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The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

scientificamerican.com

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Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#91

Post by amadeuspagel »

Recently, Macron said that the AstraZeneca vaccine was almost ineffective for people older then 65[1].

Politicians on both the left and the right sometimes find their political interests at odds with mainstream scientific research. That doesn't mean they're on some kind of crusade against science.

I also find the obsession with anti-vaxxers strange, when the FDA and many european medical authorities refuse to allow the AstraZeneca vaccine. I guess it's easier to blame everything on internet trolls, rather then medical authorities run by people like you, in your social circles, but the latter are objectively responsible for far more death.

[1]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-56252028

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#92

Post by dekhn »

al_chemist wrote: post #72
bryanlarsen wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's real science, you would expect advice to change as more data comes in, so perhaps you should find a better example.

Can you share an example of real science where advice changed as more data come in?

Smoking tobacco would be the simplest example.

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#93

Post by psychiatrist24 »

nerdponx wrote: post #18
psychiatrist24 wrote: post #3

Stopped reading at "a key feature of the political right" - the political left has adopted many anti-scientific ideas, too (if you want an example, take gender ideology and critical race theory, or belief that socialism works). People rightfully reject publications that write nonsense like that. If such a publication calls itself "science something something", or worse, has a longstanding reputation for representing…

There is plenty of antiscience on the left (chemtrails, 5g, anti-vax). But critical race theory is a deliberately extreme academic model of the world, and it actually turns out to be a useful model. To complain that it is not a falsifiable model misses the point of what literary "theory" is for. Your post smells like a bad faith dogwhistle, rather than an attempt to discuss something.

It wasn't my intention to discuss any of those beliefs, just to list examples of anti-science beliefs among leftists.

If you believe critical race theory is science, OK - it's not the subject of this thread, I suppose.

The only relevant aspect is that we will see articles of how anti-science conservatives supposedly are, because they reject critical race theory. It's actually useful for that - identifying bullshit articles and organisations.

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#94

Post by pvaldes »

al_chemist wrote: post #72
bryanlarsen wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's real science, you would expect advice to change as more data comes in, so perhaps you should find a better example.

Can you share an example of real science where advice changed as more data come in?

Anything related with astronomy, for example.

Pasteur, Galileo, Einstein, Wegener...

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#95

Post by psychiatrist24 »

elliekelly wrote: post #21
refurb wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Only if you ignore anti-vaxxers, healing crystals, “food without chemicals”, essential oils, etc can you say with a straight face anti-science is a problem driven by the right. It’s hard to take an article seriously when it only points the finger in one direction.

The article doesn’t claim that only those who lean right deny science. It claims only the right has embraced science-denial as a major political platform. There are plenty of science-denying democrats. There aren’t many (to my knowledge) science-denying policies, platforms, or official talking points of the democratic party. The same cannot be said of the GOP.

I read it again and no, it doesn't. It claims that certain things the author happens to believe in are rejected by the GOP.

I think anybody who claims to represent "the science" or "scientists" already should be mistrusted. It's an anti-science stance. In my opinion, proper science should constantly look for ways to disprove its theories, not the other way round. So saying one should "believe science" is anti-science.

The case for Covid-vaccines simply doesn't seem to be as clear cut as for example the author claims.

Here in Germany they just halted vaccinations with Astra Zeneca, and there is a lot of debate about it. I guess the author of the SciAM article would say the German government is anti-science, too. In reality, there are aspects in favour of vaccination and aspects against it.

I think the anti-science notions people worry about are more about distrust of official proclamations.

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#96

Post by JangoSteve »

eric_b wrote: post #42

Eh, the political left is just as guilty of abusing "science" for its own agenda. If you look at what peer reviewed articles in medical journals say about COVID, and then you look at the "pro-science" left-leaning-media coverage - you'll see two entirely different things. The political left picks and chooses the findings it likes to fit the narrative, and exaggerates them for effect. In the United States, if you live…

If I'm not mistaken, the studies indicated that in-person schooling could be done relatively safely with proper precautions, but in the US, most schools didn't/don't have the means to implement many of the precautions outlined. It's not really as simple as arguing that in-person schooling is safe, but democrat-controlled areas are closing down the schools anyway.

I'm also not sure what outcomes you're talking about with/without mask mandates. There are a lot of studies that show the effectiveness of mask mandates in slowing the spread of the disease. Do you have a study that shows outcomes are roughly similar in terms of spread and mortality between places with and without mandates? So far, I've only been able to find commentary that distorts the findings of the studies they purport to be citing.

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#97

Post by psychiatrist24 »

joshspankit wrote: post #84
al_chemist wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you share an example of real science where advice changed as more data come in?

The answers to this are so numerous and the logic so obvious that we as citizens may be to close to even see them. Pretty much every bit of advice in the health sciences has been changing over multiple generations (lead and xrays are two easy examples from over 50 years ago)

But if you have witnessed that, wouldn't it be prudent to remain doubtful about any new advice coming from the field? After all, the probability of it being thrown out in the future seems to be almost 100%?

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#98

Post by taylodl »

djrogers wrote: post #52
jfengel wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anti-vax took a weird twist over the past decade. It used to be a hippie-liberal notion, heavily informed by being anti-corporate anti-big-pharma. But it became more mainstream and cross-party when endorsed by celebrities, and then cross-fertilized with the anti-science anti-government Republican party. I'm sure the crunchy-granola antivaxers are still out there, but they were a fringe group and remain a fringe group…

> But for the GOP it's mainstream. No, it's really not. It's only mainstream in the GOP if you get your news from the left - if you associate with and listen to people on both sides of the aisle, you realize that it's a fringe element on both sides.

25% of the GOP members in the US House of Representatives refusing to get the vaccine doesn't sound "fringe" to me.

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#99

Post by taylodl »

h2odragon wrote: post #12
psychiatrist24 wrote: post #3

Stopped reading at "a key feature of the political right" - the political left has adopted many anti-scientific ideas, too (if you want an example, take gender ideology and critical race theory, or belief that socialism works). People rightfully reject publications that write nonsense like that. If such a publication calls itself "science something something", or worse, has a longstanding reputation for representing…

science is still great. "scientific consensus" has taken over in many places where people used to mean "scientific method"; and thats not great but still fits into "believe the science" for the people putting logos on signs. Science doesn't care what we believe.

The so-called hard sciences are still great. It's kind of hard to deny that an apple, when released, falls to the ground. Now let's go to the so-called soft sciences which rely upon statistical modeling. Whoa! We necessarily must rely more on "scientific consensus." We should be increasing the public's education in statistics since it's become so important for public discourse of important issues. But of course we haven't.

Re: The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

#100

Post by nerdponx »

psychiatrist24 wrote: post #93
nerdponx wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is plenty of antiscience on the left (chemtrails, 5g, anti-vax). But critical race theory is a deliberately extreme academic model of the world, and it actually turns out to be a useful model. To complain that it is not a falsifiable model misses the point of what literary "theory" is for. Your post smells like a bad faith dogwhistle, rather than an attempt to discuss something.

It wasn't my intention to discuss any of those beliefs, just to list examples of anti-science beliefs among leftists. If you believe critical race theory is science, OK - it's not the subject of this thread, I suppose. The only relevant aspect is that we will see articles of how anti-science conservatives supposedly are, because they reject critical race theory. It's actually useful for that - identifying bullshit ar…

Fair enough. Just don't conflate "belief in things I don't believe" with "anti-science".
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