1

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Will Inspiration4 convince Flat Earth believers?

« on: Today at 06:28:24 AM »

The rocket you saw was an unmanned missile that blew up somewhere in upper atmosphere and the interior shots of spacecraft are filmed in a studio probably in Elon Musk basement.

And your evidence for any of that is…?

2

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 17, 2021, 11:46:00 AM »

How many people currently have co morbidities in America? Many millions. Heart disease, diabetes, cancer etc. People with these afflictions that get covid and die in short order? Covid could well be a contributing factor in their early death. If you have a bad heart but take care of yourself, you can live for years. But if some anti masking covid infected muppet coughs at you, that could be the death blow as it pushes you over the edge

Lets hope someone like that crosses your path. Karma needs to give you a swift kick up the arse

Tom's distain for the old and ill is somewhat disturbing.
Is this what Republicans are generally like?

3

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 08:48:33 PM »

You are the one cherry picking, by telling us that we need to only look at the survival rate for the critically ill.

Are you just gaslighting me now?
I literally said above:

you take out all the old people who are already ill then the chances of survival are pretty good.
But that's a pretty dishonest way of calculating the fatality rate, you have to consider everyone.

I don’t see how I could have been any clearer.

Not everyone is very ill. The survival rate is very high for the general population. The people dying of this are the sick and feeble.

So…basically, fuck old and ill people, right?

I’ve shown the data which demonstrates that this was a situation which demanded a response. Whether the response has been correct is a different discussion.
And of course deaths is a pretty blunt metric. There’s also people who might not die but are taking up hospital beds and people with long Covid.

Your indifference towards people you regard as unimportant is pretty shocking.

4

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 08:36:06 PM »

There is no cherry picking involved.

The survival rate is what it is.

Yes. And it isn’t 99.7%.
That figure came from data which excludes the most vulnerable people.
The overall CFR is around 1%

The vaccine tailed off, uh?

Doesn't work, uh?

So two things here. The “it” in my sentence was clearly referring to the rollout of the vaccine, not the vaccine itself.
What does “the vaccine tailed off” even mean?
And secondly there is some indication that the efficacy of the vaccine does decrease over time, hence the talk of booster jabs.

5

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 06:15:04 PM »

Yeah, I am sure natural immunity has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Given that the vast majority of the people now ending up in hospital or dying are the unvaccinated then you are correct, natural immunity has nothing to do with it.

Oh, really.

Seems Israel is just a fluke, uh.

No, it’s not a fluke. The numbers are getting high there and it took me two minutes to find some data which may indicate why:

The share of the population having received one dose increased from 50% in February to only 68% in September. Children aged 12-15 have been included in the rollout since June 2021, yet despite this, currently only 62% of the population have had two doses.

https://theconversation.com/israel-was-a-leader-in-the-covid-vaccination-race-so-why-are-cases-spiralling-there-166945

So yeah, they started off well with their vaccine rollout but it tailed off and they still have a lot of unvaccinated people.
So what’s your point?

6

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 06:08:03 PM »

Hmm. Yes, I think it’s probably best not to feed Troll and Troller. But for all their attempts to divert, the data I’ve presented on the impact of Covid is pretty clear. As is the cherry picking dishonesty required to arrive at the “99.7%” survival rate.

7

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 05:27:16 PM »

Yeah, I am sure natural immunity has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Given that the vast majority of the people now ending up in hospital or dying are the unvaccinated then you are correct, natural immunity has nothing to do with it.

8

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 05:25:26 PM »

There wasn't a worldwide lockdown for the flu.

No, because the CFR is significantly lower for the flu than it is Covid.

Since you are comparing Covid to that

I am not. Or only in as much as patiently explaining that there are other diseases which generally don’t kill young and healthy people but can be dangerous for old and ill people. Flu and Covid are similar in that regard, but the CFR for Covid is significantly higher in all age groups which is why it caused such an extreme worldwide response.

it looks like you have debunked and discredited yourself.

Your inability to deal with the data and points I have made is noted.

9

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 04:34:16 PM »

Totally preventable with a vaccine

Written as if that could actually be known.

Here's the UK data. Note the clear correlation between Cases, Hospitalisations and Deaths over the winter and the much weaker correlation now. There is still some correlation, but the numbers are significantly lower:



I'm sure the vaccination data at the bottom which coincides with those much lower numbers is just a coincidence.

10

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 16, 2021, 09:28:39 AM »

In the Covid deaths there are an average of four comorbidities, with only 5% of deaths indicated as Covid as the only cause according to the CDC

Well, of course. These sorts of diseases rarely kill young, healthy people. That has nothing to do with anything.
During a regular flu season the people who die aren't generally young and fit, they're people who are already old and vulnerable.

Excess deaths were up in general.

From some causes, but not from others.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2778234

COVID-19 was the third leading cause of death in 2020, with an estimated 345 323 deaths, and was largely responsible for the substantial increase in total deaths from 2019 to 2020. Substantial increases from 2019 to 2020 also occurred for several other leading causes. Heart disease deaths increased by 4.8%, the largest increase in heart disease deaths since 2012. Increases in deaths also occurred for unintentional injury (11.1%), Alzheimer disease (9.8%), and diabetes (15.4%). Influenza and pneumonia deaths in 2020 increased by 7.5%, although the number of deaths was lower in 2020 than in 2017 and 2018. From 2019 to 2020, deaths due to chronic lower respiratory disease declined by 3.4% and suicide deaths declined by 5.6%.

