covid Why Did It Take So Long to Accept the Facts About Covid?

[Luna Bliss]

44 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

1 hour ago, Coffee Pancake said:

I blame YouTube for actively giving platform to nonsense so long as it remains advertiser friendly.

I credit Youtube for spreading knowledge far and wide instead of hidden away in some dusty tome. The real nonsense is when a select few are the arbiters of what they feel is the only knowledge the masses are allowed to have. Reminds one of the the dark and middle age Church being the only allowed purveyors of the Truth. Are we going to again be burning people at the stake if they don't adhere to the "Official" version of Scientific Truth?

There is no official scientific truth vs unofficial scientific truth -- there is only scientific truth. It becomes scientific truth via experiments which are repeated many times, under many conditions/variables, and then peer-reviewed. It is not science if this is not done. Science is not debatable -- it is simply an approximation of truth achieved through a detailed process named 'the scientific method'.

Much of what you bring to the table has not gone through this process -- it has not gone through rigorous testing using the scientific method.
You can't just imagine some theory and think you have the right to challenge/debate valid science -- you must create experiments to test what you imagine could be true and control variables as best you can, repeat the the procedure, and then allow other people to replicate and critique your process.  In this way we bypass some lone wackadoo or two imagining a theory is true without appropriate testing, and others are brought into the process to replicate your procedures and perhaps find important missed variables or errors.

This article explains what science is:

On The Myth Of Debatable Science:
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2021-05-24/on-the-myth-of-debatable-science/

Edited May 26, 2021 by Luna Bliss

[Arielle Popstar]

17 hours ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

At 7:20, Dr. Bailey rubs her hands and then dives into a "take down" of isolation. After quoting virologist Dr. Vincent Racaniello for definition of isolation she expresses incredulity that someone just "spits in a cup and if you mix it with a cell culture, hey presto, you've isolated a virus!"

This might be the video from which Bailey takes the quote...

Dr. Bailey makes a lot of noise about virus isolation, but Dr. Racaniello doesn't seem terribly concerned about it? Why?

Dr. Racaniello is for him more animated in that part of the video than other parts. He also emphasizes the idea that "isolation" in this case is not meaning a physical isolation of the virus and says it is "very important" to understand that. In his way, he appears to consider it as important as Dr. Bailey. 

Quote

If you spit into a cup of human cell culture (the cells can be immortal so they'll grow indefinitely) any infectious virus will eventually overwhelm everything else. You could take a bit of infected culture and drop it into another cup and keep going, diluting out everything that doesn't propagate.

The cell and all its attendant bits and pieces are also growing indefinitely as per your own words or the virus will no longer have a host to infect. Dr. Racaniello even points out that though there is many genome sequences, there are few physical isolates. Within the context of what Dr Bailey is on about, neither the video you linked or a subsequent one of his I listened to, contradicts what I hear from her. She just extrapolates it further as she is using the video as a foundation for some of her PCR videos.

 

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Dr. Bailey is a huge fan of Dr. Kary Mullis. If you already have the genetic sequence for something and want to know if it's in the spit, you can use Mullis' exquisitely sensitive and specific PCR technique to find it. That's why Dr. Racaniello says that we don't even bother to culture some samples. We just look for a genome sequence that identifies the virus. If we find it, the virus is there. You can look for exactly what you want (Covid-19) or for the reference virus it's based on (all coronaviruses share some recognizable genetic sequences).

If as she points out, you have 4000 other genome sequences in culture, how do you know which is the infectious virus? Other than maybe that it is a lab created virus of which the genome is known because it was created that way....

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While the inconsistent use of terms might frustrate Dr. Racaniello a little, and throw Dr. Bailey for a loop, it's not really hampering science's ability to detect, understand, and fight viruses.

But it does hamper the ability to use PCR testing for making a determination if someone is infected with a live virus. A few of her videos are about that aspect rather then whether the lack of physical isolation prevents a vaccination being made.

[Rowan Amore]

Wrong sub forum?

[Arielle Popstar]

30 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

 

Much of what you bring to the table has not gone through this process -- it has not gone through rigorous testing using the scientific method.

