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Update on Omicron

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551–560 of 794 posts

Re: Update on Omicron

#551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't believe there's any molecular mechanism why does it have to be molecular and not just evolutionary? That's what a virus does for a living after all.

I would say it's molecular biology that investigates what the virus actually does; while evolutionary biology is an attempt of explaining, mostly retrospectively, how an organism has changed over time, and possibly what has driven this change. My understanding is that evolutionary biology is kinda like statistics in the sense that it can tell you the distribution of the outcomes of tossing a coin, but it can't tell y…

ah, I see.

If you mean looking at the molecule's behaviour rather than the at molecule itself, we agree.

I didn't mean evolutionary biology but the evolution of the virus, it's adaption to the host and change over time.

Re: Update on Omicron

#552
post #38

South Africa's COVID-19 adviser, Prof Barry Schoub told Sky News that so far, most Omicron cases, were mild. https://youtu.be/3RSRtuRm92o Edit: "South African doctor who raised alarm about omicron variant says symptoms are ‘unusual but mild’" https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-diseas... "Dr Angelique Coetzee said she was first alerted to the possibility of a new variant when patients in her busy pr…

Unfortunately hospitalization in Gauteng seems to be going up rapidly so some people seem to getting non mild cases

https://mobile.twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/146503795478362...

Re: Update on Omicron

#553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, free at the point of need, but it still needs to be paid for; do you have a suggestion. If countries take the vaccine supplies and then sell them on, what do we do then -- install a new government so we can get vaccines distributed? What if people won't take the vaccine that came from USA/China/Russia/local state they don't trust, do we somehow force them? I'm for your proposal in the general aspect of it, but ho…

If the vaccine is free, why would anyone need to sell it on?

I assumed we wouldn't be able to supply 100% of the globe at the same instant, maybe we'd distribute ~20% in a first wave (to the most vulnerable people). That means that those who are rich[er] but don't meet the criteria are going to be in a position to want to buy.

If the country/county/area/suburb next door is poor, and a locality has lots of cases then I'm guessing anyone who can afford it has an incentive to acquire a dose of vaccine early, or a booster dose, by buying out someone in that neighbouring locality.

You need strong local government without corruption to distribute vaccines fairly.

Re: Update on Omicron

#554
post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I do think that poor critical thinking skills, as exemplified in your rationalization here, do play a major role in how we got here though. I love the way you prove my point by immediately going with a barely more civil version of "You're retarded". For the record, I'm both Vaccinated and, in a previous life, was a biomedical researcher, critically evaluating scientific literature was literally my job. I'm mostly on…

You made a bad argument and got called on it. That's as far as it goes. No need to be a victim. No need to double-down with more bad arguments. But, my apologies if I seemed unnecessarily harsh. I don't know you. I was referring to your argument; an argument that rationalizes malignant behavior and happens to be the crux of the problem. You're more a victim of tribal thinking than you think. You talk almost purely in…

>You made a bad argument and got called on it. That's as far as it goes. No need to be a victim. No need to double-down with more bad arguments.

You don't even have a damn argument here. You've lobbed personal attack after personal attack without any backing. I'm going to quote paraphrase the zen of python here on this. Be explict. Tell me exactly which part of my argument you're dismantling, rather than yelling "YOUR ARGUMENT SUCKS" and declaring victory.

>You talk almost purely in terms of "sides"

Of course I do. That's how American political lines on this are drawn. Deny the existence of this all you want, but your covid debate is almost perfectly modeled by tribal politics.

So, give your counterargument to this point, not some spiel about how I'm a bad person, or some unsupported claim about how my argument is bad. Give a proper, good faith rebuttal

- Most people function with heuristic trust evaluation. That is to say, they gauge trustworthiness by some measure of the source.

- Generally, people who detest you are not going to give you advice that is in your best interest.

- Left aligned spaces are often, if not generally, against, if not outright hostile to any right-aligned individuals. You don't really need to look very hard for this, reddit front page popular posts will give you a fantastic slice

- Given that lefty spaces are so open with their disdain of the right, it is expected that right-aligned individuals do not trust left-aligned authorities.

Despite what a good chunk of the internet seems to believe, screaming at them about how they're horrible people and deserve to die is really really unlikely to change their mind. It is however a fantastic way of signaling to your the ingroup though.

Re: Update on Omicron

#556
post #496

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I personally know wealthy, educated, analytical people who have bought into the fearmongering and propaganda Same, including medical professionals who fit this description. It's clearly an emotional and tribal issue at this point. The animating factor of nearly all of this denialism is a narrative of distrust and outright animus for the "establishment" and the organizations that represent it.

I think this hits the nail on the head. That the academic space is not just dominated, but overtly hostile to right wingers probably worsens this. Why would they trust advice given by people who proclaim their hatred of them?

Please provide examples of “academia” proclaiming hatred of “right wingers”.

Re: Update on Omicron

#557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's plausible, but it's not the whole picture. It may only partially explain some of the problem. We have, in the wealthy west, millions of vaccine-hesistant and vaccine-denialist people. I'm not just talking about poor or uneducated people, either. I personally know wealthy, educated, analytical people who have bought into the fearmongering and propaganda. I was shocked to find how deeply skeptical they were. I w…

>Watching the people around me has stirred in me many new questions. Have you ever considered they might have a point? More and more data is coming out, like https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/circ.144.suppl_1.107... , in the highest-impact cardiology journal, showing that the mRNA vaccines are not particularly "safe" by any reasonable interpretation of the word.

Steven Gundry sells food supplements, you easily mislead imbecile.

Re: Update on Omicron

#558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Proven, no. But our current best theory after 100 yeasts says “yes, it seems dice is played.” It’s the deterministic curmudgeons who keep trying to find a way to ignore that!

All that's proven is that statistical models are a good fit for something we don't really understand. No different than using epicycles to solve the problem of planetary motion.

You're wrong and and so was he and you definitely shouldn't weigh in since I'm sure you're not nearly as qualified as he was (neither wrt physics nor virology):

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_test

Re: Update on Omicron

#559
At what point does the new covid variants stop being SARS-CoV-2 and morph into something else?

To me it seems intellectually lazy to keep pretending we are still dealing with the same SARS-CoV-2 virus that emerged in 2019 given that covid is an old and relatively common family of vira that's traditionally been classified alongside rhinovirus as "The Common Cold"?

Re: Update on Omicron

#560
post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't personally believe this, but I know some people who claim that Robert Malone who invented mRNA is saying that the mRNA vaccines are more likely to create worse mutations of the disease. It seems more intuitive that getting vaccinated is the best way to prevent mutations but I'm curious if there is a good response to people who do have these concerns about the mRNA vaccines.

the fact that this guy claims he invented mRNA gives a strong clue to both his reliability and his reasoning ability.

He doesn't, that's a misquote by the OP. If you look at most citations of such, they talk about his involvement in mRNA tech.

However, that's also a long process that involves many people, as most modern scientific endeavors are. He might have played a role, but he certainly didn't single-handedly invent the field.

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