me, ignored warnings not to drink and drive, ended up dead. Wouldn’t you consider that stupid behavior? He wasn’t an alcoholic.
I would actually call drunk driving arrogant as well. As arrogance of believing one is immune to consequences. If you said her comments or her arguments were stupid, that would be one thing. But you call her stupid, every single time. I’m reminded of teenage boys in the 90s, calling everything gay and then claiming that because they’re about things that lack sexual orientation, it’s not insulting to people who are gay. I mean, it’s your choice what words you use, obviously, but at least in my eyes, it’s a choice that makes for a poorer piece of rhetoric.
Intelligent people can do stupid things, often because they overrate their intelligence. They can find some reason why they can do something, like drive and drink. I’ve known a guy who went to college and stated he could drink and drive, because at night people would drive more carefull, so it was no big deal.
@ Christine Kincaid
What year did you lose your baby to SIDS? Exactly how old was he/she?
Maybe you already gave the above; but my memory isn’t as good as it once was.
@ Joel
“What year did you lose your baby to SIDS? Exactly how old was he/she?”
Please do not ask for the year if not relevant.
@ F68.10
It may be relevant; but I won’t say why.
I should have also asked birthweight and whether premature or not.
@ Joel,
She was born Feb 26, 1994. Died June 21, 1994.
@ christine kincaid
You write: “She was born Feb 26, 1994. Died June 21, 1994.”
Thanks for info. So, now I’ll explain why I asked for it.
You are a trained nurse. You obviously have a good understanding of the current COVID-19 pandemic and you know how to find information on the internet, including medical journal articles; yet, when it comes to your daughter’s death from SIDS, you have irrationally locked on to vaccines, refusing to even consider you might be wrong. Your internet searches ignore anything that weakens your position, thus, you are guilty of confirmation bias, cherry-picking. I say “irrationally” because I would bet on any other medical/health issue you would read, think about, and reply to what others write and in internet searches look at ALL the available info; but with your belief that vaccines caused your daughter’s SIDS, you claim “absolute” certainty and when I, as well as others, refute claims made by you, no acknowledgment, no response.
So, when I call you stupid/moron, does not refer to your innate abilities, mentioned above; but to your refusal to use them, to look at SIDS and vaccines as you look at many other aspects of medical/health issues.
The only way I could come close to knowing what really happened, I would have to have the entire medical record of your pregnancy up to your daughter’s death. Even better I would have to have medical records from you and family members for possible hints at genetics. In any case, I still have some hypotheses of what might have happened and why you refuse to even consider anything besides vaccines. I base my hypotheses on the following (CDC. Data and Statistics at: https://www.cdc.gov/sids/data.htm ):
“The SUID rate, which includes sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), unknown cause, and accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed (ASSB), declined considerably beginning in 1990. This decline followed the release of
The American Academy of Pediatrics safe sleep recommendations in 1992.
The initiation of the Back to Sleep (now known as ) campaign in 1994.
So, my hypotheses are:
Since the campaign had just begun in 1994, you were unaware of it, had you been, and followed its recommendations your daughter may not have died from SIDS.
You were aware of the recommendations, just barely, and tired that night and didn’t follow through with them.
You know that your family, even yourself, have some genetic problems that you could have passed on.
In any case, your guilt, either not being aware or not carrying out, or believing you passed on the genes, would be something most people would have an extremely difficult time dealing with. So one great defense mechanism is to find something to blame, something to repress your guilt by directing your anger, your attention at it. Thus, even acknowledging you might be wrong, not that you are wrong, just might be wrong, would open up a pandora’s box of guilt.
As I said, only some hypotheses; but I think reasonable ones. If I am right, I suggest you seek help. No parent is perfect, off days, so even hypothesis 2 does not imply you were a bad parent and the other two, not to blame at all.
You might also check out NIH Research on Possible Causes of SIDS, The Triple-Risk Model at: https://safetosleep.nichd.nih.gov/research/science/causes#triple
Click on the three to get more detail. I’m sure you will want to focus on the “outside stressor”; but vaccines are just one mild stressor, there are many, and as they explain: “If caregivers can remove one or more outside stressors, such as placing an infant to sleep on his or her back instead of on the stomach to sleep, they can reduce the risk of SIDS.”
I also asked about your daughter’s birthweight and gestational age at birth, e.g., premature?
The image Orac uses at the beginning of this post shows an infant sucking on a silicon-based pacifier. It’s wonderful that silicon is being used. Historically, wonder if pacifiers, bottle nipples, and vaccines containing certain natural allergens had an effect on the incidence of cytokine-storm induced SIDS?
@ Joel (retired epidemiologist),
Has the incidence of SIDS decreased over the last five (5) years? Please advise.
@ Michael J. Dochniak
You want to give the impression that you are knowledgeable; yet, you can’t even look up some statistics!
So far the CDC only lists stats through 2017, so last three years not there. Note I referred to the CDC page in earlier comments (https://www.cdc.gov/sids/data.htm#resources ) You could have looked it up yourself.
Here’s some items from CDC page:
The SUID rate, which includes sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), unknown cause, and accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed (ASSB), declined considerably beginning in 1990. This decline followed the release of
The American Academy of Pediatrics safe sleep recommendations in 1992.
The initiation of the Back to Sleep (now known as Safe to Sleep) campaign in 1994.
Since 1999, declines have slowed. In 2017, the SUID rate was 93.4 deaths per 100,000 live births.
SIDS rates declined considerably from 130.3 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1990 to 35.4 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2017.
Cytokines can be released from exposure to silicon; but that’s an extremely long way from a cytokine storm. While not ruling it out, highly doubtful. And silicon is everywhere
Miro-Mur, F., Hindie, M., Kandhaya-Pillai, R., Tobajas, V., Schwartz Jr., S., Alijotas-Reig, J.: Medical-grade silicone induces release of proinflammatory cytokines in peripheral blood mononuclear cells without activating T cells. J. Biomed. Mater. Res. B 90B, 510–520 (2009)
Do your own homework!
@F:
Always happy to meet a fnord. I have a good friend who’s an old Discordian. Hail Eris!
Hail Eris!
Hail Eris!
But vote Cthulhu.
@ F68.10:
Well, I for one wish that you don’t depart this earthly plane soon but instead, find at least a modicum of pleasure and peace in life.
You have great skill as a writer in your second ( or third?) language, incorporating diverse themes and a unique outlook.
Your origins story ( because all superheroes have one!) is truly horrendous and a warning signal for those who care for others’ welfare as experts or caretakers.
I know I asked you once to write about your experiences either as a therapeutic act or as a means to sell a book about medical malfeasance to help others in a similar situation BUT now I would venture that you might make a kickass novelist or screenplay/ television writer: you integrate visual and musical imagery into your oeuvre as well as a complex set of interwoven scenes .I don’t know what the subject matter would be- it shouldn’t matter. I think that you are truly an artist who is lurking just under the surface of your thoughts.For the right script, you might make money and find your path.
Naa, shit’s Steven Spielberg lame. Jaws? Close Encounters of the Third Kind? A.I. Artificial Intelligence?, Minority Report? The Goonies? Ready Player One (really?)? lmao.
Rude.
I really like the guy.
I enjoyed “Ready Player One”, even though I understand it’s different from the book. It fiercely criticises the sexism that is all too comon in geek culture, as well as being an entertaining ride.
Though, he might collaberate with Joel and eek out an Umberto Eco adaptation:
Tim,
I think that he’s more an experimental writer than a pop culture creator.
Every work doesn’t have to appeal to the widest possible audience .I never go to see “block busters”.
@ Tim
OK, another movie to watch. This one I saw; but 36 years ago. Couldn’t find free on YouTube; but library has two copies, currently checked out, so on waiting list. ?
@ Denice Walter
“Every work doesn’t have to appeal to the widest possible audience. I never go to see “block busters”.”
Not even Starship Troopers?
I mean: blockbusters can be hilarious pranks well worth watching. One of my all time favourites is Big Trouble in Little China.
I’ll keep other recommendations for future interactions.
(But apologies, I do not want to discuss too publicly what are my intentions for the present and the future; thank you for trying to engage the discussion on these matters, but I’d rather decline. For now, trying to get my mind a bit back together in terms of ability to carry through a medium term action through by doing some maths. Dealing with the massive permanent headaches I now have and this trauma loop I can’t shake off. I do not believe I could achieve any sustained effort in artistic domains, where I would have everything to learn from scratch. Too physically and mentally exhausted for that. I’m “happy” enough if I now manage to walk some 300 meters a day. It’s really tough for me to even do that, now.)
@ F68.10:
Perhaps your maths will be an art form in themselves- elegant and profound.
I hope you feel better.
@ F:
And I do like some wacky, bizarre or strange films/ television
ever hear of Taika Waititi? Many others but I’m tired now.
Ha! I love me some Big Trouble in Little China:
Also by John Carpenter; Dennis Dun, Victor Wong, and Jeff Imada (as stunt coordinator, for this one) were brought along into Prince of Darkness:
My then girlfriend (who also loved BTILC) and I turned to each other and said “It’s Egg Shen!”
Tachyons. Yes, please.
And here is one for Denice Walter who never goes to see “block busters”. May she find much to ‘unpack’ within this Hal Hartley flick:
@ Denice Walter
Taika Waititi? No. I hadn’t heard of him. Arguably the weirdest shit I’ve ever seen in theaters is “The Forbidden Room” by Guy Maddin.
Several years ago, I went on a spree with lesser known post-apocalyptic movies. Letters of a Dead Man was the most memorable.* The others might come back to me.
*ObTim: The torrent is obviously better.
[…] Antivaxxers Amy Becker and Mark Blaxill deceptively use COVID-19 death statistics to claim that vacc… […]
Speaking “historically”, pacifier use has long been associated with a decreased risk of SIDS, and this effect appears independent of what the pacifier material is. From a 2005 article in Pediatrics:
“Sucking on a pacifier requires forward positioning of the tongue, thus decreasing this risk of oropharyngeal obstruction. The influence of pacifier use on sleep position may also contribute to its apparent protective effect against SIDS.”
@ Dangerous Bacon
Again, you hit a home run.
Thanks.
And major league baseball is back! (or will be, starting around July 24th).
I suppose 60 games (rather than 114) at full prorated salary, with no “universal designated hitter” is about the best I could hope for. I’ve got a bad feeling about risk to pitchers (and perhaps catchers), but the upside is that the Rickettsiae are likely taking a significant hit to the “Marquee Network.”
I may have spoken too soon. I’m undecided about “starting extra innings with a runner on second base”; while it allows defaulting to defensive indifference (the graphics don’t load for me there), it’s also a concession to the overarching goal of MLB to shorten the game.
@Narad
This season of Brockmire (IFC channel) is set some years in the future after a pandemic. He’s trying to revive baseball with all kinds of VR and shortened games…
“Well, well, well; Looks like I’m gonna fuck me some light”:
They have ‘Lemone’ personal assistant in the future — It is like SIRI but you want to kick it in the gunt even more.
re: Letters of a Dead Man
Obnoxious that it took a few clicks to find clips that didn’t ask for a login to ‘verify my age’. But, of course, I possess Stalker by the same dude — Somehow, the ruskies make it work in 4:3. I’m a big fan of the ‘Stalker’ games and saw that on a site one day {mfw no way!}. Long af, though.
@ Terrie and Renate
OK, despite I only partially agree with you, I will try to not use “stupid” in the future.
However, people with MDs and PhDs are racists. And they refuse to even consider they are wrong, so I would call that stupid or worse.
And I have interacted with people, both children and adults, with Down Syndrome and Developmentally Challenged. I would NEVER call them stupid; but, OK, again, I’ll try not to use it; but these people, Christine Kincaid, Natalie White, Tom, Beth just really make me angry. Especially Beth who obviously is quite intelligent, at least in math; but doesn’t even acknowledge when she contradicts herself and misreads what I wrote.
In any case, I wrote a long response to Christine which hasn’t been posted yet. You might like it, including its tone.
And Renate you write: “Intelligent people can do stupid things, often because they overrate their intelligence. They can find some reason why they can do something, like drive and drink. I’ve known a guy who went to college and stated he could drink and drive, because at night people would drive more carefull, so it was no big deal.”
No, not because they overrate their intelligence, they overrate their body responses to alcohol. When at university they ran studies on drinking and reflexes, gave drinks with alcohol, without alcohol, had students react to video. Asked after each if they thought reflexes affected. Nope said the students. Yep, said the timer.
Overrating ones intelligence is best exemplified by President Trump and we are in big trouble.
Honest question. Why call racists stupid? Why not just call them racist? I try to avoid insults like stupid, fat, etc, because I don’t want to suggest that not being a target is conditional on being “acceptable.” Again, that’s my personal view. It’s something I think everyone, individually, needs to consider and determine where they draw the line.
@ Terrie
In 1676 Nathaniel Bacon led a revolt in Virginia against the wealthy class. His followers included indentured servants and Negro slaves, who up to then interacted without any racial prejudices. The revolt was put down; but the upper class realized they had to prevent future ones, so, in various ways, though poor whites and indentured servants were still treated extremely poorly, they made the whites feel superior to Negroes, the beginning of racism. DIVIDE AND CONQUER. In the pre-Civil War South, only 1%, sound familiar, were wealthy plantation owners, the rest of whites were usually quite poor, barely surviving; but by directing their attention against Negroes, well, divide and conquer. I won’t go through all of American history; but many of Trump’s supporters do so because he plays on their racism. So, while he is benefitting the Corporations and Wealthy, the groups that are being hurt, are turned against each other.
So, yes, racism is stupid because it allows the 1% to turn those who should be allies against each other, again, divide and conquer. The majority not even aware of how they are being used, I mean misused; but, of course, some may be aware; but selfish wish for power, etc. leads to them being strongly outwardly racists. For instance, look at George Wallace early in his career, he was a moderate; but to ensure re-election he became a hard core racist.
So, racism is an extreme form of stupidity in the United States because it turns natural allies against those exploiting and hurting them. We are an extremely wealthy nation with room for those who work harder, come up with new ideas, to do better than others; however, that is not how the system works. It is by bought and sold politicians, etc. that we have a 1%. It would take too much time to go into the details; but just one example. In 2008 dishonest greedy bankers almost brought us a great depression. They would have made good money; but enough was never enough so they created fake mortgages, NINJAs, no income, no jobs, no assets and subprime mortgages; but since banks no longer held mortgages, just bundled and passed on, no one cared. The bankers got commissions for the mortgages and again when bundled and sold. FRAUD. So, what happened, we bailed the banks out and the bankers managed to even collect bonuses, not go to prison. To add insult to injury we helped in various ways the banks to take over smaller banks who had done nothing wrong; but hurting because of what the big banks had done, so already too big to fail, our government made them even bigger. At the same time, 10 million lost their jobs and 6 million their homes, though many could have kept them if we had designed the bailouts differently. And the trillions in bailout monies added to our national debt. Given we keep lowering taxes on the wealth and corporations, it is the working and middle classes who service the debt. So, the victims of the bankers fraud still the victims.
And what do we have, racism, DIVIDE AND CONQUER.
@Joel, That doesn’t really address my question of why you call them stupid instead of calling them racist. Why obscure the issue like that?
You can use stupid, if someone acts in a way that would be an insult to ones intelligence. Acting stupid is not the same as being stupid.
@ Joel:
I think that there be a better way to understand what you refer to:
sometimes a person has areas ( vs “conflict free* zones- remember them?) in which emotional/ psychological issues interfere with the thought process making them less functional cognitively about these topics. Suppose someone had traumatic experiences in Iraq or Afghanistan and returns home, has a relatively normal life involving work and family life BUT gets really upset and argues about politics that discuss military interventions. Of course, he or she might be rational because they know the issues intimately having been there, on the ground but it can also be a source of emotional upheaval and obsessive idea in certain cases ( not all)..
As you may have noticed, CK believes that various- unrelated- SB interventions don’t work for her: IIRC, birth control, vaccines,( either no effect or “damage”) psychotherapy.
This is a very unique and rare outlook and might be a clue about the problem to hand.
BUT at least you’re trying.
I just about pulled a muscle rolling my eyes at her claim that therapy doesn’t work for her because she has to do it for herself. That’s like claiming a gym trainer is useless for you, because you need to be the one to do the work to get in shape.
I’m thankful that you graciously answered my question.
Note: I was referring to natural rubber latex (NRL) as the culprit not silicon.
Yes, I think most RIgulars figured that out rather promptly. Perhaps you could go try to pick a fight with Babylist over their choice of “Best Natural Pacifier.”
I could never have guessed.
@ Terrie
You write: “That doesn’t really address my question of why you call them stupid instead of calling them racist. Why obscure the issue like that?”
Really, you didn’t understand what I wrote? I am calling them stupid because they are allowing the 1% to redirect them and in so doing harming themselves, their families, and everyone else not belonging to the 1%. Their racism is sabotaging them joining all those suffering, unsafe environment, unsafe workplaces, insecure jobs, legal system that favors corporations and the rich, and on and on it goes. So, I call them both racists and STUPID. Not stupid for doing a few stupid things, which we all have done, myself included; but stupid for allowing themselves to be manipulated into racism which hurts them and almost everyone else continuously.
I missed your point, because it was a question that called for a straightforward answer that you call them both, and what you gave me was a rambling history lecture of information I already know.
@ Terrie
I give up. I gave the history lesson to explain that racism is used as a divide and conquer strategy. Sorry I didn’t explain in one sentence; but I wanted to give the historical context that it is nothing new.
So what you call a “rambling history” was a simple attempt to explain why racism has been used continuously, why it is so embedded, and why those who fall for it are stupid.
Don’t you know when to quit???
Look, it’s not my fault you misunderstood my question, which was simply wondering why you apparently favored calling racists “stupid” instead of simply calling them “racist,” which is sufficient enough term to me. The history of racism in America tells me very little about why you make the word choices you do.
In other woo-fraught news….
Mike Adams ( Natural News, Brighteon, today) reminds us that he indeed warned us about riots, looting, food shortages, city takeovers (heh), upcoming civil war and now, societal collapse He has, for years, told followers to get out of corrupt, filthy, crime ridden, gang infested ghettoes and move out into the free, proud countryside where decent, honest hardworking citizens reside growing their own organic food, defending their homesteads with forearms and living the good life! Similarly, Null ( PRN.fm) advises leaving cities and suburbs and has a webinar Sunday on how to leave the nightmare of urban life far behind you- what to do, what to learn, where to go. They were prescient as true maverick rebels usually are!
I can interpret this another way:
during the pandemic, many people lost wages because of shutdowns and older retired people hung on to their cash, fearing the future which may mean that PROFITS DROPPED at the aforementioned websites’ stores because they sell overpriced supplements and superfoods.. So woo-meisters need to drum up business and admiration from their entranced thralls.
SRSLY. I live near the worst areas hit by Covid-19 and have seen great changes since mid-March and I can tell you: things are improving: the R number is below one, a gradual re-opening is taking place, county by county and gas prices are GOING UP ( as they usually do when people expect commerce to increase). people are eating at umbrella shaded benches outside cafes, the posh ristorante next door is firing up the brick oven and parking lots in nearby parks are filling up. Airline fares are GOING UP. Prices of houses and rents remain HIGH.
HOWEVER some of the woo-meisters’ fave safe locales ( TX, FL) aren’t doing so well with the virus. Maybe it’s okay if you lock yourself away on a ranch or an estate as they do.
A proposal re: stupid.
I use “stupid” to refer to a lack of intelligence and “foolish” to refer to a lack of wisdom. Yes, I know I’m being autistically over-precise, but that might resolve things.
I, too, have learned to avoid calling people ‘stupid.’ I now prefer ‘ignorant,’ with an explanatory note pointing out that one who ignores relevant information is , by definition, ignorant.
Christine K is a poster child for ignorance, as she rejects all information which doesn’t conform to her preconceptions about vaccines, SIDS, etc.
At over 150K words, English has the largest vocabulary of any language. I’m all for taking advantage of that fact.
That’s the problem with not being a native speaker in English, I don’t know all English words and though a dictonary might help, it might not always give the right word for any given situation.
@ Renate:
Your English is very good – if only we all could do as well in non-native languages.
@ Denice Walter
At school English was not my strong point. German was my favorite language, I can read it quite well. But on internet one is more or less forced to use English. When I was young, I used to ask my dad for the meaning on some English word, now it’s the other way round.
@Renate, That’s a fair point. English has such a large vocabulary that even the average native speaker knows only about 10-15% of it. You only need 1000-2000 words for daily functional communication, and the conversation here probably runs 5-8K.
“the free, proud countryside where decent, honest hardworking citizens reside growing their own organic food, defending their homesteads with forearms and living the good life!”
Sounds about right, except I use permethrin dust to keep the *#(&! flea beetles off my eggplants. Front-line homestead defense is supplied by Pluto, the deep-voiced field spaniel, from whom I had to rescue a baby bird today. He was enthusiastic about his new, warm, lively chew toy but I got him to drop it before damage could ensue.
