patchythepirate

anonymouse said:

JWSC said:

DaRev said:

patchythepirate said:

How are people just blindly accepting these vaccine passports? How is it that so few even question something that is so obviously absurd? The fact that they don't accommodate for natural immunity, which is *superior* to the vaccine 'immunity,' should be a clear indication that we're being manipulated. Not to mention the fact that they make no sense, since people 'vaccinated' with these gene modifying agents can still catch and spread covid. It's shocking how many people are accepting these 'passports' as somehow justifiable.

Listen to the science, science is absolute and no longer open to opposing views of the facts.

Hard to tell if this post is blindly serious or slyly sarcastic.  It is such an absurd statement that no credible scientist would ever say it with a straight face.  It’s emblematic of the self assured and over-confident “science believer.”

Those who have been paying attention know that the science is still out when it comes to the delta variant.  We can find lots of opinions out there from scientists and virologists and their views are by no means homogenous.  And why would they be, since precious little data exists on vaccine efficacy on the delta variant.  Yet here we are with the peanut galley jumping ahead and making claims one way or another.  It’s noise.

Automatically labeling others who do not share your views as anti-science is at best disingenuous.  At worst it is arrogant, hypocritical, and anti-science itself.

Not responding to you George.  Hugs and kisses. 🤪

I think it's obviously sarcastic, or perhaps their idea of a parody of the idea that we should trust science. As to "labelling" others "who do not share your views" as anti-science, there is certainly no problem with saying people who express anti-science views are anti-science; let's not lump all differing views together or pretend that all opinions are equally valid. Telling someone they are wrong and/or that they don't know what they are talking about when they clearly are and/or don't is not arrogant, hypocritical or anti-science, it's simply refusing to accept their ignorance as equally valid with knowledge.

That being said, I can't imagine what you mean when you say that, "the science is still out when it comes to the delta variant." Quite a lot is known about it: it's more contagious, it appears to be more virulent, it has a higher rate of breakthrough infections compared to other variants, it seems to result in more severe illness in younger people and children than other variants. I'm sure there are some questions about it that are still unanswered, or at least not thoroughly understood — such as exactly what makes it more infectious — but, in the big picture, exactly what is "still out there"?

There's a difference between scientific certainty and scientific uncertainty on the one hand, and belief and ignorance on the other. I know the anti-science crowd like to try to create false equivalencies around these things, but they are just that, false. And let's not pretend that all knowledge that can be collected under the heading of science has the same level of uncertainty. This is also a favorite, but specious, idea that the anti-science crowd attempts to promote: "it's just a theory!". They also like to ignore the fact that they are using 'theory' in an ordinary language sense, while scientists use 'theory' in a very special sense. There are varying degrees of confirmation that apply to things that fall into any specific theory, from as near certainty as is possible for anything to highly conjectural — i.e., some things in science are "known" with essentially 100% certainty, while other things are less well confirmed and may have lesser levels of certainty. (There's also, of course the conflation of 'theory' and 'hypothesis' which are not really the same thing.)

Take evolution, a perennial favorite target of a certain faction of the anti-science crowd. That evolution occurs through the process of natural selection is so well confirmed at this point to make it a practical certainty. There is simply no scientific question about this "theory" any longer. That humans are descended from a common ancestor of other primates — apes, moneys, lemurs, bush babies — is established science, so well confirmed that there is no scientific question about it. That humans evolved somewhere in Africa, no question. Where there may be questions is in details such as, exactly what selection pressures are most likely to have caused humans to evolve to exactly the form we see ourselves in today, or which came first, tool use or language. So when one says that Evolution, with a capital 'E' is a theory, yes it is in the sense that it's a body of knowledge that in its broad strokes is so highly confirmed that there is no question of whether those broad strokes are 100% true or not, they are.

