"The position Harris and Adams hold is at root that accepting uncritically (or to the extent criticism is deemed valid) the “expert” scientific consensus in a potential doomsday emergency is both required and righteous —making those who do not do so outliers whose arguments hold no persuasive weight ..."
Harris holes his argument at the water line. Summarizing, he asserts that, okay, maybe Bret Weinstein will turn out to be right, but it will only be by chance, while Harris might be wrong, but only in the way that experts occasionally are wrong.
Now, had Harris shown that Weinstein was claiming that, say, vaccines could turn out to be very dangerous because they debuted under the wrong astrological sign, then Harris would have at least part of a point.
But that isn't how it went. I happen to listen to both Dark Horse, and Making Sense.
Weinsteins argument was multi-faceted: we have never successfully controlled an infectious upper respiratory virus; we have never developed a successful vaccine against any corona virus; a non-sterilizing vaccine will provide obvious pathways for new variants; natural immunity is superior to artificial immunity; universal vaccination eliminates a control group; and it requires a great leap of faith to assume the safety of a novel approach to vaccination without anything like the sort of track record previous vaccines have required.
(Bret omitted, but it bears mentioning, that thanks to early natural experiments — cruise ships, aircraft carriers, prisons — we had every reason to believe that the mortality rate for C-19 was not going to be anything like would justify socially coercive measures, and that, in any event they wouldn't do any good.)
Harris completely neglected to address any element of Weinstein's argument, and therefore didn't reach the conclusion that Bret will turn out to be right for very good, knowable at the time, reasons.
And Harris will turn out to be wrong because Harris's opinions are correct because Harris thinks them.
Self-confessed “Intellectuals” would like for you to believe that they don’t make decisions based on “great leaps of faith”. I contend that not only do all humans, but the intellectual doing it is far more damaging to society because they are better at justifying their insane behavior after the fact. Just look at the most scientifically advanced society on earth in the first half of the 20th century, Germany, for proof of my contention.
I long ago learned to be skeptical of the 'experts'. Even leaving aside improper motives (greed, animus towards perceived political enemies, etc.) there are ample subconscious pressures to interpret the data in certain ways.
Then there's the fact that vast swathes of the 'experts' are part of organizations/institutions that are explicitly aligned with objectively false ideas, e.g. that a man can call himself a woman, and voila! he's a woman, and all must agree with this. This does not inspire confidence in their pronouncements in other areas.
Experts are paid liars that hide deceit in complexity. Modern age snake oil salesman. Except worse, because their ideas can’t even get stains out of your shirt.
Amen. When Covid first hit, I assumed, without any study or thought, that vaccination would be the cure -- no bad or long-term side effects -- all benefit and no cost. But then I started reading people like Drs. Peter McCullough, Robert Malone, Martin Kuldorff, and Jay Bhattacharya, and had very big second thoughts. But when I try to share with family and friends, I hit a brick wall. We must TRUST the CONSENSUS of our health EXPERTS.
To me it seemed very odd that all expert reaction seemed to go immediately to vaccine. Public officials immediately promised a vaccine was on the way. But how? There are many serious, even invariably fatal, diseases for which we have no vaccine--HIV AIDS comes to mind. Effective vaccines within a certain timeframe are not a given. And for most diseases the initial search is for effective treatment as well as for prevention. Instead, the official stance seemed to be "if you catch COVID stay home until you can't breathe, then go to the hospital, be put on a ventilator and die alone." Any suggestion of off-label use of available medications was shouted down as though such uses were always wrong-headed (pretty "funny" in a culture in which off-label use of a certain blood pressure medication has become its dominant use by millions of men) and the fact that one of the researchers of the novel type of vaccine being presented to us had serious reservations about its use was pretty thoroughly suppressed--as in, there no discussions that I recall in any mainstream media. Discussions with friends and family went "well, I've heard that . . . " "where'd you hear that?" "there's this blog I follow . . ." "Oh, a blogger (scornful noises) . . ." How much differently information is received if one can say--Time Magazine, NY Times, interviewed on NPR, even The Daily Show. Now with the information that is coming out about Twitter executives being coerced by the FBI and other US government agencies into suppressing accounts for "disinformation"--well, George Orwell's shade is probably thinking "I hoped I would be wrong."
Harris and Adams are great examples that humans, especially highly intelligent humans, make at least 80% of decisions from a deep emotional part of the brain (habit, greed, envy, or plain desire) and only use the prefrontal cortex to rationalize the irrational decision they already made. Trust the experts! I define “expert” as a paid liar that hides deceit in complexity.
I long ago concluded that humans aren't rational animals; they're rationalizing animals. The emotions come first; reason kicks in to justify the emotions.
Agreed. I think the bigger problem is that intellectuals have this self-delusion that they are more rational than other people. It’s dangerous because they can make rational arguments for almost anything they want. A big example of this is obviously Fauci, but many others like Sam Harris. And of course the Nazi’s. Pontius Pilate asked “what is truth?” I would ask: “what is rational”?
"The position Harris and Adams hold is at root that accepting uncritically (or to the extent criticism is deemed valid) the “expert” scientific consensus in a potential doomsday emergency is both required and righteous —making those who do not do so outliers whose arguments hold no persuasive weight ..."
