71–80 of 107 posts
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Keep in mind that vaccines solve a systemic problem, and a bad vaccine can exacerbate a pandemic. Yes, vaccines can be made in a day or two, but it takes a long time to know if they are effective .
That's not addressing the parent's point about a challenge trial though. A challenge trial could greatly accelerate measuring that effectiveness.
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It actually doesn't take long to have high confidence vaccines work. Roughly 30 days. Day 1- inject vaccine. Day 15 - infect virus. Day 30 - know it works. Human challenge studies were a ethical no brainer. Even other studies if we gradually increased the number of people allowed to take them would mitigate almost any real risk. So you let up to 1k people take it month 1, 10k month 2, 100k month 3, and so on. Basical…
I strongly agree with reducing red tape for biomedical testing, but this is a drastic oversimplification of the current scenario, and of vaccine efficacy.
Individuals are more ready to take risks than institutions. To me this was the most damning indictment of all. Once founders leave a compnay (or an institution), as BalajiS says, they become a shell of their former selves,with the individuals mostly in for self-preservation rather than set out fulfill the purpose of the institution.
An indictment, or just an admission that we're not generally willing to make? What would happen, for example, if we handed the entire education budget to teachers directly. No controls, reporting requirements... just a stack of cash? Teacher decides how to spend it. My guess is that we would see some amazingly positive things. We would also see some awful things. Fraud, failure, scandal... Perhaps, probably even, the…
I am disappointed that Yale with 30 BILLION USD ! in endowments did not have the same impact a hastily put together fund filled mostly with volunteers did. To weed out the poor capital allocators, you need skin in the game. Not saying it is perfect, but it probably would be way better than what we saw during the pandemic (and still see).
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New emergencies generally offer more low hanging fruit. I am doubtful that ~50M split into 260 grants would have any measurable impact on climate change. Just as this didn’t have any large wins. Arguably rather than research leveraging that into solar panels or other infrastructure would be a better use of funds. In the end it’s a real gamble. One or more of those 4,000 applications was likely a great use of funds, b…
Your argument is short time and defeatist. Good science can totally chance the game. You're talking about playing the existing game.
Any discovery that take 20 years to go from a lab to production isn’t fast enough to make real change. Avoiding CO2 pollution today on the other hand gives us time to find better solutions.
We need to fix our economy to encourage the flow of money to productive ideas and individuals.
Too bad the most productive ideas and individuals are mostly not in the path of this money flow, instead pushed aside by the very clamor of the uniform hordes who seek nothing else. >alternative models of science funding can work. >The macro conclusion is that we don’t yet know what works or which combination of structures would make most sense. One thing we all know is the type of things that don't work, when it com…
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That seems like an odd thing for them to say, since they are judges. They "curate" the entries that come in, and then celebrity judges award prizes. They're not really a discussion forum. They're mostly about just showing things. They have some panels, but mostly any discussions kicked off by films are arranged by the attendees for themselves. There are truly unjuried festivals, but they're much less high profile bec…
They are the people who run the show. I'm sure they know better than us!
The cynical view would be that they were looking to stir up controversy, and pretending they weren't. A less cynical view is to take them at their word, even though it's not entirely truthful since they do, in fact, regularly exercise their judgment. There are thousands of filmmakers who would have loved to have been in the theater that day instead.
I don't think that "It's an alternate viewpoint therefore it should be heard" is a very good argument, just because there are a lot of viewpoints that are Just Plain Bad. You pick and choose. I'd be curious to know why they chose this one -- because they did make a choice, and if they're saying otherwise, that's curious.
Andreessen Horowitz created Future to bypass journalists, as I understand it, and have actively tried to discredit journalists who are critics. This essay is the first I've seen in Future, and it fits what one might expect: It's highly critical of others, the authors portray themselves as heroes and avoid almost all criticism of themselves. There are almost no sources and it doesn't show or attempt to show other poin…
Andreessen Horowitz created Future to bypass journalists, as I understand it, and have actively tried to discredit journalists who are critics. This essay is the first I've seen in Future, and it fits what one might expect: It's highly critical of others, the authors portray themselves as heroes and avoid almost all criticism of themselves. There are almost no sources and it doesn't show or attempt to show other poin…
You are ignoring the article and attacking the publisher. Indeed, the article itself invites scrutiny.
I wrote specific criticisms of the article, and why shouldn't I criticize the publisher? It's necessary to know your source. People criticize publishers all the time; many criticize all journalists and their publishers with one broad brush!
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They are the people who run the show. I'm sure they know better than us!
I'm certain they do. So I'd be curious to know what's on their mind when they said that. The cynical view would be that they were looking to stir up controversy, and pretending they weren't. A less cynical view is to take them at their word, even though it's not entirely truthful since they do, in fact, regularly exercise their judgment. There are thousands of filmmakers who would have loved to have been in the theat…
Choosing just gives the idea a platform for discussion.
If it's a truly terrible idea then it will be laughed out.
Many ideas that turned out to be significant in the world were considered crazy by society. Flight, The idea of hand washing, etc.
Also, many terrible ideas were considered acceptable ideas: tobacco, lobotomies, etc.
Discussing the idea is what revealed the truth.
Just because an idea is considered 'fringe' in society doesn't mean it's wrong. Ideas deserve a platform for discussion, they may turn out to be right.
Apparently, some ideas have gathered enough steam and collected enough initial evidence to deserve discussion.