So it is with Covid-19, its variants, and vaccines. There are certain things we know, confirmed through multiple studies, that are not in question: they are known facts. There are other things we "know" that are less well confirmed, but for which we have sufficient confirmation to posit that they are very likely true. There are things we think may be true but need additional studies for confirmation. There are things that at this time are best guesses based on what we do know about Covid-19 and what we know about viruses generally, as well as other viruses similar to Covid-19 and about vaccines. And then there are things that are conjectural, or speculative.

Critics of the science on Covid-19 like to lump all the knowledge we have about Covid-19, variants and vaccines into the latter category of speculation. Largely because this supports their agenda of science denial, but it also demonstrates a profound ignorance of what scientific knowledge is and how science works.

There is no question that Covid-19 is a dangerous and often deadly disease (615K+ people in the U.S. alone dead from it). There is no question that vaccines protect those vaccinated from the risks of the disease to a very high degree. There is no question that masks are highly effective in limiting spread. There is no question that vaccines are safe and effective, and that the risk of severe side-effects from vaccines are orders of magnitude smaller than the risk of severe side-effects (including death) from infection. There is no question that the longer it takes to get everyone vaccinated, globally, the greater the risk that a new variant or strain will bypass vaccine-induced and natural immunities. And so on...

Anyone suggesting that we not listen to the scientific and medical experts, or follow their advice, on Covid-19 is speaking from either a position of ignorance or malignancy.

anonymouse said:

patchythepirate said:

I agree that 'gene modifying' was an imprecise term for me to use, but otherwise you don't do anything to disprove my points.

That's because you don't have any points, your posts are just word salad.

spice-boy said:

patchythepirate said:

How are people just blindly accepting these vaccine passports? How is it that so few even question something that is so obviously absurd? The fact that they don't accommodate for natural immunity, which is *superior* to the vaccine 'immunity,' should be a clear indication that we're being manipulated. Not to mention the fact that they make no sense, since people 'vaccinated' with these gene modifying agents can still catch and spread covid. It's shocking how many people are accepting these 'passports' as somehow justifiable.

I recall the former President who had all the kings horses and all the kings doctors working to save his life also gave him the vaccine just before he left office. People I know who got ill with Covid all got vaccinated as well. Why? Variants. Apparently those "gene modifying agents" have not made the population any more intelligent so on that count it failed. 

jslove said:

patchythepirate said:

charlesatlas said:

patchythepirate said:

How are people just blindly accepting these vaccine passports? How is it that so few even question something that is so obviously absurd? The fact that they don't accommodate for natural immunity, which is *superior* to the vaccine 'immunity,' should be a clear indication that we're being manipulated. Not to mention the fact that they make no sense, since people 'vaccinated' with these gene modifying agents can still catch and spread covid. It's shocking how many people are accepting these 'passports' as somehow justifiable.

https://www.jhsph.edu/covid-19/articles/why-covid-19-vaccines-offer-better-protection-than-infection.html

Wow, thank you for sharing that, but that is beyond absurd. I can't believe that's published on Johns Hopkins site. Extremely poorly written, lacks context, and even contradicts itself. You don't even need any outside information or knowledge to see how ridiculous this is, and conveniently, they don't reference any actual studies, just framing it as this one person's opinion.

For example, they claim that natural immunity is worse, but don't say how they came to this conclusion (antibodies? B or T cell activation?). They say they don't know how it is better, it just is, then diminish their own point by noting that the vaccines only focus on one set of antigens, the spike proteins, unlike natural immunity that can address all of the antigens on the virus. They also don't mention that focusing on spike proteins also reduces the immune response to B and T cell activation, whereas natural immunity also involves natural killer cells, macrophages, etc. They also don't mention the context of a *much* higher rate of reinfection with those who have been vaccinated vs those who have natural immunity, which shows that this limited gene therapy vaccine immunity is clearly not superior to natural immunity (which is obvious and expected).

https://showme.missouri.edu/2021/study-finds-covid-19-reinfection-rate-less-than-1-for-those-with-severe-illness/

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/309762

https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciab234/6170939

It's disturbing that an article like the one you linked is being disseminated as 'reliable' information. People need to wake up and realize that science has been politicized. 

