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Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

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Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#681

Post by HWR_14 »

colpabar wrote: post #374
hackingforfun wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, fair, I still don't know what them recommending this earlier would've done though. It just would've made the shortage sooner, right? It seems that's what they were trying to prevent. I do get that people don't like that they were lied to though, and then mandates were hard to follow when implemented, if people couldn't acquire masks. The pandemic exposed, and continues to expose, issues with our supply chains.…

I don't have a good answer either. I understand public health at a national level is about being pragmatic and doing things that actually work, and I can honestly understand if they acted the way they did to try and give hospitals some lead time to stock up before the masses did. But even if this was the case, they have not told us about it, and continue to deny that anyone ever said not to mask up. The tweet[0] from…

They never denied saying that they told us not to mask up.

You don't want people linking to obsolete information under the surgeon general's twitter. There is no way to flag a tweet as "for history only ignore the actual advice as what to follow." Meanwhile, the old "don't mask" mandates are in the CDC's website in their archives, which are purposefully hard to find (for similar reasons, to ensure you know you are going to historical and not current publications).

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#682

Post by [deleted] »

hackingforfun wrote: post #379
colpabar wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have a good answer either. I understand public health at a national level is about being pragmatic and doing things that actually work, and I can honestly understand if they acted the way they did to try and give hospitals some lead time to stock up before the masses did. But even if this was the case, they have not told us about it, and continue to deny that anyone ever said not to mask up. The tweet[0] from…

Just wondering, are they currently lying about having made these guidelines before? I haven't heard anything about that myself. I also do remember some news articles saying the government's mask guidelines were so hospitals could stock up (maybe it was once they flip flopped, I forget, it was over a year ago, but I do recall reading that). I think it's possible they deleted old content to make sure invalid data isn't…

[deleted]

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#683

Post by null_object »

18pfsmt wrote: post #485
spookthesunset wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The wonderful thing about your statement is it is unclear just what “side” is correct. You say “ The more you push, the more resistance there is. Doesn't matter how right you are and how wrong they are.” That applies a ton to a bunch of ”pro mitigation” people out there who absolutely refuse to look at the data and science. Both strongly show that covid “badness” is very strongly correlated with age to the extent tha…

One only need look at Sweden and their results. They took minimal action, allowed the youngest to remain in school w/o masks, and only canceled large events. We are now starting to see the all-cause mortality stats and they are proving Sweden's approach minimized the most harm.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1113834/cumulative-coron...

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#684

Post by ltbarcly3 »

alkonaut wrote: post #164
ltbarcly3 wrote: post #3

Edit: before you downvote this, read it? I'm not an anti-vax nutcase. They didn't trust the public with their actual thinking at any point during Covid. The guidance was initially "don't wear a mask, it will make it worse because you'll infect yourself with your hand" to "we'll just lock down for 3 weeks and then back to normal" to "we have to flatten the curve to avoid overwhelming hospitals" to the current policy o…

> Why would they initially tell us to not wear masks? Because hard data was scarce and authorities are reluctant to impose anything as mere precaution. Or rather, whether authorities would do that kind of thing as a precaution before there is solid evidence varies from country to country (unsurprisingly).

> Because hard data was scarce and authorities are reluctant to impose anything as mere precaution

No, no. I didn't say why did they not impose mask mandates. They said "DO NOT WEAR a mask, because wearing masks is inherently dangerous".

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#685

Post by roenxi »

nuerow wrote: post #638
Natsu wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you meant to reply to someone else, because you're quoting words that I didn't write. If I was running things, I would tell people that they have no power to punish anyone whatsoever and design the Covid rules with that in mind, making them focused entirely on helping people instead of controlling them.

> I would tell people that they have no power to punish anyone whatsoever and design the Covid rules with that in mind, making them focused entirely on helping people instead of controlling them. How effective do you believe your approach would be? An unenforceable rule is merely a suggestion, and one which relies on responsible and informed decision-making to be followed. If anything, the current state of affairs sh…

The alternative is a world where a ~66% majority (if that) can override the remainder on their medical decisions - which is about as personal as decisions can get.

The "force them to do what I say" approach will cause more damage the more effective it is. If this is an option for vaccines, there are a lot of things out there that are more important than COVID.

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#686

Post by oblio »

clairity wrote: post #593
CamperBob2 wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless I'm a qualified medical researcher, how exactly am I supposed to "examine my assumption?"

exactly how you form opinions everyday without having deep knowledge of a given domain. perhaps also read up on the appeal to authority fallacy[0]. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

> exactly how you form opinions everyday without having deep knowledge of a given domain

Go out and talk to a lot of people.

A decent chunk of the population form bad opinions about a lot of things and hold them until they die.

Thinking is hard, learning/researching is exhausting, a lot of people will, amusingly, work very hard to avoid it :-)

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#687

Post by oblio »

SkyMarshal wrote: post #573
cjsplat wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there was never data that said "masks don't work for the public" Actually there was plenty of data saying that masks don't work for the public. For example, https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal... And there are many others - that was just an easy one I found today. Some similar studies even showed an increase in flu transmission among the subject population wearing masks. There were plenty o…

> Actually there was plenty of data saying that masks don't work for the public. ... (a year of arguing and studies ensues while a pandemic of a new and not-well-understood virus spreads out of control) ... > The new data was that ... even modest mask technology is a good source transmission interrupter, and that the contagion window is well in advance of active symptoms. A wasted year and all that rigamarole just to…

You're fighting against such an ingrained level of belief in one's superiority that's it's almost impossible. The US, especially.

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#688

Post by raxxorrax »

clairity wrote: post #381
Natsu wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This matches a lot of my own experience in trying to convince people to take reasonable precautions and get vaccinated. And I was one of the first in line for my age group in my state. You have to do things to build trust first, and you have to be willing to admit that some of the measures taken are farcical and have no basis in science. People will listen to a reasonable, nuanced discussion. They won't listen to som…

'just follow the rules'... that's exactly how we get the blind unreasonableness we're seeing everywhere. you need to examine your assumption that masks are doing anything at all in most common situations, and then consider what's actually reasonable vs. what you've rationalized yourself into. humility is missing in your thrust to convince others of your correctness.

It isn't just humility as many such measures are by nature precautionary without any basis in facts at all. Certainty is certainly wrong, especially when we are talking about risk management. That will affect the message negatively.

Re: Covid lesson: trust the public with hard truths

#690

Post by raxxorrax »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #605
clairity wrote: post #593

Earlier quoted context omitted.

exactly how you form opinions everyday without having deep knowledge of a given domain. perhaps also read up on the appeal to authority fallacy[0]. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

Maybe you need to do some reading. Appeal to authority is a fallacy only when the appeal is to an unrelated authority. If I rely on public health authorities in determining how to deal with the pandemic, I'm in the clear, logically speaking.

Government authorities don't always convey scientific information, so you shouldn't trust them without question. I think the CDC has enough bodies in their basement that they need to account to any trust issues. That doesn't mean they will always lie to you, but you have to get secondary sources if you are critical.

And no, it isn't true what you say about the fallacy. It remains a fallacy if the only argument for a statement is authority of course.

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