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Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

natesilver.net

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Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#111
post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does adversarial inquiry look like?

A debate in real time between qualified adversaries. Treat these things like you're making a major investment. Make both sides answer hard questions from each other. For example have RFK and Fauci put together teams of MDs and PhDs to debate in a live event.

"live" debate selects far less for truth and far more for "skill at debating" which is nearly orthogonal to being correct.

That is not to say that live debate has no place, or is worthless. I'm just not sure I'd come even close to agreeing that it's the ideal way to come to the truth.

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#112
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to have lived through a different pandemic than the rest of the world. It's hard to say the GBD was wrong when Sweden didn't lock down and they weren't exactly seeing bodies pile up in the street. Covid is now here to stay, ranking somewhere in severity between the common cold, flu or pneumonia.

The statistics are that Covid is much worse than seasonal flu and that’s after vaccination. To say otherwise is to ignore reality.

people have been desperate to paint Covid as no worse than the flu from the beginning of the pandemic, and it seems like no amount of time or facts will stop them.

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#113
post #2

This is all fine, but the focus on deaths is sort of missing the larger societal problem. The COVID devastation is also about long COVID, and even people who had COVID but either recovered “fully” or never displayed symptoms. None of this is over, and we are so, so fucked. edit: Which is to say: The Great Barrington Declaration was wrong directionally as well. We really needed to optimize to eliminate COVID as much a…

> The COVID devastation is also about long COVID, and even people who had COVID but either recovered “fully” or never displayed symptoms. None of this is over, and we are so, so fucked You're right by way of the literature available to evaluate this claim. (Even jobs numbers are starting to note that some amount of the worker shortage is likely related to long COVID) Most of the "oh i got it [a few times] and i'm fin…

> Zero COVID was and still is the rational strategy

How? The vaccines are mediocre at best and are nowhere near good enough to get R < 1 (except maybe in a population where most people already had COVID, and that’s a big maybe). Masks might be effective enough if everyone wears a good one correctly, but good luck — even if you convinced people, people like eating indoors. And seeing each other’s faces, etc. And the antigen tests are not terrible sensitive.

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#114
post #2

This is all fine, but the focus on deaths is sort of missing the larger societal problem. The COVID devastation is also about long COVID, and even people who had COVID but either recovered “fully” or never displayed symptoms. None of this is over, and we are so, so fucked. edit: Which is to say: The Great Barrington Declaration was wrong directionally as well. We really needed to optimize to eliminate COVID as much a…

[deleted]

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#115
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

in what ways have we not already returned to normality?

Well flu vaccination rates are down from pre-covid levels, I'd guess more antivax sentiment's also impacting other common vaccines.

This inanity is impacting even vaccination rates for rabies in pets! https://time.com/5538926/dogs-vaccines-antivaxxers/

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#117
post #27
post #2

This is all fine, but the focus on deaths is sort of missing the larger societal problem. The COVID devastation is also about long COVID, and even people who had COVID but either recovered “fully” or never displayed symptoms. None of this is over, and we are so, so fucked. edit: Which is to say: The Great Barrington Declaration was wrong directionally as well. We really needed to optimize to eliminate COVID as much a…

Eliminating Covid stopped being an option roughly around January 2020. The partial elimination you seem to be implying with "as much as possible" was never an option. It was always all or nothing.

Even NZ gave up on our island defence once Omicron got in. We'd managed to stave off widespread Delta, but Omicron was far more transmissible, but also, far less lethal, and its arrival and spread came just after we started vaccinating.

So by then the cost/benefit analysis made it clear that reopening, while bringing more sickness, would ultimately cost less than not.

The isolation caused some havoc in our economy that we're still recovering from, but large amounts of excess deaths brings its own economic impacts that would likely have been far worse.

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#118
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, you’re saying it’s a lot, lot rarer than Covid alarmists think… because you don’t personally know anyone with it?

It's not the scientific method but if something is very common, and I have several hundred friends, relatives and work colleagues of various backgrounds and states of health then I should have heard of someone experiencing it, no? I've seen no evidence on this thread that proves it's super-common so apart from funding my own research project, what do you suggest?

Well, of the ten people I know who have gotten COVID, one has long COVID. That makes my anecdatum a 10% rate of people developing long COVID.

Given the number of people who have been infected, that's a very large number of people with potentially permanent side effects.

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#119
post #2

This is all fine, but the focus on deaths is sort of missing the larger societal problem. The COVID devastation is also about long COVID, and even people who had COVID but either recovered “fully” or never displayed symptoms. None of this is over, and we are so, so fucked. edit: Which is to say: The Great Barrington Declaration was wrong directionally as well. We really needed to optimize to eliminate COVID as much a…

>This is all fine, but the focus on deaths is sort of missing the larger societal problem. The COVID devastation is also about long COVID, and even people who had COVID but either recovered “fully” or never displayed symptoms.

And to your point, it is about everyone else who couldn't get the care they needed because COVID overwhelmed our infrastructure.

Re: Fine, I'll run a regression analysis but it won't make you happy

#120
post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good luck, there's still academics debating about the 1977 "Russian" flu [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1977_Russian_flu

> The outbreak in northern China started in May 1977 Coincidence? Do they have a climate conducive to these sorts of viruses combined with a large enough population to make it likely they get infected first or is this my selection bias in noticing when it says "started in China" versus any other country?

It would be odd vs any other country if any other country contained a quarter of the world population in 1977.
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