@ Terrie
This is my last response to you. If you don’t understand why calling them racists was inadequate, that’s your problem. If, for instance, Trump played on their racism to get elected, then actually did do things that benefited them, e.g., improved/lowered drug prices, etc., then they would still be racists; but, in some regards, not stupid as their racism would benefit them. This isn’t about some esoteric science that confirms there is NO difference in intelligence, creativity, honesty, etc. between racists, my response is simple the pragmatics of it. I hope “pragmatics” isn’t too big a word for you.
And as I’ve explained before, I don’t write comments just to respond to one person. Maybe a one sentence answer would satisfy you; but others might need a more elaborated, including historical, perspective.
I hope “pragmatics” isn’t too big a word for you. So sorry I mistook you for someone willing to engage in a dialogue instead of a lecture. If we’re exchanging words, I think I’ll go with “grandstanding.”
@ Terrie
I shouldn’t waste my time; however, being retired and sheltering-in-place, I’ve got lots of time
You write: “So sorry I mistook you for someone willing to engage in a dialogue instead of a lecture.”
My understanding of a “dialogue” is an open exchange of ideas. You made it absolutely clear that you were NOT interested in an open exchange by, no matter how many times I tried to explain my position, you insistng on a single sentence answer. I explained clearly why I didn’t give a single sentence answer and you basically demanded that I do so.
So, feel free to label me any way you want. I’m sure many others who have read my responses will appreciate what I was trying to do, even if all of them didn’t agree with me.
And, though anything possible, I sort of doubt you understood the ramifications of Bacon’s 1676 rebellion, the beginnings of racism in America, and how it is a near perfect strategy for divide and conquer. But even if you do, doesn’t change the fact that you demanded I respond with one sentence.
In a way focusing on a one-sentence response mirrors some of the unscientific, illogical approaches of antivaxxers, climate-change deniers, etc. that is, they want things SIMPLE, no nuances, no developed explanations. Welcome to their ranks.
You go, K-pop tweens! Flood those callouts by PDs. ACAB.
https://www.rateroticafancam.com/
I really wanted to post a YouRube video of this, but I can not find it (been scrubbed?). #sadfurry #sadplushie Here is the wikipedia discription:
Some of the lads passed around a block of cheeze..”And then I started… Squeeking”…. “And that is all.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mouse_Problem
Not available on youtube due to copyright.
Can be found elsewhere if needed.
“due to copyright”
That is strange. Though I was gifted the entirety of The Flying Circus back in 2003 on 14 DvDs, It was not that many years ago that Cleese himself consecrated all their work, and in HD, on yourube would be free of charge.
Try here…
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2uwxiz
?
Orac, as a fervent pro-vaxxer, I thank you for shedding light on reasons to disagree with or question or dispute those anti-vax authors who published a claim that infant deaths during Covid were fewer and that the few-ness was caused by fewer vaccinations.
Orac, just one point about your informative article: I did not read in the anti-vax publication any intention to downplay the tragic loss of older people, when they focused on the infant lives that they believed to have been saved.
No need to accuse the anti-vaxxers of wanting Covid. We should rather accuse them of jeopardizing herd immunity by misleading the public into risky decisions.
No need to blame them for actually wanting the vulnerables to get Covid (they did not want this).
No need to accuse them of thinking that the gain of fewer young deaths (if true) was worth it (a value judgment) compared with the loss of the Covid deaths.
A dangerous dark cloud like Covid can still have a silver lining, and if it is true that fewer people (of whatever age) have died of other causes this year, then great.
Covid happened and is still happening and it is absolutely frightful. But certain side-benefits and blessings of the lockdown have emerged for certain people and for planet earth. Check out any post or video claiming to know “the” reason for the pandemic or sharing “the” benefits or lessons learned.
SMK: “I did not read in the anti-vax publication any intention to downplay the tragic loss of older people, when they focused on the infant lives that they believed to have been saved.”
From Blaxill & Becker:
“We should mourn the deaths of the elderly Manhattan nursing home residents but also take heed of the hundreds of avoided infant deaths. Only with that kind of balance will we draw the proper lessons from the pandemic and the lockdowns that have followed in its wake.”
Clearly, B&B see a “silver lining” to the pandemic, or, as they put it, a “balance” that we should observe during the Covid-19 “natural experiment”. Too bad about those old people, but hey, we get to play up our theory that vaccines are killing infants.
Why did they need drag the elderly into their gleeful attempt to link vaccines and SIDS?
Just as an FYI, the reason I haven’t paid much attention to the blog since Friday is a grant deadline, which was today. I should be back to more regular posting beginning tomorrow, after having a chance to recover and maybe have a dram or two of the old single malt tonight to celebrate.
@ F68.10:
Thanks for the video. I can’t seem to find English subtitles so I’ll try in French which I sometimes can do but it takes time.
@ Denice Walter
The subtitles can be activate by clicking on the various buttons in the lower right corners of the video. It’s easier on the youtube website than on the embedded video on the RI website.
I tried to find time to pull together a compendium of the crankiest quotes and science-bashing that Gerard Pommier engages in in this video to make things as explicit as possible. It’s a fuckfest of anti-science in a really soft-spoken and mellow approach. Didn’t come around to do it, as my mind is a bit busy elsewhere.
But if you want me to do the exercise, I’ll gladly oblige.
But, with a bit of exaggeration to make the point: 5:35 “Scientists have hijacked institutions!” 5:49 “Cognitive science has only a very loose relationship with the question of education.” 5:55 “Kids that do not perform well in school have family issues, not learning disabilities”. 6:17 “The brain is not the central issue in educational difficulties” 6:27 “The scientific council is not pluri-disciplinaire!” (read “integrative” in RI parlance…) 6:33 “Hegemony of 12 cognitivists” (read non-lacanian-psychoanalysts)” 6:35 “that masquerade as neuro-scientists” (fact: misrepresentation) 6:43 “they illegitimately back their assertions on neuro-science”. 6:53 FUD on “genetic determism”. 7:25 FUD over portraying kids as handicapped because of “genes” (all the more ridiculous given the merovingian treatment of autism by Pommier’s school of thought… but I digress… or do I?) 8:35 “Institutional regression because the scientific council is highjacked by people putting their faith in the experimental method“. The Big Boogeyman: The Experimental Method.
I stop here. You’ve got more than half an hour of this kind of FUD and nonsense by these people claiming that they are persecuted by scientists who are “taking over” the institutions; the irony being that the ones being “persecuted” are de facto hegemonic in all clinical situations and judicial courts. You’ve got ONE scientific council that’s created to include scientists on the topic of education, and they go berserk, claiming it’s an american invasion of scientism and calling for insurrection against the return of eugenics (you’ve also got the Nazi gambit being played at times: Zygmund was a Joo, therefore criticising psychoanalysis is antisemitism… Not kidding… It’s That Dumb).
In a nutshell: Pure Psychological Projection about Hegemony of Scientism that is the most counterfactual as can be imagined. It’s an ideological war that pivots around the feeling the public has that psychological issues should be taylored to the patient. In essence, they oppose any form of quantification (Numbers are Evil) and thus foreclose any form of evaluation of their actions other than laudatory self-reports of success. And they are dominant in academia. Pommier is a psychiatrist-psychoanalyst, and “research director” at Paris 7 University. So you want Universities Where Pseudo-Science Is Taught, as you regularly challenge antivaxxers to pinpoint? Here’s one: Paris 7. Maybe I’ll introduce you one day to Elisabeth Roudinesco…
(And Oh! BTW. Mommy wrote the “Science” on part of the topics touched in that video. Always fun to watch her articles being shared around by anxious parents worried that their kid is “too smart” — usually, they’re not necessarily much smarter than the average “smart” kid, but never mind — and thus pathologising the condition in order to guilt-trip the educational system… Huge Fun… Her quotes on french medical discussion boards are horrifying hilarious, at least from my point of view… because they implicitly very much talk about me… and one of my siblings…)
@ F:
Believe it or not, I actually caught some of those quotes in French! Hard to believe that someone broadcasts that in the 21st Century! Mon Dieu! ( not that I believe in Him/ Her)
Fortunately, I studied with well-known Cognitive, Developmental and Social psychologists and it was all SB research-driven. Counselling psych as well. Some people I knew did study a modified Freudian approach for psychotherapy at an institute of Neo Freudianism. Not me.. Most others were CBT.
Freud is interesting for two reasons:
— he portrayed humans as animals ,in line with evolutionary studies when sex was taboo, hidden and dismissed/ lied about in the Victorian era.
— his amazing creativity constructing artificial mind constructions to explain how people behave and think NOT BASED ON RESEARCH Sci fi perhaps?
@ Denice Walter
“Believe it or not, I actually caught some of those quotes in French! Hard to believe that someone broadcasts that in the 21st Century! Mon Dieu!”
I do believe you. And yeah, it’s very rough to believe. But that’s what happens when Authority is considered as more important than Evidence. Pommier is a doctor, therefore he’s right. Scientists are not doctors, and therefore their opinion is of little value against the Humanist Approach that Respects Individuality (but evades evaluation…) of Doctors.
It’s a warning I make sternly on RI. I know you people do to some extent want to shut up antivaxxers or cranks, but there is a downside if you do not bother cleaning up the cranks in your own ranks: they can take over and usurp Authority with Credentials. And with their soft-spokenness, mellow and soothing hypocritical compassion, grandstanding against eugenics (who are the doctors, BTW, who do sterilize female mental patients? May I ask?… I’m not hearing french psychoanalysts that much on these issues…), intelligence of human flaws, they can bullshit their way with great efficiency and Hold Onto Authority and Power with great efficiency.
“Freud is interesting for two reasons: he portrayed humans as animals ,in line with evolutionary studies when sex was taboo, hidden and dismissed/ lied about in the Victorian era.”
I acknowledge that.
“His amazing creativity constructing artificial mind constructions to explain how people behave and think NOT BASED ON RESEARCH Sci fi perhaps?”
If the issue were only “Sci-Fi”, that would be OK. Do I need to draw a picture to explain how medical child abuse is centralised and handled by B. Golse at Necker Hospital when psychoanalysis is the dominant mindframe to think of the issue? B. Golse — on the editorial board of “In Analysis”, a “scientific” journal dedicated to… oh well… — is well known for being against evidence-based treatment of autism. And, by the way, how come medical child abuse is wielded in courts against mothers of children with autism? On evidence that is… problematic… with experts that are… problematic… To me, that’s a point where Authority collapses under the weight of its Stupidity. Chandrasekhar mass limit reached.
References to statements above available upon request.
I had a number of undergraduate dormmates who worked at the same lab as I did. One swore that he spotted Chandra coming out of a stall in the basement bathroom with his medal hanging over his shirt.
the merovingian treatment of autism by Pommier’s school of thought
The M-word always brings Raymond Queneau to mind.
the merovingian treatment of autism by Pommier’s school of thought
I don’t know if you were part of Orac’s commentariat back when the much-missed Lilady was commenting here. The topic of the post-Freudian establishment in France, and how they diagnosed and treated autism, roused her to incandescent heights of coruscating anger.
@ Smut Clyde
“I don’t know if you were part of Orac’s commentariat back when the much-missed Lilady was commenting here. The topic of the post-Freudian establishment in France, and how they diagnosed and treated autism, roused her to incandescent heights of coruscating anger.”
No, I do not believe I was part of the commentariat then. But she’s perfectly right on that one: it’s infuriating. But one thing that should be noted is that autism is not the only point of contention. It’s the most vivid one and where you see the fiercest attacks from “Them” to keep their hold on the system and immunise themselves from any outside criticism. But it touches the entirety of the psych spectrum. The bottom line is: if we cannot manage to crack this nut open, i.e. the autism issue, there is no way we’ll be able to introduce the notion of criticism in the realm of psych stuff and education science and policy. And we cannot afford it.
But just to give you an idea of the level of tension I have with this issue, here goes: Essentially, as “They” cannot blame mothers anymore for autism but still do think things along these lines, medical child abuse has been more or less used to piggy-back their prejudices against mothers. Which is plainly outrageous. With the added bonus, that in the minds of the French Knights of Science, the notion of medical child abuse has been equated with the notion of psychoanalysis. Logical: since psychoanalysts use the concept of medical child abuse to corner moms of kids with autism, it’s because the epistemological underpinnings of medical child abuse are tied to psychoanalysis. (Spoiler: they’re not…)
So, as psychoanalysis is Sci-Fi, medical child abuse also is Sci-Fi. And anyone claiming otherwise is Rooting In For Psychoanalysis. Because they want to blame mothers for kid’s autism. So the twist is that I am now learning that I am Defending Psychoanalysis and the stranglehold it has on french psychiatry, because, as I do claim that medical child abuse exists, and that it can materialise (among others) in psychiatry itself — using twists and turns that psychoanalysis endorses: everything is a family issue and not a biological/medical one; personalised treatment taylored to every whims of “carers” and not subject to any evaluation except laudatory self-reports of success — I am now de facto a defender of psychoanalysis… Which I am very obviously not, but that’s too complicated to grasp, apparently…
This double-bind is The Sweetest Taboo. Here’s my love anthem to the post-Freudian establishment:
@ Joel,
Back to Sleep was very new in 1994 but I knew about it. She was placed on her back, was found on her back & I was not co-sleeping.
The genetic vulnerability from the variants on the genes encoding IL-1, IL-6, IL-10, and TNF-α were not known at that time but I now know that I have them & so does her autistic biological sibling. Newborns are still, not even now; screened for them but they could be. They could be included in the newborn heelsticks that test for up to 30 different disorders. Even in the 1980s they were testing for PKU & CF via newborn heelstick. All the other tests have been added over the years.
I think it is really negligent that a genetic vulnerability to an immune-mediated cause for SIDS has been confirmed, yet the research has not been expanded to look at vaccines as the potential immune-mediating trigger. Not that I have been able to find anyway. If you are aware of any I would be highly interested in seeing them. Even an epidemiological study of only infants with the vulnerable IL-1, IL-6, IL-10, and TNF-α variants would be helpful. It could be done forensically even. Post-mortem.
Finally; she had two of the most well known risk factors. Multiple-gestation (she was a twin) & prematurity with low birth weight. She was the baby that would have been excluded from almost every study on SIDS & vaccines. I’m not sure you could even say that the safety of vaccines for HER; has ever been backed by science.
Also @ Joel,
I forgot to mention her twin. He was still on an apnea monitor as he was still on oxygen. The night she died he was fine. That next night, during the 24-48 hour period post vaccination, he experienced 17 episodes of bradycardia & desaturation. Two episodes of full respiratory arrest that I was able to intervene with & resolve. The second most terrifying night of my life.
Actually, the scientific literature strongly supports timely immunization of premature and low-birth weight infants. Adverse cardiorespiratory events have been noted to occur following vaccination in hospitalized pre-term infants (mostly without clinical significance), which is why there have been recommendations for careful hospital monitoring of these babies, especially when there’s a history of pre-existing heart or lung problems.
Such infants are also more susceptible to serious infections, including pertussis and severe rotavirus gastroenteritis, both preventable by immunization. Obstructive bronchitis has been reported to be significantly more common in preemies who weren’t vaccinated.
“Vaccines are immunogenic, safe and well tolerated in (premature and low birth weight infants), in whom early active immunisation is particularly important because they are among the most vulnerable subjects for pediatric infectious diseases. It is therefore essential to make every effort to convince pediatricians and parents that compliance with these recommendations will not cause any clinical problems.”
http://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19775838/
@ DB,
I don’t have Elsevier access for full text but I did pull up a few of the linked “similar” articles & see confirmation of what you wrote here:
"Adverse cardiorespiratory events have been noted to occur following vaccination in
hospitalized pre-term infants (mostly without clinical significance), which is why there
have been recommendations for careful hospital monitoring of these babies,
especially when there’s a history of pre-existing heart or lung problems."
Well that’s problematic. Infants in NICU & PICU have “cardiorespiratory events” round the clock. Have you ever spent time in a NICU? They are not quiet areas. Alarms go off constantly.
A cardiorespiratory event in a NICU is unlikely to have clinical significance; they are resolved by NICU RNs & MDs. A cardiorespiratory event at home, in the middle of the night, with sleeping parents is very likely to have clinical significance.
My twins were discharged at 2 months old from the NICU, unvaccinated. They were vaccinated just before turning 4 months old with the recommended 2 month old’s round & sent home, to spend the night with sleeping parents.
“Careful hospital monitoring” should not be necessary for vaccines to be declared safe. Pediatricians do not require inpatient admission for vaccination, that would be wildly inefficient. How can studies done on closely monitored, hospitalized infants be relevant for how safe vaccines are for these infants in the real world?
Another example of CK seeing what she wants to see without being fettered by reality.
The “careful monitoring” that was mentioned for post-vaccination status applies to premature/low birth weight infants in a precarious state of health in an inpatient hospital setting, not infants subsequently thriving at home who receive recommended vaccinations.
Not unexpectedly, you completely ignored what was said about serious infectious disease hazards to which premature/low birth weight infants are especially susceptible, and which are prevented by immunization. In Christine-World, only vaccines get the blame.
And now for something completely different.. (no, wait):
And for F68.10 (even though, whom, I suspect, is quite familiar with it):
Talk about swallows and coconuts!
ok, so today I learned that the yourube script does not respect the index qualifier.
If christine kincaid is right about that and the vaccines are not ‘taking’ anyways then I’d say that would be a valid ‘opt-out’ and probably should be tested for.
Otherwise… Shit. Why not:
ok. fin. I promise (not really).
@ Tim,
If christine kincaid is right about that and the vaccines are not ‘taking’ anyways
then I’d say that would be a valid ‘opt-out’ and probably should be tested for.
Yes, son has a medical exemption now based on this & other findings by his Immunologist.
Wish the information was available when he was immunized & when my daughter was immunized but it wasn’t.
Now it is & infants are not screened for it.
@ DB,
Seriously?
"The “careful monitoring” that was mentioned for post-vaccination status applies to premature/low birth weight infants in a precarious state of health in an inpatient hospital setting, not
infants subsequently thriving at home who receive recommended vaccinations."
So you are confirming my concern. Vaccine safety has only been tested for either: 1. Premature/low birth weight infants in an inpatient setting; which mitigates the chance for SIDS, or: 2. Full term, single gestation, normal birth-weight babies who are “thriving at home”.
Vaccines, therefore; have not been tested for safety in now thriving infants at home who had been multiple gestation &/or Premature/low birth weight. Because THOSE infants are excluded from vaccine safety studies.
What if the risk factor for multiple gestation &/or Premature/low birth weight infants from SIDS; is actually the risk factor for SIDS from vaccination in multiple gestation &/or Premature/low birth weight infants?
"Not unexpectedly, you completely ignored what was said about serious infectious disease hazards to which premature/low birth weight infants are especially susceptible, and which
are prevented by immunization."
Jesus; it’s 2020. IVF, IV antibiotics for Pertussis. Supplemental O2. Access to NICU/PICU. I’d take my chances any day with a treatable disease than to blindly vaccinate & risk SIDS.
Christine,
I wanted to tell you that I think you are very brave to post the personal details about your situation here. I’d like to have a private conversation with you. You can find me on facebook as Beth Clarkson. Please friend me.
@ Beth,
There are several but I think I found the right one
@ Beth
So, you want to participate in an echo chamber of unscience, illogic, etc. Way to go.
Though probably the wrong term, idiot savant is applied to someone who is “genius” level at something; e.g., music, math, theoretical physics, computer science; but totally foolish, ignorant in a number of other subjects, aspects of life. Probably not the right word; but makes the point that you obviously are excellent at math; a subject, by the way, that deals with PROOFS; but not when it comes to science which doesn’t “prove” things; but deals with probabilities, with accumulation of studies, etc.
You still haven’t provided texts from courses in research methodology, philosophy of science. Nor answered question, which vaccines you approve of.
So, yep, I think you and Christine are destined to be great friends.
Joel: “@ Beth
So, you want to participate in an echo chamber of unscience, illogic, etc. Way to go.”
Joel, Beth is the embodiment of motivated reasoning. Yes, she has a PhD in statistics, but she works in the manufacturing sector. It is all engineering, and carbon fibers are not subject the Belmont Report. She may have taken a bio-statistics course a long long time ago, but she has never had any training in the ethics of any animal testing, and definitely nothing on human subjects.
She and her repetitive questions are best ignored.
@ Joel
“but makes the point that you obviously are excellent at math; a subject, by the way, that deals with PROOFS.”
Wrong, wrong, wrong….
There is an experimental component to even the purest segments of maths. It’s even where it’s the most manifest.
@Joel
“So, you want to participate in an echo chamber of unscience, illogic, etc. Way to go.”
I merely want to have a private chat with her. I generally only participate in echo chambers where I argue against the majority view. Like this one.
“You still haven’t provided texts from courses in research methodology, philosophy of science.” No, nor do I intend to. My textbooks are all either in my university office or my basement office at home. Neither of which I have access to because I broke my leg a few weeks ago and currently only leave the main floor of my home to get treatment for my broken leg. I don’t plan to be in my university office again until after the pandemic has passed.
