21 ms·

I feel like COVID has become like a marshmallow test for adults, where those who can manage their emotions and make rational decisions can set themselves up for

I feel like COVID has become like a marshmallow test for adults, where those who can manage their emotions and make rational decisions can set themselves up for greater long-term rewards. It looked for a while there like this could be a thing that gets “done”—that we would get a good vaccine into enough people, then incidence would decline so far it just goes away. That didn’t happen. We’re stuck with it for a foreseeable future. Well, one can cry for the world that was, or one can get up and live in the world that is. We’re not going to be done with vaccines and mandates. And that does not have to be a big deal. I have had to prove vaccination status of my kid for schools and camps for years. It’s annoying but not any harder than keeping my car registration up to date or any other minor bureaucratic headache. I know someone who almost quit a great job because they were mad about a vaccine mandate from their employer. They were going to give up a good salary, great benefits, and a stable career because they were “so over COVID.” That is what failing the marshmallow test looks like.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
claytongulick 5y ago
It's interesting that you phrase it that way, because I was thinking exactly the same thing, but from the opposite direction. I caught covid early, and while (for me) it was a nasty bug, I recovered with nothing more than a lingering cough for several weeks. Against enormous pressure I decided not to get vaccinated. Everything I read supported that natural immunity is at least as protective as the vaccine, and most studies I've seen say it is much better. This makes sense to me, a natural immune response in a healthy person should be stronger than a vaccine, given that all a vaccine is supposed to do is "train" your immune system via an immune response to a "simulation" of the actual virus (apologies for the gross oversimplification). I thought the marshmallow test was in the other direction - the millions of people who acquired natural immunity through infection, but "grabbed the marshmallow" in the form of the vaccine. What will the long term effects be? We don't know. FWIW, my immunity does seem to have been pretty effective, since I just tested positive for Covid. My only symptoms were a light headache and backache. My wife, however was sick for around three days with fever and sore throat laying right next to me in bed, coughing. I took care of her, kissed her on the forehead, etc... I didn't get as much as a sniffle.
- mizzack 5y ago
  The free donut test.
- spenczar5 5y ago
  If you don’t mind, why not get vaccinated? Like, what is the downside? I know this is a dangerous topic, especially on the internet with strangers, so feel free to just not respond - that would be understandable. But I am curious to hear your thought process.
  - luke_value 5y ago
    He has natural immunity. There are literally only downside risks from taking the shot. Who gets vaccinated for a disease they already had? No one gets measles and THEN gets vaccinated.
    - jeremyjh 5y ago
      - axiosgunnar 5y ago
        What does any of this have to do with any kind of political spectrum? It is laughable to try to turn everything into left-right politics. Is eating pineapple pizza leftwing or rightwing extremism?
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - curmudgeon22 5y ago
        There are risks from the vaccines, even if they are rare. Why expose yourself if you're protected already? Myocarditis being the main one: - Postmarketing data demonstrate increased risks of myocarditis and pericarditis, particularly within 7 days following the second dose. [1] - The true incidence of myopericarditis is markedly higher than the incidence reported to US advisory committees. (preprint) [2] [1] https://www.fda.gov/media/151707/download https://www.fda.gov/media/151707/download [2] https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.21.21268209v1.full.pdf https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.21.21268209v...
recursive 5y ago
