Tribalism comes for pandemic science • Hacker News Board

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#71

Post by m0zg » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:07 PM UTC

emteycz wrote: post #42

m0zg wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fascism is private enterprise under total government control. Of course it'll be very effective at getting things done, both the autobahns and the gas chambers. Communism is pretty effective too. It's government-owned enterprise under total government control. The only thing that really changes is who owns the means of production. And, well, under Communism you're de-facto a slave to the state as well. Not having a j…

Communism is known for economically collapsing on itself, that's not very efficient or productive.

Yes. But it takes decades for it to do so, and in the initial stages it can appear to be quite effective. And as any communist will tell you, "it's not really communism" if it collapses on itself, killing tens of millions of people in the process.

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#72

Post by ardy42 » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:08 PM UTC

Snoozle wrote: post #62

eirini1 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

obviously you listen to the epidemiologist, not the economist. The economist is an expert on the economy and not on pandemics, and therefore will always give advice that is aimed at keeping up the economy and not saving people and preventing the spread of the virus. Its baffling to me that you think an economist has any kind of valid input on this matter. At best an economist could advise you on how to keep the econo…

Economic problems come with a cost on human life. There are numerous studies and paper that show how bad being poor and unhappy are for a person's health. Why WOULDN'T we consider the economic ramifications?

>> At best an economist could advise you on how to keep the economy afloat under the restrictions the epidemiologists has advised.

> Why WOULDN'T we consider the economic ramifications?

He's not saying that. He's talking about who should be giving the marching orders. Let me put it another way: in a war, the generals decide what equipment the military needs and the economists figure out how to produce it. You don't have the economists saying: the economy is good at making buses, it makes sense to us to weld extra armor to them rather than to design a tank from scratch, so go fight the war in armored buses.

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#73

Post by Press2forEN » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:09 PM UTC

salmon30salmon wrote: post #2

This is so very disheartening. I will speak only for the United States, as I am not familiar enough with other countries to comment. Not only is this impacting nearly every single person in the country, it is ruining the financial situation of over 40m people, primarily concentrated within the most financially vulnerable. This is because leaders on the left and right have refused to respond to new data, and are worki…

The US will not resume its position as a functioning democracy until both sides reconcile their differences. But when those differences are on the opposite sides of the political spectrum, perhaps we should be considering other options.

At this point, with COVID and the riots, its a matter of life and death.

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#74

Post by eirini1 » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:09 PM UTC

Snoozle wrote: post #62

eirini1 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

obviously you listen to the epidemiologist, not the economist. The economist is an expert on the economy and not on pandemics, and therefore will always give advice that is aimed at keeping up the economy and not saving people and preventing the spread of the virus. Its baffling to me that you think an economist has any kind of valid input on this matter. At best an economist could advise you on how to keep the econo…

Economic problems come with a cost on human life. There are numerous studies and paper that show how bad being poor and unhappy are for a person's health. Why WOULDN'T we consider the economic ramifications?

[flagged]

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#75

Post by ska » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:10 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #47

rayiner wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was pro lockdown at the beginning. Now, I’m convinced that we could have gotten most of the benefits with a substantially less invasive approach, especially outside the mega cities.

Or a shorter harder lockdown earlier on, combined with rigorous test and trace programme.

I think it's pretty clear the best use of a lock down is to allow time to develop and improve the infrastructure and protocols to do this properly.

But if you lack the competence or political/social will to do this properly, all you really have in the face of rising (or rising again) case numbers rolling lock downs and wait in hope of a vaccine. Or failing to manage it spectacularly, that also seems to be an option.

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#76

Post by eirini1 » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:10 PM UTC

chrisjarvis wrote: post #66

eirini1 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

obviously you listen to the epidemiologist, not the economist. The economist is an expert on the economy and not on pandemics, and therefore will always give advice that is aimed at keeping up the economy and not saving people and preventing the spread of the virus. Its baffling to me that you think an economist has any kind of valid input on this matter. At best an economist could advise you on how to keep the econo…

in a world where losing a job can be just as disastrous to one's health as disease, you really don't think their opinions are valid whatsoever? not everyone has large savings or the ability to work from home.

maybe the economist can advise on how we do not have a world where losing a job has any kind of health effects? Its really that simple. Its the concept of "people over profits".