Nor answered question, which vaccines you approve of”
Actually I did answer that question earlier. Although mu might have been a better answer as your question assumes I approve of some and not others. In fact, I approve of all of them with regard to their being available to individuals who want them. But my assessment of the risks and benefits are based on my individual circumstances and which risks I find more tolerable. As a result, my choices and don’t always coincide with recommendations made for the population. I’ve already discussed this at length.
@ Beth
“In fact, I approve of all of them with regard to their being available to individuals who want them. But my assessment of the risks and benefits are based on my individual circumstances and which risks I find more tolerable.”
So essentially, you disapprove of coercion. Which leaves the following question open: to the cost of jeopardizing herd immunity?
I mean, I vehemently disapprove of coercion, but I do recognize the value of herd immunity, and the necessity to find ways not to jeopardize it.
F68.10 says: So essentially, you disapprove of coercion. Which leaves the following question open: to the cost of jeopardizing herd immunity?
I mean, I vehemently disapprove of coercion, but I do recognize the value of herd immunity, and the necessity to find ways not to jeopardize it.
Herd immunity is nice, but I don’t think it’s worth coercing others into getting an injection with the intention of altering their bodies immune system. I’m fall rather strongly into the “my body, my choice” moral stance for issues ranging from abortion to recreational drug use and including vaccinations.
Herd immunity is not even a possibility for some vaccines, such as Tetanus or Pertussis, although the reasons why vary. While, as NARAD pointed out to me previously, in other cases, a small enough %immune is needed that insisting everyone be vaccinated isn’t appropriate. IMO Measles is the only vaccine that comes close to both being able to achieve herd immunity at all and needing a high enough population immunity rate to make herd immunity a plausible argument for coercion. I can disagree that the need for herd immunity should override an individuals choice and also recognize it’s a valid argument for measles but not for Tetanus.
Further, high levels of rejection of a vaccine should be considered feedback from the public to vaccine manufacturers. Coercion eliminates this important channel for feedback and can kick off a cycle of continuous degradation.
@ Beth
“I’m fall rather strongly into the “my body, my choice” moral stance for issues ranging from abortion to recreational drug use and including vaccinations.”
I fall rather strongly in the “my life my choice” line of thought too, but I also acknowledge that there are legitimate reasons to say “our society our choice”. Which means “choice of citizens, through vote, typically”, not “choice of self-appointed authorities” whatever they may be, and that includes the “we are free to make mistakes” notion.
“Herd immunity is not even a possibility for some vaccines, such as Tetanus or Pertussis, although the reasons why vary.”
For Tetanus, I’ve wondered something a bit different: isn’t it mostly a countryside disease, and not an urban city disease. Seems to me a reason to be a bit more relaxed on the meaning of heard immunity. Though herd immunity is not the only reason to enforce vaccination in the case of tetanus, as it’s quite severe. In the case of tetanus, I would believe that it’s not really the role of parents or caretaker to have a say in the matter. “My child my choice” is much less defensible than “my body my choice”. For adults, yes, it seems it’s a somewhat different matter, and the “my body my choice” may make sense. Though I’m no expert on tetanus. So, anyone, feel free to contradict me.
“I can disagree that the need for herd immunity should override an individuals choice and also recognize it’s a valid argument for measles but not for Tetanus.”
Good. So it all revolves essentially around the moral argument of coercion. I’m going to have a hard time agreeing with you on the matter of coercion for vaccinations, since I do not believe it’s an unacceptable infringement on personal freedom. Compared to other stuff… There’s always a slippery slope argument when it comes to personal freedom, but I have a hard time finding that vaccination is engaging society on a slippery slope. So many other issues where society already is on a slippery slope (if it ever was not on that slippery slope in the first place).
“Further, high levels of rejection of a vaccine should be considered feedback from the public to vaccine manufacturers.”
I do not see how that argument applies for vaccination. And even for some medication, while I tend to oppose rather seriously forced medication, I do not believe the general public is a good judge of that. Even doctors tends to be shaky at times at being a good judge for the usefulness of various medications, so…
“Coercion eliminates this important channel for feedback and can kick off a cycle of continuous degradation.”
I do not buy this one for vaccines.
@ Christine Kincaid
You write: “I’d take my chances any day with a treatable disease than to blindly vaccinate & risk SIDS.”
We had antibiotics in 1950s, before antibiotic resistance developed; yet, do you have any idea how many children suffered, hospitalized, permanently disabled, and died from vaccine-preventable diseases? In 1965, a rubella epidemic ended in almost 40,000 pregnant women experiencing stillbirths, miscarriages, or congenital rubella syndrome (born with one or more of deafness, blindness, seizure disorders, mental retardation) or microcephaly, dying shortly afterwards. Do you have any idea how many kids were permanently crippled from polio, more than 15,000? Measles resulted in 45,000 hospitalized each year, 1,000 with some disability, and up to 500 dying. And all when our population was half what it is today. So, even today, total SIDS deaths less than 1/10 paralyzed from polio alone. And, you continue to refuse to even consider that vaccines may not be responsible. Maybe someday you will realize that you aren’t God, and just might be wrong.
You described that the daughter you lost was premature, that she had cytokine disorder; but refuse to even consider that even a slight infection could have been responsible for her SIDS. It had to be the vaccine. It had to be the vaccine. It had to be the vaccine. Was an autopsy performed? Did they check for every possible infection? Did they do nasopharyngeal for, for instance, staphylococcus aureus?
You write: “So you are confirming my concern. Vaccine safety has only been tested for either: 1. Premature/low birth weight infants in an inpatient setting; which mitigates the chance for SIDS, or: 2. Full term, single gestation, normal birth-weight babies who are “thriving at home””
Not what you first wrote: “Finally; she had two of the most well known risk factors. Multiple-gestation (she was a twin) & prematurity with low birth weight. She was the baby that would have been excluded from almost every study on SIDS & vaccines. I’m not sure you could even say that the safety of vaccines for HER; has ever been backed by science.”
So, now you accept that some research was done. Typical, you keep changing your criteria.
Read my other comment.
The problem I have with you and other antivaxxers is not that there may be some rare cases where vaccines MAY contribute to SIDS; but that you don’t really accept/understand the risks from vaccine-preventable diseases and/or that if they had the pre-existing problems, SIDS could have occurred without the vaccine AND that you consider yourselves having God-like certainty. Last time I looked, most people believe in one God and you and other antivaxxers are not HER.
For confused onlookers ( unfortunately, I can’t link to images of the yelling woman/ confused white cat with plate of vegetables BUT you get the picture – we’re the cat):
Anti-vaxxers claim that they have the testimony of “millions of parents” ( Gary Null films) who saw their child regress or die following routine vaccination; websites/
facebook pages who support anti-vax ideas get as many as 50-150K + followers ( Stop Mandatory Vaccination; the Vaccine Machine; TMR, AoA, The High Wire, V is for Vaccines), thousands signed the VAXXED bus or saw the film.
why have studies failed to reveal this phenomenon?
As we’ve mentioned too many times already, studies can uncover rare events ( early rotavirus vaccine, narcolepsy, cat injection site carcinoma, OPV etc) perhaps 1 in 10,000 or less.
SO, if autism occurs in about 1-2% of children, let’s venture** that a full 10% of parents attribute their child’s condition to vaccines – thus, 10% of 1-2% is 1/1000 to 1/500.
Why isn’t this showing up?
Vaccine studies have already shown serious problems that lead to changes in vaccine formulation and monetary remuneration to parents ( Vaccine Court)
If it’s all money based, wouldn’t serious researchers, seeking fame and fortune, attempt to reveal this great malfeasance and become instantly the Person of the Hour and RICH? There’s no competition in research? Since when? Do all researchers seek the status quo whilst toeing the line, terrified of the powers-that-be? Why are only woo-meisters/ anti-vax mothers, brave, mavericky rebels? Why are all of the studies that link ASDs and vaccines done by cheats, people with suspect or irrelevant degrees, bad statisticians with odd funding sources?
Why can’t you find ONE decent study, designed correctly, replicated?
Even if you say, it’s political: is the whole world the US/ UK/ EU? Wouldn’t non-friendly rivals ( Russia?, Iran?. China? Venezuela?) try to show how corrupt the West is? How much better they are?
Lots of people believe in alien visits/ abductions BUT are there any photos, videos, documentation that isn’t dodgy?*
** I’m sure that Liz D and Dorit may have actual figures on this, I’m guessing
There’s also the simple fact that we don’t have to make things up to make our argument. Cherry picked data, distorted numbers and outright lies.
@ Christine Kincaid
OK, great, you did your best, followed the Back to Sleep guidelines. Good to know and additional proof that you are quite capable of finding out information.
You write: “The genetic vulnerability from the variants on the genes encoding IL-1, IL-6, IL-10, and TNF-α were not known at that time but I now know that I have them & so does her autistic biological sibling.”
“The possibility that cytokines associated with these foci of inflammation are involved in the fatal episode is purely hypothetical (92-96). It should also be noted that such areas of minor chronic inflammation are commonly found in lung sections.” (Byard. Chapter 24:The Autopsy and Pathology of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513401/ )
“There is convincing evidence that slight infection and an activated immune system are involved in SIDS. One common thread may be the dysregulation of inflammatory responses to apparently mild infections, leading to a cytokine storm that contributes to death.” (Opdal . Chapter 30: Cytokines, Infection, and Immunity. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513388/?report=printable )
So, a slight infection in infants with genetic predispositions can elicit, in some cases, a cytokine storm. “A slight infection.” I won’t cut and paste; but numerous studies have found numerous microbes, including staphylococcus aureus in the nasal passages of SIDS cases. If slight infections can elicit a cytokine storm, then almost anything they are exposed to could, e.g., rhinoviruses (colds), etc. And, if still incubating, you wouldn’t notice they had been infected; but their immune system would. At worse, a vaccine mimics a slight infection. And there are a few studies where vaccines were given to premies:
Recent data collected by Carbone et al. in a very well conducted, prospective, randomised study definitely exclude the possibility that DTaP causes cardiorespiratory problems even in extremely PTIs and very LBWIs These authors studied a group of 93 children with a mean GA [gestational age] of 26.9 weeks and a mean birthweight of 896 g, who received a dose of DTaP at a chronological age of 57.5 days, and compared the incidence of apnea and bradycardia in these subjects with that observed in a control group of 98 comparable PTIs [preterm infants] and LBWIs [low birth weight infants] who were not vaccinated. Klein et al. studied the risk factors for developing apnea after immunisation in a neonatal intensive care unit, and found that episodes were more frequent in children who had experienced similar clinical manifestations in the 24 h before vaccination. (Esposito S et al. (2009). Vaccines and preterm neonates: Why, when, and with what. Early Human Development; 85: S43-S45.)
Note there are a few earlier studies as well; but above refutes your claim: “Finally; she had two of the most well known risk factors. Multiple-gestation (she was a twin) & prematurity with low birth weight. She was the baby that would have been excluded from almost every study on SIDS & vaccines. I’m not sure you could even say that the safety of vaccines for HER; has ever been backed by science .”
And you ignore that some studies have even found that vaccines significantly reduce SIDS.
However, for sake of argument, let’s assume that vaccines didn’t cause; but contributed in rare cases to SIDS, to an infant born prematurely and/or low birthweight together with genetics for overreaction of cytokines to even slight infections. We know that infants are exposed to up to 3,000 full strength microbes on a daily basis. Even when you breast feed an infant, there are microbes on your breasts and in the milk. Given this, what are the odds that an infant so sensitive to microbes would NOT end up experiencing not one but multiple cytokine storms with SIDS the outcome from one of them without being vaccinated? At the same time, we know that, given their risks of infection, that premies, even more than other infants, are at risk for vaccine-preventable diseases. Minor scratches, food, water, air, things put in mouth, all introduce bacteria and viruses. Since staph aureus is ubiquitous, high likelihood they would be infected. So, vaccines protect premies even more than full gestation infants and, even if one believed they contributed to, not caused, SIDS, if the cause was cytokine storms because of genetics, cytokine storms elicited by the most mild foreign intruder, then, at best, SIDS might have occurred a few days or so later; but, the research that has looked at vaccines and premies has NOT found any problems! ! !
I’m curious, what was the exact gestational time and birthweight of your daughter???
And I again suggest that you buy and read: Lauren Sompayrac’s “How the Immune System Works (6th Edition) and read it CAREFULLY. You obviously have the time to search the internet and write comments, so why not actually learn how our immune systems work.
Your problems is that you have decided, are absolutely certain that it was the vaccines because of the timing (Post Hoc Ergo Prompter Hoc) and your need to attribute blame. You are absolutely certain. No honest human being assumes they can be absolutely certain about almost anything in life. And, as I wrote in previous comment, given you followed the Back to Sleep guidelines, that you may be trying to avoid accepting that, though not your fault, that the genes you passed on to your daughter, resulted in her tragic death. If you can convince yourself that without vaccines, despite the genes, she received from you, she would have been OK, OK even when exposed to, for instance, common cold, excellent psychological defense mechanism; but not medical science. So, even if research (current and future) continues to show vaccines NOT related to SIDS, including research on premies, as long as you can convince yourself, perhaps, getting the vaccine was a blessing, namely, something to blame.
And even if future research finds that in a minuscule number of SIDS cases vaccines played a role, it will still be valid that vaccines will have prevented many more SIDS cases and/or other serious infections. So, if we tested for cytokine genes, deciding not to vaccinate could put more kids in danger than the few protected by not vaccinating them.
As I’ve said quite often, we don’t live in a black and white world. If you had tested your twins for the cytokines, refused to vaccinated, and one or both subsequently died from a vaccine-preventable disease, or from SIDS, who would you blame?
You can find the current CDC recommendations for contraindications and cautions for certain vaccines at: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/hcp/acip-recs/general-recs/contraindications.pdf
You can find “Screening Checklist for Contraindications to Vaccines for Children and Teens” at: https://www.immunize.org/catg.d/p4060.pdf
Note question 9 refers to suppressed immunity
Ugg. Dirty tiddies. My great grandma used to ‘practice’ ‘curing’ thrush by blowing into babies’ mouths.
@ Joel,
They were 29 weeks. She was 2 lbs, 14 oz.
"You are absolutely certain. No honest human being assumes they can be absolutely
certain about almost anything in life."
I am not absolutely certain. I have tried to talk myself out of believing what I do a multitude of times. Maybe almost on a daily basis. It’s actually more comforting to try to convince myself that I am wrong. I’ve never wanted to be wrong about something so much in my life.
But then it happens again. A feeling like I was punched in my stomach. Sick. An awful feeling telling me I know I am right & it’s a horrible thing to be right about. All those babies.
Hard to explain, I’m not sure you could understand. I am autistic. I’ve spent my whole life trying to navigate a world that didn’t make sense. Always on the outside looking in. People can be predatory to young girls who can’t read their intentions. I had to learn to rely on my instincts for situations because I don’t have good character judgement. I know what instinct feels like & that’s what I feel when I try to tell myself I am wrong about vaccines. I’m right & it’s awful.
"If you had tested your twins for the cytokines, refused to vaccinated, and one or
both subsequently died from a vaccine-preventable disease, or from SIDS, who
would you blame?"
But that is almost irrelevant. The vaccines I get don’t provide lasting immunity. The vaccines my son has had; he has no immunity from them. We could get a VPD despite the vaccines, or maybe we have some genetic innate immunity at play. Maybe those that don’t adapt to immunity are on a different immune pathway. Lots of maybeys. Sorry.
If you were right, you wouldn’t have to lie all the time. And you know it’s an issue, because you continually dodge responding to people pointing out when you’re wrong on basic facts. Maybe you should ask yourself what your gut instinct says about your need to lie.
@ Christine Kincaid
Thanks for info. Yep, not low birth weight; but very low birthweight (less than 3 lbs 5 oz), and very preterm, since full term 40 weeks.
Risks associated with preterm (Wikipedia. Preterm Birth):
Neurological problems include apnea of prematurity, hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE), retinopathy of prematurity (ROP),[27] developmental disability, transient hyperammonemia of the newborn, cerebral palsy and intraventricular hemorrhage, the latter affecting 25% of babies born preterm, usually before 32 weeks of pregnancy.[28] Mild brain bleeds usually leave no or few lasting complications, but severe bleeds often result in brain damage or even death.[28] Neurodevelopmental problems have been linked to lack of maternal thyroid hormones, at a time when their own thyroid is unable to meet postnatal needs.[29]
Cardiovascular complications may arise from the failure of the ductus arteriosus to close after birth: patent ductus arteriosus (PDA).
Respiratory problems are common, specifically the respiratory distress syndrome (RDS or IRDS) (previously called hyaline membrane disease). Another problem can be chronic lung disease (previously called bronchopulmonary dysplasia or BPD).
Gastrointestinal and metabolic issues can arise from neonatal hypoglycemia, feeding difficulties, rickets of prematurity, hypocalcemia, inguinal hernia, and necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC).
Hematologic complications include anemia of prematurity, thrombocytopenia, and hyperbilirubinemia (jaundice) that can lead to kernicterus.
Infection, including sepsis, pneumonia, and urinary tract infection [1]
AND (Wikipedia. Infant respiratory distress syndrome0:
Infantile respiratory distress syndrome (IRDS), also called respiratory distress syndrome of newborn, or increasingly surfactant deficiency disorder (SDD),[2] and previously called hyaline membrane disease (HMD), is a syndrome in premature infants caused by developmental insufficiency of pulmonary surfactant production and structural immaturity in the lungs. It can also be a consequence of neonatal infection and can result from a genetic problem with the production of surfactant-associated proteins.[3][4] IRDS affects about 1% of newborns and is the leading cause of death in preterm infants.[5] The incidence decreases with advancing gestational age, from about 50% in babies born at 26–28 weeks to about 25% at 30–31 weeks. The syndrome is more frequent in males, Caucasians, infants of diabetic mothers and the second-born of premature twins
Note just two above are APNEA and RESPIRATORY DISTRESS SYNDROME. Note that the respiratory distress syndrome is leading cause of death in premature infants and notice up to 50% of premies suffer from it. So, once again, both were at extreme risk with or without vaccines. And, as I already wrote, even slight infections which are ubiquitous could elicit a cytokine storm in those with a genetic predisposition; but it has to be the vaccines, your obsession.
You write: “I am not absolutely certain.”
I would have to search; but you said it in a previous comment awhile back that you were absolutely certain, so, one more example of your contradicting yourself.
You write: “The vaccines I get don’t provide lasting immunity. The vaccines my son has had; he has no immunity from them. We could get a VPD despite the vaccines, or maybe we have some genetic innate immunity at play. Maybe those that don’t adapt to immunity are on a different immune pathway. Lots of maybeys.”
First, your “maybes” are always biased towards wanting to believe it was the vaccines. Second, yep, they don’t always work and, even those that work, need boosters. In fact, not all diseases once experienced guarantee life-long immunity. So what? Seatbelts only reduce deaths and serious injuries by about 50% and a few people have died from the seatbelt and a number had bladder and kidney injuries. However, the benefits so far outweigh the risks that no one in their right mind would hesitate to use a seatbelt. And, even if the benefits of vaccines are short term, for a premie, that short term would keep them safe during their most vulnerable period. And if it didn’t, if you were not so certain that vaccines are the problem, you would accept that getting them is a wise choice. Finally, once more you fail to understand the immune system. Innate immunity is essential; but for many invaders, its function is to delay their advance and alert the adaptive immune system; but the adaptive immune system, B-cells (make antibodies) and T-cells take up to two weeks after first encounter with a microbe to reach full defense strength. All vaccines do is allow the adaptive immune system to recognize a killed or severely weakened microbe so they create memory cells which if and when a full-strength microbe enters the body they don’t need 2 weeks; but rev up super fast and even produce more antibodies and T-cells. If your son didn’t react to the vaccine, then it could mean he is even more vulnerable to whatever microbes the vaccine was meant to protect against, not because he has some innate system variant. In that case, he has just been lucky that he hasn’t been exposed to those specific microbes.
And Dangerous Bacon found another article that documents studies done on premies in outpatient settings, a welcome addition to the articles i included in a comment and some others I have in a folder on my desktop.
And you write: “I have tried to talk myself out of believing what I do a multitude of times. Maybe almost on a daily basis. It’s actually more comforting to try to convince myself that I am wrong. I’ve never wanted to be wrong about something so much in my life.”
You have got to be joking or self-delusional. As I’ve pointed out time and time again by refuting claims made by you; e.g., non-polio acute flaccid paralysis in India or no studies on premies or, then, only on premies hospitalized, and others as well, nothing sways you. You ignore and repeat or practice a Gish Gallop, that is, find something else. I imagine a prosecutor certain the defendant is guilty, the defense proves witnesses wrong, got date wrong, that DNA lab had lost its accreditation, and re-examination of DNA didn’t match, what does the prosecutor do, well, in actual cases comes up with new witnesses, e.g., a jailhouse snitch who claimed while together in a holding cells for 15 minutes the defendant confessed. Later discovered by defense after defendant been in prison for years that prosecution offered a reduced sentence and they were in different cell blocks at the time. So, what does the prosecution do, in actual real cases, fight against release of prisoner. Ring a bell.