I think the marshmallow test is pretty flawed itself. But maybe the marshmallow test is actually a good analogy. I suspect many of the test "failures" were caused because the test subject (kid) didn't trust the authority figure (test administrator). When you can see a marshmallow with your own eyes, it's more believable. I think it's quite reasonable to factor in some probability that an untrusted stranger would "alter the deal". If you take the marshmallow now, no one can bait-and-switch you. And it's starting to look like a pretty good description. There are plenty of people who were on-board with the "temporary" restrictions initially who are now doubting that these promised marshmallows are ever going to be delivered. I'm vaxxed. And I'm done. Good luck on getting your marshmallows.
- at_a_remove 5y ago
  "Just two weeks to flatten the curve!"
  - rhino369 5y ago
    I would be in favor of a two week shut down to act like a short circuit breaker for Omicron. But I have no trust in local authorities, who let "two weeks" turn into months of restrictions even when hospitalization rates were low in 2020.
- HideousKojima 5y ago
  The fact that college campuses (which have ~100% vaccination rates as well as young student bodies that are far less likely to face severe symptoms from COVID) are reinstituting lockdowns makes it abundantly clear that the marshmallows are never, ever coming.
  - DaltonCoffee 5y ago
    Some college campuses could also be better choices for lockdows because they're hotbeds of international students.
    - 5y ago
disambiguation 5y ago
This pandemic has more in common is the Milgram and Asch experiment than the Marshmallow Test.
- kkjjkgjjgg 5y ago
  Listen to the scientists!
bko 5y ago
> It looked for a while there like this could be a thing that gets “done”—that we would get a good vaccine into enough people, then incidence would decline so far it just goes away... That didn’t happen. We’re stuck with it for a foreseeable future. Well, one can cry for the world that was, or one can get up and live in the world that is. Whats the magic number? There are places like New York that have 95% over 18 with at least 1 vaccine and 83.3% with completed vaccination status. But the problems still persist and the entire focus is on those last few percent of people moving the needle, when in the past we've been told "herd immunity" would be conservatively reached at ~70%. https://coronavirus.health.ny.gov/vaccination-progress-date https://coronavirus.health.ny.gov/vaccination-progress-date
- ekanes 5y ago
  In a pandemic, I think herd immunity is a worldwide concept more than localized.
- holbrad 5y ago
  It's almost like the COVID vaccines don't work very well to prevent spread. (It clearly helps against being hospitalised)
  - creato 5y ago
    It’s almost like the variants of the virus prevalent today are very, very different from those when those estimates were produced.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    And death. And hopefully against long COVID (prior to infection, that is).
  - rhino369 5y ago
    Then you can't blame continued high cases on the unvaccinated and you can't expect the covid risk to go away. The at-risk should get used to wearing an N95 mask, but I'm done complying with mitigation measures (I'll get future boosters if they actually do anything for me).
jdminhbg 5y ago
> ... set themselves up for greater long-term rewards Such as?
- typon 5y ago
  Having a job, presumably
  - jgod 5y ago
    Sounds like the Weinstein method, writ large
- jogu 5y ago
  I agree, the reward is neither clear nor consistent to individuals. It's also worth nothing the sacrifice to be made isn't consistent and is highly subjective to an individual. A single person who moved to a new town and spends months isolated, or a business owner, etc. is making very different sacrifices from a person who's in a stable marriage with a family working a software engineering job.
- snowwrestler 5y ago
  Personal health, health of friends and family, continued employment, etc.
TimTheTinker 5y ago
