Thanks to the Dunning-Kruger effect, many antivaxers think they know more about vaccines than doctors, scientists, and other experts in infectious disease, immunology, and vaccines. It is this arrogance of ignorance that fuels their antivaccine activism and makes them resistant to disconfirming evidence.
Tag: Dunning-Kruger effect
What makes a physician become an antivaxer? (Part 2)
Orac contemplates a reason why doctors become antivaccine that he missed the last time he discussed this topic.
More antivaccine stylings from someone who is Dunning-Kruger personified
I was measured, science-based, and reasonable in yesterday’s post about the new American Cancer Society guidelines for screening mammography (which is obviously why that post garnered so few comments, thus teaching me my lesson yet again0, but regular readers know that I can be quite obnoxious and sarcastic and there’s a reason why this blog is called Respectful Insolence. It’s based on a quote from a character (a computer, actually) in a 35 year old British science fiction series. That character, Orac, is my namesake, and the adopted quote is, “A statement of fact cannot be insolent.” Of course, you …
Get out the popcorn: Science Babe vs. The Food Babe
I’ve spend considerable time documenting the utter pseudoscience, misinformation, and downright idiocy about “chemicals” in food regularly inflicted on the public by the misguided “food activist” named Vani Hari, who is better known by the moniker she chose for herself “The Food Babe.” Indeed, in decade-plus that I’ve been running this blog and the few years before that during which I honed my skeptical skills on Usenet and other discussion forums, rarely have I come across someone so full of the arrogance of ignorance, someone who is the living embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect. Perhaps the most spectacularly dumb thing …
Who knew? My state’s vaccine personal belief exemption rate stinks! (Part 2: What to do.)
After yesterday’s post on the depressingly high (and increasing, apparently) rate of personal belief exemptions to vaccination requirements for entering school in the state of Michigan, I felt the need to pontificate a bit further. The reason is that MLive.com has posted some followup stories. Also, I didn’t have a lot of time last night to write because I had the pleasure of attending the CFI-Michigan Solstice dinner to hang out with fellow skeptics and heathens. Unfortunately, the topic of the high exemption levels in Michigan came up. First up on the follow up story parade is one entitled Why …
Who knew? My state’s vaccine personal belief exemption rate stinks!
One aspect of my life that’s kind of strange is how I’ve basically ended up back where I started. I was born and raised in southeast Michigan (born in the city of Detroit, actually, although my parents moved to the suburbs when I was 10). After going to college and medical school at the University of Michigan, I matched at a residency in Cleveland (regular readers know that it was Case Western Reserve University), and then did a fellowship in surgical oncology at the University of Chicago. Finally, I ended up taking my first “real” (i.e., faculty) job at the …
Pediatricians versus the Dunning-Kruger effect on vaccines
I don’t know if I could be a pediatrician right now. True, I probably don’t have the personality to be a pediatrician, at least not a primary care pediatrician on the front lines. After all, if I did, I probably wouldn’t have become a surgeon, much less a hyperspecialized cancer surgeon. One reason (among many, of course) is that I don’t have the patience to deal with non-vaccinating parents, particularly parents with massive cases of Dunning-Kruger disease. The same goes for being a pediatric nurse practitioner or nurse, who are also on the front lines in dealing with the antivaccine …
Thinker. You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
After yesterday’s detailed analysis of a study that’s being touted far and wide as “evidence” that vitamin C cures cancer, I thought I deserved a bit of a break. No, that doesn’t mean I’m going to take the day off from blogging. (Obviously, as you’re reading this now.) It does mean that I plan on doing a bit of slumming, though, and what better place to slum than on some of the antivaccine crank blogs? Besides, it’s almost as though they want me to apply a heapin’ helpin’ of not-so-Respectful Insolence to their material, given that they’ve put up posts …
More arrogance of ignorance in the antivaccine movement
After a digression yesterday, it’s time to get back to business. Don’t get me wrong. Yesterday’s post was business. It was definitely something important (to me) that needed to be said, in my not-so-humble pseudonymous opinion. It just wasn’t the usual business I engage in on this blog. I’ve often referred to what I (and others) refer to as the “arrogance of ignorance.” This particular not-so-desirable trait consists basically of people without any special training in a field or who are otherwise unqualified in a field coming to believe that they understand the field better than experts who have devoted …