FACT vs OPINION

[Thumbs Up]

A lot of today's (and yesterday's) facts are being promoted with very deep wallets. This is something that has not been brought up yet in this conversation. Did anyone look at the video that I posted last night? It is about (in part) how Sigmund Freud's nephew, Eddie Bernays, re-invented propaganda (by calling it public relations) and his influence on society. Bernays published Propaganda http://whale.to/b/bernays.pdf and the essay The Engineering of Consent http://www.fraw.org.uk/data/politics/bernays_1947.pdf

In the eyes of the public, truth, and facts are pretty much for sale. Expert opinions are for sale. When you say that something is probably true on the basis of evidence you have to look at who paid for that evidence. These entities have very deep pockets. They can pretty much prove whatever they want.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by valhalla360

Not moving the goal posts...You are finally starting to grasp my point.

"Hoaxes" are generally though of as extreme. So by phrasing it as a hoax, we assume those people have an extreme view...aka, the whole thing is made a made up hoax.

Now if qualified as you did "it's a hoax, to some degree", it's still a biased way to phrase it but that's a lot closer to reality but that wouldn't have drawn the same gasps of fear over how many crazy people are out there. In fact, people might wonder why the percentage isn't even higher.

It's not productive to be debating your (shifting) assumptions about a survey or its results, neither of which you've actually seen, let alone linked to. Where's YOUR facts?

You're simply casting about for hypotheticals to debate with.

[Thumbs Up]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

God I know , Skynet is coming , run for the hills, arm yourself to the teeth

The real SKYNET: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SKYNET...lance_program)

[Jason Flare]

Originally Posted by Dsanduril

So, by your numbers there are ~16k deaths FROM Covid in the US this year. At ~40k annual deaths from traffic accidents that would say that 40% of all traffic fatalities are from driving to Covid tests. A little hard to find that credulous, you'll have to provide some facts on number of miles driven, etc. to back up the idea that driving to Covid tests represents 40% of driving miles/fatalities (for myself, I have driven to two Covid tests, am still alive, and driving to the two tests represents far less than 1% of the driving I have done this year).

When there were 151,000 deaths attributed to covid the CDC clarified the numbers.

94% of the 151,000 had an average of 2.6 additional causes of death besides covid.

About 9,000 people had died with covid as the sole cause of death.

ETA: These are causes of death on the death certificate.

[Singularity]

Originally Posted by valhalla360

More like calls the horse has left the barn while I'm sitting there watching him munch on hay in his stall.

The 35% number is completely non-credible.

Given research from Pew linked below, I'd suggest your insight and research on this subject is completely non-credible, while normative for certain types of people who get paid to obfuscate (sort of, perhaps, what this thread is about).

https://www.journalism.org/2020/06/2...might-be-true/

[Thumbs Up]

Originally Posted by Singularity

Given research from Pew linked below, I'd suggest your insight and research on this subject is completely non-credible, while normative for certain types of people who get paid to obfuscate (sort of, perhaps, what this thread is about).

https://www.journalism.org/2020/06/2...might-be-true/

But isn't PEW a globalist think tank with deep pockets?

[SalingSue]

Originally Posted by Singularity

Given research from Pew linked below, I'd suggest your insight and research on this subject is completely non-credible, while normative for certain types of people who get paid to obfuscate (sort of, perhaps, what this thread is about).

https://www.journalism.org/2020/06/2...might-be-true/

Oh education lol

My favorite bartenders had masters degrees, and roommates lol


Honestly a degree doesn’t mean squat to me, so me your history in real world accomplishments.

Whatever the person with 6 figures in debt for a going nowhere liberal arts degree thinks is a good idea, do the opposite

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

God I know , Skynet is coming , run for the hills, arm yourself to the teeth

At least the machines would make choices based on numbers and logic, not mindless fear and greed and virtue

Also being armed = being free, so I’d hope folks are armed and proficient, that’s a good thing

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Jason Flare

When there were 151,000 deaths attributed to covid the CDC clarified the numbers.

94% of the 151,000 had an average of 2.6 additional causes of death besides covid.

About 9,000 people had died with covid as the sole cause of death.

ETA: These are causes of death on the death certificate.

To be completely pedantic, NO-ONE has actually died from the COVID-19 virus. They die from the body's response to it - flooded lungs, organ damage, stress to heart, etc.

Further - when completing death certificates, doctors will list that separate effect as cause of death - most commonly pneumonia, etc. Doesn't mean that those were pre-existing comorbidities; they were most often a consequence of having COVID-19.

And, if John has emphysema, catches COVID-19, and dies... how is that not a COVID-19 death, if John had good prospects for living a few more years otherwise?