I don’t believe for one minute you try to talk yourself out of blaming vaccines when you obviously, as I wrote, ignore what people write, refutations of your claims, and devote time to finding new things on the internet.
And what you fail to recognize is that if anyone believes you, you could be responsible for harm coming to other children, the exact opposite of what you delude yourself into thinking you are doing.
Dangerous Bacon: Thanks for the article on premies, outpatients, etc.
@ Joel
“You have got to be joking or self-delusional.”
No. On that I do believe she is perfectly honest. Doesn’t mean she got things right, but wanting to be wrong in these situations is a very real thing…
https://crooksandliars.com/cltv/2020/06/palm-beach-residents-demand-right-die
ffffffFFFUCK!!!!
I’ve had folks tell me that the reason the “Florida man/woman” stereotype exists is because they are required by law to publish all arrest reports (or something like that), but the truth is that there are a lot of nutty people saying and doing a lot of nutty things in Florida.
My current joke-theory is that all weirdos in America go south and west until they hit water, and this explains Florida and the whole west coast (and Alaska).
@ JustaTech
“My current joke-theory is that all weirdos in America go south and west until they hit water, and this explains Florida and the whole west coast (and Alaska).”
There is some truth to that, seemingly:
Here is that first woman’s full rant with
— 5g
— Bill Gates
— Deep State
— Hillary (hitlery, I confess I dub her that) Clinton
— pedophiles
— 6ft is military ‘protocol’ for the ‘scanners’ they are training us for (<– actually, that one works in my world view as recognition algorithms are flailing under masks and AWS compute is growing costly).
https://peertube.live/videos/watch/4242a06c-467a-4b76-95ff-dd34158d3e0e
Our hospitals are full. My mom has been doubled over in pain for a month (I actually had her go to the emergency room and primary care doctor was not even allowed in! and had to set the timer back to ‘did it get introduced here’).
Nota.
She can’t get a fucking cystoscopy — Doc just quadupled her hydrocodone (with acetomenaphen) said “that is all we can do”. {I think she may have acually ruptured her bladder as she fell a few weeks back} — Moreover, I suspcect all the tylenol she has been taking is why she’s in pain in the first place, same as with the ‘itching’.
If she’s going to be addicted and knocked out all day anyways; Why not just bring on the oxycontin without the parace…bullshit included?
re: Florida man
Be advised, people, that when you enter your birthday to see what antics Florida Man got up to that day then now google has your birthday — vpn does not help as cloudflair/browser/isp/search provider fingerprints you down to 1:billion for many.
https://panopticlick.eff.org/
For JP
CK: “Vaccine safety has only been tested for either: 1. Premature/low birth weight infants in an inpatient setting; which mitigates the chance for SIDS, or: 2. Full term, single gestation, normal birth-weight babies who are “thriving at home”.”
False. Numerous studies involving multiple vaccines have been done for preterm/low birth weight infants in an outpatient setting, some of which are referenced here:
https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/112/1/193
Beth appears to be confusing bravery with evasiveness and exhibitionism.
Speaking of evasiveness, still waiting for Beth gee-I’m-not-antivaccine to tell us which vaccines she supports. Any?
@ Joel:
BUT but but, that article is from Wikipedia and we all know that woo-meisters/ anti-vaxxers call it irrelevant! (I’m joking- it’s SB)
…Your last paragraph ( prior to the note to DB) Applause…
That’s exactly why we spend so much time and effort countering anti-vaxxers- they misinform the public about VPDs which can lead to serious consequences for children.
I was in school when the new measles vaccine became available: my mother made an appointment for me to get it but I got the measles first. I can hardly recall what happened because I was so sick but two much older cousins informed me that I missed 3 or 4 weeks of school and lost a lot of weight. I do remember being confined to a darkened room with a radio and being very thirsty. I actually can’t remember what the measles looked like which is interesting because I was usually very visually oriented, doing drawing and painting. I wasn’t allowed to read or write or draw.. My cousins said that adult family members were very worried about me developing visual problems or dying
Other than measles, I had very little illness in elementary/ secondary school.. .
Now, imagine if this happened today:
of course, kids would still be miserable and at risk for complications or hospitals stays as they were long ago.. Measles is extremely infectious: would they have to close schools?( I vaguely remember that schools were closed at one point for a week, not when I was sick). Today, most parents work. Who would care for the sick child? And suppose this didn’t just involve the present low percentage of unvaccinated students BUT that anti-vax ruled and MANY more children weren’t vaccinated?
Then we have Covid-19.
Anti-vaxxers would think it a perfect world.
But you only got a bad case of measles because you grew up with poor sanitation and nutrition, right?
I know, I know! My father worked for a large enterprise that NEVER paid him! We lived in a wooden building that my Grandmother bought, I had to share my food with SEVERAL unruly cats! I walked five hundred feet to a school! We only had a pool for the summer months! We didn’t always have a brand new car.
AND I had to shop in ((shudder)) a Department Store.
@ Joel,
Sorry I have a packed day with kid stuff planned so I have to be brief but to clarify; no I am not 100% sure. Instinctively, I believe I am right. I get in trouble when I try to explain how I think to others but I am not dishonest. I know I am not communicating accurately & it’s frustrating.
Are you 100% sure that a population of genetically vulnerable infants are not succumbing to post-vaccination SIDS? I wish I could find out what the prevalence of those IL-1, IL-6, IL-10, and TNF-α (or the HLAs) variants are. Even at just 5% of the population; it could swing the epidemiology.
And yes I am aware of what my daughters potential complications were. She had an autopsy & they were ruled out. They had no choice (& yes, when you read a SIDS autopsy report, that’s what it conveys; the rule out everything & then surrender) but to declare SIDS.
The infant suddenly just died. Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. It’s like saying the cause of death was dying.
I am not dishonest.
On this post alone, you claimed the pertussis vaccine was not around in 1950, treated a per 1000 death rate and a per 100,000 death rate as directly comparable, and portrayed 24 hours post vaccination and 72 hours post vaccination identical time spans. Please explain how that’s not dishonest.
@ Terrie,
Sigh. I quoted a data set that spanned the years from 1941-1950. I quoted rates from both 1941 & 1950. Pertussis vaccine wasn’t used extensively since the mid 1940s.
I quoted rates from both 1941 & 1950.
You stated “Death rate from Pertussis without a vaccine was 0.2. wtf.” The death rate in 1941 was 1.0, the death rate in 1950 was .2. More dishonesty, huh?
@ Christine Kincaid
You want the prevalence of cytokine disorders because you claimed the vaccine elicited a cytokine storm. Now you state an autopsy found nothing. Well, an autopsy should have found excess cytokines in blood. And you continue to ignore that sleep apnea and respiratory distress syndrome highly likely responsible in very low birthweight infant and I really doubt that an autopsy would show either.
And I’ve given numerous other causes of SIDS in comments above; not all would be found in a standard autopsy; but some would require everything from expensive labs to brain ct scan or biopsy.
So, there are numerous possible causes that a very low birthweight, extremely premature infant could die from SIDS, many would NOT be caught by a standard autopsy; yet, for you, it still has to be vaccines.
As I and others have pointed out, numerous studies have been carried out with vaccines on premies, including outpatient and, as mentioned, several major causes of SIDS, some which would NOT be found in a standard autopsy, but you still want to focus on vaccines. So, please cut and paste autopsy results into a comment, if you have them, and let’s see what they did. I could be wrong about an autopsy checking for apnea or respiratory distress syndrome; but even so, they would NOT have come close to covering ALL the possible causes I listed. Would have required genome sequencing for numerous things besides cytokines.
I realize that this is a waste of time if I thought anything would change your mind; but I hope others monitoring this exchange will learn just how WRONG you are.
And, as I’ve discussed several times, anything is possible, so, though highly unlikely, vaccines may have contributed to your daughter’s SIDS; but if she had such an overreaction to vaccines, then it is highly likely that any slight infection would have triggered it within a short timespan AND given her fragility, she would have been much more vulnerable to vaccine-preventable diseases.
You don’t have to be intentionally dishonest in order to be wrong. You are very, very wrong. You are also extremely stubborn and unwilling to consider the possibility that you are wrong, because you FEEL like you are right. There will never be any evidence that can convince you that your “instincts” are incorrect. So really, is there any point in continuing to talk about it?
@ Christine Kincaid
You write: “I am not dishonest.”
Yet, despite giving NO indication you have tried to learn the basics of immunology (I have repeatedly suggested an excellent book), look keep throwing out immunological terms. And, when I have refuted claims made by you, you haven’t even acknowledged them, let alone tried to respond. And you called epidemiology a fake/fraudulent science (forget the actual term you used), again with NO indication you have even tried to learn the basics of epidemiology. And you have contradicted yourself on occasion. I consider the aforementioned indications of an extremely high level of dishonesty.
CK: “I get in trouble when I try to…think”
There’s that.
However, when one repeatedly make false statements, mischaracterizes what others say and ignores factual rebuttals, it’s difficult to excuse on the basis of a cognitive deficit..
Previously, I tried to give CK the benefit of the doubt, that she was just lazy and sloppy with her facts. But her reaction to someone pointing out she’s wrong is consistent. 99% of the time, she drops out of that thread, as if the correction never happened. The remaining 1% of the time she tries to claim she was right. She knows she’s being dishonest.
Remember the lie that the UNICEF delivery of measles vaccines to Samoa preceded the measles outbreak, and was therefore responsible for it?
“Unicef (largely at the urging of the WHO), potentiated increased vaccine uptake by shipping 135,500 doses of the MMR to Samoa, 115,000 doses of the MMR to Fiji & 18,000 doses to Tonga; ALL on October 1, 2019 & the mass-immunization of the islands began.”
https://www.respectfulinsolence.com/2019/12/04/measles-outbreak-samoa/#comment-419027
Combined with the spectacularly ignorant claim that “measles was only rarely fatal in Samoa previously”.
You could probably get a Greatest Hits, Vol I and Vol II out of Christine.
@ Dangerous Bacon
If I ever run for office I’ll hire you as my speech writer as I really wouldn’t want to give long speeches and you seem, at least sometimes, to summarize what I obsessively-compulsively need to go into detail, in a few well-chosen words.
Attack ads a specialty.
I can provide the “Disorderly Retreat” ads.
@ Terrie,
"You stated “Death rate from Pertussis without a vaccine was 0.2. wtf.” The death rate in 1941 was 1.0, the death rate in 1950 was .2. More dishonesty, huh?"
You are right. I should have said the death rate without a vaccine in 1941 was 1.0.
It was 0.9 in 1939 & 1940.
0.6 in 1942
0.8 in 1943
0.5 in 1994 & 1945.
All without, depending on when use of the vax was ‘widespread’. And what WAS the uptake rate for the vaccine I wonder.
Reminder, that was one in 1000 infants. You compared it to a SIDS rate of 35.4… per 100,000. So the comparable whooping cough rate was three times that SIDS death rate.In fact, whooping cough was higher for every one of those years you just listed. You are dishonest.
Oh, and Christine, I will point out that even if we assume every single one of those SIDS death would never have occurred without vaccines… With no vaccines, whooping cough alone would kill more infants by the numbers you provided. And that’s one VPD vs the whole infant vaccine schedule. You just disproved your own point. Congrats,
@ Terrie,
Oh okay thank you, I think I understand. You are saying that the Pertussis rate would be 100, compared to SIDS at 35.4.
Except for this … The total, all cause death rate was 29.2 (1950). And yes, you are right. That is out of 1,000 live births.
Page 273 of https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsus/vsus_1950_1.pdf
Would that mean 2,920 out of 100,000?
Because apparently, our current infant mortality rates are still calculated as per 1,000:
“According to this year’s America’s Health Ranking Annual Report, the U.S. infant mortality rate is 5.9 deaths per 1,000 live infant births, while the average rate of infant mortality among the OECD countries is 3.9 deaths per 1,000 live births”
https://www.americashealthrankings.org/learn/reports/2018-annual-report/findings-international-comparison
So I am still confused.
@Christine, this is fractions. You can only compare the numerator if the denominator is the same. It doesn’t matter if it’s per 100, per 1000, per 100000. There are arbitrary choices. There’s no requirement that any specific one be used.
The issue is the SIDS number you gave is per 100,000. That should have been obvious, since 35.4 is much larger than 5.9. Did you think they were not counting SIDS deaths as part of our total infant deaths? If you want to use the per 1000 rate, SIDS deaths are .35.
@ Christine Kincaid
“You are right. I should have said the death rate without a vaccine in 1941 was 1.0.”
I, for one, without wishing to lend support to your positions or what I perceive them to be, wish to congratulate you for rectifying that statement. (Whatever the criticisms others give you, I believe that correcting a mistake or imprecision, whether deliberate or not, should be met with at least a minimum of acknowledgement that you did so. I know you’re having a tough time here, but I also applaud you for confronting your ideas here.)
@ F68.10
So, out of up to, perhaps, 100s of misstatements, contradictions, etc, and ignoring what I and others write refuting them, once in a blue moon Christine Kincaid makes a trivial correction and you applaud her. Well, maybe this will encourage her to do more; but given her history I really doubt it.
@ Joel
“Well, maybe this will encourage her to do more; but given her history I really doubt it.”
Yep. That’s part of it. Honestly, I do feel for her, and I know how easy it is to suffer, rightly or wrongly, through issues such as hers. Whatever (and I do stress that last word) may have happened in her past, and no matter how she may, ah, well, mistake, confuse or distort things, she’s obviously not exactly enjoying this situation. I looked a bit at a few things that you likely are not looking at, tried to do a bit of mind reading, and honestly, I do not see someone that is bent on attention whoring, though quite a number of things she stated in the past may point to that. She really is trying to solve a conundrum. She’s not exactly doing it out of pleasure or contrarianism. There still are dark zones in her mind and in her story that I cannot mind read yet, so I’m not making blanket statements based of my telepathic skills, but, provisionally, that’s my opinion.
A bit too Christian to my taste, but Stabat Mater comes to mind. I do like Pergolesi’s composition of Stabat Mater.
A bit of baroque music might be a worthwhile change…
But yeah, I do believe she is trying too hard to relate an individual experience with the literature. She’ll likely always face a very callous stone wall there. No wonder she doesn’t like the epidemiology: it will never really really cater to her concern. So she’ll look into biological etiology instead. No wonder why she’s doing that… But she’s trying way too hard to decipher the inscrutable.
@F68.10
I think most of us have some sympathy for the death of Christine’s child and her struggles with raising a special needs child who requires a high level of supervision. Unfortunately, she’s burned through any potential good will that might earn her with her exploitation of her son, her scorn for the death of children from VPDs, her mockery of parents dealing with special needs that are not severe autism, her attacks against multiple posters here and the many other ways she has made it clear that she wants other people to suffer as if that will make up for the way her own life doesn’t measure up to her desires.
@F68.10,
Thank you. It was a stupid mistake for me to make. And I am still confused because (per my comment above to Terrie), it appears current infant mortality rates are still calculated per 1,000.
I WILL get through this.
@ F68.10
Yep, some people, perhaps too many, like Christine turn their suffering into allowing others to be hurt and even directly hurting others; but there are also people who are suffering who care about others and don’t want others to suffer. I don’t know which is the dominant group; but suspect the former.
Instead of continuing to spend time defending the indefensible she could be doing things more constructive. For instance, lobbying members of Congress, her state legislature, etc by writing letters, sending e-mails, phoning their offices. to devote more funds to special needs children, not just with ASD, but ALL special needs children. She could even try to organize parents; but NOT if she then tries to get more to be antivaxxers. But given the impression one gets from her comments, probably not possible for her. She needs a scapegoat. Terrie says it all.
@ Terrie,
I have never exploited my child. That’s a really horrible thing to say.
He is your go to cautionary tale about the “dangers” of vaccines. You talk about him here like he’s a burden, an abuser and a potential killer. When we point out how you talk about him, you counter that we’re clearly negative people and that everyone who meets him loves him. Apparently, the only positive thing you have to say about your son is “other people like him.”
You splash his identifying information all over the internet, and when multiple people here pointed out that’s a bad idea and you should be more careful of your son’s privacy, you accused us of trying to hide “the reality of autism” away in your basement. What your son’s name, age, description, city of residence and description of school setting has to do with the reality of autism I don’t know. And that’s just what I remember you providing on this site. Do you get how easy it would be for someone to track do your son in real life based on information you have provided?
You put your agenda ahead of your son when you’re on this site. If not exploitation, what word would you use?
Amen.
In fact, she also uses her dead child, its twin and her own mother as well to indict medicine and illustrate her own heroic suffering. Medicine killed a baby, almost killed, another, labelled her as MR and tossed her mother out of school for telling the truth about vaccines. Her son with ASD was depicted as a danger to society and herself, keeping her injured and broke ( having to buy cheap used clothes-“$3 dresses”,, was it?), She comes here to challenge the status quo ( Fight the Power/) and warn parents about the dangers of vaccines to “save children. knowing more than the assembled world and Orac himself.
As you mention, she, like some anti-vax mothers** puts identifying information about her son in a public space which could endanger him or upset him ( if he can read so well).- again, this is to display her own suffering without regard for him.
She created a family history where many people are experts*** or scientists and then needs to explain why she and two of her children has ASDs. It has to be vaccines, not genetics.( even though genes include de novo variation- -btw- two or more children in a family points to inherited genes, one child to de novo– in recent research).
I would rather not even comment on her at all but owe it to readers who are new, transient or sporadic minions. I can compile information like this easily.
If she truly wanted to help infants/ children rather than spending hours on the internet with tales of woe, I’m sure that there are volunteer opportunities in Colorado where poor women and girls need support after having babies, disadvantaged kids need tutors and autistic people need allies. Her son has been/ will go back to school so she is not occupied 24 hours a day, everyday. .
** Rossi and Wright twitter etc
*** my parents and grandparents were business people , doesn’t make me one.
I have to wonder if the siblings she says love her son so much know the crap she says about him online. She doesn’t seem to get that the reason we find her comments upsetting has nothing to do with her challenging our views on neurodiversity (a movement she hates, though it’s equally clear she doesn’t understand it), but more to do with the fact that a mother saying nasty things about their child is just not okay behavior. We’ll never get her to change her views on vaccines, but if we could get her to stop trashing her son to strangers online, or at least portray him as a whole person, I’d count it as a win.
Of course you have. You do it all the time here to push your narrative about the evils of vaccines.
I sometimes get the feeling she doesn’t even see it as talking about her son. She’s talking about “the autism.” She compared it once to saying you love someone with cancer, but hate the cancer. What is she going to do? Have her son undergo surgery to cut up his brain and remove “the autism”? It really points to how toxic and dehumanizing antivax beliefs are.
Tangentially related:
https://www.ebaumsworld.com/pictures/former-health-insurance-exec-comes-clean-for-the-lie-he-helped-spread-years-ago/86303346/
@ Terrie,
You are so full of shit.
I talked about my son to raise AWARENESS about real, severe autism. This was before I was invited to join a private group of over 6,000 parents of children with severe autism. Before I realized exactly why groups for us have to be private & that thousands of parents with severe kids have been treated the same way I am here.
Yeah, I screwed up. I thought maybe the reason people here said insane things like:
“I’d rather my kid have autism than measles” … Was because you didn’t understand autism. Ha, how stupid of me. You don’t understand & you don’t want anybody else to understand because it makes vaccines look bad. Parents of kids with mild or high functioning autism are much less likely to blame vaccines because their child’s reaction & regression were much less extreme. Not as obvious. Parents of SEVERE kids are the REAL threat to provaxers.
From that group I’ve learned that I do not have it as bad as so many. I have learned how infinite love can be, from these parents that will fight to the death to defend their child against people like YOU one minute & the next minute are fleeing to lock themselves into a safe room with a 300lb 22 year old hot on there heels. I have seen the posts from black single moms of very large, very severe young men who put signs up in there yard to warn the police (because neighbors call out of “concern”), because these police, who are not AWARE; have literally killed so many black autistic males (there is a problem, normal restraint tactics DO kill ASD people).
Fuck; I am LUCKY. The medical treatment my son receives now is WORKING. Improved verbal skills, less stimming (he is huge; when he moves as wildly as he does; he hurts himself), massive reduction in violent outbursts. It would be super awesome if behavioral therapy could resume, on hold due to COVID but nontheless; I am so lucky, he is so much happier & that is what really matters. Other parents; not so much but don’t worry; they hide so that their kids don’t inspire abuse from people like you. Everybody hates April; “Autism Awareness Month” because it is such a farce.