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#77

Post by microtherion » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:12 PM UTC

salmon30salmon wrote: post #2

This is so very disheartening. I will speak only for the United States, as I am not familiar enough with other countries to comment. Not only is this impacting nearly every single person in the country, it is ruining the financial situation of over 40m people, primarily concentrated within the most financially vulnerable. This is because leaders on the left and right have refused to respond to new data, and are worki…

> We _now_ know that children are at a very low risk, people under 40 are very low risk.

… at very low risk of death, but there seems to be increasing evidence that some COVID-19 survivors, including children, suffer serious, and possibly permanent health effects.

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#78

Post by JPKab » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:12 PM UTC

matthewdgreen wrote: post #57

JPKab wrote: post #24

Question: Has anyone here changed their mind about COVID19 in a major way as the data has become more complete? Just wondering. I have sensed in myself tribalistic tendencies of not changing my mind when the data changes. I'm trying hard to look at myself and recognize it and experiment with different thoughts. I find myself bouncing between thinking we have overreacted to then thinking that my perception of an overr…

I don’t know what you mean by “change your mind”. I’ve come to understand that it is much less infectious outdoors, that it is more responsive to moderate social distancing than we though initially (possibly due to super spreading?) and that masks appear to work well. This has made me more relaxed about many activities. I continue to believe that it’s an extremely infectious RNA virus that will spread exponentially i…

Specifically, I was asking if you had informed opinions on the virus that are now significantly different than the informed opinions you hold now?

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#79

Post by ithkuil » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:13 PM UTC

salmon30salmon wrote: post #16

albybisy wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i would like to know how to "isolate the vulnerable"...?! We send to an island? we weld inside home? We should talk only if we have a realizable plan and not a "dream/idealistinc" plan.

Well we were able to somewhat effectively isolate the entire country, so I would say have modified stay-home orders that target those who are most vulnerable. That, in addition to common sense acts like hand washing, isolating the sick etc. would go a long way to flatten the curve enough to not overwhelm the hospitals, which after-all was the original goal.

An interesting game theoretical interplay has been an almost irresistible force that draw almost all democracies towards the same behavior: if it was possible for 100% of confidence to separate the group of people at risk from the people whose risk factor is small (e.g. pick some threshold like smaller than the risk dying of any other cause), then sure, it would have worked.

But the moment a number of apparently healthy and young people start dying from it, people start thinking thateither a) it's hard to know in advance whether you're at risk (e.g. unknown pre-existing conditions) or b) the disease is stronger than previously thought.

And that's even if the actual cause has nothing to do with (a) or (b), i.e. if the data was just a statistical fluke or misattributed deaths (e.g. people dying from X who also had sars-cov-2 in their system). It doesn't matter; there is no time to get to the bottom of things. The authorities have to play it safe, least they will be proven to have acted recklessly. And even if they try to be "brave" and plow ahead, the public opinion will quickly sway towards playing ir safe.

This seems to be an especially strong force since people today have an unprecedented capability of communicating and broadcasting "gossip". Even China's strictly controlled public communications wasn't able to censor spontaneous outrage from the citizens. And the fact that China reacted they way they did, set a high bar; any country that wanted to act differently had to be play it pretty convincingly to their populace (e.g. "we can do it, because we're different, we are so disciplined we can pull it off")

Re: Tribalism comes for pandemic science

#80

Post by maemilius » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 9:14 PM UTC

salmon30salmon wrote: post #16

albybisy wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i would like to know how to "isolate the vulnerable"...?! We send to an island? we weld inside home? We should talk only if we have a realizable plan and not a "dream/idealistinc" plan.

Well we were able to somewhat effectively isolate the entire country, so I would say have modified stay-home orders that target those who are most vulnerable. That, in addition to common sense acts like hand washing, isolating the sick etc. would go a long way to flatten the curve enough to not overwhelm the hospitals, which after-all was the original goal.

That raises the question of how to identify the sick. SARS-CoV-2 infections can be transmissible before the infected shows any symptoms, if they present at all.

Personally, I don't feel that there are many population centers in the US that are prepared to do the kind of testing that seems like would be needed to properly identify the sick.