That 9k number is grossly misleading when used like above. It's a deliberate attempt to downplay the severity of COVID-19.

[Jason Flare]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

That 9k number is grossly misleading when used like above. It's a deliberate attempt to downplay the severity of COVID-19.

Take it up with the CDC.

https://www.cdc.gov/contact/index.htm

[Mike OReilly]

Originally Posted by valhalla360

The whole point of using the "appeal to authority" fallacy is to claim some professional or other specialty knowledge that the general public cannot have...so at best you are playing at semantics to claim you weren't talking about professional titles.

No need to get huffy. I stated a FACT. I said nothing about professional status. One can be an expert without lots of letters after their name. But it is a useful shorthand in many cases.

Originally Posted by valhalla360

As far as an immunologist from Cornell...I still want the debate based on the facts (in so far as we can know facts). An immunologist may have spent his entire career in a lab with zero knowledge of public policy, how people react to restrictions or what the collateral impacts may be, so before we hand over full control of the response, we need more than if he has a piece of paper.

That's why we need experts in public policy as well. I never said, or implied, otherwise.

[Kelkara]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

The question is NOT misleading. It contains no falsehoods. The only 'trick' is that most people have strong preconcieved ideas that gold is heavy and feathers are light, and these assumptions cause them to misread the question, missing the "pound" references.

No. this is exactly how confidence tricks work ... you think the trick is about density, and you think you are smart enough not to fall for it. But the trick you saw is just a diversion blinding you to the actual trick they are trying to pull. You have stronger preconceived ideas that a pound is a pound, and this assumption causes you to miss the reference to a precious metal.

It's funny that you can't engage with a pretty simple question without grasping for "alternative facts" or claiming that it is misleading..

When it comes to engaging with the question, it comes down to Gord's original intent in asking ... was he asking a simple question because he needed to learn about the relationship between weight and density ... or was he trying to trick us, and if so, how deep does his treachery run?

Knowing Gord's posts, I'm half expecting him to come back having dug up research showing that most of the universe's gold is located in gravitational fields stronger than Earth, but all the known feathers are on Earth, therefore as far as we know on average gold weighs more than feathers ... and the joke will be on me ... actually now I think about it ... birds fly, bullion doesn't ... flying takes one to higher altitude and lower gravity ... the truth is so confusing.

[Mike OReilly]

Originally Posted by Thumbs Up

Mandatory inoculations, of course. They are now running huge PR campaigns to quell what they call vaccine hesitancy.

Hmmm, like mandatory seatbelt use? Maybe... but I doubt it. More likely there will be institutional restrictions and sanctions placed on the nutbars that insist on exercising their freedom not to be inoculated.

I'd not support mandatory vacinations, but I would support allowing society rit-large to exercise its freedom to protect the general populace. We could require proof of the appropriate inoculations for those who want to do things like go to work, or school, or Walmart or the like.

Rights come with responsibilities.

[SalingSue]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

Hmmm, like mandatory seatbelt use? Maybe... but I doubt it. More likely there will be institutional restrictions and sanctions placed on the nutbars that insist on exercising their freedom not to be inoculated.

I'd not support mandatory vacinations, but I would support allowing society rit-large to exercise its freedom to protect the general populace. We could require proof of the appropriate inoculations for those who want to do things like go to work, or school, or Walmart or the like.

Rights come with responsibilities.

So you’re going to try to use force to stop people from going to work, or buying food.
That’s sounds like it has a much larger than a sub 1% chance of getting someone killed. People don’t take kindly to such things.

As for school, I’m 100% onboard, ban me from the schools and stop charging me for a product I now am legally unable to use. DEAL!!!!


I find it HILARIOUS that people so scared of a cough with a sub 1% death rate, are so fast to enter into armed conflict with strangers. Clown world

[Thumbs Up]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

Hmmm, like mandatory seatbelt use? Maybe... but I doubt it. More likely there will be institutional restrictions and sanctions placed on the nutbars that insist on exercising their freedom not to be inoculated. .....................

Pretty close to the same thing. Sanctions can be crippling and cause a lot of deaths. Classifying people as nutbars (Almond Joy?) because they don't trust the rushed research being done by convicted felon mega corporations and their revolving door with government agencies (such as FDA, and CDC) is a powerful tool right out of their psy-op playbook.

The District of Columbia is trying to make it legal for 11+ year olds to be co-erced into receiving inoculations without their parents knowledge or permission.
https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/l...3-dfceae3867d0

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Jason Flare

Take it up with the CDC.

https://www.cdc.gov/contact/index.htm

They're pretty clear on the subject: 266k deaths from COVID-19 in the US to date.

https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tra...r100klast7days