ALL our kids are extremely sweet, talented & the light of our lives but in great danger from themselves & others because people, society in general is not AWARE & YOU don’t want us to help our kids because it makes vaccines look bad. OK; measles must be way worse. WTFever; you are full of shit & I am an idiot for thinking autism awareness could be discussed here, on a blog where autism & vaccines are a common topic. I misunderstood who you people were. I thought you were professionals who wanted & needed to be aware. I was wrong.
Have you tried letting him get stoned on the ganja?
I can’t help myself here (I’m mean):
Agreed.
@ Tim:
I think I know where you live BUT you sure don’t fit in with the average white guy there ( if you are white): you hate Trump, don’t dislike Black people and follow safety recommendations
about masks/ Covid. Maybe more of the younger people are like you I hope so.
At any rate, Applause
-btw- My SO has relatives in FL and AZ and he has accused me of hastily judging those locales HOWEVER, I predicted bad results with compliance with Covid safety measures and guess what? I was right. I know demographics/ business trends about different places so my guesses were not purely bias against them ( there’ are reasons behind my dislike- although I do know a few great people in FL- it’s, of course, not everyone but as a simple guide, look at who wins statewide elections)
@Denice Walter
{please take the following as being from an unreliable narrator}:
Yea, I’m lilly white (physically, at least). I grew up in a weird space as what I’ve come to dermine and label as an ‘operation paper clip kid’. And I’ve always been somewhat ‘rebellious’ here in the eyes of parents, teachers, …, everybody else.
I was not born here. I was imported here at the age of one. I won’t say where I was born for the fear of revealing personally identifying information. Suffice it to say, I hear the veiw across the Potomic from the upper floor apartment was quite the capitol experience.
I grew up around kids of physists and engineers and their parents; The guys who design, build, and aim the missiles. Imagine (something I can’t do because of aphantasia) an eccentric millionare that bought a new car for himself for my graduation, then pointing to a popup book in the mall after dinner of a manned manuevering unit and telling me he did that first (he did).
He fed one particular duck religously at university I would later attend. Somebody murdered that duck. That was very sad. Near as I can tell, His main job was befriending ex-Nazis so we’d all play nice.
But, hey — They put men on the moon.
Umm. My rebellious pot-smoking phase involved much time spent in surrounding counties friending and unfriending people. I’m saying this to soften your eminent disappointment. “Woman, please.” — I even have a friend who spent is childhood in a ‘sundown town’ with a nasty edict on the bridge entering that county. When he goes on a rant, I have to end it with an (usually valid) excuse that mom is awaiting a call from the doctor.
As far as Dumbp goes, I think many ‘churched’ people around here are going on the view that they are holding up the arms of an ‘imperfect vessel’. Like Moses. That is what they are told.
And now I’ve thrown up in my mouth a little. Again.
@ Tim,
Lol; you are not mean, you are actually one of my favorite posters here.
Ganja. Pediatrician approves. Probably a Sativa like Charlotte’s Web. I wouldn’t right now because he just started on the Immunologist’s protocol but I am not opposed.
. I wouldn’t right now because he just started on the Immunologist’s protocol but I am not opposed.
That’s CBD, Christine. Loading a kid on an actual sativa (glances at Jack Herer) would be a very bad idea, if you ask me.
@ Christine Kincaid
“Ganja. Pediatrician approves. Probably a Sativa like Charlotte’s Web.”
Why not have a try with Jack The Ripper for the added THCV kick? Add some Salvia Divinorum, and drop some dizocilpine into a glass of champagne. But go easy on Jimson weed. And do not smoke your efavirenz.
Or if you’re into botanical studies, for science, y’a know… or… into camouflage… you may want to try Ducksfoot.
Anyhow, I’ll stick to coffee. Maybe one day I’ll try khat to spice up the coffee.
Oh! And a discussion on psychotropic stuff is never complete without a reference to Soap MacTauvish. A must read.
@kincaid
I was looking for the video of the non-violent autistic black man murdered in the street by police (I think it was around christmas, can’t remember which city… there are so many — the one where he is calling out for his father just before he succumbed (died).
Everything is saturated with recent events, so I’ll proffer up this:
https://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/stephon-watts-police-shooting-autism-death/Content?oid=20512018
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Kelly_Thomas#Incident
I myself suffer PTSD from ongoing ‘routine’ encounters with police dating back to a very young age. I get it.
@Tim, I always think of the case of the (black) group home staff member who was shot while he lay on the ground with his hands in the air, telling cops that his autistic charge had a toy train in his hands, not a weapon. The cops tried to claim they were “protecting” him from the autistic man. The one with the train, who was just sitting there.
This is one area where I will agree with Christine, except it’s not just the autistic members of our community. The police are an absolute threat to people with disabilities, be they physical, intellectual or mental health. The disabled are roughly 20% of the population, but make up between 33 and 50% of those murdered by the police. Deaf people shot for “gang signs” and not following instructions. Wheelchair users dumped from their chairs as “fakers.” Sandra Bland had epilepsy. The medication she was on can cause suicidal ideation when withdrawn.
And that’s before you get into the issues of disability and poverty, and the way we’ve criminalized poverty in the US. Nothing like having a mobility issue while poor and having someone call the police on you for “loitering” because you need to sit down and rest.
ALL our kids are extremely sweet, talented & the light of our lives </>
And once again you only have nice things to say about your kid when I point out how negative you are about him in your comments. The fact that you did it for “awareness” doesn’t change that you said it. And the fact that your son is a large kid prone to violent outbursts doesn’t change that vaccines don’t cause autism. There’s no such thing as “Scientific proof through pity.”
@ Terrie
If you want to make a valid case that Christine used negative descriptions of her children, then give accurate quotes from her and not just one. Even better if you give the link to which of Orac’s articles and the actual times and date. Easy enough to cut and paste.
I realize that you attacked me for not giving a one-sentence answer, which I seldom do, which, though you do support vaccines, makes me wonder just how thoroughly you have investigated them, understand how they work.
So, we’ll see just how well you can support your attacks on Christine. And, not one or two, as most humans say things that they regret at some time; but show a consistent abuse of how she describes her children????
Joel, I didn’t attack you for not giving one sentence answer. I said the question I was asking called for a straightforward answer. I’m not interested in lectures, giving or receiving, as it is my style, so please don’t lecture me on how to comment here.
Is not my style. Dang lack of an edit option.
Have you noticed that these “severely autistic” kids are abnormally large?
Maybe it’s because their condition is genetic?
@ Lawrence,
That’s the effects of Risperidone you are seeing; used to treat aggression in many severe adolescent males.
In my son’s case, he went off the growth charts at 8 weeks old (as in literally off the page in height). Before he regressed, actually, at the same appointment when he got the ill-fated catch up vaccines that resulted in his regression; the doctor estimated he would be 6 foot 7 when fully grown.
I’ll never forget, he said: “This kid’s going to college on a sports scholarship” & we both laughed. Anyway.
So now he is 16, 6 foot 5 & 230 lbs. But I am 5’10, his dad is 6’4 & had two uncles who were both 6’7. I don’t medicate my son with psychotropics; they are contributing to morbid obesity & even increased violent outbursts over time.
And yet, it’s common see see anti-vax parents with children with severe autism describe them as “huge, line-backer sized” regardless of the heights of the parents.
Again, it’s almost like it’s a genetic co-morbidity to genetic autism….like children with Downs will also have additional genetic conditions.
@ Christine Kincaid
You’ve made it absolutely clear that, regardless of what people write, regardless of the overwhelming science (over 30,000 published articles on vaccine safety, including premies both inpatient and outpatient), you focus on vaccines. You even made it clear that it is your gut, not you “intellect” that does this.
I disagree with Terrie about your discussing your children; however, you’ve also informed us that you are on the Spectrum, that you have a genetic cytokine disorder, and that your daughter and son, fraternal twins, were very premature and very low birthweight. And I pointed out that apnea and respiratory distress affects around 50% of them. And, that cytokine overreaction occurs due to SLIGHT infections. In other words, without any of the other causes of SIDS which I already listed, already we have strong evidence of the much more likely causes.
Just to give an exaggerated analogy. Imagine a 55-year-old man gets his flu shot and dies from a massive heart attack a few hours later. Well, you would jump to conclusion that flu shot caused it. Imagine that it then comes he was 5’ 10” weighing in at 310 lbs, smoked three packs of cigarettes per day, loved bread and butter, cream pies, and deep fried foods, and NEVER exercised, in fact, drove two blocks to local 7-11 just to buy a pack of cigarettes. I would bet you would still focus on the vaccine. Then we find out it was his 3rd heart attack and that his older brother died of a heart attack at age 46, his father and uncles all before their 50th birthday, and even find out one grandfather died of heart attack before 50. In other words, diet, smoking, non-existent exercise, and genetics and . . . And I would bet your “gut” would still tell you it was the vaccine.
So, though I agree with Terrie’s strong support of vaccines, I disagree with how she views your sharing of your children, just as I think it right if information of the above heart attack victim came out.
However, doesn’t change the fact that you continually ignore when I and others literally refute what you write, what you claim about vaccines, e.g., for the umpteenth time, non-polio acute flaccid paralysis in India. I assure you I can present overwhelming scientific evidence that intelligence does NOT differ between races, social classes, ethnic groups; but if I tried to present this to Aryan Nations, KKK, neo-Nazis, eugenicists, they would probably physically assault me or, at the minimum, just consider me a liar or stupid. They know they are right.
You are tiresome. You basically just keep making a fool of yourself. And, if anyone is foolish enough to pay attention to you, not vaccinate their children, and one gets a vaccine-preventable disease, ends up hospitalized, perhaps with permanent disability, or even dies, you will be partially responsible.
As I’ve written before, given seven billion people on the planet, anything is possible, including some RARE genome that a few cases might end up with almost anything; but compared with the literally millions who would benefit from the vaccines and that it would be literally impossible to screen for every possible genetic predisposition, focusing on highly improbable; but not totally impossible risks is foolish.
As I’ve written before, seatbelts reduce deaths and serious disability by 50% and there have been 2 – 3 deaths attributed to them (e.g., the belt twisted, tightened, and literally sliced into person), and some damaged bladders and kidneys. So, literally millions saved and, maybe, a few dozen harmed. But the evidence, overwhelming, is that SIDS and ASD not associated with vaccines, so . . . your GUT is literally FULL OF SHIT!
Just one more example of not being willing to admit wrong. A number of years ago a young man in Texas was found guilty of a vicious rape murder. The only evidence was blood type and he had bragged he met a woman at a bar and had sex. There was also evidence he had been at work at the time, though alone, he drove a fork lift and the amount of merchandise that had been moved that morning would have taken several hours, hours during which the crime occurred. Years later when DNA started to be used, his DNA didn’t match what was found on and in the raped/murdered woman. The first appeal failed as the appellate court came up with an alternative theory of the crime, that is, he had held the woman down while someone else actually raped her. Alternative theory because not even considered in original trial and no evidence for. Eventually he was released, exonerated; but rejecting both the DNA and evidence he was at work to come up with a bogus alternative theory of the crime is just one more example of how people, not just you, even if it hurts innocent victims, refuse to admit when they are wrong. So, you are in good, I mean BAD COMPANY, racists, nazis, people who would rather allow someone to be harmed than admit they had been wrong. Congratulations???
@ Joel,
I thank you for supporting me against Terrie’s accusations, in your own way.
@ christine kincaid
As usual you focus on one thing and ignore the other parts of my comment. Yes, I try to understand how difficult your life is; but that does NOT excuse how you continue to focus on vaccines despite overwhelming evidence that they are not associated with ASD or SIDS and despite overwhelming evidence that, tragic as it was, your daughter had several factors that easily could explain SIDS.
The CDC definition of ASD includes:
“Highly restricted, fixated interests that are abnormal in intensity or
focus (e.g., strong attachment to or preoccupation with unusual
objects, excessively circumscribed or perseverative interests).”
Your fixation on vaccines might well fit into the above; but I assume you are intelligent enough to fight against this.
So, I repeat, you have ASD, research has found a strong genetic component, so you passed it on to your children. You have a cytokine disorder, again genetic, you passed on to your daughter. Your daughter was born very premature and very low birthweight, this alone has a risk of around 50% of apnea and respiratory distress, and, as pointed out from the research, overreactive cytokine genetics can result in cytokine storms from SLIGHT infections. And infants are exposed to up to 3,000 microbes per day. And yet you keep trying to find vaccines as cause of her SIDS. I know people with ASD, high functioning as you, and though not easy, they can learn, why can’t you?
@ Terrie
You did write: “I missed your point, because it was a question that called for a straightforward answer that you call them both, and what you gave me was a rambling history lecture of information I already know.”
I responded with: “I give up. I gave the history lesson to explain that racism is used as a divide and conquer strategy. Sorry I didn’t explain in one sentence; but I wanted to give the historical context that it is nothing new. So what you call a “rambling history” was a simple attempt to explain why racism has been used continuously, why it is so embedded, and why those who fall for it are stupid.”
And you responded: “Look, it’s not my fault you misunderstood my question, which was simply wondering why you apparently favored calling racists “stupid” instead of simply calling them “racist,” which is sufficient enough term to me. The history of racism in America tells me very little about why you make the word choices you do.”
So, now we come down to the crux of it, you wrote: “sufficient enough term to me.” I consider them stupid because they allow the divide and conquer strategy to end up hurting themselves, their families, etc. Apparently this was too complicated for you. And as I also explained, I don’t write comments for one person. Not worth my time and effort. I assume that a number of people are monitoring these exchanges. Maybe you are too arrogant to think I would not be entering into a two-person dialogue with you???
I didn’t misunderstand your question; but could not give what you consider a “straightforward answer”, so, you apparently have a difficult time if anyone doesn’t respond exactly as you need the response to be, that is, you have a limited intellectual ability.
And, as for your claiming Christine has used negative descriptions of her kids, I asked you simply to give clear examples, but that seems beyond your comprehension as well. If I have understood Christine, she is on the Spectrum and has other medical problems, and she tragically lost one child to SIDS and has others with varying problems. I don’t get the impression she has a strong support network. However, since she is a nurse and apparently good at finding, cherry-picking papers on the internet, I attacked her for this and for making claims and ignoring what I and other wrote refuting her claims, and for literally grasping at straws and, yes, apparently contradicting herself; but, if you noticed, I almost always cite what she wrote, then refute it. I don’t usually just attack.
So finally you wrote: “I’m not interested in lectures, giving or receiving, as it is my style, so please don’t lecture me on how to comment here.”
But it’s all right to attack other people’s style. My suggestion to give substance to your claims she used her children in negative ways, for you, is a lecture. Yikes! Friggin hypocrite. And it is NOT a lecture to point out that attacks without substance, valid examples, just puts you in the same class as many others, who use phrases, etc. with NO substance.
I learned a long time ago that people may seem to agree; but for different reasons. I know people who always vote for one political party, never bothering to investigate the candidates. I know others who do some minor investigations; but still always vote the party line. And there are those who do thorough investigations and sometimes on a few votes cross party lines. In my home state, I often leave half of the ballot unresponded because we have often many initiatives, some 50 pages long, so I don’t have time to research each and every one and ignore paid soundbites. We also have too many elected offices. I almost never vote for a judge because almost impossible to find much out about them. In any case, I don’t know why you support vaccines; but you give the impression of being rather shallow, if not answered in your narrow range of understanding then not accepted and if pointed out that you need to give concrete examples, calling it a lecture. Oh well.
I hope others monitoring this blog understand what I am saying, namely if they want to make a point/refute others, don’t just attack; but explain, with examples, why you are attacking. I don’t expect you to understand.
This is my last response to you.
I look at it this way. If someone put a can of Coke on the table and said “Explain how this is both a solid and a liquid,” Joel would say “The contents are liquid and the container is solid.” I would respond “If functions as a liquid when you drink it, and a solid if you chuck it at someone’s head.” And then Joel would write 200 words minimum on why my answer made me stupid.¯_(ツ)_/¯.
@ Terrie
You write: “I look at it this way. If someone put a can of Coke on the table and said “Explain how this is both a solid and a liquid,” Joel would say “The contents are liquid and the container is solid.” I would respond “If functions as a liquid when you drink it, and a solid if you chuck it at someone’s head.” And then Joel would write 200 words minimum on why my answer made me stupid.”
Proof you are DISHONEST. You wrote: ““Look, it’s not my fault you misunderstood my question, which was simply wondering why you apparently favored calling racists “stupid” instead of simply calling them “racist,” which is sufficient enough term to me. The history of racism in America tells me very little about why you make the word choices you do.” And I explained the history of racism and you considered that a waste of time. And I was the one that explained it was both racism and stupid; but that I emphasized the stupid because of divide and conquer. Not, it is you who explains what a can has two ways of looking at it. I guess too much for you to understand.
So, you wanted me to say both; but then only one. You keep changing.
And, just as Christine, you avoid dealing with what else I wrote, namely, that if you are going to attack Christine for portraying her kids in a negative light when needed, you NEED to actually give examples, and not just one, because anyone can misspeak; but a few to make concrete your claim. For instance, I can call someone a liar or any other negative term and unfortunately, some people will believe it and react accordingly without every questioning what I base my claim on.
So, another example of your DISHONESTY, not responding to my other point.
Oh, and by the way, coke cans are made of aluminum, unless really close by, chucking at someone’s head would probably do little to no damage and they really aren’t a solid either, when empty, mostly air, very little aluminum. Yep, another difference between you and me, things are NOT black and white for me.
So, feel free to continue to make a fool of yourself. Appears you think more like the antivaxxers than you realize. Though you support vaccines, I really wonder what you base your position on. How much do you know about history and current status of infectious diseases in world? How much do you understand the immune system and how vaccines work? I could go on; but even responding to you is probably a waste of my time, though I hope others monitoring this blog may learn something.
Can’t we all just get along? Heh**.
More seriously, both Terrie and Joel are valuable commenters who approach scepticism and anti-vax/ woo in strikingly different ways:
–Joel and I have many educational qualifications in common but he presents much greater detail and links. I personally wouldn’t use “stupid” to describe anti-vaxxers/ woo-ists/ racists when other insults are more succinct and apropos and.. even nastier ( see Smut Clyde). He is an older person who has time and wants to instruct newbies/ sceptics as a useful hobby
–Terrie often reacts as I do but writes in another manner. How she describes CK’s variable descriptions of her son are exactly what I surmise ( first as a threat, then a joy)- because the internet is forever, interested parties who want to check can go back a few months.. et Voila!. I refer others to material but don’t directly link ( so they can learn how to access material themselves) unless it is outstanding ( the other day I wrote about Dr Novella and then later found the posts Orac wrote about the debate: it was so important that I remembered it well 8 years later- yes, I DO know something about memory)
Interestingly, Terrie mentioned she knows many people who aren’t NT ( I can’t recall what she said about herself). A few times, I took Baron-Cohen’s ASQ test for adults and got- Surprise!- a 3 and a 5 ( very low/ NT) YET many commenters*** on RI who identify as AS/ ASD/ similar and I can communicate very well and often agree : that factor is NOT the only one determining human interaction.
HOWEVER, one particular scoffer may find my NT’ness a stumbling block. Oh, Guess!
** my Prof/ Trainer for Group Therapy once called me
‘the Peacemaker’ when we were evaluated as proto-therapists
*** Alain, Julian, OR Dave, maybe Narad.
@ Denise Walter
You write: “How she describes CK’s variable descriptions of her son”
But Terrie doesn’t actually describe CK’s variable descriptions, she just attacks them. That is exactly the point I made, she should describe, give accurate examples, then explain her problem with these. As I wrote, I could call someone a liar or a drug addict or . . . and without any evidence, some people will accept this. This is what dishonest politicians do, attack others without any evidence, what ignorant people do, and, unfortunately, too many people take such as gospel truth. So, I simply tried to get Terrie to actually give evidence; but, instead, she went on the extreme defensive and tried to turn it against me. Typical unscientific, irrational, antivax approach.
And, if you didn’t notice, I accepted her critique of my using stupid and now use “intellectually dishonest” or “foolish”. Unfortunately, acknowledging her critique didn’t seem to be enough for her.
You may consider Terrie a valuable contributor because she supports vaccines; which is well and good; but I don’t consider something a valuable contribution when based more on someone’s opinion/gut belief when not backed by evidence and explanation. After all, exactly what Christine admitted, she based her antivax position of her gut.
I am not NT, but not on the spectrum either. That’s one of the thing that annoys me with Christine — she uses neurodiversity in a very outdated sense to pit people on the spectrum against each other. I’m lucky enough to have a social circle that includes people with ASDs, FASDS, LDs, schizophrenia, etc, in a wide range of ages, and they all fall under the “neurodiverse” umbrella.
In fact, one reason I got interested in the antivax autism claims was a friend who adopted a pair of siblings with FASDs. She started fostering the older boy when he was between 1 and 2. Since he was in the system, he was eventually evaluated and diagnosed as autistic. No one raised the possibility of FASD, until his younger brother was born a couple years later and the bio mom was drunk during delivery. Despite this, it took until the older boy was 6 or 7 to get the autism diagnosis removed and new one of ARND, because every doctor went “But he doesn’t have the facial features!” (The FAS facial features occur during a very small window of fetal development, while the neurological vulnerability lasts most of the pregnancy). She has since gone down the woo rabbit hole, putting her kids on a GF/CF diet, wondering if their mercury fillings should be removed, etc. But it got me reading on the topic.