Harris holes his argument at the water line. Summarizing, he asserts that, okay, maybe Bret Weinstein will turn out to be right, but it will only be by chance, while Harris might be wrong, but only in the way that experts occasionally are wrong.
Now, had Harris shown that Weinstein was claiming that, say, vaccines could turn out to be very dangerous because they debuted under the wrong astrological sign, then Harris would have at least part of a point.
But that isn't how it went. I happen to listen to both Dark Horse, and Making Sense.
Weinsteins argument was multi-faceted: we have never successfully controlled an infectious upper respiratory virus; we have never developed a successful vaccine against any corona virus; a non-sterilizing vaccine will provide obvious pathways for new variants; natural immunity is superior to artificial immunity; universal vaccination eliminates a control group; and it requires a great leap of faith to assume the safety of a novel approach to vaccination without anything like the sort of track record previous vaccines have required.
(Bret omitted, but it bears mentioning, that thanks to early natural experiments — cruise ships, aircraft carriers, prisons — we had every reason to believe that the mortality rate for C-19 was not going to be anything like would justify socially coercive measures, and that, in any event they wouldn't do any good.)
Harris completely neglected to address any element of Weinstein's argument, and therefore didn't reach the conclusion that Bret will turn out to be right for very good, knowable at the time, reasons.
And Harris will turn out to be wrong because Harris's opinions are correct because Harris thinks them.
Self-confessed “Intellectuals” would like for you to believe that they don’t make decisions based on “great leaps of faith”. I contend that not only do all humans, but the intellectual doing it is far more damaging to society because they are better at justifying their insane behavior after the fact. Just look at the most scientifically advanced society on earth in the first half of the 20th century, Germany, for proof of my contention.
I long ago learned to be skeptical of the 'experts'. Even leaving aside improper motives (greed, animus towards perceived political enemies, etc.) there are ample subconscious pressures to interpret the data in certain ways.
Then there's the fact that vast swathes of the 'experts' are part of organizations/institutions that are explicitly aligned with objectively false ideas, e.g. that a man can call himself a woman, and voila! he's a woman, and all must agree with this. This does not inspire confidence in their pronouncements in other areas.
Experts are paid liars that hide deceit in complexity. Modern age snake oil salesman. Except worse, because their ideas can’t even get stains out of your shirt.
Amen. When Covid first hit, I assumed, without any study or thought, that vaccination would be the cure -- no bad or long-term side effects -- all benefit and no cost. But then I started reading people like Drs. Peter McCullough, Robert Malone, Martin Kuldorff, and Jay Bhattacharya, and had very big second thoughts. But when I try to share with family and friends, I hit a brick wall. We must TRUST the CONSENSUS of our health EXPERTS.
To me it seemed very odd that all expert reaction seemed to go immediately to vaccine. Public officials immediately promised a vaccine was on the way. But how? There are many serious, even invariably fatal, diseases for which we have no vaccine--HIV AIDS comes to mind. Effective vaccines within a certain timeframe are not a given. And for most diseases the initial search is for effective treatment as well as for prevention. Instead, the official stance seemed to be "if you catch COVID stay home until you can't breathe, then go to the hospital, be put on a ventilator and die alone." Any suggestion of off-label use of available medications was shouted down as though such uses were always wrong-headed (pretty "funny" in a culture in which off-label use of a certain blood pressure medication has become its dominant use by millions of men) and the fact that one of the researchers of the novel type of vaccine being presented to us had serious reservations about its use was pretty thoroughly suppressed--as in, there no discussions that I recall in any mainstream media. Discussions with friends and family went "well, I've heard that . . . " "where'd you hear that?" "there's this blog I follow . . ." "Oh, a blogger (scornful noises) . . ." How much differently information is received if one can say--Time Magazine, NY Times, interviewed on NPR, even The Daily Show. Now with the information that is coming out about Twitter executives being coerced by the FBI and other US government agencies into suppressing accounts for "disinformation"--well, George Orwell's shade is probably thinking "I hoped I would be wrong."
Harris and Adams are great examples that humans, especially highly intelligent humans, make at least 80% of decisions from a deep emotional part of the brain (habit, greed, envy, or plain desire) and only use the prefrontal cortex to rationalize the irrational decision they already made. Trust the experts! I define “expert” as a paid liar that hides deceit in complexity.
I long ago concluded that humans aren't rational animals; they're rationalizing animals. The emotions come first; reason kicks in to justify the emotions.
Agreed. I think the bigger problem is that intellectuals have this self-delusion that they are more rational than other people. It’s dangerous because they can make rational arguments for almost anything they want. A big example of this is obviously Fauci, but many others like Sam Harris. And of course the Nazi’s. Pontius Pilate asked “what is truth?” I would ask: “what is rational”?
Creative and convincing work, JG -
You brought forth sophists for review with a fine 'deconstruction', roping in Mitch Hedberg and Eric Stratton for support.
Thanks as well to you, Jeff Guinn, for summarizing Bret Weinstein's argument, which does feel quite solid.