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You have to always look at the world probabilistically, and not focus entirely on results. Take a current event for example. Right now Texas has declared that t

You have to always look at the world probabilistically, and not focus entirely on results. Take a current event for example. Right now Texas has declared that they are under invasion [1], giving them a superseding constitutional right to self defense above and beyond Federal orders, and that's put them on the track for a direct conflict with Federal forces, should Biden choose to push the matter. One person might say this is ultimately going to lead to a civil war. Another person might say in a month, this will all have completely blown over. Both outcomes are possible, and so what matters is the probability. There was obviously a probability that COVID turned into what it did, there was also a probability that it simply ended up being one of the zillion other localized little nasty plagues that emerges in nations and ends up remaining localized. I'm certain you'd be surprised to learn of all the zillion potentially cataclysmic issues facing us all on a literally daily basis. That's how you get these hind-sight reports about how everything was always known but not acted on. Well yes, it was seen as a possibility and a potentially cataclysmic one - but ultimately the call was made that it probably would not come to pass. And the thing is, that may have been the case that 99.99% of the time, that would have been the right call. And we got to live through the .01%. It could also have been a completely idiotic call. Seeing leaked probabilistic modeling could help, but even then - models can be wrong, as they quite often were (frequently to an absurd degree) during COVID times. So, even there it's not so simple. [1] - https://gov.texas.gov/news/post/governor-abbott-issues-statement-on-texas-constitutional-right-to-self-defense https://gov.texas.gov/news/post/governor-abbott-issues-state...

ethanbond 3y ago
Eh, “start massively deploying tests for a novel respiratory virus” was a totally reasonable response for the information we had for sure in Jan 2020.
- somenameforme 3y ago
  There's a timeline here. [1] We started screening at airports and ports on January 17th. The first tests were created (and found to be faulty) on January 20th, before China had even issued its first public warning. This was all even though the CDC still evaluated the risk as low, and it was not clear if human to human transmission was even possible. The Wiki does not specify, but it's implied that by January 27th formal testing for all relevant entrants became mandated as we reached thousands of people being tested. By February 2nd travel restrictions were in place, which many media outlets then framed as being racist - emphasizing how the public at large was still treating the virus at that point. It does not seem like a poor response, in my opinion. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_COVID-19_pandemic_in_the_United_States_(2020) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_COVID-19_pande...
  - llamaimperative 3y ago
    Right and the timeline says that in late November 2019 the IC said there’s high risk of it becoming a cataclysmic event. Part of the argument against the Feb 2nd travel restrictions was actually that it was too late to be effective. COVID was already confirmed in the US in mid January. It had almost certainly already been circulating for weeks and obviously was definitely circulating internationally, which is why the epidemiologists weren’t advocating for a travel ban from China. I wouldn’t be surprised if it helped soften the blow a little bit, but there’s no way it was going to substantially change the course of events and there’s no way it’s a replacement for mass testing within the country. Yes, “the public at large” was mostly wrong. The IC wasn’t. The White House was privy to much more information than the public and likely even more than CDC was. That’s the whole point? Trump came out and said in June 2020 that he specifically told the federal agencies to slow down testing. Travel ban or no travel ban, that was simply the wrong decision and it was wrong for the wrong reasons (making his numbers look bad). There’s being wrong because reality is hard to parse in the moment, or because you have incomplete information, or because mistakes just happen (e.g. the botched test manufacturing) and there’s being wrong because selfish political ends dominate public health considerations. Those types of “wrong” are not equivalent.
    - somenameforme 3y ago
      We need to get back to the probability point, because you're adding a word that is not in the article you linked, nor any article to my knowledge. From the article you linked: --- "Analysts concluded [unknown disease] could be a cataclysmic event," one of the sources said of the NCMI’s report. "It was then briefed multiple times to" the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Pentagon’s Joint Staff and the White House. Wednesday night, the Pentagon issued a statement denying the "product/assessment" existed. --- There is no mention of high risk anywhere. It's just another risk among countless others. In this particular case the wording of your article is also suggestive that the initial reports were not even concerned about it coming stateside, but rather its impact on the US forces in the region. It only made it to the President's daily briefing, and seemingly only once at that, sometime in January. Also remember even well into January it wasn't clear if human transmission was possible, and it was initially have thought to have come from an animal that US forces could potentially have been exposed to - like malaria, for example.
FrustratedMonky 3y ago
Sure. There is survivor bias. I agree with all these points. What we'd debate is the assigned probabilities. Which is a bit subjective and a sliding scale. Think at that point there were definitely signs that it was not going to be nothing, and blow over. The US was much more 'head in sand' response, not as you imply, they made some reasonable calculation of probabilities.