To the contrary, I have brought quite a few peer reviewed studies to the table and you have ridiculed them anyway. From that I have come to the scientific conclusion you really don't care whether it is peer reviewed science unless it agrees with your narrative. The few times you could not avoid it, you got all political instead as if that negates the science.

[Chris Corvinus]

1 hour ago, Arielle Popstar said:

I credit Youtube for spreading knowledge far and wide instead of hidden away in some dusty tome. The real nonsense is when a select few are the arbiters of what they feel is the only knowledge the masses are allowed to have. Reminds one of the the dark and middle age Church being the only allowed purveyors of the Truth. Are we going to again be burning people at the stake if they don't adhere to the "Official" version of Scientific Truth?

Oh god. This is why aliens wont visit us. 

[Silent Mistwalker]

2 hours ago, Coffee Pancake said:

Don't need to watch all of ancient aliens to know ancient aliens aren't real.

 

It is nice to see another that can comprehend and accept the fact that our ancestors were every bit as intelligent as we are, if not more so. If they had been less intelligent, we would not be here now.

[Drayke Newall]

2 hours ago, Velk Kerang said:

From First Post:

Travel in and out of the country should have been locked down immediately and the threat assessed. This did not happen.

From Second Post:

This country could have been shut down long enough to assess the situation. Would it have made a difference? We'll never know. What I do know is none of it even took place. 

Um.... are you sure about what you have said?

early January 2020: CDC gives early advice to citizens to restrict their travel to hotspots as does many other counties
31 January 2020: US government close borders to mainland china like many other countries at the same time. Similarly external Chinese territories were allowed to travel to USA and same with USA nationals, just like other countries that made the same travel ban between 29th Jan and 3rd Feb.
29 February 2020: USA travel bans put in place to hotpots across the globe including in Italy, Iran and South Korea with advice of not traveling to select countries
1 March 2020: USA issues travel ban to Iran with Italy and South Korea travel warnings elevated 
12 Mar 2020: US government closes borders to Europe from 12:01am 14 March except UK and Ireland and 4 other minor countries for 30 days with extension possible to do as you have suggested "assess the situation". With quarantine for returning positive test USA residents. Europe announces anger at closure decision saying it isn't needed.
18 March 2020: US government close border with Canada and Mexico border closed around same time.

The above in effect now has the USA completely closed off to all of the infected western world and some other eastern countries with advice of not to travel to all most all other countries. In other words from the 18th March USA borders were all but nearly closed.

As far as internally goes on the 17 March 2020 USA government (aka president) issued the "15 days to stop the spread" guidelines of which it basically advises states to lockdown if there is evidence of community spread and advises USA citizens to follow specific rules i.e. stay at home where possible. These guidelines where issued within the period of "assess the situation (all borders closed)" to get a handle on things. What happened? States ignored them as did most US Citizens with them going to spring break or protesting against those measures or simply ignoring them.

So please, can you tell me where the USA government didn't close borders to try and get on top of things or assess the situation? You specifically state that it never took place yet above it is outlined in black and white to the day and month the closures of borders showing that the USA was generally in front of other countries as far as border closures go.

[Madelaine McMasters]

1 hour ago, Arielle Popstar said:

Dr. Racaniello is for him more animated in that part of the video than other parts. He also emphasizes the idea that "isolation" in this case is not meaning a physical isolation of the virus and says it is "very important" to understand that. In his way, he appears to consider it as important as Dr. Bailey.

Nope. Dr. Bailey seems to believe that if you don't physically isolate a virus, you haven't really found it. Dr. Racaniello understands that's not true, and so isn't bothered by the lack of physically isolated purified virus for detection of variants, or potentially even for detection of a new pathogen, though he doesn't discuss that.

Having a reference virus genomic sequence in hand, all you really need is enough genetic material in your sample to match sequences against the reference, and then look for mutations. As he mentions, you sometimes don't even need to culture a swab sample to obtain all the fingerprints you need. Though there might be a lot of other junk in the sample, none of it will match against the reference sequences. And if you get negative PCR against 35 other reference pathogens, there's a very good chance you've found what you were looking for.