> I know someone who almost quit a great job because they were mad about a vaccine mandate from their employer. [...] That is what failing the marshmallow test looks like. Or perhaps it's a matter of personal principle. Personal conscience and conviction used to be held sacred in the US ... to the point that conscientious objectors wouldn't be forced to fight in wars (they could be assigned to work as medics in Army MASH units, for example, as my grandfather was in the Korean war). In modern US politics, it has become politically incorrect to have a personal principle or conviction that contradicts the approved viewpoint, or otherwise goes against the grain. Because consideration for personal liberty has gone by the wayside, people are reacting by flatly refusing to be vaccinated. Many are convinced that the vaccine is actually harmful... and I'm convinced that viewpoint only gained traction because of the strong-arming going on in government. It would have been much better to communicate clearly what we know, keep updating that communication regularly as new data comes in, fund efforts to develop and distribute vaccines, and let people choose without mandating anything. I'd bet the world would look very different today, and far more people would be vaccinated, if the US government had taken this route.
- sobellian 5y ago
  Scattershot vaccine mandates have increased the number of vaccinated. Those left will naturally have resisted some amount of authority, but that observation basically amounts to survivor bias - and it doesn't explain why those individuals failed to get the vaccine before there ever was a mandate.
  - wallacoloo 5y ago
    we’re dealing in counterfactuals here, so we’ll never truly know. one possibility is that vaccine mandates brought a large portion of those on-the-fence in to get a vaccine sooner than later, at the cost of pushing others on-the-fence way far away from ever getting the vaccine. i.e. a short-term boost in vax numbers at the cost of long-term rates. maybe worth it, maybe not (there’s so many second order effects). in any case, i have friends here in progressive seattle who were part of the “vaccinate and done” group back in Apr/May but once the governor used vaccine uptake as an excuse to enforce new mandates now say “i’ll get the booster once i know doing so means i get to go back to normal”. so mandates definitely do push a certain type of otherwise compliant person away from getting the vaccine. i only have anecdata, but i think it’s worth keeping an eye on that viewpoint. could this “vaccine and done” group grow into a “reject mandates (including boosters) and done” if the mandates prevent them from actually being “done”?
twblalock 5y ago
"Vaxxed and done" is the marshmallow! The article's description of the "vaxxed and done" mindset is not very different from what you have described -- we accept that the disease will be endemic, and we treat Covid like we treat the flu, including keeping up with annual shots.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
belorn 5y ago
> I know someone who almost quit a great job because they were mad about a vaccine mandate from their employer. That situation is impossible to assess without knowing the job description. I would also be hesitant to work at a place if the employer demands vaccinations because they are refusing remote work even when the job description does not require it. We have a pandemic and employers need to minimize unnecessary risks like open floor plans and crowded meetings rooms for employees that doesn't need physical proximity in order to do their job. On the other hand if the job description is being in a hospital or elder care facility, it would be irresponsible to let nonvaccinated employees treat clients. Everything between is a sliding scale that in a pandemic should lean towards safe rather than unsafe.
- eternalban 5y ago
  If an employer demands vaccination they should be liable for all possible adverse effects, including indefinite long term care costs.
  - belorn 5y ago
    They should have the same liability as to anyone which interacts with the company or organizations, including patients outcomes in hospitals. If a patients get infected by a sick doctor or nurse, the fault is at the employer who allowed that situation from happening. Every person who get injured at work is to some degree harmed by the company that allowed that injury to occur. This is why companies has insurance to deal with that. If vaccinations is required for the job then getting vaccinations is by definition work, should happen during paid hours, and any adverse effects dealt with as with any other work related adverse effects.
    - eternalban 5y ago
      But unlike work related injuries, we simply do not know when adverse effect will manifest. If, for example, an employee leaves a company shortly after submitting to vaccination mandated by her employer for continued employment, at most the insurance coverage will extend for a month after termination.
