News COVID-19 pandemic

[Marijn]

What makes it advantageous?

That the name doesn't reveal gender.

 

[Artlav]

So an undefined gender name is more hireable than a male name? Interesting.

 

[jedidia]

So an undefined gender name is more hireable than a male name? Interesting.

Essentially anything that sparks curiosity is a plus in a CV. The aim is to get an interview, and if an HR person is curious, he's more biased to invite you to one, even if just to satisfy that curiosity.

Important note: Sparking curiosity is not the same as causing confusion. If the CV is confusing, that's *not* a good thing :lol:

 

[richfororbit]

The fake money will increase prices at the shops. h:

 

[Urwumpe]

The fake money will increase prices at the shops. h:

Ah, Youtube economics. :lol:


Guess what would have happened with a gold standard.... Or should we better say today "Vaccine standard?"

 

[richfororbit]

Those people at the Ron Paul forums, really believe in a libertarian society, with no fiat money, and work, work, and faith in a deity, a good number of them. Which I found very very odd, while i was on there.

If they do want a less involved America in the world, their whole way of life would need to change, okay, they don't want an empire of bases, but who will keep the sea lanes open, it won't be the Icelanders. Or Norway.

 

[Urwumpe]

Well, I would rather call it "contrarian", since it mostly replaces a government by a magical anti-government, without even creating something new. Its almost as stupid as "The government takes taxes. Libertarians don't pay taxes."

Its the same amount of unsolved problems that already had been known after Ayn Rand, but all believe that those problems will just magically go away and nobody has to solve them. Especially not any kind of social organisational structure that might or might not be considered a government.

 

[jedidia]

Its the same amount of unsolved problems that already had been known after Ayn Rand, but all believe that those problems will just magically go away and nobody has to solve them.

If it wasn't for the mention of Ayn Rand in that comment, I could've sworn you were talking about marxists. Sure, the unsolved problems are different, but the concept of them "magically going away" seems pretty much the same.
I doubt they'd like to hear that, though... :lol:

 

[Urwumpe]

If it wasn't for the mention of Ayn Rand in that comment, I could've sworn you were talking about marxists. Sure, the unsolved problems are different, but the concept of them "magically going away" seems pretty much the same.
I doubt they'd like to hear that, though... :lol:

Marxism had a very elegant solution for every problem. All it took had been new humans, the old ones had been broken. :lol:

 

[jedidia]

All it took had been new humans, the old ones had been broken.

As true as that unfortunately is, it *is* pretty magical as far as solutions go... :lol:

 

[Urwumpe]

As true as that unfortunately is, it *is* pretty magical as far as solutions go... :lol:

Well, not THAT magical. Since humans can be mass produced by unskilled labour, the simplest way to achieve this goal is just a very strict quality assurance....


Which again brings us to COVID-19 and how radicals seem to think just removing the "weak" will make them strong...

 

[Artlav]

the simplest way to achieve this goal is just a very strict quality assurance....

Now why does that sound very familiar...

 

[richfororbit]

Well, I would rather call it "contrarian", since it mostly replaces a government by a magical anti-government, without even creating something new. Its almost as stupid as "The government takes taxes. Libertarians don't pay taxes."

Its the same amount of unsolved problems that already had been known after Ayn Rand, but all believe that those problems will just magically go away and nobody has to solve them. Especially not any kind of social organisational structure that might or might not be considered a government.

Often these ignorant libertarian posters on the forums would express, or state stealing is wrong, or that a crisis somewhere wasn't there problem. They were one trick ponies, who don't care about anybody else.

Look at the posters here, polar opposite to what others would state in support of Mr Fauci instead of Mr Paul.

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showth...Paul-Questions-Dr-Fauci&p=6947253#post6947253

created4 states, If they don't expose Fauci for his corruption and conflict of interest, they are going to lose this debate, because the American public has been trained to worship medical doctors.

 

[insanity]

Well, not THAT magical. Since humans can be mass produced by unskilled labour, the simplest way to achieve this goal is just a very strict quality assurance....


Which again brings us to COVID-19 and how radicals seem to think just removing the "weak" will make them strong...

It's been really eye opening to see how weak the people who want to 'remove the weak' actually are. They spend their whole life prepping for the apocalypse but can't even go without a haircut for 8 weeks.

 

[Thorsten]

It's been really eye opening to see how weak the people who want to 'remove the weak' actually are. They spend their whole life prepping for the apocalypse but can't even go without a haircut for 8 weeks.

You sure that's the same group? The zombie apocalypse preppers usually appear wide-eyed and shaggy-haired, you'd think they've gone without a haircut for eight years...

 

[mahdavi3d]

 

[Urwumpe]

That "unlikely" sounds at least like current fear of a mild infection resulting in no long-term immunity is not the biggest problem anymore and a herd immunity against the current virus at least possible. Of course, going that way is still painful and a vaccine a much better solution - even those who survive the bad cases are often no longer able to get back into their old job.