ethanbond 3y ago

Eh, “start massively deploying tests for a novel respiratory virus” was a totally reasonable response for the information we had for sure in Jan 2020.

somenameforme 3y ago
There's a timeline here. [1] We started screening at airports and ports on January 17th. The first tests were created (and found to be faulty) on January 20th, before China had even issued its first public warning. This was all even though the CDC still evaluated the risk as low, and it was not clear if human to human transmission was even possible. The Wiki does not specify, but it's implied that by January 27th formal testing for all relevant entrants became mandated as we reached thousands of people being tested. By February 2nd travel restrictions were in place, which many media outlets then framed as being racist - emphasizing how the public at large was still treating the virus at that point. It does not seem like a poor response, in my opinion. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_COVID-19_pandemic_in_the_United_States_(2020) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_COVID-19_pande...
- llamaimperative 3y ago
  Right and the timeline says that in late November 2019 the IC said there’s high risk of it becoming a cataclysmic event. Part of the argument against the Feb 2nd travel restrictions was actually that it was too late to be effective. COVID was already confirmed in the US in mid January. It had almost certainly already been circulating for weeks and obviously was definitely circulating internationally, which is why the epidemiologists weren’t advocating for a travel ban from China. I wouldn’t be surprised if it helped soften the blow a little bit, but there’s no way it was going to substantially change the course of events and there’s no way it’s a replacement for mass testing within the country. Yes, “the public at large” was mostly wrong. The IC wasn’t. The White House was privy to much more information than the public and likely even more than CDC was. That’s the whole point? Trump came out and said in June 2020 that he specifically told the federal agencies to slow down testing. Travel ban or no travel ban, that was simply the wrong decision and it was wrong for the wrong reasons (making his numbers look bad). There’s being wrong because reality is hard to parse in the moment, or because you have incomplete information, or because mistakes just happen (e.g. the botched test manufacturing) and there’s being wrong because selfish political ends dominate public health considerations. Those types of “wrong” are not equivalent.
  - somenameforme 3y ago
    We need to get back to the probability point, because you're adding a word that is not in the article you linked, nor any article to my knowledge. From the article you linked: --- "Analysts concluded [unknown disease] could be a cataclysmic event," one of the sources said of the NCMI’s report. "It was then briefed multiple times to" the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Pentagon’s Joint Staff and the White House. Wednesday night, the Pentagon issued a statement denying the "product/assessment" existed. --- There is no mention of high risk anywhere. It's just another risk among countless others. In this particular case the wording of your article is also suggestive that the initial reports were not even concerned about it coming stateside, but rather its impact on the US forces in the region. It only made it to the President's daily briefing, and seemingly only once at that, sometime in January. Also remember even well into January it wasn't clear if human transmission was possible, and it was initially have thought to have come from an animal that US forces could potentially have been exposed to - like malaria, for example.

FrustratedMonky 3y ago

Sure. There is survivor bias. I agree with all these points. What we'd debate is the assigned probabilities. Which is a bit subjective and a sliding scale. Think at that point there were definitely signs that it was not going to be nothing, and blow over. The US was much more 'head in sand' response, not as you imply, they made some reasonable calculation of probabilities.