I was a 2E kid, which resulted in some very odd ways in processing information. At 12, I was reading at a college level, but had phonetic skills on par with someone of 8 or 9, because I tend to read everything as sight words. I still can’t spell worth shit. Sometimes I misread information or I phrase it in a way that confuses other people. In those cases, I correct my mistakes or try to rephrase it, rather than dismissing people as”stupid.” He’s made it clear he has zero tolerance for the fact that I process information closer to a casual socratic method style than his long recitations of facts, so after his little lecture on the “proper” way to comment, I stopped reading his comments. I’ll stick to the commentators who are actually interesting to talk with from now on.
@ Terrie
Again, you avoid one of my major points, that is, you attack Christine’s use of her kids without giving any examples. How does this fit into the Socratic method? It doesn’t, just an example of your intellectual dishonesty. And you continue to point out I used “stupid” even when I agreed with your criticism and have tried to avoid using it. Obviously, even when people agree with you it’s not good enough. Maybe you think like Inspector Jauvert in Les Miserables, once someone does something you consider wrong, never let it go, ignore everything else.
And you write: “Sometimes I misread information or I phrase it in a way that confuses other people. In those cases, I correct my mistakes or try to rephrase. . . He’s made it clear he has zero tolerance for the fact that I process information closer to a casual socratic method style than his long recitations of facts, so after his little lecture on the “proper” way to comment, I stopped reading his comments.”
What you call the “proper” way to comment as I clearly explained is not a valid comment. Again, I could call someone a liar or any other detrimental term, without giving any evidence. That is what you did. So, if that is your “proper” form of comment, then, whether because you just are incapable of learning or intellectually dishonest and refuse to learn, ends up with the same thing, some of your comments are not “proper”; but dishonest.
And admitting you don’t read my comments; but continue to defend your indefensible position, just more proof of your intellectual dishonest.
And, for someone who didn’t like when I developed my argument for emphasizing stupid over racism, now you give a detailed comment on why you are as you are. Once more you are a “dishonest hypocrite”.
And you write: “I am not NT, but not on the spectrum either. That’s one of the thing that annoys me with Christine — she uses neurodiversity in a very outdated sense to pit people on the spectrum against each other.”
So, give some examples where she pits people on the spectrum against each other!!!
And, I have had both friends and acquaintances with varying levels of ASD and even Down Syndrome. You are NOT the only one. And you probably missed where I explained in Sweden, a PhD is a pure research program and Clinical Psychology, a professional program, so, I took ALL the required courses for both, did the clinical practicums AND a one year internship, mainly at the Psychiatric Clinic at Gothenburg’s main hospital, Sahlgrenska, supervised by both an associate professor board certified psychiatrist and a licensed, many years experience, Clinical Psychologist. So, I have a reasonable understanding of various disorders. In fact, I was a licensed clinical psychologist in Sweden, though I think my license has been long expired since I returned to the states almost 40 years ago.
As I pointed out to Christine, her fixation of vaccines may fit well into the CDC definition of ASD; but she is also intelligent enough to fight it if she so chooses. So, I don’t know what your actual level of intelligence is; but just like Christine, you contradict yourself, and, instead of even considering my suggestions, fall back on your narrow ability to only process information Socratic Style. I doubt this ability is fixed in stone. So, does that mean you really don’t understand how and why vaccines work because it would be very difficult to summarize in a simple Socratic approach?
@ Joel
“Maybe you think like Inspector Jauvert in Les Miserables, once someone does something you consider wrong, never let it go, ignore everything else.”
You got your reference wrong! It’s not “Les Misérables” but “Les Miséroïdes” with Jean-Claude Vandame!
(Some subtitles in this comparative medley with Gangs of New York.)
Just did some test and scored 39 out of 50, so I seem to be a bit on the spectrum.
I can’t say it bothers me.
@ Renate
“On the spectrum.” As i’ve pointed out on various blogs, the definition of autism has been broadened to Autism Spectrum Disorders. ASD includes a number of various groups of observable behaviors and puts them under one umbrella. They do this by focusing on a smaller group of behaviors that are similar and leaving out many other behaviors that would be quite different. What does this mean? First, no autism epidemic, just as when leukemia was added to cancers in the late 19th century, so number of “cancers” increased; but leukemia could just as well have been put under heading “Blood Disorders”, things in common with other cancers; but other things in common with other categories.
As for your score on the test, I’ve know a number of people, grown up with some, that at one time would have been considered “eccentric”; but nowadays, with advent of the “therapeutic society” every slight difference gets a label. So, if you are doing well, enjoying life, etc. I wouldn’t put much attention to one score.
Most people have their individual eccentricities.
@ Joel
Well, when I was a kid, I had problems with social contacts and I could be bad-tempered if things didn’t go my way. They took me institute for children with some kind of problems. I got some kind of diagnosis, but it wasn’t autism (if we ever had heard about it, because it was in the 60s and 70s.) My parents got a booklet about children with my kind of problems.
Some years ago I was send to some organisation, to help me get a job. The lady who was supposed to help me considered me a bit weird and suggested I should get tested for autism. I had given her the booklet, my parents had gotten when I was a kid. According to her, I was very intelligent and had some social problems. Well, yes, I can’t say I have many friends. There are several reasons for that. At some point I was send to an organisation which tried to get people with autism and other non neuro-typical people and I could get along with the people there. Alas things didn’t work out.
I enjoy life, though there are some aspects, I would rather have less problems with. I don’t really like my social issues.
I appreciate those responses.
Why I am here is – in any way I can, based on my education, experience and fortunate status in life – to oppose quackery, anti-vax, woo and general BS. Orac gets my support because he has managed to continue unimpeded upon his valiant quest for many years and has attracted a coterie of like-minded adherents who do not always fit into the same mold.
WHICH IS A GOOD THING-
Let’s take Trump ( although I’d rather not but…)
he is despised by many people across the world:
you can find a sincere political reporter who writes a detailed book about his activities, a gossip columnist writes a tell-all that may not be fact-checkable but creates a stirring image of his
malfeasance, a professor of history who compares him to other presidents, a lawyer documents his possible crimes, a member of his inner circle quotes him precisely, a family member discusses his problematic early life, 3 world leaders together laugh at him publicly, several former members of his party create a pact to unseat him, late night and weekend comics have a field day describing or portraying him accurately ( Mr Baldwin) or facetiously ( by a Black comedian). All real people- btw-
Congress host hearings with witnesses, opinion writers write pieces, a political cartoonist lets go of inhibitions and draws an unforgettable portrait. These diverse revelations,images, facts, stories and insults will affect their audience, hitting their target from multiple points.
So why not?
We’re all in this together. And, no , I have no problems with sceptics critiquing other sceptics but lets’ not forget what the Big Picture is.
We’re better than altie, woo, anti-vax BS. we’re on the same side
@ Denise Walter
Being on the same side doesn’t mean an in-depth position or even on same side for same reasons. And, even if on same side on one issue, may be on opposite sides of other issues.
I agree with Libertarians that we should get rid of drug laws, except, for instance, when driving a vehicle or giving/selling to minors. Laws should only be for what actually harms us, e.g. our bodies, damaging our property, stealing our property, not what offends us. However, I certainly don’t agree with their position of limiting government. I won’t go into details, except that classic libertarianism emphasizes a world that no longer exists, namely, mainly rural small farms. We now live in dense urban environments where everything from paved streets to schools to fire departments to water, and many other things dependent on a sense of community. So, I agree with them about drug laws; but not the underlying reasoning and not their overall politics.
Of course.
And people may be influenced by anti-Trump books by Mssrs Acosta, Woodward, Cay Johnston, Wilson or Bolton or by comedy routines by Mssrs Colbert, Noah, Baldwin, Thompson or Ms Bee FOR DIFFERENT reasons but hopefully they all lead to LESS VOTES for Trump.
Minions may present facts, testimony, data, opinion, sarcasm or comedy but we all
( hopefully) aim at cutting into false information engendered by woo and anti-vax any way we can
One person might present data and others may riff off of it.
It’s about the ultimate aim of eventually reducing BS in the world.
Sceptics conferences may include comedy.
I feel much the same about drug control. Portugal decriminalised all drugs and started treating addiction as a medical issue. Switzerland will actually give addicts heroin in a controlled setting.
Part of the appeal of drug use is the forbidden fruit aspect. And when this is taken away, it quickly becomes obvious just how pathetic addiction really is.
I dislike libertarianism. We even have libertarians here in South Africa. Libertarianism denies the existence of the tragedy of the commons, externalities, and leonine contracts. It also assumes that the market is best, disregarding that in some matters (like prisons) it is to the market’s advantage to do a bad job.
@ Julian Frost
“Portugal decriminalised all drugs and started treating addiction as a medical issue.”
They had no choice in the matter. After the revolution that reestablished democracy, the whiff of freedom got out of hand when it came to drugs. And the extent of heroïn addiction (not talking about pot, here…) got so so bad that they had to find realistic ways to handle the issue. Not realistic to “crack down” on heroïn addicts when it means cracking down on many kids of members of parliament. That’s how bad it was. An no, it was way way worse in some poor shithole — apologies for the trumpism — neighbourhoods of Lisboa.
Nowadays, yes, they have this policy ongoing. And it’s not only that they “medicalise” the issue. They avoid coercion in terms of medicalisation. If you’re caught smoking pot in a bar in Lisboa, the police will come, but you know you have nothing to fear. Police will engage in a chat, as they are obliged to, and will give you a paper with an address and a phone number. I do not know how mandatory it is, but I guess you’re more or less obliged to go to that interview, where a panel of doctors start assessing you. Then, this panel potentially offers you medical support and/or hospitalisation that you’re quite really free to decline. And this way, drug addicts know it’s their choice to get treatment. And it therefore builds a rather good rep’ among druggies.
That’s a way to build trust. Instead of believing that because you’re a doctor you’re morally obliged to use stealth force and veiled threats to get potential patients to comply.
Now, there are downsides to the portuguese situation. Notably the fact that quite a number of heavy heroïn addicts in european countries kind of dream to get there and quite often do… Not the kind of “tourism” or “immigrants” you want. Plus the neighbourhood of Morocco that is quite a big producer of hemp…
But really, they did not really have a choice given the extent of heroïn addiction at the time Barroso — I think it is Barroso — passed that law.
“Switzerland will actually give addicts heroin in a controlled setting.”
Not everywhere in Switzerland. Geneva does it. Likely Zürich too. And maybe formerly drug-friendly towns such as Biel/Bienne. But I do not believe a canton such as Ticino has any intention of going down that road. But that’s the interesting thing about being a confederation with very extensive legislative autonomy: you can experiment different policies in various cantons, and compare. (Not talking about slavery, here…)
But things are far from being perfect in Switzerland when it comes to drug use. The good thing is that swiss people are so respectful of other’s privacy that the police does not get into the house and garden of someone whom everyone knows grows pot. That’s considered illegal yet private business. Smoking a joint in the street, on the other hand, is a Big No-No… A Very Big No-No. Not decriminalised, but paying a fine gets criminal charges dropped. The problem is not fines, however, except if you’re poor and in an illegal immigration status (quite a number of black people dealing dope there, at the mercy of the albanian mafia) but social conventions. Swiss villages do not have that much of a graffiti hip-hop gangsta rap culture…
And being a druggie in Geneva is no fun. Yes, you have… hum… access to medicalised heroïn (not merely partial agonists). But given the social and money constraints of living in Geneva, it’s not fun being a druggie there. A young US woman I met moved to Geneva for that reason, and she was living a very tough life. Not recommended as an immigrant destination for druggies except if you’re quite well socially adjusted and very cautious about your social image.
But in what other country where hemp is illegal other than in Switzerland can you see that, openly displayed as a documentary on Youtube? Tell me… OK: The guy, Bernard Rappaz was playing cat and mouse with the rather lenient legislation, and was so much of a local that he had friends in political positions (not surprising given how small his canton is). But finally got caught. Went on hunger strike (15 times). Got all over in the media. Now tell me of a country where someone can confess selling 5 tons of hemp, police seizing 50 tons of hemp, start 15 hunger strike, and have all the media in the country pontificating over his condition, whether the law was too harsh or not, whether force-feeding was legitimate, et cetera?
When it comes to drugs, the real problem in Switzerland is that the country is way too lenient towards the mafia, and notably the N’drangheta and the very very rough and tough albanian mafia. As long as mafiosi stay quiet there, do not cross the street when the light for pedestrians is red, and respect speed limits on highways, the mafia can rather safely use Switzerland as an operational and logistic base for its actions in neighbouring countries. Met quite a number of mafiosi would did not that much shy away from saying that they were so. The State doesn’t have enough of a backbone on these matters to deal with them appropriately. A judge can too easily be threatened by the mafia there.
Catching up on comments upside-down here (I’ve been in a rough patch again, fell off the face of the earth a bit); but, as I think I mentioned, my dad’s mom’s family was mafia back in the old country (Switzerland), but “Gypsy” mafia, or involved in some sort of broader mafia. I mean, when faced with so much racism and discrimination, there aren’t a lot of options. Pa lit right out of Zurich like a match, for some reason. Went as far as he could, pretty much, which is sort of telling/interesting.
Ah, the good old days when Radio Tirana was laying down some serious crazy on the shortwave bands.
@Denice, Joel is free to comment as he see fits. Even when I commented on his use of the word “stupid” you’ll note I never said he couldn’t use it, simply that I disliked his constant usage. It’s clear based off recent interactions that we are seeking very different experiences and there’s nothing wrong with that That’s why I won’t be reading or responding to his comments anymore. All that it does is produce mutual annoyance.
I suppose ‘despicable’ is right out.
@Tim, Robin’s minstrels do manage an accurate description of some of the nastier comment sections out there. Obviously, I don’t mind a certain amount of verbal sparring, but there’s a point where you’re like “I have more productive uses for my time. Like snaking the drain.” Both mucky activities, but at least with the later, you know you’ll have useful results.
@ Terrie (@ Joel)
I noticed Joel seemed to have gotten a bit more “angry”, or, shall I rather say, a bit more rough on the edges. It seems that he has been more open with the underlying reasons as to why he attaches importance to rationality and science, and it indeed goes on beyond merely medical matters. It is indeed attached to the nature of the psychological underpinnings of some of the most outrageous nonsense out there, namely racism and the outrageous nonsense that goes beyond merely plain racism but dives into conspiratorial kinds of racism mingled with downright legitimation of violence. He is right to be concerned by that and also right to be concerned by the analogies between what he abhores and stuff like antivaxx.
But I think it’s unfair to characterise various forms of lunacy uniformly. While some of the psychological underpinnings are the same, the scope of nastiness and downright dumbness can vary very widely. As to Christine, I all too well understand how one can develop the kind of thoughts she has. I’ve already mentioned to her that in much the same way you cannot derive statistical knowledge from anecdotal evidence, you cannot derive anecdotal knowledge from statistical evidence. Which means that many things may have happened to her kid. And why not some outlier related to vaccines? You never know. What you can know, however, is that if that were the case, it’s enough of an outlier not to show up in the stats, and thus not enough to mount an opposition to vaccines. I know that’s tough for her to acknowledge, but her behaviour is not morally comparable with the KKK or stuff like that. One may point out analogies, but that’s as far as moral indictment can go.
Joel seems to some extent to take this somewhat personally. Not in the sense of vindictiveness but rather in the sense of banging his head on the wall (figuratively speaking) when he writes a post to, say, Christine.
It’s all right to have personal reasons for endorsing science or rationality. In a sense, it can also be all right to have personal reasons to reject science or rationality, as long as you acknowledge what these are, as that can open up a discussion.
Personally, I’m rather insensitive — and for wrong and/or abnormal reasons — to the rationality issue inherent to racism or even antivax. Whether people are racists or not, antivax or not, or whatever, the message I want to drill into people’s heads is that there is no sensible way forward if one rejects science or rationality. Opposing scientific results and/or social interpretations thereof, or opposing what passes as “rationality” can sometimes be the Right Thing To Do. But believing one can find a collective way to Organise Society and Hedge the Future (here’s my hedgie tropism playing tricks with me again…) without understanding what rationality and science is is plain wrong. That statement goes, to my mind, deeper than merely issues on racism or antivax; and, in a sense, it is because it does go deeper — I’ve got two philosophers that structure my mind on these issues — that I can pass off as lenient towards racists or antivaxxers. I believe it is sometimes wiser to acknowledge their subjective perspective, not as valid, but as a fact pertaining to their personality, and work from that starting point to a gradual acknowledgement of the worth of rationality; itself a notion deeper than merely science.
That’s why with Tom or Pathcoin, I can be scathing. While with Christine, I do recognise that she is making efforts amidst a rather painful conundrum. She may make one step forward and then two or three steps backwards, but at least she is making one occasional step forward. Sleazy schmuks such as Tom or Pathcoin do not: they are very inventive when it comes to setting up rhetorical curtains designed at hiding their real thoughts and adept at immunising themselves against criticism in any conceivable way. This is much more immoral to my taste.
So we all have deep-seated reasons for having a personal stance on the worth of rationality, science and morality. Some of them good, some of them bad. The more personal these reasons go, the more one gets in the intimacy of someone else’s worldview. And that’s a point where one has to be both very careful not to offend needlessly while being rigidly anti-bullshit.
But a quote the close this comment:
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” — George Bernard Shaw
+1 ☝ ??
Though, I feel a little left out that U did not shame me over the use of {fucktarded + modifiers} as JustaTech did.
@ Denice
“Orac gets my support because he has managed to continue unimpeded upon his valiant quest for many years and has attracted a coterie of like-minded adherents who do not always fit into the same mold.”
Orac got my (almost) inconditional support the day I read his post on angioplasty.
He wrote:
“My counter to the argument that the patients included in this trial were not that sick is: Yes! That’s the point. These are exactly the sorts of patients who too frequently are subjected to PCI for in essence no benefit over that which can be achieved by medical management.”
There, I got won over. I knew he was honest. Not someone trying to lie to himself over the benefits of medical interventions…
@ Terrie
You wrote: “I have to admit, Joel, I wish you’d lay off with the “stupid” thing.”
And I wrote: “OK, despite I only partially agree with you, I will try to not use “stupid” in the future.”
Then I explained in detail, showing how racism developed as a divide and conquer strategy, writing: “So, racism is an extreme form of stupidity in the United States because it turns natural allies against those exploiting and hurting them.” And your response was: “That doesn’t really address my question of why you call them stupid instead of calling them racist. Why obscure the issue like that?”
My only response is you must be really dense, claiming a clear explanation is “obscure.”
And I continued with: “Really, you didn’t understand what I wrote? I am calling them stupid because they are allowing the 1% to redirect them and in so doing harming themselves, their families, and everyone else not belonging to the 1%. Their racism is sabotaging them joining all those suffering, unsafe environment, unsafe workplaces, insecure jobs, legal system that favors corporations and the rich, and on and on it goes. So, I call them both racists and STUPID. Not stupid for doing a few stupid things, which we all have done, myself included; but stupid for allowing themselves to be manipulated into racism which hurts them and almost everyone else continuously.”
Then you wrote: “Look, it’s not my fault you misunderstood my question, which was simply wondering why you apparently favored calling racists “stupid” instead of simply calling them “racist,” which is sufficient enough term to me. The history of racism in America tells me very little about why you make the word choices you do.”
Actually in my comments I gave a lot more detail; but if explaining my view of history, of how racism was used to turn natural allies against each other rather than the exploiting class didn’t explain my choice to you, then, all I can assume is you are not very intelligent.
And after wanting to know why I used stupid rather than racism, why I used one term, you then give an example of how a coke can could be seen as liquid and solid, though you were even wrong about the solid, since a thin amount of aluminum and mainly air when empty. So, you gave two terms.
Then after criticizing me for giving an in-depth response, you turn around and give an in-depth response of why you think along what you call Socratic lines. What hypocrisy!
Then you write: “Joel is free to comment as he see fits. Even when I commented on his use of the word “stupid” you’ll note I never said he couldn’t use it, simply that I disliked his constant usage. It’s clear based off recent interactions that we are seeking very different experiences and there’s nothing wrong with that That’s why I won’t be reading or responding to his comments anymore. All that it does is produce mutual annoyance.
No, you didn’t say I couldn’t use the word; but did write: ““I have to admit, Joel, I wish you’d lay off with the “stupid” thing.” And I said I would try; but that wasn’t good enough for you so you just kept harping on it.