 

[Thorsten]

That "unlikely" sounds at least like current fear of a mild infection resulting in no long-term immunity is not the biggest problem anymore and a herd immunity against the current virus at least possible. Of course, going that way is still painful and a vaccine a much better solution

Okay, I'm still baffled - what media would I have to have read to learn about that 'current fear' ? I've never seen it expressed anywhere and I have no idea where it would come from - certainly the experts in Sweden, the UK, or the Netherlands did not think seriously that heard immunity might not work at all.


It was very evident from the beginning that people recover from the disease with no detectable virus load remaining. That's quite unlike HIV - so antibodies are formed and destroy the virus particles efficiently.

The same mechanism that destroys a virus already in the body destroys also the same virus if it comes from outside - the process tags specific biochemistry of the virus, not how it got somewhere.

Thus 'immunity' and 'recovery' are fundamentally the same mechanism.

Now the question 'how long does the immune system remember' and 'how fast does the virus mutate to be sufficiently different' is - by nature of a disease that's been known only a few months - open - no one has data for what happens in 10 years.

But during an ongoing epidemic, that's not really relevant because the immune system doesn't have to remember, it gets reminded all the time by low level virus exposure all around (it's an airborne disease, so it's quite hard to get zero exposure).Thus, immunity can reasonably be expected to last as long as the ongoing epidemic plus some.

Now, unlike language where 'immune' is a binary 'yes/no' thing, nature doesn't work that way. Even for a disease like chickenpox which you usually get only once in your life, in rare cases people get it again. There's cases like herpes which you get again and again, but with decreasing severeness - it used to be quite painful in my childhood, now I hardly notice.

So in reality immunity is a probabilistic process - the probability that a disease breaks out is generally reduced and the severity is also reduced. Thus, even given that there could be no complete, long-lasting immunity - it wouldn't matter so much if the severity is reduced enough by residual immunity that it's nothing more than a common cold.

The level of immunity that you need to effectively prevent a large-scale spread through a population is also not staggeringly high. There's no complete immunity against most influenza strains, and still they rarely manage to infect more than a few percent of the population.

Now, what really baffles me is what I've read several times (in clear text or implied) that if there's no (long term) immunity, herd immunity doesn't work so we need a vaccine - but in this case a vaccine certainly won't do anything. The basic principle of the vaccine is that it simulates the disease for the immune system so that it can train with an easy opponent. If fending off 'the real thing' doesn't give sufficient training, a reduced strength sparring parter certainly won't. So you can't have a scenario in which vaccines work but herd immunity does not.

even those who survive the bad cases are often no longer able to get back into their old job.

I think it helps occasionally to get the perspective. This is a visual picture of the effects of an uncontained outbreak in the working age population

The guy in the lower right (black) died, the red ones went to hospital. More than 2/3 of the rest never got the disease despite being exposed to the virus, of the third who got it 3/4 never had any symptoms and would not have noticed without testing and the rest had some fever and coughing.

(If you don't believe that this is the picture, look at Singapore - lots of testing, low number of undetected cases, as of today about 30.000 cases, 11.000 recovered, 22 (!) dead.)

The large numbers elsewhere come from the huge number of undetected cases (the numbers from the Heinsberg study suggest that the true number of infected in Germany are about 2.2 million, out of which just 7% have been tested and found - the rest never had any symptoms).

All the media coverage about multiple organs affected, people not fit for work etc. refer to the six unfortunate souls in the lower right.They're statistically a tiny minority of all that contract the disease and just had bad luck - like getting a heart attack at 40 for a healthy person, it's rare but can happen, doesn't really mean everyone needs to fear.

This is no unknown 'killer virus' on par with the pestilence (which would have wiped a third of the above diagram and would have caused 100.000 dead per day when breaking out in New York), it's a fairly normal virus leading to a disease which is potentially severe for the elderly, but for anyone under the age of 60 is no worse than other diseases which we accept as risk of life.

 

[Urwumpe]

(If you don't believe that this is the picture, look at Singapore - lots of testing, low number of undetected cases, as of today about 30.000 cases, 11.000 recovered, 22 (!) dead.)

You mean the Singapore, that just got into news because the illness was spreading completely untested and uncontrolled among lowest class workers? Yeah, great example. Just ignore any event when the virus does not suit your theories.



https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/20/magazine/singapore-coronavirus.html



Also, you seem to use numbers from early in the pandemic and claim all will stay like that. You use current IFR as final IFR, despite already CFR opposing your claims.

 

[4throck]

" it's a fairly normal virus leading to a disease which is potentially severe for the elderly, but for anyone under the age of 60 is no worse than other diseases which we accept as risk of life."

I agree in general but you can't simply consider the elderly as discardable.
Society needs people of all ages.