lawn 5y ago
The marshmallow test has more to do with kids coming from a poor family, where it's the rational action to take what you can now as the opportunity disappears quickly, rather than with their willpower.
defaultprimate 5y ago
- robertoandred 5y ago
  What sort of long-term effects? Which harmful vaccine are you using as a reference?
  - defaultprimate 5y ago
    Who knows? That's the point.
    - Steltek 5y ago
      The mRNA Covid vaccines do not alter your DNA. Conspiracy theorist nonsense and lies don't belong in this forum.
      - defaultprimate 5y ago
        Steltek 5y ago
        One of the co-author's of that pre-print paper does not agree with your interpretation of his work. > “There is absolutely no reason to believe that any of the vaccine mRNA is doing the same thing. The viral spike protein mRNA is a tiny piece. Vaccines are not inducing LINE element RTs,” said Young. “Vaccines are protecting against the possibility of long-term seriously debilitating diseases or death.” So yes, you are spreading anti-vax conspiracy theories. And this is why misinformation is treated as dangerous. It takes too much time and effort to repair the damage caused by this insane drivel. (Also, other readers should note that OP edited his comment after my reply to remove the DNA modification boogeyman, although he seems to have doubled-down on it...)
        5y ago
wilde 5y ago
The marshmallow test has been largely debunked by recent follow up studies. It largely acts as a test of socioeconomic conditions at home if anything. The analogy to COVID probably holds but not in the way you’re suggesting. https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/marshmallow-test/561779/ https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/marshmall...
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ellyagg 5y ago
Your marshmallow test framing fails for me. Just as it is often important to signal community and solidarity, it is also often important to signal individuality and resistance to authority.
xapata 5y ago
> It looked for a while there like this could be a thing that gets “done”—that we would get a good vaccine into enough people, then incidence would decline so far it just goes away. Coronaviruses in general are endemic to humans, and SARS-CoV-2 in particular appears to infect animals. Even if at some point no humans carried the disease, it'd still come back from some cross-species transmission. The only "done" state I ever expected is/was the same situation we have with influenza -- annual vaccine and seasonal waves of illness.
rexpop 5y ago
> one can cry for the world that was, or one can get up and live in the world that is. This is certainly beside the (your) point, but it's worth mentioning that mourning and grief (ie, to "cry for the world that was") is a crucial and possibly unskippable component to "live in the world that is." They're certainly not mutually exclusive activities, and I'd love to see more STEM demographics recognize the former's necessity.
throwawaylinux 5y ago
I'm not going to get vaccinated, and it is out of pride and the principle of it. I'm fortunate that I probably won't lose my job and if I did I would be fine financially. And I am in the age and health range where the absolute benefit of getting vaccinated is vanishingly small. So I don't pretend I'm some martyr or sacrificing for my principles. But it is my own small personal protest. I have many reasons. Unrepentant corrupt, incompetent, and lying governments and pharmaceutical corporations are among them. But the biggest ones are my anger for coercion and threats of financial ruin people have suffered; the collectivization of health and personal responsibility; and finally I just don't like the way I'm spoken to about it and so I take great pleasure in the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the ruling class enraged by the commoners who refuse to bow down and submit to them.
upsidesinclude 5y ago
tekknik 5y ago
> We’re not going to be done with vaccines and mandates. And that does not have to be a big deal. Sure it does. My body, my choice. I have no problem quarantining myself and have left my house less than 40 times in 2 years. I’m quite capable of managing my health and preventing others from getting what I don’t have so why take the risk with the vaccine? Do you believe that there are no long term effects?

