Hi Bill Herfel ‘PhD Philosophy & Science’
I’m intrigued by your assertion that the Canadian Covid Care Alliance “seems dinkum”. I’m really interested in your basis for saying this.
You see, I’ve read your post in answer to your own question, and you don’t really explain your stance.
I agree that we need to strip off the politicisation—but who has ‘politicised’ things? Not the scientists! I agree that we need to understand and listen to the science, but you seem to be labouring under a slight misapprehension about what science is, and what science can reasonably achieve.For a self-styled philosopher of science, I find this puzzling. I’m even more puzzled by your take on both the ‘CCCA’ and the prolific anti-vaxxer Byram Bridle. Let’s look at this together.
Do vaccines save lives?
You may wish to prime yourself by looking at the data currently available from Our World in Data.
I’ve provided an example from Switzerland, but pretty much wherever you look, the graphs are similar—the unvaccinated are admitted to hospital and also die to a far greater degree than the vaccinated, regardless of age. Similarly, the side effects of the vaccines are consistently fewer and milder overall—across age groups—than the effects of getting COVID-19. These are extremely safe, effective vaccines.I appreciate that (despite being a Philosopher of Science) you may not be able to explain off the cuff what mRNA does, or how PCR works, or indeed how the different vaccines work. You may not have been reading research papers for forty years, so you may not know how bad statistics can trip up the unwary, or even how to read a paper. But graphs like the above are pretty eloquent.*
Even better, they fit with everything we know about the science of SARS-CoV-2. No, I’m not going to write yet another book to explain this all to you. But I’m still mystified why graphs like the above don’t speak volumes to you. Perhaps you misunderstand science?
How does science work?
I’m particularly interested in the philosophy of science. Doubtless you too will be familiar with David Hume’s rather gloomy conclusion that we can never be sure about a ‘fact’, and how this contradicts Plato’s view that wise philosophers can somehow see beyond the shadows and perceive a perfect model of how things work. You may well have read Karl Popper, and realised that his explanation is that all models of reality are provisional—and can be superseded. I’m sure you’re familiar with Kuhn’s sociological take on science, and indeed with Quine’s rather bizarre ideas about ‘underdetermination’. You may even have read ET Jaynes. And you too may have become a bit dazzled by postmodernism—until you realised that however much you wave your hands, you still won’t fly, even if you have a vague and rather dotty sociological view of science.
But the bottom line in science is that we test models in reality and provisionally accept those that work as ‘true’. Then we must act. Subsequently we may refine, revise or even replace our models, but especially over the past century or so, we’ve become quite good at joined up logic, doing the right statistics, and spotting bullshit. Science works; bullshit walks. With this in mind, let’s look at that website you’re so enamoured of.
Is this ‘dinkum’?
You seem to think that the anti-vax (and pro-ivermectin) sentiments expressed on the CCCA website are ‘real, honest or true’ (as in a ‘fair dinkum bloke’).
You also seem to think that we should devote a lot of effort ‘discussing’ the different opinions expressed by those behind the website, contrasting these with those of the vast majority of epidemiologists, molecular virologists, vaccine experts, pharmacologists and public health professionals. People who are combating SARS-CoV-2 — or at least doing the best they can. Sometimes with conspicuous success, like ours in New Zealand over the last couple of years.
The sad thing is, we’ve seen all of those objections before. Your position is very little different from asserting that:
- We need to give flat-Earth conspiracists equal time with those who’ve just built and launched the James Webb telescope.
- We need to give Biblical-literal creationists who believe the Universe was made a few thousand years ago equal time with geologists and astrophysicists.
- We need to give homeopaths equal time with pharmacologists, microbiologists and clinicians.
Now it’s remotely possible that, for example, the image of pentacene acquired from an atomic force microscope
is so similar to the predicted structure (shown below) just by chance, and that atoms don’t really exist, so we can dilute substances to homeopathic dilutions and there’s still something there. But all of the evidence is in favour of our current models—and in the context of everything else we know, that ‘chance’ seems something like one in a googol. And so on with all of the nonsense ideas above.The reason why there is so much push-back to Byram Bridle’s ideas—including from all of the other faculty at the university where he trained—is because he’s talking nonsense. As they have pointed out
:Dr. Byram Bridle has stated on multiple platforms and numerous outlets that COVID-19 vaccines are unsafe. These statements are contrary to overwhelming scientific evidence. The S protein generated by or incorporated into vaccines is an effective immunogen but does not alter DNA, does not induce infertility or pass through breast milk, and is not a toxin. Adverse vaccine effects do occur but at a similar or lower frequency than for routine vaccines.
Similarly, you can embrace the random ideas touted by the strange people who put together the CCCA—but we’ve already seen the same crap from the FLCCC. In fact, if you look at their protocols, they’re the same.
I’m a sucker for punishment. Heck, I might even be prepared to waste more time exploring their ‘dissent’ with them …
If they were honest enough to even provide their names.
They’re not.
That about says it all.
Just my 2c.
Dr J.M. van Schalkwyk. MB. BCh. FCP(SA)(Critical Care). FRACP. Dip Data(S.Afr). (aka Dr Jo).
* For everyone who is not so bat-shit crazy that they believe that the whole world is conspiring against them.
Footnotes