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I’ve been watching the vaccine discussions on HN these years and one can see that too many people are stuck fighting vaccination windmills from days gone by, wh

by blub 4y ago

I’ve been watching the vaccine discussions on HN these years and one can see that too many people are stuck fighting vaccination windmills from days gone by, while downplaying vaccine risks which by now are established and continue to be investigated as this publication shows. Meanwhile many EU countries have understood that heart problems are a real risk and have adjusted recommendations accordingly. They’ve also stopped obsessing about vaccinating people. The vaccination crusade’s dead folks, please stand by for the next pandemic.

failuser 4y ago
So you argue that you should increase the risk of death or disability by COVID by not vaccinating. Got it.
- throw4659261 4y ago
meindnoch 4y ago
It’s the paradox of intelligence: smart people are more prone to fight tooth and nail, and do all kinds of mental gymnastics, rather than to admit that they too have been misled. People of average or below average intelligence tend to accept it much more easily. I don’t know if there’s already a name for this phenomenon…
- marvin 4y ago
  Would love to see the incidence of this by IQ. My intuition says it spikes in slightly smarter-than-average folks.
  - chromatin 4y ago
    This is the so-called "midwit" meme. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/iq-bell-curve-midwit https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/iq-bell-curve-midwit
- api 4y ago
  In my experience smart people are also far more likely to create elaborate self-reinforcing systems of belief that are detached from reality. Any moron can understand the idea of a round Earth and stuff orbiting around it. It takes a genius to comprehend the sublime intricacies of ether vortex theory which explains how a flat Earth can still permit satellites to stay airborne over the plane. I've met an extremely intelligent person who was convinced we never landed on the Moon and that Stanley Kubrick faked the whole thing and left clues to this in his production of The Shining. I've also met one who thinks the Nazis invented anti-gravity and are hiding the technology to this day in underground bases in Antarctica and South America.
  - mancerayder 4y ago
    That sounds a lot more like creativity than capacity to reason logically, or a number of other facets of intelligence. That's probably part of the issue, which properties of 'intelligence' we are talking about. There are also a lot of crazy and intelligent people. I certainly know so many, it almost becomes a correlation.
    - lsllc 4y ago
      Actually, the Nazi's hid on the moon wit their anti-gravity tech: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1034314/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1034314/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0 (which is an entertaining movie if you haven't seen it).
  - rnd0 4y ago
    Were they convinced, or are you convinced that they were convinced? The Kubrick thing is an old joke (which usually ends by saying he insisted on filming "on location" for the sake of authenticity)
    - api 4y ago
      They were convinced.
- rnd0 4y ago
  I don't either. Personally speaking, after watching the effects of disinformation campaigns over the last 7 or so years -particularly regarding Covid and vaccinations I am pretty much 1,000% unwilling to listen to any "skepticism" simply because I don't trust the source that anyone is getting their information from. The only reasonable course I can see is to not take any chances and vaccinate early and vaccinate often.
  - smeej 4y ago
    Why would you trust the source on the side that's telling you something new, but not the side that's skeptical of it?
- majormajor 4y ago
  "Misled" is a stupid word for "we constantly learn more and should be adapting our positions." There is zero evidence for a "haha i told you you were being misled" position. You are performing either foolish or disingenuous logical gymnastics to equate something like "adjusted recommendations accordingly" with "it was intentionally misleading the whole time." Show me a place where people haven't adjusted their behavior as the virus has evolved, more time has passed creating more data, vaccination rounds have been administered, death rates have evolved, and exposure/infection has happened. It ain't here in liberal California, so is there any such strawman place you're arguing against in the US? Go out on the street and look around and observe that people are being rational and adapting over time instead of keeping up your silly little "haha i'm smarter than you you fell for a hoax" keyboard battle.

by blub 4y ago

failuser 4y ago

So you argue that you should increase the risk of death or disability by COVID by not vaccinating. Got it.

throw4659261 4y ago

meindnoch 4y ago

It’s the paradox of intelligence: smart people are more prone to fight tooth and nail, and do all kinds of mental gymnastics, rather than to admit that they too have been misled. People of average or below average intelligence tend to accept it much more easily. I don’t know if there’s already a name for this phenomenon…

marvin 4y ago
Would love to see the incidence of this by IQ. My intuition says it spikes in slightly smarter-than-average folks.
- chromatin 4y ago
  This is the so-called "midwit" meme. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/iq-bell-curve-midwit https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/iq-bell-curve-midwit
api 4y ago
In my experience smart people are also far more likely to create elaborate self-reinforcing systems of belief that are detached from reality. Any moron can understand the idea of a round Earth and stuff orbiting around it. It takes a genius to comprehend the sublime intricacies of ether vortex theory which explains how a flat Earth can still permit satellites to stay airborne over the plane. I've met an extremely intelligent person who was convinced we never landed on the Moon and that Stanley Kubrick faked the whole thing and left clues to this in his production of The Shining. I've also met one who thinks the Nazis invented anti-gravity and are hiding the technology to this day in underground bases in Antarctica and South America.
- mancerayder 4y ago
  That sounds a lot more like creativity than capacity to reason logically, or a number of other facets of intelligence. That's probably part of the issue, which properties of 'intelligence' we are talking about. There are also a lot of crazy and intelligent people. I certainly know so many, it almost becomes a correlation.
  - lsllc 4y ago
    Actually, the Nazi's hid on the moon wit their anti-gravity tech: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1034314/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1034314/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0 (which is an entertaining movie if you haven't seen it).
- rnd0 4y ago
  Were they convinced, or are you convinced that they were convinced? The Kubrick thing is an old joke (which usually ends by saying he insisted on filming "on location" for the sake of authenticity)
  - api 4y ago
    They were convinced.
rnd0 4y ago
I don't either. Personally speaking, after watching the effects of disinformation campaigns over the last 7 or so years -particularly regarding Covid and vaccinations I am pretty much 1,000% unwilling to listen to any "skepticism" simply because I don't trust the source that anyone is getting their information from. The only reasonable course I can see is to not take any chances and vaccinate early and vaccinate often.
- smeej 4y ago
  Why would you trust the source on the side that's telling you something new, but not the side that's skeptical of it?
majormajor 4y ago
"Misled" is a stupid word for "we constantly learn more and should be adapting our positions." There is zero evidence for a "haha i told you you were being misled" position. You are performing either foolish or disingenuous logical gymnastics to equate something like "adjusted recommendations accordingly" with "it was intentionally misleading the whole time." Show me a place where people haven't adjusted their behavior as the virus has evolved, more time has passed creating more data, vaccination rounds have been administered, death rates have evolved, and exposure/infection has happened. It ain't here in liberal California, so is there any such strawman place you're arguing against in the US? Go out on the street and look around and observe that people are being rational and adapting over time instead of keeping up your silly little "haha i'm smarter than you you fell for a hoax" keyboard battle.