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

claytongulick 5y ago

It's interesting that you phrase it that way, because I was thinking exactly the same thing, but from the opposite direction. I caught covid early, and while (for me) it was a nasty bug, I recovered with nothing more than a lingering cough for several weeks. Against enormous pressure I decided not to get vaccinated. Everything I read supported that natural immunity is at least as protective as the vaccine, and most studies I've seen say it is much better. This makes sense to me, a natural immune response in a healthy person should be stronger than a vaccine, given that all a vaccine is supposed to do is "train" your immune system via an immune response to a "simulation" of the actual virus (apologies for the gross oversimplification). I thought the marshmallow test was in the other direction - the millions of people who acquired natural immunity through infection, but "grabbed the marshmallow" in the form of the vaccine. What will the long term effects be? We don't know. FWIW, my immunity does seem to have been pretty effective, since I just tested positive for Covid. My only symptoms were a light headache and backache. My wife, however was sick for around three days with fever and sore throat laying right next to me in bed, coughing. I took care of her, kissed her on the forehead, etc... I didn't get as much as a sniffle.

mizzack 5y ago
The free donut test.
spenczar5 5y ago
If you don’t mind, why not get vaccinated? Like, what is the downside? I know this is a dangerous topic, especially on the internet with strangers, so feel free to just not respond - that would be understandable. But I am curious to hear your thought process.
- luke_value 5y ago
  He has natural immunity. There are literally only downside risks from taking the shot. Who gets vaccinated for a disease they already had? No one gets measles and THEN gets vaccinated.
  - jeremyjh 5y ago
    - axiosgunnar 5y ago
      What does any of this have to do with any kind of political spectrum? It is laughable to try to turn everything into left-right politics. Is eating pineapple pizza leftwing or rightwing extremism?
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
    - curmudgeon22 5y ago
      There are risks from the vaccines, even if they are rare. Why expose yourself if you're protected already? Myocarditis being the main one: - Postmarketing data demonstrate increased risks of myocarditis and pericarditis, particularly within 7 days following the second dose. [1] - The true incidence of myopericarditis is markedly higher than the incidence reported to US advisory committees. (preprint) [2] [1] https://www.fda.gov/media/151707/download https://www.fda.gov/media/151707/download [2] https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.21.21268209v1.full.pdf https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.21.21268209v...

recursive 5y ago

I think the marshmallow test is pretty flawed itself. But maybe the marshmallow test is actually a good analogy. I suspect many of the test "failures" were caused because the test subject (kid) didn't trust the authority figure (test administrator). When you can see a marshmallow with your own eyes, it's more believable. I think it's quite reasonable to factor in some probability that an untrusted stranger would "alter the deal". If you take the marshmallow now, no one can bait-and-switch you. And it's starting to look like a pretty good description. There are plenty of people who were on-board with the "temporary" restrictions initially who are now doubting that these promised marshmallows are ever going to be delivered. I'm vaxxed. And I'm done. Good luck on getting your marshmallows.

at_a_remove 5y ago
"Just two weeks to flatten the curve!"
- rhino369 5y ago
  I would be in favor of a two week shut down to act like a short circuit breaker for Omicron. But I have no trust in local authorities, who let "two weeks" turn into months of restrictions even when hospitalization rates were low in 2020.
HideousKojima 5y ago
The fact that college campuses (which have ~100% vaccination rates as well as young student bodies that are far less likely to face severe symptoms from COVID) are reinstituting lockdowns makes it abundantly clear that the marshmallows are never, ever coming.
- DaltonCoffee 5y ago
  Some college campuses could also be better choices for lockdows because they're hotbeds of international students.
  - 5y ago

disambiguation 5y ago

This pandemic has more in common is the Milgram and Asch experiment than the Marshmallow Test.

kkjjkgjjgg 5y ago
Listen to the scientists!

bko 5y ago

> It looked for a while there like this could be a thing that gets “done”—that we would get a good vaccine into enough people, then incidence would decline so far it just goes away... That didn’t happen. We’re stuck with it for a foreseeable future. Well, one can cry for the world that was, or one can get up and live in the world that is. Whats the magic number? There are places like New York that have 95% over 18 with at least 1 vaccine and 83.3% with completed vaccination status. But the problems still persist and the entire focus is on those last few percent of people moving the needle, when in the past we've been told "herd immunity" would be conservatively reached at ~70%. https://coronavirus.health.ny.gov/vaccination-progress-date https://coronavirus.health.ny.gov/vaccination-progress-date

ekanes 5y ago
In a pandemic, I think herd immunity is a worldwide concept more than localized.
holbrad 5y ago
It's almost like the COVID vaccines don't work very well to prevent spread. (It clearly helps against being hospitalised)
- creato 5y ago
  It’s almost like the variants of the virus prevalent today are very, very different from those when those estimates were produced.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  And death. And hopefully against long COVID (prior to infection, that is).
- rhino369 5y ago
  Then you can't blame continued high cases on the unvaccinated and you can't expect the covid risk to go away. The at-risk should get used to wearing an N95 mask, but I'm done complying with mitigation measures (I'll get future boosters if they actually do anything for me).

jdminhbg 5y ago

> ... set themselves up for greater long-term rewards Such as?

typon 5y ago
Having a job, presumably
- jgod 5y ago
  Sounds like the Weinstein method, writ large
jogu 5y ago
I agree, the reward is neither clear nor consistent to individuals. It's also worth nothing the sacrifice to be made isn't consistent and is highly subjective to an individual. A single person who moved to a new town and spends months isolated, or a business owner, etc. is making very different sacrifices from a person who's in a stable marriage with a family working a software engineering job.
snowwrestler 5y ago
Personal health, health of friends and family, continued employment, etc.

