4 ms·

Just to be clear, by the standard you're proposing there's also no scientific evidence that posting on Hacker News is safe. There is no scientific evidence that

Just to be clear, by the standard you're proposing there's also no scientific evidence that posting on Hacker News is safe. There is no scientific evidence that the internet is safe. There is no scientific evidence that wearing a mask is safe. There is, of course, an INCREDIBLE amount of EVIDENCE for all of these things being safe (including the vaccine). There has simply never been a 100% complete full evaluation of safety to the rigorous standards of an academic paper. But it's really important to understand that we know TONS of things without having that rigor, and we don't hold the vast majority of our life to that standard. Heck, we outright know that driving IS dangerous, ridiculously so compared to taking a vaccine, but we still allow that.

dhanvanthri 5y ago
Parachutes have not been subjected to rigorous evaluation by using randomized controlled trials. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC300808/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC300808/ :D
- criticaltinker 5y ago
  Had to up-vote because this is hilarious, thanks for sharing. As a critique of evidence based medicine they've clearly demonstrated their point, but it's obviously philosophical and the tradeoffs of practical medical interventions are no where near as clear cut as the case of falling from the sky without a parachute.
  - handoflixue 5y ago
    We have a known-safe vaccine that has been tested on millions of people. We have a known-deadly pandemic that has killed almost 4.5 million people. While we are not QUITE as clearcut as parachutes, this is still an area where we can reasonably conclude that the vaccine is vastly safer than being unvaccinated.
criticaltinker 5y ago
Just to be clear, you're arguing against evidence based medicine and instead advocating for hasty generalization and jumping to conclusions based on the absence of evidence. Somewhere between our two points is an optimal middle ground. The holy grail of exclusively evidence based interventions is lofty no doubt, and we'll have to do the best with what we know right now, but to aim for anything less is quite difficult to defend.
- handoflixue 5y ago
  I can't fathom how you could misinterpret a post saying "there's a difference between evidence and peer reviewed academic standards" to conclude that I've abandoned the idea of evidence entirely. I don't need an academic, peer-reviewed study to tell me that using this site is safe. I don't need one to tell me that masks are safe. It's NICE to have such things, and I'm NOT opposed to them, but they are also NOT necessary for day-to-day reasoning. I do think we should continue vaccine trials, because we might uncover subtle risks. But until we do, we are in fact at a point where we can conclude that the vaccine is significantly safer than going unvaccinated. What we expect to find going forward is small refinements like "X group should prioritize Y vaccine", not "Y vaccine is in fact more dangerous than Covid"
  - criticaltinker 5y ago
    You're attacking a straw man here, my original comment was about the lack of evidence for vaccine safety in certain understudied sub-populations. > we are in fact at a point where we can conclude that the vaccine is significantly safer than going unvaccinated You keep coming back to "vaccinated versus unvaccinated" rhetoric and using irrelevant logical reasoning to argue that we should hastily generalize safety results to these sub-populations without citing any scientific literature supporting your claim. The reality of the situation is a lot more complex, and it's obvious you're neglecting these nuances because for example, you fail to acknowledge how immunity acquired through natural infection is a major factor in the tradeoffs of vaccinating these understudied sub-populations. I'm open to further debate, but I won't continue responding if you continue to raise the same unsupported arguments.

dhanvanthri 5y ago

Parachutes have not been subjected to rigorous evaluation by using randomized controlled trials. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC300808/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC300808/ :D

criticaltinker 5y ago
Had to up-vote because this is hilarious, thanks for sharing. As a critique of evidence based medicine they've clearly demonstrated their point, but it's obviously philosophical and the tradeoffs of practical medical interventions are no where near as clear cut as the case of falling from the sky without a parachute.
- handoflixue 5y ago
  We have a known-safe vaccine that has been tested on millions of people. We have a known-deadly pandemic that has killed almost 4.5 million people. While we are not QUITE as clearcut as parachutes, this is still an area where we can reasonably conclude that the vaccine is vastly safer than being unvaccinated.

criticaltinker 5y ago

Just to be clear, you're arguing against evidence based medicine and instead advocating for hasty generalization and jumping to conclusions based on the absence of evidence. Somewhere between our two points is an optimal middle ground. The holy grail of exclusively evidence based interventions is lofty no doubt, and we'll have to do the best with what we know right now, but to aim for anything less is quite difficult to defend.

handoflixue 5y ago
I can't fathom how you could misinterpret a post saying "there's a difference between evidence and peer reviewed academic standards" to conclude that I've abandoned the idea of evidence entirely. I don't need an academic, peer-reviewed study to tell me that using this site is safe. I don't need one to tell me that masks are safe. It's NICE to have such things, and I'm NOT opposed to them, but they are also NOT necessary for day-to-day reasoning. I do think we should continue vaccine trials, because we might uncover subtle risks. But until we do, we are in fact at a point where we can conclude that the vaccine is significantly safer than going unvaccinated. What we expect to find going forward is small refinements like "X group should prioritize Y vaccine", not "Y vaccine is in fact more dangerous than Covid"
- criticaltinker 5y ago
  You're attacking a straw man here, my original comment was about the lack of evidence for vaccine safety in certain understudied sub-populations. > we are in fact at a point where we can conclude that the vaccine is significantly safer than going unvaccinated You keep coming back to "vaccinated versus unvaccinated" rhetoric and using irrelevant logical reasoning to argue that we should hastily generalize safety results to these sub-populations without citing any scientific literature supporting your claim. The reality of the situation is a lot more complex, and it's obvious you're neglecting these nuances because for example, you fail to acknowledge how immunity acquired through natural infection is a major factor in the tradeoffs of vaccinating these understudied sub-populations. I'm open to further debate, but I won't continue responding if you continue to raise the same unsupported arguments.