And finally, you continue to avoid the elephant in the room, that is, your attacking Christine, making claims of her negative use of her children, without giving any examples, any direct quotes from her. And I repeat, this is NO different from someone calling another a liar or any other negative descriptive term without giving one iota of proof. Something politicians and con men do quite often. So, I could care less if you don’t read my comments since you seem incapable of understanding what many others are capable of, namely, I actually quote what someone else wrote, then criticize it and/or when explaining my position, sometimes giving several examples and links to SEVERAL papers, I don’t just throw out strong phrases; but explain clearly.
I wonder how far you got in school. When in school, final exams included multiple-choice, fill in the blanks, short essay answers and usually one long essay answers. Many students could memorize and do well on the multiple-choice and fill in the blanks, but I excelled in the essays because I was good at actually explaining something, building a case. Obviously, you prefer multiple choice and filling in the blanks.
So, as I’ve written to Christine and others, I don’t know what your innate abilities are; but do know that you refuse to even try to learn, that is, that calling people out, making accusations requires evidence. And you are a hypocrite when criticizing me for building a case, then write extensively to explain why you think, or more, don’t think, the way you do.
And I could care less about you; but what you represent, which is, unfortunately, how many people don’t really think, including you and Christine. You don’t annoy me, what you represent does.
And, I realize you won’t answer; but what do you actually base your support of vaccines on; e.g., history and current status of infectious diseases, understanding how vaccines work, basics of immunology, etc.?
Oh, fuck off, you condescending wanker.
@ Narad
As I’ve written before, sometimes you contribute to the dialogue; but other times are just an asshole. So, you pick one sentence out of what I wrote. Maybe I shouldn’t have written it; but it did make a point. Any university I went to would require supporting what one writes, something Terrie doesn’t do, or at least in this current exchange. So, do what Christine, Terrie, antiscience types, antivaxxers do, take one sentence and run with it.
And as I’ve responded, you’re not the hall monitor, as much as you seem to crave the role. Oh, and again, who am I?
This is my last response to you.
I hate to break this to you, but you are not “the dialogue.” Your endlessly repeating your qualifications are not “the dialogue.” The contents of your library are not “the dialogue.” Pick up the needle and turn the LP over.
@ Narad
“And as I’ve responded, you’re not the hall monitor, as much as you seem to crave the role.”
He’s nonetheless free to try pushing the conversation where he wants to.
I still think however that Joel’s references are valuable input. May give him some criticism on other aspects, though, but he has a right to point out what he wants to point out. The same way others are…
sometimes you contribute to the dialogue; but other times are just an asshole.
Is that a bad thing now?
Asking for a friend.
Dude. Joel. Terrie was being exceedingly friendly with you, and you really just went completely off at her for bringing up what’s clearly a sensitive subject without even stopping to consider that, or stopping to consider how friendly she had been. I don’t see how going full-guns-bored at length at anybody who even slightly disagrees with you, even in a measured and respectful way, is constructive or well-advised at all.
I may be exceedingly tolerant of my fellow/ sister sceptics because I survey the frighteningly horrendous, oozing, rancid, intellectually rotting, criminally negligent “health” and “science” information daily that is supplied by woo-meisters and anti-vaxxers whose relationship with truthful reportage is entirely non-existent. Random anti-vax commenters who loll about at RI are small game indeed, merely feeding their own obsessions and ego deficits whilst the previously mentioned are Big Business raking in millions and living like lords ( it’s mostly men), thumbing their noses at reason and science although they proclaim the converse loudly.
“frighteningly horrendous, oozing, rancid, intellectually rotting, criminally negligent”
That’s no way to talk about Joe Mercola (who, according to his self-professed lesser half, Erin Elizabeth) has just been de-Twitterized, at least to the extent of having all links to his stuff* being banned by the Twitter Lords.
*the same penalty supposedly has been wreaked on Ty and Charlene Bollinger, who have been bravely telling us everything about cancer that They don’t want us to know. They and Mercola may have to head over to Parler along with the Trumpites.
Give me a little while to feel concerned about the free-speech implications. First I have to stop laughing.
@ Denise Walter
But if your “fellow skeptics” use the same illogic unscientific approach as the antivaxxers, then they leave themselves open to the same valid critique as critique of antivaxxers. I simply asked Terrie to give a few examples of Christine’s negative use of her children and she refused, not her style. This isn’t about style, it’s about rationally, logically, scientifically arguing. And I don’t consider someone a “fellow skeptic” who contradicts herself as Terrie has done. So, defender if you feel the need; but don’t expect me to change my opinion of her.
If I were on a jury and listened carefully and weighed the evidence, deciding not guilty, of course, I would want other jurors to agree; and accept the vote of someone who simply said “he just doesn’t look the type to commit such and such a crimes”; so, I would be happy with the verdict; but not happy that some juror ignored the evidence and decided on something superficial. So, the more people that support vaccines the better; but the more people who both support vaccines and actually understand why, even better because their position will be much stronger.
ADDENDUM
Imagine that after the trial, I ask the juror why they didn’t even consider the presented evidence and they responded, no need as they are an excellent judge of character. I prefer basing things on evidence, the more, the better.
@ Joel:
Take it easy!
Terrie provided her synopsis of what CK wrote over time at RI: I agreed that I had observed quite the same.
OK. RI is not a court of law before a jury BUT we have witnesses INCLUDING other minions who read the same material over a few months (in short, earlier stories were about how violent/ dangerous the teenager was, later reports were about how everyone “loved him”, how “awesome: he was) – our testimony can jog their memories but anyone can go back to check out what happened for themselves
If I had to document and link to PROVE what I surmised point by point, it might take a week because CK wrote an awful lot over a long period of time.
But it’s not that important. It is a small tile in a grand mosaic that illustrates how anti-vaxxers discuss how kids with ASDs behave/ suffer in order to blame vaccines
Other anti-vaxxers uncover material about how dysfunctional their children are.( often in insensitive ways about female hygiene and toileting e.g. AoA) Trust me, they do.
So over a long period of time, we pointed out how frequently this happens and NO, we do not analyse how prevalent this trend is or whether it occurs globally only that we keep seeing similar portrayals using kids’ disabilities to justify anti-vax points…
Other sceptics do provide links to SB research or acute observation: including snark
Who hasn’t been persuaded by DB’s comments- and not only the science parts?.
I am sick and tired of this ‘sign in to confirm your age’ google\yourube shit. This is a whole new level of batfuckery limits on criticism of shit “They” do. yea, they just happen to be men and happen to not be black. But this stuff is entirely white bread! Must be some truthiness involved then.
There are other ‘sanitized’ versions of Freeman’s work out there; Lame as fuck.
^^ I don’t even know what elicited that part. fucking never mind.
My freaking bank has adopted some sort of 2.5/3–step verification. I mean, OK, you accidentally deleted my account once and didn’t give me starter checks, stopped providing free coffee and wafers, but I’d still like to be able to check my meager balance in less than 10 minutes.
Oh god oh fuck! not the wafers..
@ Tim
If you time, I’d suggest listening to this lecture on witch trials. Rather fascinating that people in position of power in England seemed to oppose witch trials but had trouble reining in public hysteria with respect to witchcraft and had trouble reining in the instrumentalisation of witchcraft to settle personal feuds. Notably personal feuds between women…
That’s why I find it somewhat ironic to have blanket statements that witch hunts and witch trials are to be equated with patriarchy. Which is not to deny that the church did had a vested interested in eradicating witchcraft and the role of women in healing knowledge. But these two previous paragraphs are so intermingled that I have trouble making the “witch hunts” = “patriarchy” equation as bluntly as it is sometimes made nowadays.
And thank you for your “Mindwalk” video. It has that Éric Rohmer vibe to it.
@ Tim,
"I was looking for the video of the non-violent autistic black man murdered in the street by police (I think it was around christmas, can’t remember which city… there are so many — the
one where he is calling out for his father just before he succumbed"
Maybe this kid from January? But he died in the police car I think. His dad tried to tell the police he didn’t need their assistance, an onlooker had called the police to report a “fight” in the parking lot outside a Laser Tag. The dad had bite marks on him & the police disregarded his pleas.
I cannot stand this. This could be my son one day. This could be one of many friend’s sons too. People here say I should save my energy for advocacy instead of arguing here about vaccines but they don’t know that I DO & reaching out to law enforcement is a primary focus of mine. I write letters, emails & send my local PD links to specific training programs; one developed by a retired police officer who is also an Autism dad. They are friendly & receptive but I don’t know how much change I have influenced but that’s okay; they will continue to hear from me.
I have specifically said that if I say I don’t need help; I DON’T NEED HELP. Whatever triggered him isn’t his fault. Someone could have whistled (it hurts). I have a friend with a 19 yr old severe son who is triggered by the sound of sniffing. We have both been that parent in a parking lot before & thank God nobody tried to “help” us.
Have you heard about the death of Elijah McCain? He was a 23 year old black massage therapist who played violin for shelter kittens on his lunch break. I’m not sure if he was autistic, a very young looking 23 for sure who still lived at home but he had a severe anemia & would wear a ski mask out in public a lot. Here in Colorado, he was assaulted by police officers & injected with Ketamine, also saying that he couldn’t breathe. A big protest for him was held in Denver last night, several well known black violinists came to play
Every time I think about him I cry. There needs to be awareness, of ALL disabilities & I’m sorry if sometimes autistic awareness means talking about some difficult things but that’s just how it is.
That was not the video I was thinking of. I am aware of the cat guy though — Numerous videos are available. He had the ski mask on because it was cold and he was anemic.
I do not like to be touched. I may have mentioned it here before but If I had not got my head into the door and shouted “he is going to suffocate me!” and a hundred people that knew me at GHCC spilled out, I would be dead. I would be like my boy scout acquaintance (not, exactly, a friend) who was killed a year earlier by the same technique. The cop was doing that exact thing before they all arrived {cop was shouting “go back inside, go back inside!) but, thankfully, they did not.
2 seconds. If I had not got in that callout (and throwing a quarter million dollar piece of hardware inside) then I would be dead now. I’m a ‘tech guy’ and white. One is not supposed to piss off a cop; if you do, It is justified that you must die, around here.
The Special K was from the paramedics, not the police. Why they’re using K. rather than Haldol for a possibly nonexistent state is anybody’s guess. It’s like the PCP routine all over again — sorry, floating up and down on the couch and drooling doesn’t comport with turning into Superman.
@ Joel,
"So, I repeat, you have ASD, research has found a strong genetic component, so you passed it on to your children. You have a cytokine disorder, again genetic, you passed on to your
daughter. Your daughter was born very premature and very low birthweight, this alone has a risk of around 50% of apnea and respiratory distress, and, as pointed out from the
research, overreactive cytokine genetics can result in cytokine storms from SLIGHT infections. And infants are exposed to up to 3,000 microbes per day. And yet you keep trying to find
vaccines as cause of her SIDS. I know people with ASD, high functioning as you, and though not easy, they can learn, why can’t you?"
HOW do we know vaccines are not causing SIDS & ASD in non-responders? Have non-responders, as a group; ever been isolated in an epidemiological study of vaccine safety?
And WHAT, exactly; is the prevalence of genetic non-responders in the general population? You might have extensive knowledge of research that has been done but I bet you can’t find the answer to those two questions.
I’m still waiting for you to produce the studies showing Unicorns don’t exist.
My son says unicorns do exist.
@ Dorit Reiss
“My son says unicorns do exist.”
So we have a witness!
He also says they’re going to remain hidden because they’re scared of humans.
The world, five years old version.
Unicorns are hiding in the herd? Hmm.
My youngest nephew explained to me a while back that a cougar had “flown” into the box on grandma’s (my mom’s) back deck (it’s like some antique box that she just uses as a table), but he definitely seemed to be much more frightened of “the walking ones.” (It was still some time in winter and it was dark out.)
@ Christine Kincaid
So, now you want research on non-responders and AIDS and SIDS. I really don’t feel like devoting time to seeing if such research exists because if I do find it, then you will come up with something else. Your daughter had several problems that directly relate to SIDS, overactive cytokines (even slight infection), very premature and very low birthweight linked with high risk of apnea and respiratory distress; yet, you keep grasping at straws.
A long time ago a man was shot in Houston. He was placed on life-support, Eventually he developed an infection at the hospital and died. If you were his lawyer I’m sure you would argue that the infection killed him, not the bullet. Not the same as vaccines, etc. but just a poor analogy of how someone can always attempt to blame something else.
As for non-responders, at some point the overwhelming evidence, over 30,000 vaccine safety studies, together with the high risk of your daughter’s, should stop you; but as Lawrence writes: “I’m still waiting for you to produce the studies showing Unicorns don’t exist.”
As I’ve written before, one can’t prove a negative, not with science. You are hopeless. As I wrote, if I did find studies on non-responders, you would just come up with something else.
Maybe the part of the CDC’s definition of ASD really does fit you perfectly:
Highly restricted, fixated interests that are abnormal in intensity or
focus (e.g., strong attachment to or preoccupation with unusual
objects, excessively circumscribed or perseverative interests).
I suppose the lawyer of the shooter could argue that the shooter didn’t kill the victim, but the hospital did.
It is also the kind of reasoning used by people who want to downplay Covid-19, by stating that everyone with some kind of co-morbidity didn’t die from Covid-19, but from the co-morbidity.
@ Narad
Yep, I wrote it would be my last response to her, so what? I’m not the only person in the world who changes their minds on such a trivial thing.
No, I’m NOT the hall monitor and it isn’t just my credentials. One of my all time favorite authors, Eric Hoffer, had a high school diploma, was a longshoreman and wrote one of the best books ever, The True Believer. But if you read what my last comment to Denise Walter, you might understand the point I was trying to make; but, then again, maybe you’ll just take one of the sentences out-of-context. As I’ve written before, sometimes your contributions are excellent; but other times your one-liners display that you have a need to be an asshole.
I made clear to Terrie that what she was doing was in some respects no different than many antivaxxers, just attacking without evidence, so if you call that hall monitoring, I could care less. Some people, not apparently Terrie, might actually consider what I wrote and contribute with much stronger future comments. You will probably continue once-in-a-while to make really good contributing comments and once-in-a-while to just be an asshole. I wonder if you suffer from multiple personalities? Nothing is impossible.
I also pointed out to Terrie that she, just as Christine, contradicted herself.
And, if you noticed, Christine also, like you and like Terrie, responded to just part of what I wrote.
This is the problem with blogs. Sometimes I learn quite a lot, including obtaining new articles/documents, sometimes I see an opportunity to educate by responding to something someone wrote, not to educate that person; but others following these exchanges who are open-minded. Not you, not Terrie, not Christine; though I could be wrong?
Wait for it….
https://i0.wp.com/respectfulinsolence.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Irony-Meter-Explode.jpg
Please, can we just get along and be nice to eachother, if our goals are the same, defending science against the people who have several reasons to attack science?
We may not all agree politicaly or with the choice of words we use, we are from different countries, with different political systems and healthcare, with different languages, which means English is not the first language for all of us, but in the end we are here, because we want to put an end to quackery and to defend children against the wrong health decisions there parents can make. We want people to look at the science, even if it goes against their gut-feelings.
@ Diane Walter
You write: “Terrie provided her synopsis of what CK wrote over time at RI: I agreed that I had observed quite the same.
OK. RI is not a court of law before a jury BUT we have witnesses INCLUDING other minions who read the same material over a few months (in short, earlier stories were about how violent/ dangerous the teenager was, later reports were about how everyone “loved him”, how “awesome: he was) – our testimony can jog their memories but anyone can go back to check out what happened for themselves.”
First, it is NOT a contradiction that someone is loved by many and feared by others. Second, maybe not a court of law; but Terrie was responding with her interpretation and now you agree with her. Well, great, I can find dozens of people who have a positive view of Trump, who say, for instance, he gave a great speech. I would simply ask for a link to the speech. What would it say if they refused to give the link?
Terrie asked me a question. I took the time to give her my answer. She rejected it, called it basically wasted effort, all she wanted was for me to agree to use racism instead of stupid.
As for Christine’s portrayal of her kids, I know of kids who have problems who can be quite sweet and suddenly lose it. In addition, my concern is the science of vaccines. I focus on this. Not on how Christine portrays her kids. I’m sure there were days when I was a child that I did something so that if someone asks my mother what I was like, she would have said something like “incorrigible” and yet other times that I was a “delight”. Christine is on the Spectrum, has additional health problems, and has kids with various problems. And, as I wrote, I have not been given indications she has a strong social support network. So, I’m not all that concerned with how she portrays her children. However, she is a nurse and quite capable of finding research on the internet, so I am concerned that her posts here and, perhaps, elsewhere could influence some parents to not vaccinate.
And, I did NOT ask Terrie to give dozens of Christine’s comments, spending inordinate time finding them, a couple would have sufficed. A synopsis in someone’s words is their opinion, nothing more, nothing less. And that two people agree says not much more.
And when I asked Terrie what she based her support of vaccines on, there was a simple answer, something like: “I know not all doctors are competent and/or honest and I know that pharmaceutical companies are greedy, out for profits; but my grandparents told me about kids they knew with polio and measles, and nations all over the world use vaccines, and we don’t see polio or measles, so I choose to accept that the vast majority of scientists, not the few corrupt ones, are trustworthy and that vaccines confer far more benefit than risk, especially from the actual diseases.
Basically, she doesn’t have to understand immunology, etc.; but show how she has some awareness of the ravages of vaccine-preventable diseases and understanding that science isn’t based on a few. Christine and other antivaxxers do the opposite, trust the lone wolf. As Michael Shermer says in his book “Why People Believe Weird Things”, paraphrasing (too lazy to look it up), for every Galileo there are thousands upon thousands of others who disagreed with the science at the time who have been consigned to the dustbins of history.
And, as for Narad’s comment on my education. When I was in high school we had term papers. Usually required to have 10 references, a few could be Brittanica; but some had to be from other sources. In college the paper requirements were much more rigorous, including going to original sources, e.g., peer-reviewed journals or government reports. But even in high school my teachers would try to keep me from asking so many questions. If they gave an answer I would ask what they based it on, where they got it from. Even then I didn’t trust one source. And studies show that, though we have higher percentage of high grads and college grads today than when I was young, their level of knowledge, on the whole, has lowered. In college and grad school I became friends with some of my profs. They actually thanked me for my questions because they were uncomfortable, feeling students really didn’t understand something; but knowing that I was reasonably bright and well-prepared (all the required reading) that if I asked a question, then certain others didn’t understand as well. And over coffee, lunch, fellow students would thank me for asking the questions because they were too shy to do so. Well, I paid the tuition (worked my way through college, though tuition was a lot lower then), so I wanted my money’s worth. I didn’t go to get a degree; but an education.
And Narad doesn’t like me bringing up my education; but I gave the example that, though reasonably intelligent, I couldn’t decide on a design for a bridge because I’ve NEVER studied structural engineering. In other words, I try not to display the Dunning-Kruger Effect. If I don’t know a subject, I don’t even give an opinion, or in rare cases might give an opinion; but also say not really in my area of expertise.
Besides epidemiology, public health, my education included behavioral and social sciences; and an undergraduate degree in political science with THREE courses in Constitutional Law; but since preteens I have been interested in law, criminal justices, prejudice, etc. I guess it’s all right for Orac, and some others to give their educations and experience; but not me. I forget who; but someone didn’t even like that I told about being a blood donor. Wow! I have NEVER been a good athlete, poor hand-eye coordination, slow reflexes; but I’ve done sports most of my life, just not good at them. People brag about their golf scores, being on champion high school team, etc. so why shouldn’t I brag about donating blood. First, only 5% of population are regular blood donors, some, of course, can’t; but most could. Second, means I have potentially each donation helped three other people. Three, before gym closed down due to pandemic, I always wore a sticker saying blood donor. Some would ask me how many times and I am confident that I probably over the past 15 – 20 years got 10 or more people from my gym to donate. But, even mentioning that upsets some people. Well, I don’t give a shit, can’t please everyone. So, yep, my education allows me to understand infectious diseases, epidemiology, some immunology, and how vaccines work. Christine and other antivaxxers reject research; but their only criteria is not the methodology, the statistics, because they don’t understand them; but the results disagreeing with what they choose to believe.
So, I repeat, I don’t focus on what Christine says about her kids; but about vaccines and if you and Terrie choose to, at least give a couple of concrete examples. Your opinion is just that “an opinion”.
@ Joel:
I tried to find out when CK first showed up at RI ( her name in the Search box yielded nothing) looking for her early descriptions of her son.
SO I went back to Sept 2019, thinking that was when her tenure began but she was already here. I skimmed through REAMS of comment sections, noting her numerous contributions on all manner of topics, arguing with many of Orac’s finest.
At any rate, I went back to June 2019. ONE frigging year ago! A thankless task.
Early on, even Orac addressed her !! So did Rene, DrPH and Science Mom They quit.- we should all be as smart.
I did find something I recalled ( see July 2019, Orac’s post on Stop Mandatory Vaccines) she writes about how she had to “duck 20 blows” from her son while writing and how there were “guards” to deal with him in school; also about someone whistling leading to a reaction. Also his height and weight. His father was elsewhere.
