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Can we use a Mastodon instance as a containment unit? /s It really looks like the attempts at censorship have failed, and it doesn't look like it's working aga

Can we use a Mastodon instance as a containment unit? /s It really looks like the attempts at censorship have failed, and it doesn't look like it's working against disinformation. In fact, these people might (and probably do) feel that because they are being censored, they are actually right but the real conspirers are trying to suppress the truth.

xoa 7y ago
>In fact, these people might (and probably do) feel that because they are being censored, they are actually right but the real conspirers are trying to suppress the truth. As I said in another comment, you're utterly missing the point of efforts like this. Of course quarantining infected people doesn't cure them. But that's a different goal and requires different methods, and sometimes there may be no cure at all (or it might be very individualized, challenging and expensive, and thus hard to scale). The idea of a quarantine is to keep vulnerable new parts of the population from themselves being infected. Another somewhat equivalent case would be security, which is always an economic equation. Security would be impossible against an omniscient omnipotent attacker, but in the real world there is no such thing. Everyone, even the biggest government entities, face resource constraints. So security is all about increase the resources needed by an attacker. Saying "oh putting a lock on the door doesn't keep someone from breaking a window!" is missing the point. It still increases the effort an attacker must go to, the risk they must take, and in turn the security. Remember, the effective contact rate β is determined by multiplying the transmission risk p by the total contact rate γ. β = γ*p Vaccines lower p and in turn reduce β, but so does lowering γ itself. And reducing β even a smaller amount can still mean many lives saved, that it's not 0 doesn't mean giving up.
- grenoire 7y ago
  I see, thanks for the points. I still wonder about the longer term formation of a smaller but more extreme group.
  - xoa 7y ago
    We all need to keep in mind when the topic of any single effort comes up that none of this exists in isolation, it's not a purely zero sum game. Society can multi-task. You are not wrong at all that it'd be independently also worth also exploring how to directly reach out to and cure the existing smaller groups too. And it's completely fair to acknowledge that sometimes damage reduction efforts for the general population might directly make that harder. But even so, keeping the overall number of people harmed as low as possible is the ultimate goal. And while there is some margin for error, when the level of vaccination drops below herd immunity there can be a sharp, non-linear increase in harm. So while attempting engagement and changing of minds is something to pursue in parallel, it's also necessary to at least try to maintain the status quo in the mean time too.

xoa 7y ago

>In fact, these people might (and probably do) feel that because they are being censored, they are actually right but the real conspirers are trying to suppress the truth. As I said in another comment, you're utterly missing the point of efforts like this. Of course quarantining infected people doesn't cure them. But that's a different goal and requires different methods, and sometimes there may be no cure at all (or it might be very individualized, challenging and expensive, and thus hard to scale). The idea of a quarantine is to keep vulnerable new parts of the population from themselves being infected. Another somewhat equivalent case would be security, which is always an economic equation. Security would be impossible against an omniscient omnipotent attacker, but in the real world there is no such thing. Everyone, even the biggest government entities, face resource constraints. So security is all about increase the resources needed by an attacker. Saying "oh putting a lock on the door doesn't keep someone from breaking a window!" is missing the point. It still increases the effort an attacker must go to, the risk they must take, and in turn the security. Remember, the effective contact rate β is determined by multiplying the transmission risk p by the total contact rate γ. β = γ*p Vaccines lower p and in turn reduce β, but so does lowering γ itself. And reducing β even a smaller amount can still mean many lives saved, that it's not 0 doesn't mean giving up.

grenoire 7y ago
I see, thanks for the points. I still wonder about the longer term formation of a smaller but more extreme group.
- xoa 7y ago
  We all need to keep in mind when the topic of any single effort comes up that none of this exists in isolation, it's not a purely zero sum game. Society can multi-task. You are not wrong at all that it'd be independently also worth also exploring how to directly reach out to and cure the existing smaller groups too. And it's completely fair to acknowledge that sometimes damage reduction efforts for the general population might directly make that harder. But even so, keeping the overall number of people harmed as low as possible is the ultimate goal. And while there is some margin for error, when the level of vaccination drops below herd immunity there can be a sharp, non-linear increase in harm. So while attempting engagement and changing of minds is something to pursue in parallel, it's also necessary to at least try to maintain the status quo in the mean time too.