So, you're basically right BUT the increase in deaths from those other causes nowhere near accounts for the total increase in mortality. Here are some graphs I made from the data in that article.
Fairly significant rise in heart disease, Alzheimer's and diabetes - although I would note that all of those do have a rising trend before that. Some falls in deaths from other things - notably other respiratory diseases which isn't a surprise, the new kid on the block with this sort of thing tends to dominate, but the bottom graph shows the real impact of Covid. Yes there is a slight increase if you ignore the Covid deaths but with them the increase is clear:



That's a lot of motorcycle crashes...

Covid has a 99.7% survival rate

No it doesn't. I can't see your source for some reason but I found this one:

https://fsph.iupui.edu/news-events/news/death-rate-covid-statewide-study.html

Using the non-institutionalized population, researchers determined the overall IFR for Indiana to be 0.26%.

So basically they took out all the people in care homes to get that figure. So yes, you take out all the old people who are already ill then the chances of survival are pretty good.
But that's a pretty dishonest way of calculating the fatality rate, you have to consider everyone.

11

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 15, 2021, 06:38:02 PM »

I generally think people should get vaccinated. But some people are acting like those who don't are a serious danger to themselves and everyone around them. I'd agree they are increasing the risk to themselves and others. But enough that they should be denied access to certain venues or certain jobs? I'm not so sure.

If it's my venue or my job I should have the right to say stay the fuck away from us you diseased freak.

It's the same thing conservatives have told homosexuals for years.

Well, sure. Then the market decides.
Nightclubs which would only let vaccinated people in might go bust. Or maybe they wouldn’t, that might be a popular thing if people feel unsafe around unvaccinated.
So sure, private businesses do have a right to decide who they serve up to a point - that point being when it’s discriminatory as defined by certain protected criteria.
 
But if the government declares that only vaccinated people can do certain things, that’s where I feel a dangerous precedent is being set. Unless unvaccinated people pose such a big risk to others I guess, but I don’t really buy that’s the case here.

12

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 15, 2021, 01:57:04 PM »

You forget the law of large numbers

A covid fatality rate of 1%.... Letting covid rip through America would cause millions of deaths

I'm not forgetting that. I never claimed that this was a "nothing to see here" situation as some are doing.
It was clearly a situation which required a response. I'm not convinced the response was right, but that's a different debate.
So yes, the restrictions were needed and the vaccine rollout important. No argument there.

And lets be honest, covid is here to stay and will continue to mutate and affect you again and again and it's going to catch everyone eventually - like 'The Cold'. Imagine a 1% CFR each time it mutates and turns into something else. You want to take that chance year after year? Natural immunity wont work. Just like getting infected with influenza wont protect you next year from influenza

I don't know about that. The Spanish Flu killed 50 million people worldwide, we don't have that every year now. I don't know whether people just collectively developed immunity but these things tend not to last forever, that one lasted 2 years. If this is the same then we're not out of the woods yet but we do have the vaccine this time which hopefully will yield a better outcome.

Currently the overwhelming majority of covid related deaths (as in ~99%) now are among the unvaccinated. The breakthrough infections that lead to death are usually in people with co-morbidities or elderly. In a place like America, to not be vaccinated at this point in time is because you chose not to.

Right. And that's the same in the UK. People are choosing to not get vaccinated, it is mostly them who are getting ill.
The question is what do you do about that? It's their lookout if they do something (or don't do something) which means they're more likely to get ill. But as I said to Roundy, people do things all the time which make them more likely to get ill. We generally don't deny them treatment because of it.

I generally think people should get vaccinated. But some people are acting like those who don't are a serious danger to themselves and everyone around them. I'd agree they are increasing the risk to themselves and others. But enough that they should be denied access to certain venues or certain jobs? I'm not so sure.

13

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 14, 2021, 08:16:47 PM »

If you're gonna be a dumbass about something that could save your life you deserve to die. I know it's crude to put it that way but it's that simple. Idiots who refuse to get the vaccine are clogging up hospital beds. Give those beds to the responsible people who did what they could to prevent getting the virus.

You are going down a pretty dangerous rabbit hole there. People do dumb stuff all the time (like smoke, drink to excess, get very fat) which increase the likelihood of them clogging up hospital beds.
Are you suggesting we should reserve the beds for the tee total, non smoking vegans?

I have some sympathy for the vaccine hesitant (while also sharing some of your frustration with them). Especially in an era where people who have fallen down certain conspiracy theory rabbit holes are bombarded by nonsense which validates their view that the vaccine is dangerous / experimental / ineffective.

A factor here is surely how many beds they are clogging up. In the UK the numbers are relatively low right now.

14

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 13, 2021, 08:03:28 PM »

Yeah, the guy on the right is a tax lawer and the guy on the left is a Canadian litigator of some sort.