First, I wrote this (before using forum):

patchythepirate is an appropriate name for a troll.  Here are two examples:

"...they don't accommodate for natural immunity, which is *superior* to the vaccine 'immunity'"

We do not know how to detect superior natural immunity.  Some of us may indeed be naturally immune, but we won't know about that for years.  If patchytheprirate means innate immunity, the first line of defense, that is clearly not superior, or none of us would get sick.  If the writer means acquired immunity from having had an infection, that's still not quite right.  In infection provides some immunity, vaccination is better, and the combination of having had an infection and then been vaccinated appears to be the best.  There are multiple sources for this, but I recommend the podcast, "This Week in Virology".  Chances are there are many relevant links in the notes for some of the episodes.  I'd rather listen to experts; they are available there.  "Natural immunity" in this context is sleight-of-hand; meaningless as used.

"gene modifying agents".

The vaccines are different, but we know that the ones authorized (not yet licensed) in the USA do not modify the DNA of a vaccinated person.  That is, they do not insert, delete, or change the DNA base pairs.  We may someday discover that changes in gene expression occur, but those are still the genes the cell started with, given that mutations in cell reproduction do occur, some of which lead to cancer.  How gene expression changes is another topic, but it's somewhat like changes in the state of a computer program, and expected and desirable in many contexts.  Without it, there would not be different types of cells in our bodies.

Not clear how valid the passports are or how long they should last, but manipulation via false statements is perfectly evident in their post here.
----
But then we have their response, quoted above.  It's sort of impressive in a "dropping technical terms suggests you know what you are talking about" kind of way.  So to falsify a few of the claims:

The reinfection rate for vaccinated persons is lower than for unvaccinated persons.  That's the case for vaccination.  The reinfection rate for persons who had the disease versus the reinfection rate for vaccinated persons is less analyzed, but we know there are reinfections and "breakthrough" infections among the vaccinated.  We know that the post-vaccine infections are milder and hospitalization and/or death is very unlikely; we have no such observation for post-infection reinfection.  I regard the statement that post-vaccination infections are have a much higher rate than post-infection reinfection as misleading and probably false.

Post-vaccination reinfection is really a red herring; being vaccinated is not being infected, the writer refers to people vaccinated and infected twice, which is a very small group indeed, and unlikely to be able to produce a statistically significant high rate.  These are people whose immune systems are not working well enough to protect them; they are not typical.

This is a serious disease.  You don't want to have an infection at all.  Having an infection followed by vaccination produces far more antibodies than either alone; this has been measured.  We don't know whether antibodies or T-cells are more important, but both are stimulated by vaccination.  An immunoassay can distinguish people infected from people merely vaccinated because only people previously infected have antibodies for the non-spike parts of the virus, which is useful, but may not be relevant to effective immune response.

Also, some symptoms of long covid have been reported to be reduced by post-infection vaccination, especially two shots.  Those reports are anecdotes, not data, but interesting and will likely result in data collection later as part of understanding long covid better.  It's too soon for that now, but better understanding could be good news for sufferers from other diseases with long post-infection sequelae.

lkrupp said:

patchythepirate said:

How are people just blindly accepting these vaccine passports? How is it that so few even question something that is so obviously absurd? The fact that they don't accommodate for natural immunity, which is *superior* to the vaccine 'immunity,' should be a clear indication that we're being manipulated. Not to mention the fact that they make no sense, since people 'vaccinated' with these gene modifying agents can still catch and spread covid. It's shocking how many people are accepting these 'passports' as somehow justifiable.

Because society has to protect the public from the lies, misinformation, disinformation, and anti-science conspiracy theories from people like, well, YOU. 

And you’ll be very interested when vaccine mandates are finally implemented. The Supreme Court, in a 1905 case regarding mandatory vaccination during a small pox epidemic,  ruled 7-2 that the government does have the right to mandate vaccinations when the public health is endangered. The precedent is already established, ready to go.