Anti-vaxxers

GT89

GT89 wrote: »

I'm using touch screen so it's to make mistakes

Didn't even understand what they were saying did you.
They weren't referring to the typo

GT89

DubInMeath wrote: »

Didn't even understand what they were saying did you.
They weren't referring to the typo

Look if your just gonna go back and forth calling and not debate the actual issue at hand then there's no point debating you.

AirBiscuit

GT89 wrote: »

Look if your just gonna go back and forth calling and not debate the actual issue at hand then there's no point debating you.

Why is there any point debating you when you're apparently the smartest person here, as purported by the people who know you? Surely we're all merely intellectual peons compared to your mighty cranium, what you say should be law being so much smarter than us and there should be no debate because we don't know how to think as well as you.

GT89

A typical debate with covidians.

Disagrees with your point
No logic to back it up
Use a stupid analogy
Calls you selfish

GT89

AirBiscuit wrote: »

Why is there any point debating you when you're apparently the smartest person here, as purported by the people who know you? Surely we're all merely intellectual peons compared to your mighty cranium, what you say should be law being so much smarter than us and there should be no debate because we don't know how to think as well as you.

Okay I am against covid measures such as masks, health passports and lockdowns

AirBiscuit

GT89 wrote: »

A typical debate with covidians.

Disagrees with your point
No logic to back it up
Use a stupid analogy
Calls you selfish

Where did I say I disagreed with any of your points? A link to a post or a quote of mine would be nice. YOu wouldn't be talking a load of aul nonsense then making a strawman where I'm some grandstander making a point, having you blow it apart with outstanding logic and reason, then resorting to pettily insulting you directly as a result of being obliterated in argument? Maybe I just like making fun of people who type foolish gibberish online and think they're great.

GT89

AirBiscuit wrote: »

Where did I say I disagreed with any of your points? A link to a post or a quote of mine would be nice. YOu wouldn't be talking a load of aul nonsense then making a strawman where I'm some grandstander making a point, having you blow it apart with outstanding logic and reason, then resorting to pettily insulting you directly as a result of being obliterated in argument? Maybe I just like making fun of people who type foolish gibberish online and think they're great.

My post wasn't directed at you

Bobeagleburger

GT89 wrote: »

A typical debate with covidians.

Disagrees with your point
No logic to back it up
Use a stupid analogy
Calls you selfish

You are patriotic..... Committed to staycations

Timberrrrrrrr

GT89 wrote: »

Younger folk like myself generally don't wear them in each others houses. I go to my friends house with like 5 lads none wearing masks.

Must work at "full time mad bastàrd"

And went to school at "the school for hard knocks"

:rolleyes:

Timberrrrrrrr

GT89 wrote: »

Okay I am against covid measures such as masks, health passports and lockdowns

But only for yourself, fùxk the elderly/vulnerable though.

GT89 wrote: »

Lol but I actually wear a mask in shops where it's legally required just where it's not required. If that's the case then nearly everyone under 25 is likely a danger to every geriatric in the country. If the elderly/vulnerable don't want to catch covid they can just stay indoors if not they can quit moaning and accept the risk.

VinLieger

AirBiscuit wrote: »

2 things here: Read what you actually typed out, smart fella.
Secondly, this always holds true in my experience

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lwFK1ImzcA

The only people I've encountered in person who reckoned they're smart to the point of telling everyone that they're smart are actually just thick as cow shít and not smart enough to know that's what they are.

There's a serious bang of incel/qanon off their posts too.

volono

volono wrote: »

Cheers also for inferring I'm too stupid to read them.

In fairness I did not read their post like that myself. I think you might have taken it up wrong. The poster is just pointing out that links like that require a certain level of grounding in science to read and understand. And most of the Joe/Jane public do not have that grounding.

It is not an insult to you - rather just an acknowledgement of the level most of the public are at.

