11 ms·

I for one love it when mouthy oncologists get picked to talk about epedemiology in the Journal. Next week, tune in for a sculptor's hot take on the Mars lander

I for one love it when mouthy oncologists get picked to talk about epedemiology in the Journal. Next week, tune in for a sculptor's hot take on the Mars lander.

nimbius 6y ago
s/We'll have/I really really want/ These sadly arent the exclusive purvey of the journal. plenty of other dog-trainers and nightly consumer-news shows often feature what amounts to a thinly-veiled quarantine tantrum masquerading as insightful critique.
- jessaustin 6y ago
  News firms in USA optimize for audience size. Most Americans would rather listen to Pollyanna bullshit than uncomfortable truth. So, the news firms mostly publish wishful thinking. According to some of these shallow beings, we were supposed to have "herd immunity" by last April. Here in the real world, it's still not clear that this concept is even possible with the covid virus.
  - aww_dang 6y ago
    What about the old adage of "fear sells"? Do doomsday predictions no longer generate clicks?
    - devNoise 6y ago
      I agree that "fear sells". Usually there is a "them" to be afraid of. Not sure the media has figured out who we're supposed to be afraid of in this pandemic.
      - aww_dang 6y ago
        The unmasked? Those with differing opinions on the pandemic? Fellow shoppers? People outside your immeadiate family circle? Consumers of non-essential services? At this point the divisions have been potentially driven to a point where each individual is atomized. Of course that it is the extreme case, but you needn't look far if you are looking to personify the target of the fear campaign.
        chasd00 6y ago
        the media wants you to fear, and even hate, those who's information source is not the same as yours. In other words, anyone getting information from a competitor.
    - jessaustin 6y ago
      We've been subject to the fear-cannon for two decades. They had to sell many disastrous wars, and after all brown people are scary. A fatigue has set in. At this point they've turned the knob so far they're worried they may have broken it. They hype up tanker explosions and everybody starts googling "Tonkin Gulf". Significant numbers of Americans actually remember dumb advice they got from leading health officials an entire year ago. Now that we've had a 9/11 every day for a year, a new 9/11 won't land the same. If e.g. Xinjiang and Hong Kong were both leveled by atomic bombs tomorrow, the average American would change the channel. Popular news just doesn't have the effect it used to have; it's back to the drawing board for the media firms and their owners.
      - aww_dang 6y ago
        Let's not forget the well documented Iraqi WMD debacle. >it's back to the drawing board for the media firms and their owners. Enter social media. All of your "friends" believe in precepts x, y and z. It is popular. Don't be skeptical. That's fringe. Do you need a fact check headline? It isn't difficult to imagine how the WMD story would be sold today.
        jessaustin 6y ago
        Apologies for the late reply. You're right about what they've attempted and will continue to attempt, of course. There is reason for hope, however. They had decades of experience manufacturing consent via print and broadcast media, and they got pretty good at it. Clearly they want to wield social media as deftly (see all the wishful thinking about the obviously-bullshit-from-day-one "Russiagate" theory). I don't think they have that skill yet, however. The current thinking is that they'll get it if they just deplatform the right people (and, it seems, the right platforms). That's a dead end; it runs counter to the way that social media works. Rather than swimming upstream, eventually they might develop effective mass communication methods via social media. I don't know what form those will take... maybe trolling-at-scale? They don't have it yet, though. Another thing about "fear sells"... some fears are more comfortable than others. That's why it has taken so much work to get a tiny minority of Americans worked up about global warming, but they've easily stoked a series of stupid wars. It's comfortable to fear brown people, but it is less comfortable to fear things that seem fundamental to our own lives like the current form of our economy.
theli0nheart 6y ago
This is textbook ad hominem, and I think is against HN guidelines.
- swivelmaster 6y ago
  Pointing out that someone is not an expert at something is not an ad hominem.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    Arguing against someone's position by simply stating (truthfully or not) that they are not an expert is textbook ad hominem.
    - user-the-name 6y ago
      This is a good example of why "ad hominem" is one of the worst arguments you can try to use against something. In actual human discussion, pointing out that someone is making claims about something they don't know anything about is the very basis of common sense. Trying to make this out to be a logical fallacy only shows how useless that label is.
      - aww_dang 6y ago
        The problem becomes how you quantify your opponent's knowledge from a subjective position. How can you prove that they don't know what they are talking about without disputing the points they have made? You must attack the argument, not the person.
        user-the-name 6y ago
        No, you really don't. This isn't a mathematical proof. This isn't a formal debate. This is regular, common-sense discussion. Pointing out that a guy who is not an expert in a field is making claims that go against the actual experts in that field is a perfectly reasonable argument, and ignoring it is intentionally blinding yourself.
JamisonM 6y ago
He cites Manaus as a positive example of the power of heard immunity, not only is he not an expert he doesn't seem to actually read the news.
marcod 6y ago
It's prefaced by Opinion, so I am assuming it's not really science-based :p
JeremyNT 6y ago
Yet another useless piece of Op-Ed trash that people are tricked into reading because it's in a big name publication. Otherwise respectable news outlets really need to get rid of their dead weight opinion sections, which only serve to damage the credibility of the news divisions. These pundits are a dime a dozen and their unfounded speculation (or at times outright misinformation) is no better than the typical junk floating around medium and substack.