TimTheTinker 5y ago

> I know someone who almost quit a great job because they were mad about a vaccine mandate from their employer. [...] That is what failing the marshmallow test looks like. Or perhaps it's a matter of personal principle. Personal conscience and conviction used to be held sacred in the US ... to the point that conscientious objectors wouldn't be forced to fight in wars (they could be assigned to work as medics in Army MASH units, for example, as my grandfather was in the Korean war). In modern US politics, it has become politically incorrect to have a personal principle or conviction that contradicts the approved viewpoint, or otherwise goes against the grain. Because consideration for personal liberty has gone by the wayside, people are reacting by flatly refusing to be vaccinated. Many are convinced that the vaccine is actually harmful... and I'm convinced that viewpoint only gained traction because of the strong-arming going on in government. It would have been much better to communicate clearly what we know, keep updating that communication regularly as new data comes in, fund efforts to develop and distribute vaccines, and let people choose without mandating anything. I'd bet the world would look very different today, and far more people would be vaccinated, if the US government had taken this route.

sobellian 5y ago
Scattershot vaccine mandates have increased the number of vaccinated. Those left will naturally have resisted some amount of authority, but that observation basically amounts to survivor bias - and it doesn't explain why those individuals failed to get the vaccine before there ever was a mandate.
- wallacoloo 5y ago
  we’re dealing in counterfactuals here, so we’ll never truly know. one possibility is that vaccine mandates brought a large portion of those on-the-fence in to get a vaccine sooner than later, at the cost of pushing others on-the-fence way far away from ever getting the vaccine. i.e. a short-term boost in vax numbers at the cost of long-term rates. maybe worth it, maybe not (there’s so many second order effects). in any case, i have friends here in progressive seattle who were part of the “vaccinate and done” group back in Apr/May but once the governor used vaccine uptake as an excuse to enforce new mandates now say “i’ll get the booster once i know doing so means i get to go back to normal”. so mandates definitely do push a certain type of otherwise compliant person away from getting the vaccine. i only have anecdata, but i think it’s worth keeping an eye on that viewpoint. could this “vaccine and done” group grow into a “reject mandates (including boosters) and done” if the mandates prevent them from actually being “done”?

twblalock 5y ago

"Vaxxed and done" is the marshmallow! The article's description of the "vaxxed and done" mindset is not very different from what you have described -- we accept that the disease will be endemic, and we treat Covid like we treat the flu, including keeping up with annual shots.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

belorn 5y ago

> I know someone who almost quit a great job because they were mad about a vaccine mandate from their employer. That situation is impossible to assess without knowing the job description. I would also be hesitant to work at a place if the employer demands vaccinations because they are refusing remote work even when the job description does not require it. We have a pandemic and employers need to minimize unnecessary risks like open floor plans and crowded meetings rooms for employees that doesn't need physical proximity in order to do their job. On the other hand if the job description is being in a hospital or elder care facility, it would be irresponsible to let nonvaccinated employees treat clients. Everything between is a sliding scale that in a pandemic should lean towards safe rather than unsafe.

eternalban 5y ago
If an employer demands vaccination they should be liable for all possible adverse effects, including indefinite long term care costs.
- belorn 5y ago
  They should have the same liability as to anyone which interacts with the company or organizations, including patients outcomes in hospitals. If a patients get infected by a sick doctor or nurse, the fault is at the employer who allowed that situation from happening. Every person who get injured at work is to some degree harmed by the company that allowed that injury to occur. This is why companies has insurance to deal with that. If vaccinations is required for the job then getting vaccinations is by definition work, should happen during paid hours, and any adverse effects dealt with as with any other work related adverse effects.
  - eternalban 5y ago
    But unlike work related injuries, we simply do not know when adverse effect will manifest. If, for example, an employee leaves a company shortly after submitting to vaccination mandated by her employer for continued employment, at most the insurance coverage will extend for a month after termination.