 

1 hour ago, Arielle Popstar said:

If as she points out, you have 4000 other genome sequences in culture, how do you know which is the infectious virus? Other than maybe that it is a lab created virus of which the genome is known because it was created that way....

I explained this. I'll explain it again. Since only infectious agents will multiply (much faster than the culture cells), they'll eventually drown out all the other stuff. Quite often, this becomes visually apparent in the culture. Imagine looking at a fresh sample under a microscope and identifying 4000 different unidentified floating objects (UFOs). Now, put a drop of that in a culture dish and wait a day or two or ten. Now stir everything up and examine a drop of that culture. If you now see 2000 objects, but 1000 of them look alike, you'll have reason to believe something's been multiplying. Maybe you spot two objects that have become more common, that's fine. Sort them using any of the tried and true methods of biochemistry. You might then start new cultures from those two groups and see what happens. If you keep up this culturing and sorting, the growing stuff pops out.

You might never get perfection, but that's not really necessary. One reason scientists don't report having pure, isolated stuff is that they often don't need it. When they do, they'll work to get it.

1 hour ago, Arielle Popstar said:

But it does hamper the ability to use PCR testing for making a determination if someone is infected with a live virus. A few of her videos are about that aspect rather then whether the lack of physical isolation prevents a vaccination being made.

There is a lack of standardization in the use of PCR cycle counts in determining if someone is infected, but that's not due to confusion over the definition of isolates. It's not even completely due to lack of standardization over cycle count thresholds, or efficiency of different PCR machines. There's tremendous variability in the relationship between viral density at the sample site and a patient's eventual outcome. I don't think we're going to standardize humans anytime soon, so there will always be someone unhappy about any threshold we set for anything.

With respect to developing vaccines for variants of known pathogens, isolation isn't necessary. We have the mug shot, we can spot the culprit out in public, even if she's put on a more attractive wig.

If we're searching for a new pathogen, it's harder work, but still might not require complete isolation and purification. Each new challenge is unique. If Dr. Bailey wants to theorize that vaccines engineered from knowledge of non-isolated viruses don't actually work, she'll need a compelling explanation for the apparent success of this year's crop of Covid-19 vaccines.

 

[Blush Bravin]

8 hours ago, Drayke Newall said:

12 Mar 2020: US government closes borders to Europe from 12:01am 14 March except UK and Ireland and 4 other minor countries for 30 days with extension possible to do as you have suggested "assess the situation". With quarantine for returning positive test USA residents. Europe announces anger at closure decision saying it isn't needed.

You need to look no further than all the deaths in New York City to see that the travel ban from Europe came way WAY too late. 

[Qie Niangao]

14 minutes ago, Blush Bravin said:

You need to look no further than all the deaths in New York City to see that the travel ban from Europe came way WAY too late. 

That's very true. The point may have been, though, that the US administration at the time acted as quickly as possible, given the information available (so blame the Chinese, I suppose). Thing is, it absolutely did not act as quickly as possible, had the information from China months earlier, and then finally, when they realized it was inevitable, made the disastrous mistake of not sealing the borders immediately but rather announcing they were about to seal the borders, causing airports around the world to flood with crowds of travelers frantic to get home. That unfathomable blunder was the real origin of uncontrolled spread in North America.

[Blush Bravin]

It was irresponsible of the administration to not assume that the virus had spread outside of China when travel restrictions to/from China were initiated. There were already reported cases outside of China at that time of that closure. Then compound that disaster with the ineptitude of the state government in New York. The combination of those two mistakes took the lives of many citizens. That disaster at least prompted other state governments to take action. Unfortunately, too many state governments caved to pressure put on them by the administration, who was more concerned with propping up the economy (due to reelection concerns) than the health of its citizens, and consequently reopened too soon. Again, resulting in flare ups and more deaths. 

Unfortunately, I don't think the lesson of this disaster has been learned. Instead of looking at the mistakes and making plans on how to avoid this happening again, both sides are simply pointing fingers at the other side and casting blame. It's very discouraging.