Seen videos from the bloke on the left before.
He spent months being wrong about the merit of all the cases Trump and his allies were filing. It’s nice to see he’s now turned his attention to (probably) being wrong about this.

15

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 13, 2021, 12:10:56 PM »

Proper preventative measures are necessarily based on what is likely to work, not what we have data on. That's what makes them preventative. This implies that we must err on the side of caution, even if it turns out later that some measures were unnecessary.

Largely agreed but any measures should be proportionate to the risk those measures are designed to mitigate.
There's always a risk of any virus mutating
The risk of Covid...well, the overall CFR is around 1%, then there's "Long Covid" which I haven't seen much data around. It obviously causes pressure on health services which has knock on effects.
This isn't a "holy shit there are piles of bodies in the streets" level event. The trouble is some people think that because of that it's not a situation which requires any response at all. It clearly does.
Whether that response should have included lockdowns - I'm sceptical, particularly the way our idiots did it which was to implement lockdowns far too late and with so many caveats and exceptions so to render them ineffective.
I'm also sceptical that the risk posed by the unvaccinated is high enough that they should be prevented from attending certain events or holding certain jobs*.
I'm a bit unsettled at this creating a "two tier society", even if people are choosing which tier to be in.

(*That said - my wife used to work in a care home, they are getting rid of staff who won't be vaccinated - won't as opposed to can't. I do think there is a case to be made for that in jobs where you are dealing with vulnerable people all day...although I'd note that the NHS aren't making the same rule, because they'd be screwed if they did, where care workers are 10 a penny)

16

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 13, 2021, 09:37:31 AM »

I think people should get vaccinated but I’m finding this “two tier society” which is being created unsettling. I don’t think that is part of some “government plot”. People can, after all, choose to get vaccinated. But I don’t like the idea of those who choose not to being treated like second class citizens who can’t get certain jobs or travel or go to certain venues

If you show up to a job interview with offensive body odour, you will probably not be hired, yet nobody is campaigning for their right not to wear deodorant.

False equivalence. Someone like that would actually be unpleasant to be around. Someone who hasn't been vaccinated would...well, you wouldn't even be able to tell the difference unless they told you.

Smelling like a hobo, though unpleasant, is far less of a hazard to others than not getting vaccinated.

How much of a hazard to others are the unvaccinated really? That's hard to quantify, but the way I've always seen it I got vaccinated mostly for pragmatic reasons. I didn't really feel I was at high risk of getting very ill from Covid (although I'm getting towards the age where that risk starts to increase). But I foresaw potential issues if I wasn't vaccinated in terms of travel etc and sure it did feel like the "right" thing to do. But if someone chooses not to be then I see that as mostly putting them at more risk, not me. I'm vaccinated, I've done my bit to try and lessen the chance of getting ill. If other people choose to stay at risk then that's their look out. The unvaccinated in ICU have made their own bed and are literally lying in it. It's more an act of self harm than anything.
They might also be increasing the risk of passing it on to me but...I'm vaccinated, so the chances of that causing me to get seriously ill are greatly diminished.

I've not seen any data which would indicate to me that unvaccinated people are such a big public health risk to others that they should be treated like second class citizens.

17

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Will Inspiration4 convince Flat Earth believers?

« on: September 11, 2021, 07:28:48 AM »

Governments hire actors all the time - just look at 9/11 - total inside job by Bush Admin but they had us all thinking it was the Iraqis. If they can fake 9/11, they can fake a space launch.

How many actors did they hire? I think you mean Afghanistan, not Iraq. The former has been in the news a lot lately. Not sure how you missed that.

Wasn’t it the Saudis?
And obviously AlephNull has excellent and credible evidence for his claim. So what happened, they hired actors willing to fly suicide missions to simulate a terrorist attack? Honestly, what nonsense.
This is the trouble with some people. They demand evidence and observations but then dismiss them when they are presented.

18

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 11, 2021, 06:16:59 AM »

All other factors being equal, vaccinated patients should get treated before unvaccinated people. That’s just basic triage.

Don’t your prioritise the people who are more ill (unless they have no chance of survival)? In which case shouldn’t it be the opposite?

I think people should get vaccinated but I’m finding this “two tier society” which is being created unsettling. I don’t think that is part of some “government plot”. People can, after all, choose to get vaccinated. But I don’t like the idea of those who choose not to being treated like second class citizens who can’t get certain jobs or travel or go to certain venues

19

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Coronavirus Vaccine and You

« on: September 10, 2021, 05:56:10 AM »

You tell ‘em, Joe!

20

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Holy shit, vegans suck

« on: September 09, 2021, 06:30:45 PM »

Fine, and I think the sticking point here is the word “value”. That was identified quite early in this exchange, but I don’t know what other word to use.
Is it fair to say that most people don’t regard animal and human life as equivalent? So during a marriage course I wowed the crowd by saying that I didn’t regard men and women as equal. I did go on to elaborate that equal means “the same”. So sure, men and women are of equal value but they’re not equal in all ways.
So if we agree that most people will choose X over Y (where X is a human and Y is not) but you don’t think it’s because they value X over Y then why would you say it is?