And this is on our education system. We do "Science" in lower levels of schooling. Then we do things like physics biology and chemistry in the higher levels. And amazingly at almost no level of any of that does the curriculum teach how to find / read / interpret / write a science paper or study.

In fact depressingly at third level of science this is often the case too. Not all of our science education or medical education at third level require teaching some of the actual processes of science to students.

Almost none of the actual processes of science get taught to us in science class at school though. We are just expected to learn by rote some of the facts science has churned out over the years.

So when a lay public are expected to go and understand something like Vaccine - they are ill equipped to do so. Which is how someone like you ends up here having it explained to you by someone like me. It should not be this way. But it should not be taken as an insult against you to have this pointed out.

astrofool

GT89 wrote: »

A typical debate with covidians.

Disagrees with your point
No logic to back it up
Use a stupid analogy
Calls you selfish

Ah man, go and answer all the posts you've been running away from everywhere, you never have any evidence to back up anything you've been saying unless it's a crank website or an out of context youtube video that's shown to be lies within seconds.

Seth Brundle

[Deleted User] wrote: »

And this is on our education system. We do "Science" in lower levels of schooling. Then we do things like physics biology and chemistry in the higher levels. And amazingly at almost no level of any of that does the curriculum teach how to find / read / interpret / write a science paper or study.

Are you seriously questioning why school kids who are learning the fundamentals of science aren't shown technical papers?
However, in saying that, research projects are a key part of the curriculum and this involves having to research and reference technical information on a subject.
Also why put science in quotes as if it's not a real subject? Or are you just being "childish"?

[Deleted User] wrote: »

In fact depressingly at third level of science this is often the case too. Not all of our science education or medical education at third level require teaching some of the actual processes of science to students.

Can't speak about other courses but this was covered in both my undergraduate and postgraduate courses.

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Almost none of the actual processes of science get taught to us in science class at school though. We are just expected to learn by rote some of the facts science has churned out over the years.

Again, no point forcing kids to read technical papers if there's no understanding if the subject. It would just discourage participation.

[Deleted User] wrote: »

So when a lay public are expected to go and understand something like Vaccine - they are ill equipped to do so.

Whoever suggested that they should understand vaccines?
The public arent expected to go and understand a vaccine. They are however expected to believe that the science as explained by experts. This is why the likes of NPHET are explaining things to the public almost daily.

Igotadose

Deleted User wrote: »

So your reference point is Jim Jordan, a politician who has had a history mired in controversy including the covering of sexual abuse in the Ohio University sex scandal. He's also an ardent support of Donald Trump who took to insulting Fauci and ignoring his advice throughout the pandemic.


Next up is Rand Paul who is happy to push conspiracy including being a guest on Alex Jones over the years. So it's not unusual for him to be pushing conspiracy theories.



So overall, you've got two senators of pretty questionable repute in general that are happy to play into Trumpist style tactics. But ultimately, neither of them have much going for them in terms of facts. There are one hundred sitting senators and you've chosen some of the loonier ones. I'm sure Ted Cruz and the likes may row in behind them too. It doesn't amount to much.

Only Paul's a Senator. Jordan's a Congressman.

Seth Brundle

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Are you seriously questioning why school kids who are learning the fundamentals of science aren't shown technical papers?

I'm questioning why at no point throughout our science education are we taught pretty much anything about how science is produced or communicated. The average Joe on the street appears to have been given little to no grounding of _any_ type in how to read or interpret science.

Even the people given the job of writing Science Articles in our news papers seem to have very little grounding in actually reading science. I have even spoken with GPs who feel a little lost when having to read papers on the drugs they themselves end up prescribing. And quite often this means the decisions they make on what to prescribe gets influenced by the sales people from the drugs companies.

I do not think it is an all or nothing thing. That we either do nothing or we have kids learning how to read and produce high level technical papers.

There is a middle ground there where some grounding and interpretation could be given somewhere in the curriculum along the way. Hell - even adding Ben Goldacres book "Bad Science" to the curriculum would probably be more beneficial that much of what we learn in science class in school. And that is just a pop-science communication book really.