I for one love it when mouthy oncologists get picked to talk about epedemiology in the Journal. Next week, tune in for a sculptor's hot take on the Mars lander.

nimbius 6y ago

s/We'll have/I really really want/ These sadly arent the exclusive purvey of the journal. plenty of other dog-trainers and nightly consumer-news shows often feature what amounts to a thinly-veiled quarantine tantrum masquerading as insightful critique.

jessaustin 6y ago
News firms in USA optimize for audience size. Most Americans would rather listen to Pollyanna bullshit than uncomfortable truth. So, the news firms mostly publish wishful thinking. According to some of these shallow beings, we were supposed to have "herd immunity" by last April. Here in the real world, it's still not clear that this concept is even possible with the covid virus.
- aww_dang 6y ago
  What about the old adage of "fear sells"? Do doomsday predictions no longer generate clicks?
  - devNoise 6y ago
    I agree that "fear sells". Usually there is a "them" to be afraid of. Not sure the media has figured out who we're supposed to be afraid of in this pandemic.
    - aww_dang 6y ago
      The unmasked? Those with differing opinions on the pandemic? Fellow shoppers? People outside your immeadiate family circle? Consumers of non-essential services? At this point the divisions have been potentially driven to a point where each individual is atomized. Of course that it is the extreme case, but you needn't look far if you are looking to personify the target of the fear campaign.
      - chasd00 6y ago
        the media wants you to fear, and even hate, those who's information source is not the same as yours. In other words, anyone getting information from a competitor.
  - jessaustin 6y ago
    We've been subject to the fear-cannon for two decades. They had to sell many disastrous wars, and after all brown people are scary. A fatigue has set in. At this point they've turned the knob so far they're worried they may have broken it. They hype up tanker explosions and everybody starts googling "Tonkin Gulf". Significant numbers of Americans actually remember dumb advice they got from leading health officials an entire year ago. Now that we've had a 9/11 every day for a year, a new 9/11 won't land the same. If e.g. Xinjiang and Hong Kong were both leveled by atomic bombs tomorrow, the average American would change the channel. Popular news just doesn't have the effect it used to have; it's back to the drawing board for the media firms and their owners.
    - aww_dang 6y ago
      Let's not forget the well documented Iraqi WMD debacle. >it's back to the drawing board for the media firms and their owners. Enter social media. All of your "friends" believe in precepts x, y and z. It is popular. Don't be skeptical. That's fringe. Do you need a fact check headline? It isn't difficult to imagine how the WMD story would be sold today.
      - jessaustin 6y ago
        Apologies for the late reply. You're right about what they've attempted and will continue to attempt, of course. There is reason for hope, however. They had decades of experience manufacturing consent via print and broadcast media, and they got pretty good at it. Clearly they want to wield social media as deftly (see all the wishful thinking about the obviously-bullshit-from-day-one "Russiagate" theory). I don't think they have that skill yet, however. The current thinking is that they'll get it if they just deplatform the right people (and, it seems, the right platforms). That's a dead end; it runs counter to the way that social media works. Rather than swimming upstream, eventually they might develop effective mass communication methods via social media. I don't know what form those will take... maybe trolling-at-scale? They don't have it yet, though. Another thing about "fear sells"... some fears are more comfortable than others. That's why it has taken so much work to get a tiny minority of Americans worked up about global warming, but they've easily stoked a series of stupid wars. It's comfortable to fear brown people, but it is less comfortable to fear things that seem fundamental to our own lives like the current form of our economy.

theli0nheart 6y ago

This is textbook ad hominem, and I think is against HN guidelines.

swivelmaster 6y ago
Pointing out that someone is not an expert at something is not an ad hominem.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  Arguing against someone's position by simply stating (truthfully or not) that they are not an expert is textbook ad hominem.
  - user-the-name 6y ago
    This is a good example of why "ad hominem" is one of the worst arguments you can try to use against something. In actual human discussion, pointing out that someone is making claims about something they don't know anything about is the very basis of common sense. Trying to make this out to be a logical fallacy only shows how useless that label is.
    - aww_dang 6y ago
      The problem becomes how you quantify your opponent's knowledge from a subjective position. How can you prove that they don't know what they are talking about without disputing the points they have made? You must attack the argument, not the person.
      - user-the-name 6y ago
        No, you really don't. This isn't a mathematical proof. This isn't a formal debate. This is regular, common-sense discussion. Pointing out that a guy who is not an expert in a field is making claims that go against the actual experts in that field is a perfectly reasonable argument, and ignoring it is intentionally blinding yourself.

JamisonM 6y ago

He cites Manaus as a positive example of the power of heard immunity, not only is he not an expert he doesn't seem to actually read the news.

marcod 6y ago

It's prefaced by Opinion, so I am assuming it's not really science-based :p

JeremyNT 6y ago

Yet another useless piece of Op-Ed trash that people are tricked into reading because it's in a big name publication. Otherwise respectable news outlets really need to get rid of their dead weight opinion sections, which only serve to damage the credibility of the news divisions. These pundits are a dime a dozen and their unfounded speculation (or at times outright misinformation) is no better than the typical junk floating around medium and substack.