I wish this was true. I hope it was true. But I'm losing faith. People have a hard time believing truth if it goes against what they want to believe if the lies can be framed in any plausible way at all. This applies to everything from cults to businesses to abusive spouses to, of course, politics.
Maybe I'm just getting old and cranky and tired of playing the long game of truth. Part of the problem is the liars are sometimes highly motivated to continue with the lies, and it takes a greater army of equally motivated truth "warriors" to come behind them and put out the fires. It's just so damn easy to spread bullshit.
The other issue is that smart people are way outnumbered- and the others now have a helluva voice.
Sound familiar?
Then why is Bill Gates the de facto lead on curing covid?
It's my general impression that if Gates says something about Covid, he's just repeating what experts said.
Why doesn't that disqualify Bill Gates according to your own reasoning?
>It's my general impression that if Gates says something about Covid, he's just repeating what experts said.
And who determines if he is or isn't repeating experts? Also, who decides who is or isn't an expert? An advertising company? Sorry, but that is a scary path.
> Why doesn't that disqualify Bill Gates according to your own reasoning?
Because there's a big difference between presenting yourself as an expert and saying things that disagree with experts, and repeating what experts say.
If Bill Gates starts spouting off stuff without evidence that disagrees with what all the experts are saying, he'll absolutely be disqualified according to my reasoning.
> And who determines if he is or isn't repeating experts? Also, who decides who is or isn't an expert? An advertising company? Sorry, but that is a scary path.
Well, everyone has to determine that for themselves, based on what limited ability they have.
It seems like you think I'm one of the pro-censorship people here, but I assure you I'm not, please follow the comment chain up to where I started it and read my comment there. On the contrary, I believe Sikora's video should have been left on YouTube, and responded to by experts.
The power to decide who is or isn't an expert, as well as the ability to restrict speech based on those decisions, is a pretty dangerous and scary path that I am vehemently opposed to taking.
"A lie gets halfway around the world before truth puts on its boots" - not sure who actually said this
Experts discover they are wrong and change their views based on evidence, not based on what other experts or non-experts say.
Non-experts, like the majority of HN users, really can only go off the word of experts at some point, unless we decide to spend the time studying a field to become experts.
And to be clear, I'm not saying "experts" only meaning people who got a degree in a field. A degree is only the most obvious way to show expertise in a field. But it's quite possible to study a field for a long time without getting a degree. But it's not at all apparent that Sakora has done that--in fact, all evidence I see seems to be trying to gloss over his lack of expertise.
https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/national-directive-on-w...
Note the difference between "we can't condone masks because there is limited evidence that they are helpful" and "we recommend against masks because they are harmful" and "the lockdown is a government consipracy to subjugate us".
You can listen to Theresa Tam's (Canada's version of Dr. Fauci) exact words here: https://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/watch/tam-on-why-canadians-d...
I think any reasonable person who defers to authority would have listened to this and come to the conclusion that there is no reason to wear a mask if they're asymptomatic and had no connection to a sick individual. They could even reasonably conclude that it would be dangerous as they would be touching their face and virus particles would accumulate on the outside of the mask.
And they would have been wrong.
- Prioritizing supply to healthcare workers is of the utmost priority
- Current evidence supports wearing a mask if you're sick to prevent spreading droplets, also wearing a mask if you're in close contact with a symptomatic person
- Masks can provide a false sense of security.
Her final statement is "if people try to use these measures, they have to be really, really careful and wash their hands, absolutely. That's the key. So we're also worried about the potential negative impacts."
All of that is sound advice, and it is dangerous to think that a mask will protect you without any other precautions. But it isn't a statement that one should not wear a mask, fullstop. It's a statement that one should still follow other cautions. IOW, a mask isn't a magical solution.
It was a statement that masks are a placebo for the general public and actually require one to take extra precautions so that they don't make things worse.
It couldn't have been more discouraging towards people on the fence about wearing a mask in late March.
Since then, the understanding about asymptomatic carriers has changed. And in response, the government updated it's suggestion.
If so, why not steer people toward that process, especially when the harm of wearing a mask is low, while the harm oh reopening the economy due to a lack of understanding the covid dangers is much greater?
Have you seen different statements?
Public health officials, while they usually are experts, have other concerns beyond simply saying the truth. The US and Canadian recommendations against medical masks for the general public were part of a strategy based on reserving medical masks. So yes, you should have followed the recommendations of health officials and not worn a medical mask, because healthcare workers needed them.
As far as I know, neither the US nor Canada has ever taken a stance against non-medical masks. They haven't taken a stance for medical masks either, but this was likely due to concerns that people would be confused about medical versus non-medical masks. Your own post is an example of this being a very legitimate concern: you have completely failed to differentiate between medical and non-medical masks.
If you look at what experts have been saying who aren't part of governments, the messaging has been fairly consistent: masks prevent illness at varying rates, and we need to prioritize healthcare workers when allocating the most effective masks.
So when you say, "Should I have deferred to expert opinions and waited until yesterday(!?) to start wearing a mask?" I have to say, no, it would have been impossible to do that, because deferring to expert opinions and waiting until yesterday to start wearing a mask are mutually exclusive actions.
So there's a narrative that may or may not have my best interest at heart but demands my compliance for some nebulous greater good?
No.
