- They said vaccines were 100% effective. Since then that’s continually dropped - They said the vaccinated can’t spread covid - They said masks did nothing, then they changed their minds and said masks did do something And many more, but those are off the top of my head
I've not seen vaccines been described as 100% effective or, by the majority of science, that the vaccinated can't spread covid. Same for masks divided opinions the most in favour. I hope if this bill if passed it targets the conspiraloon crackpots, the racial haters, misogynistic posters. There's more of course
Good piece in the Sunday Times today about this, which essentially I agree with (which must be confusing as it's in "the media"). The right to speak nonsense in public is a pillar of democracy When we encounter an argument we don’t like, the worst thing we can do is try to shut it down Matthew Syed Sunday February 06 2022, 12.01am, The Sunday Times Afew years ago I presented a regular BBC podcast with Andrew “Freddie” Flintoff and Robbie Savage. It was imaginatively called Flintoff, Savage and the Ping Pong Guy and had a surprisingly loyal audience. I loved doing it, not least because of the friendship with the two other presenters. The podcast was ostensibly about sport, but we ranged across anything that took our fancy: politics, mental health, parenting and so on. I imagined that the free-flowing format might alienate listeners, but they loved it. One of the most popular episodes was about Flintoff’s flat-Earth views. Savage and I hammered him, but Freddie defended his position valiantly, and listeners reached their own conclusions. Free speech is one of those expressions that everyone claims for their own. It’s a bit like democracy — even the most oppressive states have the word in their name. Those who are against free speech are widely considered awful. But, as philosophers have asked since classical times, what exactly is “speech”, and when it is free? Joe Rogan, an American stand-up comedian, has a podcast on Spotify not dissimilar to my former one, the main difference being that it is a million times more successful. I have listened to it a few times and it involves vigorous chat and plenty of give and take. He has had guests with whom I agree, some with whom I disagree and others in whom I have no interest. As you might expect. Recently he was joined by a scientist called Robert Malone, who has argued that US hospitals are given incentives to say that deaths are caused by Covid and that young adults should not have the vaccine, as well as other things with which I happen to disagree. Neil Young withdrew his songs from Spotify in protest, and others followed suit. Young said in an open message to Spotify: “They can have Rogan or Young. Not both.” Perhaps the first thing to say is that Young had a perfect right to withdraw his music, just as Spotify had the right to retain Rogan. Freedom of speech encompasses the freedom to protest and the freedom to publish. I am not particularly exercised by this debate: I suspect that Spotify will act in its own interests, just as Rogan, Young and others will act in theirs. More interesting, I think, is the scale of anger directed at Spotify and, by implication, the view that opinions like Malone’s should not receive an airing at all. This is striking, given that there are dozens of podcasts on Spotify that offer an alternative position and, in some cases, explicitly reject Malone’s claims. Hundreds (perhaps thousands) of newspaper articles have done the same, as have academic papers. In other words, democratic debate seems to be operating in roughly the way envisioned by the founders of Athenian democracy two and a half millennia ago. This is why I think that the question we need to be asking in such cases is not “Is Malone right or wrong (and, if the latter, how quickly can we ban him from speaking out)” but rather “In what sort of system do the best ideas rise to the top?”. Socrates argued that too much central control over speech is inimical to progress because it has the tendency to suppress unconventional views that might, in time, prove to be useful, innovative or right. The ancient Greeks lived in a very different milieu, of course, but the argument expressed a penetrating and subtle logic. It traded on the idea that, however much the human species knows at any given time, the space that lies beyond the frontier is limitless. As Karl Popper, an eloquent advocate for open societies, put it: “Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.” In this context it is vital people have the freedom to venture into the infinity of the unknown: pioneers who will often be wrong, outrageous and threatening to the status quo are crucial to progress. In tolerating this freedom, we will also endure a great deal of nonsense and quackery from the snake-oil salesmen and those gullible enough to believe them. I have spent hours immersed in the Covid antivax echo chamber and acknowledge the damage that many have inflicted upon themselves and others by refusing the jab. On the balance of harms, though, this is vastly smaller than the alternative. Take the vaccine itself, the subject of much controversy. It is worth noting that in open societies, with some tolerance for dissent, vaccine uptake has been high, not least because of the battalions of impartial fact-checkers and authoritative news sources that refuted the conspiracists. In the UK 98 per cent of people over the age of 80 (the most vulnerable) have had at least one jab, and more than 90 per cent of over-12s. The scientific consensus won out. But the value of free speech reaches far deeper. Consider that there are many consensus positions held by experts today that will be comprehensively disproved in the future. These currently “respectable” viewpoints — of which Neil Young doubtless approves — are harming us, here and now, in ways we do not yet grasp, and perhaps lack the conceptual framework to understand. Without free speech, without the “mad” ideas of dissenters, we rob ourselves of the raw material of progress. We face an interesting few decades. In China a social credit system is being used to monitor the thought and speech of millions. The ostensible purpose is to determine whether people are trustworthy (think of a financial credit score on steroids), but is set to become even more Orwellian. President Xi Jinping is taking a historic bet that surveillance and control enabled by artificial intelligence will prove superior to the messy, disruptive and sometimes confounding system called democracy. I believe with all my heart that he is wrong. It is why I urge us not to be frightened of a silly little chat between a stand-up comedian and a maverick scientist, any more than between a ping pong guy, a footballer and a cricketer. The more pernicious danger is the growing intolerance of different opinions, the hysterical cancellation of those with whom we disagree and, perhaps most of all, the urge to censor falsifiable positions rather than expose them. Our task today is not to retreat from the spirit of the ancient Greeks but to rejuvenate it for the tech age. To ensure that the digital platforms that dominate the public square do not have monopoly power to set the limits of speech; to be vigilant that science remains open and accessible; to vigorously defend a free press; and to protect democracy from the autocrats and pseudo-liberals out to destroy it. In the long run our system will prove more resilient, but only if we keep the faith. A liberal society cohabiting with an illiberal mindset is a recipe that could kill democracy itself.