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Also why put science in quotes as if it's not a real subject? Or are you just being "childish"?

To distinguish it as being the Title of the course, rather than just another word in the flow of the sentence. In the Junior Cert when I did it we had a course titled "Science".

I have noticed more and more in recent times that perfectly valid uses of quotes are falling out of favour and common practice and as such get misinterpreted quite often. I fear the use of "air quotes" as a form of sarcasm/derision is probably one of the main reasons for this as I have been getting the vague impression that derision has become the main interpretation of quotations. But derision and direct speech are far from the only valid uses they have.

But I have more and more lately seen peoples meanings and messages being misinterpreted solely due to how they perfectly validly use quotations. Recent random example of this was in a thread on the transgender community where Richard Dawkins was interpreted as putting derision on transgender women for simply putting the word woman in quotes as "woman" in a perfectly valid and normal way.

Not a subject for this thread of course - more a point of linguistic interest on a linguist thread I suppose. But suffice to say in this case that no - there was nothing either wrong nor childish about my use of them above.

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Again, no point forcing kids to read technical papers if there's no understanding if the subject. It would just discourage participation.

Again - not really a topic for this thread but an interesting discussion all the same as to what would encourage or discourage interest in science in children and teens. I for one actually found the processes of science and communication of science massively interesting. A hell of a lot more interesting than merely learning things by rote from age 12 to 18.

All we ever seemed to do in "Science" in the Junior Cert - and physics and biology in the leaving cert - was learn off terms and diagrams and equations by rote - and the results of experiments that presumably we were meant to do but almost never actually did do.

The structures within education subjects in science can often be a hell of a lot more interesting than the base facts learned in those sciences. A totally random example: I have seen kids all proud of themselves for being able to list in order the 8 planets of the solar system. I have yet to ever ask a kid what a planet actually is however - and get a remotely useful reply. They can reel off a list of names without the first notion of what it actually is they are naming.

So I am massively open to discussions on what would encourage or discourage participation in science. I would not automatically assume a grounding in how to read and interpret science would be off putting however. I certainly have a low level of optimism that what we have in place at the moment however is all that good at encouraging people generally.

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Whoever suggested that they should understand vaccines? The public arent expected to go and understand a vaccine. They are however expected to believe that the science as explained by experts.

By "expect" in this context I mean when certain things are said by our politicians or our media - they are done so in a way that seems to automatically assume the target audience will understand what is being said. And if you read back over the posts on this thread by the user I was directly replying to - this expectation is not always warranted. That user complains a few times they they are hearing certain phrases or claims being made frequently - but they do not understand the meaning or context behind them. And it was not until ending up here talking to someone like me - that certain things suddenly started becoming clear to them.

The less any public understands any aspect of science - the less they are empowered to understand - control - or hold accountable the actions and decisions of the political or scientific elite who are making decisions on their behalf. And the more prone to conspiracy theory - nonsense - and outright lies they are as a result. And fear - for one of the main things in our world that engender fear and panic is ignorance.

So I am all for an educated public. Simply expecting a public to just "believe" what they are being told is not an agenda I would ever want to work towards. That makes science feel more like a religion to me than anything else. But YMMV of course.

If some large scale decision of any kind - political, economic, medical or whatever - is being made blanket across a society I would generally expect or hope for some minimal level of understanding of it across that society. An ignorant democratic construct of any type is not much better than no democratic construct at all.

And that is why a core issue for me has always been to not just try and get a public to understand some "X" - but to question whether they are even given the basic tools to understand this "X" in the first place. And quite often I find myself merely feeling pessimistic that this is the case but optimistic that making it the case is not an insurmountable task.

Baggly

Mod

Folks, this a long running thread and started as a serious discussion when AH was host to such discussions. It no longer fits the remit of the forum, so im closing it up. I suggest you start a new thread in CA on the topic if you so wish.