If sacrifice is required on the part of collective, you honour them by allowing them to engage with informed consent. If you don't, you have no credibility the next time some ambiguity arises where collective sacrifice is needed to avoid a tragedy of the commons.
I haven't actually seen evidence that this is effective in the modern social media era.
Trump is president, the American Nazi party is growing, the most popular news network in America is Fox News, the anti-vax movement is growing; and the primary evidence that deplatforming works seems to be a study that shows that bigots left Reddit and declares victory, completely ignoring that Voat started at the same time. If you want evidence, where's yours?
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/bjbp9d/do-social-media-ba...
Deplatforming leaves people with a smaller audience. Only a fraction of the audience follows a banned person to another platform. Voat is nothing compared to Reddit.
I agree with everything you wrote, except the above. He is a doctor, speaking on health issues, so he isn't speaking from outside the field of medicine. And I'd challenge that a specialist within the field of medicine can only offer valuable information or insight with their own speciality. Specialists on all fields are prone to group think, so people with related training from the outside should be welcomed to challenge the orthodoxy.
The the fact is, charlatans are far more common than visionary outsiders.
And in Sikora's case, there are a lot of red flags indicating he's a charlatan and not a visionary outsider. The virus is "getting tired"? Really?
> and imo the issue here isnt what is "true" -- nobody knows the truth with corona; its novel.
If nobody knows what's true with corona, then shouldn't claim to know what's true with corona, which is what Sakora is doing.
How do I know what anyone says is true? Why should I trust what you're saying about Sikora?
I should be able to watch a video on youtube and decide for myself because censorship is inimical to free thought.
You should take a moment to consider that most of the examples throughout history of censorship were carried out by decidedly bad people. Truth can stand on its own!
The Wikipedia article looks very unbalanced to me, but there is definitely some smoke there too.
Infectious disease is a distinct specialty in medicine.
The doctor in question is not licensed for infectious disease.
You should never trust a doctor speaking outside of his expertise.
However most of the celebrity doctors do that every single day which is an insult to the entire medical profession.
In general we shouldn't blindly trust any single doctor about an important or risky topic, even within their own specialty. Always get a second or even third opinion if practical. (I agree that most celebrity doctors are little more than quacks.)
Creating a culture where people are willing to have uncomfortable conversations instead of trying to silence anyone they disagree with is the hard part.
Which is why it's important that we present the truth right next to it, so people don't have to look elsewhere.
> The information is dangerous, it should not be available.
Well, it is available, in places where the truth isn't available, so I don't really know what you think taking it off YouTube has achieved.
This still assumes that people will be willing to watch it.
> Well, it is available, in places where the truth isn't available, so I don't really know what you think taking it off YouTube has achieved.
It has achieved a lower spread of misinformation. Now nobody browsing YouTube will happen upon this video by chance and start believing something that is false and dangerous. Of course, those who are already embedded in these communities will still be able to access the information elsewhere. It is not a perfect solution, I don't think there is a perfect solution, but it does reduce the impact.
Has it? I'm not really sure how you came to this conclusion.
If kicking Sakora off YouTube causes his followers to become angry and go share his personal site through a bunch of different channels, that could easily outpace the impact of a YouTube channel where refutations are included.
If someone censored your views, what would you do? Why do you think people who disagree with you won't do all the same things?
Meanwhile, Fox News is the most popular news network in America.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most-viewed_YouTube_vi...
I explained in the comment you replied to. You seem to be deliberately ignoring that people who are not predisposed to the viewpoint could also be exposed. I do not believe that censoring on YouTube will prevent anyone who already believes this stuff from finding the content elsewhere, and I already admitted as such.
If two groups of people (those who actively seek the misinformation, and those who encounter it by chance) could access the misinformation, it stands to reason that preventing one of those groups from accessing the misinformation results in a lower overall spread of misinformation, even if the other group is unaffected.
The only opinions that matter are infectious disease and respiratory doctors.
A clear example is an Italian virologist that called the hypothesis of thrombosis in the alveoli that came out from autopsies and the suggestion of using heparin in treatment protocols "a colossal idiocy".
Then other data, including the recent Lancet paper and the Hamburg study came out.
The mere fact one is an expert does not make him or her always right. So weigh opinions more, but don't trust them blindly.
> Non-science: calling Karol Sikora a "professor of medicine" hides the fact that he's an oncologist; if he ever had any expertise it was in cancer, not epidemics, and he has no business speaking outside his field.
Can you provide us with an image of your degree and job experience to prove you have the expertise to tell us "he's either an insane person or an amoral profiteering liar who doesn't care if his lies get people killed."? Or at least admit you're being hypocritical.
1. Non-science: calling Karol Sikora a "professor of medicine" hides the fact that he's an oncologist; if he ever had any expertise it was in cancer, not epidemics, and he has no business speaking outside his field. Sikora is also a fellow of The Princes Foundation For Integrated Health and a professional member of the generically-named College Of Medicine. Both of these organizations are lobbyists which promote alternative medicine.
2. Censorship: rather than allow conversation where real scientists can respond to Sikora's nonsense with facts, YouTube decided to push his followers into their own echo chambers where pieces like this which represents him as a martyr go unchallenged.
Sakora isn't a martyr: he's either an insane person or an amoral profiteering liar who doesn't care if his lies get people killed. But I don't think censorship is the answer to lies. Truth is the answer to lies.