[Drayke Newall]

23 minutes ago, Blush Bravin said:

It was irresponsible of the administration to not assume that the virus had spread outside of China when travel restrictions to/from China were initiated. There were already reported cases outside of China at that time of that closure.

I dont think it was really a case of that as they were aware of the cases outside of China. They, as Qie said, acted as quick as possible based on the available information much the same as say where I live, Australia. The steps they did take in a gradual closing of borders was based on information from the WHO in that they (WHO) said full border closures were not needed. As such following that advice led to them closing China then Iran then Italy etc.

I was in my post going to post a comparison between USA and Australia but didn't. If I did it would have shown that Australia followed the same border closure system either a day ahead or behind USA with a full border closure on the 20 March 2020 2 days after USA. The only difference was that Australia also closed the state borders until the situation was on top of which allowed early opening of everything.

I think what really impacted on the USA's approach was firstly the error of the federal government not closing state borders for the same 30 day period the instigated for Europe as well as the generally vibe of the citizens in that they didn't want to conform to the lockdowns or guidelines of not traveling. If the state borders were closed for the 30 day period to stem travel in and out, it probably would have allowed controls to be put in place to limit the spread.

:EDIT:

As far as New York goes, that was just pure mismanagement on a state level in that a lockdown (no one allowed to leave house) wasn't put in place immediately. Such lockdowns are out of the legal bounds of the federal government as they can only close state borders.

Edited May 26, 2021 by Drayke Newall

[Blush Bravin]

2 minutes ago, Drayke Newall said:

as the generally vibe of the citizens in that they didn't want to conform to the lockdowns or guidelines of not traveling. If the state borders were closed for the 30 day period to stem travel in and out, it probably would have allowed controls to be put in place to limit the spread.

Agree. The combination of too lax efforts on the federal government and the refusal of citizens to take the threat seriously is why the US has fared much worse than say your country. Australia got control of the situation so much faster than the US.

[Love Zhaoying]

39 minutes ago, Blush Bravin said:

Unfortunately, I don't think the lesson of this disaster has been learned.

They (this kind of disaster) probably need to happen more often for the lessons to take hold. IMHO.

[Jordyn McGregor]

11 hours ago, Chris Nova said:

Oh god. This is why aliens wont visit us. 

Lord help us if they do!  If movies are anything to go by, we wouldn't be able to count on the Americans to save the world, cos those in charge are a joke. 

[FairreLilette]

58 minutes ago, Blush Bravin said:

Agree. The combination of too lax efforts on the federal government and the refusal of citizens to take the threat seriously is why the US has fared much worse than say your country. Australia got control of the situation so much faster than the US.

California was the second to go into lockdown after France.  California went into lockdown a day or two after France. The states were in charge and many states did not want to go into lockdown stating the reason that they "are not New York" for their reason to NOT go into lockdown, meaning they are more like rural states.  States are still in charge today aside from the stimulus bills/acts; however, California is taking over it's own stimulus for it's citizens because it was the congress that bungled the coronavirus relief not the presidents, and California will now be giving out it's own stimulus checks because congress got it way wrong for California (understatement), way wrong, but we will have our own stimulus now.  

 

1 hour ago, Drayke Newall said:

The steps they did take in a gradual closing of borders was based on information from the WHO in that they (WHO) said full border closures were not needed. As such following that advice led to them closing China then Iran then Italy etc.

The WHO has in it's own protocol to close travel as a last resort.  The WHO got it wrong about the airborne nature of this deadly disease.  The WHO has said this coronavirus is from an animal.  There is no animal currently and articles are now appearing that there was no intermediate host for this coronavirus (no animal) and this is a human coronavirus only, a super coronavirus and thus could not have been from nature.   I agree with Trump in that at least he stood up to the WHO and refused payments.  I think the WHO is largely, largely to blame.  I still would not agree with paying them.

Edited May 26, 2021 by FairreLilette

[Luna Bliss]

13 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

13 hours ago, Luna Bliss said:

Much of what you bring to the table has not gone through this process -- it has not gone through rigorous testing using the scientific method.

To the contrary, I have brought quite a few peer reviewed studies to the table and you have ridiculed them anyway. From that I have come to the scientific conclusion you really don't care whether it is peer reviewed science unless it agrees with your narrative. The few times you could not avoid it, you got all political instead as if that negates the science.