I recall other descriptions about his violence but they are hidden amongst the volume of comments.- later on, her descriptions focus upon how wonderful he is.
Reading her material is trudging through the muck and mire of pseudoscience
this would take weeks AND she is NOT worth it.
I have bigger fish to fry
People like CK- although they can harm many people through their dissemination of mis-information- actually are victims of anti-vaxx entrepreneurs who instruct them ( I might steal Natrass’ term: “Culto-preneurs”, applied to hiv/aids denials who profit) CK is a distraction.
Mis-information comes from specific sources who generally profit monetarily. And we all know who they are..
.
@ Denise Walter
So, CK wrote she had to avoid blows from her son and school guards had to watch him, and on other posts she described him as sweet. So what? We know that kids on the Spectrum can be docile, quiet, and then break out in temper tantrums, and so can other kids. As I wrote, description of kids and people in general can show a range of behaviors, including extreme negative and extreme positive. Given CK is on the Spectrum and her son as well, doesn’t mean she was exploiting descriptions. And I am grateful she was willing to give gestation time, birthweight, etc.
The crux of the matter is when you wrote: “Reading her material is trudging through the muck and mire of pseudoscience.”
It is not only her pseudoscience; but Gish galloping, ignoring refutations of her claims, ignoring even that her daughter had problems that strongly were associated with SIDS, that I focus on, not her descriptions of her kids.
And, again, you gave a couple of her “negative” descriptions without any of her positives. Terrie gave neither; but, again, attacking Christine for these was wrong in my opinion. I want to focus on the science and it is not science to judge how she describes her kids, it is opinion and, as I wrote, such extremes of behavior are not out of the ordinary.
So, if you are trying to defend Terrie, you failed. Stick to the science.
But Joel:
it’s not just about science:
Alt med partisans- whether amateur or professional- put out misinformation that affects bystanders precisely how CK does–
stories about harms and injuries, devastation of families, battered mothers, wasted lives – these stories are powerful ammunition against SBM and vaccines
That’s why we recount them
RI as a collective quotes science ( theories, research, history) but also consolidates
material that woo/ anti-vax/ alt med disseminate across the net through websites and social media. (as well as minions’ personal experiences that encourage solidarity amongst us).
I look at how misinformation spreads and how it can be countered. You quote many studies that show how vaccines are NOT dangerous but a young parent may hear a single story ( which is an anecdote by a single person) which may frighten them enough to avoid or delay vaccination. Research has shown that parents can be very affected by other parents’ reports rather than health professionals’ materials. You’ll note that I have often provided the results of SBM to anti-vax commenters ( autism and genetics, early indicators of autism, prenatal brain development, lack of relationship of vaccines and autism complete with names and dates) to NO AVAIL
Over the years I’ve immersed myself in what anti-vaxxers/ woo-meisters say. it’s all over the net and it spreads like a virus.
Take a look at what they write sometimes. They aim at new parents.
@Joel,
I know CK has been commenting here at least since 2017.
https://www.respectfulinsolence.com/2017/05/01/thanks-for-the-measles-yet-again-andy/
A few months ago someone (Chris?) posted a link to what may have been her first comment.
I definitely remember one thread where she was talking about the problems she was having with her son. Some of us gave her advice about local resources that could help her. Then she shifted to how she had tried that and it didn’t work out for some reason. And when we expressed concern for her safety, she switched to talking about how sweet and loving he was, almost as if there was no threat.
I know from stories my wife has told me about working in a high school program for these kids that raising a severely ASD child (or other types of disability) must be extremely stressful. So the parents need to celebrate the good to help them get through the bad days.
But CK pulls out these stories almost as needed as if they were scientific evidence in and of themselves despite actual scientific research about the safety of vaccines and lack of a connection with ASD and SIDS.
At least I think I helped persuade her to accept the safety of the MMR.
It’s a small success, but I’ll celebrate it.
BTW, have you ever watched The Good Doctor?
As I recall (and I can’t find the comment, but the behavior is common enough), my complaint was in fact your questioning someone else’s education. I probably also commented upon your untiring bloviation about your own education, but I think these were separate.
Feel free anyone to point me to what specifically Joel’s referring to; I’m irritated with myself for losing track.
@ Narad
And you missed the point when I explained why I questioned her education, besides ignoring all that I wrote to pick out one sentence, exactly what antivaxxers do. While education doesn’t prove anything, even an undergraduate education should include some courses that require one to show an ability to actually explain their position, including some evidence. But, at least in the schools I attended, we learned this in high school, before college. And, as i also wrote, in comment to Denise, if she didn’t understand how vaccines work, she simply could have explained how she trusts science when the vast majority of scientists around the world support vaccines as opposed to Christine and other antivaxxers who prefer lone wolves, and how she is aware, perhaps through grandparents, of the real ravages of vaccine-preventable diseases. That would have been enough; but just supporting anything without even being able or not be willing to explain ends up not being different from most antivaxxers.
But it still comes down to you focusing on one sentence. I assure you that even the best of books I’ve read that I can find a sentence of two, taken out of context, and attack it.
And as for my “untiring bloviation about my education” I can’t recall how many times I’ve mentioned it, perhaps half dozen times over past few months; but so what? Are you envious? Why shouldn’t I mention my education when pointing out that I understand research methods, so I can judge the methodology of studies? Why shouldn’t I mention that I actually understand the immunology of vaccines, that is how they work? When I asked John Stone, a rabid antivaxxer from Age of Autism if he understood the basics of infectious diseases, immunology, epidemiology, etc. his response is he doesn’t need to because he reads things carefully. My response to him is that I could read a paper on bridge design extremely carefully; but since I have never studied structural engineering, wouldn’t understand it. Didn’t phase him a bit, he knows, KNOWS, he is right. So, when I exchanged comments with him, I had no intention of changing his mind, knew it impossible; but hoped others following the exchanges would understand just why Stone literally doesn’t know what he is talking about. And I’ve suggested over and over again that Christine; but also everyone else who supports vaccines learn the basics of immunology. The basics, not an undergraduate course, just a really super book, inexpensive, at amazon.com
Lauren Sompayrac “How the Immune System Works (6th edition). One doesn’t need to be a college graduate to read it and one would have the knowledge to really defeat antivaxxers, not just comments; but science.
So, again, you are a jerk for taking one sentence out-of-context and also for making such a big deal about my explaining my education. I’m proud of it, so what?
And, again, taking one sentence and focusing on it is often what antivaxxers do.
@ Narad
“As I recall (and I can’t find the comment, but the behavior is common enough), my complaint was in fact your questioning someone else’s education. I probably also commented upon your untiring bloviation about your own education, but I think these were separate.”
Well, people have different views of the importance of education. I do believe it’s something very much fundamental to society. As I told my daughter when she was bitching about school: “M’kay, just imagine a society where people did not go to school? What would it look like? In your (not yet) educated opinion?”
Nonetheless, I just want to drown all the people in France who use their credentials (the same as mine by the way…) to assert their know-it-all authority on the rest of society on the grounds that they are the “Élite de la Nation”. The first time I heard this wording (applied to me), it made me cringe. It has made me cringe worse and worse over time. Unfortunately.
So I’m a bit ambivalent toward the issue of “credentials”. I respect them very much. I do not respect the idea of other people asking me to respect them. In a sense, I respect culture, much less so society. I dream of a day where society will fade away to let culture be the real game in town.
And that’s very much independent of Joel. Whom I overall like, but did wish he’d take it a bit more easy.
He casually puts magic in everything he does
He easily smiles, even at idiots
He has fun, he never falls in traps
He isn’t made dizzy by roundabout neons
He lives his life without bothering with the faces
Made around him by vipers in the nest
Max is truly free
Max is truly free
Some even say they saw him fly
He works a bit when his body agrees
To him, no worries, he knows how to gauge his efforts
In the can of worms, he doesn’t pretend to be a snake
He doesn’t try at all cost to make bubbles in a pond
Max is truly free
Max is truly free
Some even say they saw him fly
He looks around with eyes of love
Before you say anything, he already loves you in the first place
He is quiet, he doesn’t play drums
But the marble statue smiles at him in the yard
Max is truly free
Max is truly free
Some even say they saw him fly
And of course, every woman is doe-eyed with him
He does tell them stories to be nice with them
He takes them beyond the ploughed fields
To ride unicorns til the nightfall
Max is truly free
Max is truly free
Some even say they saw him fly
Because he has no money to do great travels
He often goes and speaks to his heart’s residents
What they tell each other, that’s what one should know
To have, like him, so much love on one’s face.
Max is truly free
Max is truly free
Some even say they saw him fly
Whose? I already asked whether anyone could find the comments in question.
Yah, before you were here, there was… I don’t want to call it a spat, but I disagreed with Uncle Smut about referring to random Ph.D.’s as “Doctor,” rather than reserving the title for medical doctors.
Don’t even get me started about the new therapist I’ve been assigned after my muy simpatico one retired. I’m sorry, but “Psy.D” (without the final period) should have been a big red flag. I cringe every time I address her with the honorific.
When I was in grad school, “Doctor” was pretty much reserved for right after somebody had defended their dissertation. There was one grad student who addressed and even often referred to his advisor as “Dr. Such-and-Such,” which was honestly pretty weird. We were mostly even on a first name basis, or, more formally, would go with “Professor So-and-So.”
There was also “Last-Name-Without-Title,” which signified dislike. (Only in the third person amongst ourselves.)
I do think people with a doctorate are entitled to the title, and I have no problem with it being used, say, in a newspaper article, or in similar reference. And, I mean, in context, in an academic department, I don’t find it to be a problem. But in a context in which somebody might be confused with an MD, yeah, I can see how it might be a problem.
Idk, otherwise it mainly just seems kind of pretentious.
Actually, come to think of it, I did have a therapist in grad school who was a psychologist, and she was “Dr. Oppenheimer.” It didn’t actively bother me, and honestly I didn’t really address her much in the second person; ditto with most of my therapists. I always thought of asking if I could call her “Oppie,” but I never did.
Saw her for part of my first year and part of my second year at a UM place where they had therapists as well as shrinks; I didn’t feel like I got much out of it for whatever reasons. I think maybe we just didn’t “click.” Well, I was also pretty dissociated from my sh!t at that point. I recall her being a bit weirded out that I would laugh at really dark stuff instead of having an emotional reaction.
My current therapist is about the best I’ve had, though. LCSW, I think. Sadly over the phone after about two appointments.
Not saying it’s an educational issue – but why is it that antivax books tend to spawn publication of “summaries”, i.e. Cliff notes versions? For example, both J.B. Handley’s recent “autism epidemic” book and Judy Mikovits’ Plague of Bullshit have two summary versions each for sale on Amazon. I’ve never noticed this phenomenon for books written by Paul Offit or other pro-immunization authors.
It probably isn’t money (the Cliff notes versions only are a few bucks cheaper on average). Maybe antivaxers just don’t have the patience to read through a complete book to confirm their biases.
@ Dangerous Bacon
The antivaxxers also don’t give their search strategies for articles, which, for instance, the Cochrane Collaboration does. Of course, you and I know that their search strategy is to find/cherry-pick whatever confirms their predetermined belief. In addition, Cliff notes, like article Abstracts, don’t give details of sampling, methodology, etc. so one could find really poorly done articles; but the Cliff notes version would not allow the reader to know how poorly done they were. And back to my first, point, without an honest search strategy, they might find several dozen poorly done pieces of research and, perhaps, even a couple of well-done ones; but ignore an overwhelming amount of well-done research that contradicts their views. As anyone familiar with research understands, even a well-done placebo-controlled double-blind randomized clinical trial can end up with a result caused, not by the independent variable; but by some unmeasured variable(s) that, despite attempt at randomization, ended up more in one group than the other, so that is why, except in extremely rare circumstances, science basis its decisions on cumulative research. Odds that unaccounted variable(s) would land always in one group become ever smaller when research conducted by different researchers, on different populations, with different designs, etc. etc.
And what is worse, as with Christine, the antivaxxers, don’t even know how, usually, to determine the methodology, so only rely on the results. Even more so, sometimes, they even get this wrong by citing something in the paper which was NOT the result. I’ve seen where a paper begins with discussing previous research, which it then shows was flawed; but the antivaxxers cited only a sentence or two from the introduction.
@ F68.10:
Credentials can be problematic because they may be used as a signal that loudly proclaims:” Listen to me!” without providing the relevant backup, like data. AS you yourself have illustrated- via a video- a doctor dismissed relevant SB material that didn’t fit into his worldview ( psychoanalysis).
Amongst those I survey ( in woo and anti-vax) credentials are used in two ways:
— a prominent anti-vaxxer may flaunt his or her degrees in irrelevant subjects like Business, Marketting, Engineering, English, Computers: the respected universities they attended are artfully displayed. MBA – Harvard or Stanford. Most of these partisans discuss medicine, biology or psychology which they may not have ever studied formally
— poseurs who have suspicious degrees from dodgy schools in nutrition or alt med, decorate their websites with doctorates and academic awards, having followers address the as Dr!
Thus, whilst they heap scorn upon valid professionals, they ape their titles and mimic their accomplishments ( as “professors” doing “research”, writing in “journals” but all cosplay, cargo cult. pay-for-play articles)
HOWEVER there are a few people with actual degrees in medicine who have fallen into the tunnel of woo: anti-vax doctors ( Wakefield, Tenpenny, Banks, Palevsky, Sears- more than one,,Gordon etc), professors ( Duesberg hiv/aids denialism) and even Nobel Laureates, Montagnier, Mullis, Pauling.
Education and degrees are no guarantee
-btw- The singer you linked to looks like an artsy Frenchman from Central Casting!
.
.
I actually watched part of a documentary on Pauling on PBS while I was sitting around before a medical test recently; Oregon boy. Fascinating and sympathetic story, brilliant man. Really sad how he went off the rails in old age, really.
@ Denice Walter
“AS you yourself have illustrated- via a video- a doctor dismissed relevant SB material that didn’t fit into his worldview ( psychoanalysis).”
Well, he wasn’t really presented with SB material. More like the media hands him the mic’ with deference. Because he has credentials. And because psycho-analysis reached Cult Status with the penetration it has in the media through the intellectual elite, bourgeois elite and show-biz elite. It’s very much entrenched, and SB material can be safely discarded as whacko-nazi nonsense. There’s a backlash ongoing though, because it got so ridiculous that some people have finally opened their eyes. But there is a really really long way to go, and psychoanalysts are fond of using courts, rather successfully in general, to suppress opposing views.
What I’m really annoyed with when it comes to the credentials issue is that, in France, when you raise up a medical matter, you get shut down because people say “are you a doctor?”. They’re not either… But as not me nor them are, there’s in the end no one to talk to. Or you get threatened with the “illegal practice of medicine” gambit by wankers who believe that making any medical statement, no matter how cautious or nuanced, is “practicing medicine”. Completely off-target, but rhetorically efficient.
And more generally, in France, we have the concept of anonymous competitive exams for positions as civil servant. On paper, it’s really a good idea. In reality, it creates a caste that gets selected in their youth (like me) on outstanding intellectual abilities, but who in the end, are more in a symbiotic relation with the State than they are with Academia/Knowledge. So it creates know-it-all overconfident pricks that rule the State, with seldom serious ongoing connections with academia. And they wield their one-time achievement at a competitive entrance examination into Lifetime Civil Servant Status as if it were a Nobel Prize that should give them the right to dismiss any contradiction or criticism as if it witnessed a debilitating neurological condition in other people.
I’m annoyed. Credentials are not designed to shut down discussion. They are designed to offer some focus on legitimate discourse, to foster discussion. You seem to have a lot of credentials hi-jacking in the US with the likes of Gary Null. We do not have that that much around here.
“-btw- The singer you linked to looks like an artsy Frenchman from Central Casting!”
It was in 1981. If you look at Sarah Connor’s haircut in the first Terminator, it’s not that better. But that song was all the rage at the time. And on the radio, you do not have the visuals. I’d therefore suggest listening at the song in itself without the visual cues to understand its success and how it captures the attention when you overhear it when you know the lyrics. And french music is more focused on text than it is on instrumentation or musicality compared to music from the english-speaking world. That tendency of “text more important than musicality” also does manifest in french rap (closer to old-school NY rap than modern West Coast modern rap/hip-hop).
I also really liked the song. F, are you a fan of Jaques Brel? I confess that I mainly know his music through English versions; regrettably I do not know French, although I can pick up the meaning somewhat when it’s written.
@Denice:
I may have been combative with you and others during a manic episode this winter; I was also in an abusive situation and my PTSD was flaring up. Memory isn’t great to be honest.
My kingdom for a properly functioning brain. Bipolar disorder is a curse of a disease. (I can’t understand for the life of me people who romanticize it.) Not to mention when you have other stuff on top of it.
@ Denise Walter
You write: “Education and degrees are no guarantee.”
No, education and degrees are no guarantee; but odds are they have a higher probability of knowing what they are talking about. The example of a few that you give is, to some extent, similar to antivaxxers where they can find a few doctors and other researchers who for financial gain do the bidding of pharmaceutical companies, most don’t; and if you’ve noticed, I do sometimes give my degree; but I also give detailed explanations and references where appropriate. So, it is my explanations and references that are the important part; but my degrees explain the background that helped me with the explanations and references. I don’t rule out that someone with a lesser education could give similar explanations and references; but usually I write my comments in response to antivaxxers, who neither give good explanations nor references OR if a pro-vaxxers gives a weak argument, so that some of them may improve their comments, though some refuse to even consider such.
Of course.
It’s really enlightening to compare people with similar educations or degrees who espouse divergent views – like SBM vs woo- when they are both doctors in the same speciality such as Jay Gordon vs Chris Hickey ( of RI). They have exchanged words. Oy vey!
Even better: Orac vs Jay!
A few prime anti–vax mothers have degrees – even graduate -in psychology, education, social work or counselling ( Wright, Jameson, Dachel, McNeil, Limekiller, Taylor- they have been at AoA or TMR) but you’d never know it from their writing. Straight vaccines cause autism. No questions.
@ JP
You might be surprised to learn that in some European nations, only someone with a PhD is actually considered a doctor, whereas, for instance, in Sweden, one doesn’t get an MD; but a medical certificate. In Sweden and some other European nations, a doctor is someone who defended a dissertation; but I’ve noticed you seem to use yourself as the litmus test for what is proper. Your right, of course.And when I first came to Sweden late 1960s patients call their “doctors” by their first names, except the older ones, a generation from before World War II, before Sweden had developed its well-known more egalitarian society, not perfect, but much more so than most nations.
In fact, when I was growing up, a law degree was an LLB, now it is a JD; but they don’t defend a dissertation, just as American MDs don’t refer to defending a dissertation. With me, friends call me by my name; but I do not answer to Mr. Harrison. Mr. Harrison was my dad and before he passed the pride of his life was my being the first person in the family to earn a PhD or even a graduate degree of any kind, so part of my requirement that people address me as Dr. Harrison is both Mr. Harrison has me fighting tears thinking of my dad and also his pride in my accomplishments. And I could care less what you think!
It was pure discussion; it’s the normal course of things around here. I’m not sure why you can’t handle a simple comment (that wasn’t directed at you) without going on a lengthy and angry and personal diatribe. I was simply describing academic culture and a bit of my own opinion.
Just by the by, I didn’t finish the PhD, due to personal mental health issues and tragedy; I ended up taking the MA. I don’t list it after my name for my own reasons, nor do I insist on the title.
My own dad didn’t manage to finish college for various reasons, and I’m sure he would have been damn proud to see me graduate undergrad, but he died when I was 11. He was a logging mechanic and he fell from a ladder and got a TBI and shot himself with a hunting rifle a few months later. I’m not sure why you imagine you’re the only one who blinks back tears.
@ JP
First, really sorry to hear about how you lost your dad. As for: “I’m not sure why you imagine you’re the only one who blinks back tears.” Where did I say I was the only one. All I pointed out was that when I heard Mr. Harrison I thought of my dad. I am quite sure that many others, at least those who had great dads, fight back tears when reminded of them as well.
And I doubt it was “pure discussion” since I was attacked for listing my credentials and responded. Why else would you bring up credentials at this particular time?
And I’m sorry you weren’t able to finish your PhD; but you either intentionally added something I didn’t say, namely claiming I’m the only one who misses a parent or have problems understanding what people write and, again, I think it disingenuous to claim you just brought up credentials out of the blue. While anything is possible, highly unlikely.
And you write: “I’m not sure why you can’t handle a simple comment (that wasn’t directed at you) without going on a lengthy and angry and personal diatribe.”
Really, explaining changes in degrees, LLB to JD, etc, explaining that European nations confer doctor only for dissertations, explaining why I react to Mr. a diatribe?
Wow!
Only one sentence actually was directed at you, that I’ve noticed in past comments by you that, whether it is your intention or not, you seem not to be giving just your opinion; but that you are the “litmus test” and I followed with “that’s your right.” Maybe in your mind, one sentence is a diatribe; but, again, feel free to give your own interpretation, even if it deviates from the rational.
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