lawn 5y ago

The marshmallow test has more to do with kids coming from a poor family, where it's the rational action to take what you can now as the opportunity disappears quickly, rather than with their willpower.

defaultprimate 5y ago

robertoandred 5y ago
What sort of long-term effects? Which harmful vaccine are you using as a reference?
- defaultprimate 5y ago
  Who knows? That's the point.
  - Steltek 5y ago
    The mRNA Covid vaccines do not alter your DNA. Conspiracy theorist nonsense and lies don't belong in this forum.
    - defaultprimate 5y ago
      - Steltek 5y ago
        One of the co-author's of that pre-print paper does not agree with your interpretation of his work. > “There is absolutely no reason to believe that any of the vaccine mRNA is doing the same thing. The viral spike protein mRNA is a tiny piece. Vaccines are not inducing LINE element RTs,” said Young. “Vaccines are protecting against the possibility of long-term seriously debilitating diseases or death.” So yes, you are spreading anti-vax conspiracy theories. And this is why misinformation is treated as dangerous. It takes too much time and effort to repair the damage caused by this insane drivel. (Also, other readers should note that OP edited his comment after my reply to remove the DNA modification boogeyman, although he seems to have doubled-down on it...)
        5y ago

wilde 5y ago

The marshmallow test has been largely debunked by recent follow up studies. It largely acts as a test of socioeconomic conditions at home if anything. The analogy to COVID probably holds but not in the way you’re suggesting. https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/marshmallow-test/561779/ https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/marshmall...

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

ellyagg 5y ago

Your marshmallow test framing fails for me. Just as it is often important to signal community and solidarity, it is also often important to signal individuality and resistance to authority.

xapata 5y ago

> It looked for a while there like this could be a thing that gets “done”—that we would get a good vaccine into enough people, then incidence would decline so far it just goes away. Coronaviruses in general are endemic to humans, and SARS-CoV-2 in particular appears to infect animals. Even if at some point no humans carried the disease, it'd still come back from some cross-species transmission. The only "done" state I ever expected is/was the same situation we have with influenza -- annual vaccine and seasonal waves of illness.

rexpop 5y ago

> one can cry for the world that was, or one can get up and live in the world that is. This is certainly beside the (your) point, but it's worth mentioning that mourning and grief (ie, to "cry for the world that was") is a crucial and possibly unskippable component to "live in the world that is." They're certainly not mutually exclusive activities, and I'd love to see more STEM demographics recognize the former's necessity.

throwawaylinux 5y ago

I'm not going to get vaccinated, and it is out of pride and the principle of it. I'm fortunate that I probably won't lose my job and if I did I would be fine financially. And I am in the age and health range where the absolute benefit of getting vaccinated is vanishingly small. So I don't pretend I'm some martyr or sacrificing for my principles. But it is my own small personal protest. I have many reasons. Unrepentant corrupt, incompetent, and lying governments and pharmaceutical corporations are among them. But the biggest ones are my anger for coercion and threats of financial ruin people have suffered; the collectivization of health and personal responsibility; and finally I just don't like the way I'm spoken to about it and so I take great pleasure in the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the ruling class enraged by the commoners who refuse to bow down and submit to them.

upsidesinclude 5y ago

tekknik 5y ago

> We’re not going to be done with vaccines and mandates. And that does not have to be a big deal. Sure it does. My body, my choice. I have no problem quarantining myself and have left my house less than 40 times in 2 years. I’m quite capable of managing my health and preventing others from getting what I don’t have so why take the risk with the vaccine? Do you believe that there are no long term effects?