On rare occasions you have referenced a peer-reviewed study, but I said a study needs rigorous testing to be considered more credible, and this goes beyond an initial peer-review.
I have no narrative other than believing the scientific method is the best way we have to sort out medical truths.
If I ridicule the studies you bring to the table it is because they are not accepted science -- they haven't gone through the rigorous testing needed to be considered such. The far-right-wing rags you like to grab studies from don't understand this, and neither do you.

You imagine all of mainstream science is "the left"  (you only need to scroll up for evidence of this where you labeled those who initially believed Covid was less likely to be spread via airborne particles vs droplets as "the left"), and yet you accuse ME of politicization?
Repeatedly you claim that unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth yet you demonstrate an unquestioning respect for people who are not authorities.

Going on the slim chance that you really do want to understand science and that you're not entirely a born-again de-wormer drinker who is only concerned with proving your religion at any cost, here is an article describing what science is, opening at the peer-review process section:
https://undsci.berkeley.edu/article/howscienceworks_16

"Peer-reviewed articles provide a trusted form of scientific communication. Even if you are unfamiliar with the topic or the scientists who authored a particular study, you can trust peer-reviewed work to meet certain standards of scientific quality. Since scientific knowledge is cumulative and builds on itself, this trust is particularly important. No scientist would want to base their own work on someone else's unreliable study! Peer-reviewed work isn't necessarily correct or conclusive, but it does meet the standards of science. And that means that once a piece of scientific research passes through peer review and is published, science must deal with it somehow — perhaps by incorporating it into the established body of scientific knowledge, building on it further, figuring out why it is wrong, or trying to replicate its results".

[Luna Bliss]

@Arielle Popstar

https://theconversation.com/ivermectin-why-a-potential-covid-treatment-isnt-recommended-for-use-157904

[Luna Bliss]

It's shocking to me how one man starting the fundamentalism movement (where Biblical literalists felt the need to deny the science of evolution) morphed into this massive distrust of mainstream science we have today, and causing such a debacle surrounding Covid issues.

https://theconversation.com/fundamentalism-turns-100-a-landmark-for-the-christian-right-123651

I really admire the following scientist, a conservative evangelical who doesn't toe the evangelical alt-right line:

http://www.katharinehayhoe.com/wp2016/

Edited May 26, 2021 by Luna Bliss

[Janet Voxel]

This thread is wild man.....

[Arielle Popstar]

1 hour ago, Janet Voxel said:

This thread is wild man.....

Been wondering how to gently bring aliens into the picture.

Surely they are connected somehow too!

Edited May 26, 2021 by Arielle Popstar

[Rowan Amore]

Here ya go!

https://news.avclub.com/apparently-trump-is-an-alien-hybrid-and-his-covid-diag-1845286402

a new, very plausible theory has arrived to complicate our understanding of the situation even further: Trump infected himself on purpose because he’s an immortal alien-human hybrid who’s using his illness as a distraction from his species’ secret plans.

Edited May 26, 2021 by Rowan Amore

[Janet Voxel]

2 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

Been wondering how to gently bring aliens into the picture.

Surely they are connected somehow too!

Go for it! It's not that far off!

[Luna Bliss]

Great expose by Harriet Hall on a book by some germ theory deniers. 

https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/no-everything-you-thought-you-knew-about-disease-is-not-wrong/

"The book What Really Makes You Ill?: Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Disease Is Wrong, by Dawn Lester and David Parker has been featured on conspiracy podcasts and shows like Crrow777 and it’s getting a lot of attention.  I’ve always been willing to follow the evidence and admit I was wrong about something; and if everything I thought I knew about disease was wrong, I needed to correct my errors, so I struggled through the whole 1,030 pages. I’m willing to follow the evidence, but this book contained no actual evidence for me to follow. It failed to convince me that science-based medicine is wrong".

[Arielle Popstar]

Ran across this video on Youtube. 

 

 

A comment under it that I thought worth repeating  was "We are swimming in a sea of information and drowning in ignorance"