They were said to be 97-100% effective at the start. Then it dropped and dropped into the 80s, then over time has got lower and lower until everyone required boosters
On the flip side of this though is a far bigger question about the large platforms becoming publishers (which they are) without having to abide by any of the set in stone rules about publishing (that the likes of BBC and main news outlets have to run on). As publishers (as I say, which they are) it's not before time that there were some boundaries within which they need to operate.
That's the thing with science though, it adjusts and refines itself upon evidence and data. There's an awful lot more misinformation that was spread about at the beginning which is still misinformation, but that hasn't been adjusted, despite all evidence to the contrary. That's the part that's worse.
Which is EXACTLY my point about this bill. Making disinformation illegal is censoring this refinement of science. Whatever your opinions about what’s gone before, this kind of bill is ludicrous and dangerous
I tend to agree, i think changes need to be made, so that platforms at least consider what they’re putting out there, and whether it should be out there (for instance, the BBC would never have broadcast a show with the Jimmy Carr ‘joke’, but Netflix don’t have the same type of editorial covenance). But I don’t like the idea of an over-arching bill to try and control a narrative, particularly one overseen by Nadine Dorries. I haven’t looked properly into what they’re proposing mind you.
I havent either, I’ve just gone off the headline. But in general, if you find something offensive… just don’t watch or listen to it. Same as it’s always been. This idea of cancelling comedians and everyone that says anything.. it’s just insanity
I think the bill is to do with the *deliberate* spreading of dangerous/disproven misinformation. Which if done sensibly isn’t necessarily a bad thing (and I suspect will be driven by trying to control the pernicious influence of Russian/Chinese troll farms). Will look into it though.
Looking forward to the bill that makes the spreading of Brexit disinformation an offence, especially if it can be attributed to historical comments.
But, but, the NHS will benefit by several hundreds of million pounds, when Britain leaves the European Union. To misquote Tom Robinson, "It's there on the side of the Battle Bus, it must be the truth"
Not true or supportable by any scientific studies at the time. This is an evolving situation with new variants being countered by new vaccines. No disinformation from reputable sources. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70... 14, 2020–August,U.S. COVID-19 pandemic waves. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/coronavirus-vaccine/art-20484859 https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanmic/article/PIIS2666-5247(21)00069-0/fulltext
Come off it. There was article after article and politician after politician including boris and Biden saying that “there is no chance you can get covid if you’ve had the vaccine”, “Covid stops the spread” etc. They only changed the narrative once so many people realised that was a lie. They then moved the goal posts to say that the vaccine doesn’t stop the spread, it just makes covid less dangerous. Which is nigh on impossible to prove and is still disputed by the numbers today, as there’s no control group. Israel has had the most amount of boosters and cases are skyrocketing
Please back this up with some verifiable sources, quoting politicians instead of scientists just doesn't do it. Who are they, they, they? https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog-january-3-2022/
St Jabbo I am glad you posted this as it underscores quite nicely what I wanted to say having read the recent posts on this thread. Someone made the good point that eventually everyone will have had Covid and that is why some people have been folloish enough to write Covid off as an aggressive type of flu. I am not surprised by the news from Israel as it is something I had expected and was going to be the focus of my contribution to this thread. No one ever said that vaccines would be 100% effective and even when they were introduced last years, it was widely reported that even with efficacy of 80%, if 20% of the population went unvaccinated, the measures would be one third ineffective. The issue of face masks strikes me as common sense. No one will know how this measure has reduced rhe spread of Covid but common sense tells you it will have done - in addition to cutting down other respiratory diseases caused by polution. However, the main argument I wanted to present was that we have been fornutate that Omicron has been milder. How bad would it have been if Omicron has led to more severe sympton or have evaded the vaccines ? I really feel that there is a false sense of security about Covid. There was an intersting discussion about this at work on Friday where a scientist friend has suggested that the reality is that Covid is getting milder. The experience from Israel is evident that the problem has not gone away even for a country which was considered to be well prepared (that is a lie because of the vvaccine appartheid operated against Palestinians which will always pout the Israeli's at risk.) I can see no logic for Covid not mutating in to something more severe. We had a body swerve with Omicron but at some point we will get a variant which is going to put everything back to square one. I think I have said before that many scientists see no logic in assuming that Covid will be defeated by 2026 if at all. Eventually a new strain will emerge which will have similar consequences to the first wave. It is inveitable.
Yes Ian the likelihood of a more virulent strain is more likely with high infection rates we can only hope the vaccine evolution gets ahead of the virus.
Osvaldorama, there is (or at least ought to be) a clear difference between scientific information, including the possibility that new information will change things, and the assumptions spread by politicians, that are purported to be 'facts'. Politicians want you to believe them, and their way of disseminating their brand of 'everything will be OK, just as long as you continue to vote for me'. Scientists are not in the business of making people like them, their concern is with verifiable evidence, and rational conclusions that can be drawn from the evidence, with the inherent understanding that new evidence can change things, leading to different conclusions.
