Bret and Heather have covered a lot of the ridiculous posts on gender and sex being put out. Making people aware of the ridiculousness of these notions is critical, but that requires people becoming more knowledgeable. One thing I tend to be concerned about a lot of the COVID talk is figuring out how much information people are taking in and whether they are able to figure out what makes sense or what may be noise.
I have also noticed this sudden politicization in science. I have recently attended a professional meeting (transplant related) and was lectured on how to create my own land acknowledgment statement. Several lecturers also commented on the Ukraine conflict. I haven’t been to a meeting in several years so maybe this has been a gradual regression, but it was definitely unexpected.
The NEJM has been rather notorious about this which makes it all the more weird. They've published several editorials outlining things such as gender ideology. The fact that these ideas are making their way into medical journals and influencing science is what's so scary.
This was such a weird piece since it was so blatant in their writing of social justice ideology. The Discussion section spent paragraphs describing all the -isms it could.
Your comment about that professional meeting is interesting. I generally don't notice much of these things in science aside from a few prior coworkers who would bring this stuff up. However, I did go to a conference a few years ago and watched a presentation where this concern was artificially introduced by someone in the crowd. I can't recall what it was about, but I remember someone raising some concern about gendered language or something ridiculous along those lines.
It makes me think of organic chemistry and how Sn2 reactions are described as "back-sided attacks". That certainly wouldn't fly now and this incessant need to control language from outsiders is seriously harming science.
"It’s frustrating to see that many of our premier scientific journals continue to move in the direction of politicizing science, something that many mainstream “scientists” have argued against."
I think "frustrating" is too mild a word. I prefer something more like "chilling". Others may disagree and I am OK with that, but I see this as an indicator of the existence of a relentless drive of the cattle into the chute, with far more power behind it than most people imagine or can imagine.
I don't think we are going to stop this through our own efforts. I think we need to re-think what we are seeing and what the active force is behind it. And I think we need to consider how our own behavior could have led us into this situation. I also believe that there is a way out, but not by trying harder to stop it ourselves. I believe that to pursue that approach is to behave like an animal caught in a trap, clenching the jaws more firmly through struggling.
I generally use milquetoast or mild language since I'm rather passive in my writing. I try to stay away from the more extreme styles of writing, but know that I find all of this just as ludicrous as others even if it may not seem so in my writing.
The biggest problem with this introduction of language into science is that it is influencing how actual scientists conduct science. It's seriously damaging since the public already has difficulty in understanding science and may not understand some of the language used, so when language as the one in this paper gets introduced it influences how the public views these topics.
I certainly believe there is a way out, and the general way is to actually have people become knowledgeable about true science. Take a lot of this absurd talk about turning puberty on and off, as if there is some scientific basis for it. There absolutely is not, and yet we have therapists and sociologists making this claim yet never needing to show evidence of this phenomenon of turning puberty back on.
People can be taken advantage because of their ignorance, so the best way of fighting that is to make them more knowledgeable.
My language is becoming less mild as more and more evidence piles up. I hesitated posting that reply, but unfortunately that is the image I had and have and I decided to just say it. I won't make a habit of that here.
I also believe there is a way out, and I see a variety of possible courses that that events might take from here. My understanding could be completely wrong, and that would not be a bad thing. But I am now seeing a uniquely urgent situation in the history of the world, and "mild" no longer works for me. If I end up making a fool of myself, fine, but I would rather err on that side than downplay what I think I see happening. We really do need to look closely at our assumptions, and quite possibly revise our beliefs.
How much of this move to push masking again is actually driven by the need to protect unmasked kids from shedding and immunocompromised clot spotted kids from the everyday flues and sniffles that can now potentially KILL them as these shitty "vaccines" have destroyed their defenses? The CYA aspect of this is underappreciated.
I generally consider the aerosolizing of spike to be more of a red herring in some sense. To the extent that it's happening generally comes down to anecdotes of not feeling well when around vaccinated people, and I have to wonder to what extent that is an influence of something psychosomatic. No one has explained the actual mechanisms in which spike would leave the body, and by that point would spike be more concerning or would COVID infection?
We also have to remember that spike protein alone is much smaller than virions, so if we make an argument that the virus can easily escape a mask wouldn't that same argument work for the spike which is a much smaller construct?
I take this dire need to bring back masking to be an attempt to regain control, or to present it in a manner that appeals to ideologues, like policymaking wrapped up in a bow of social justice activism.
The institutions surrounding science are mostly gone. Recent Nature and Scientific American articles betray the intended war on actual science.
Ideologues are entrenched in powerful positions and it’s going to take a very long time to root them out if or when such action is taken.
Right now it’s a big “if.”
Bret and Heather have covered a lot of the ridiculous posts on gender and sex being put out. Making people aware of the ridiculousness of these notions is critical, but that requires people becoming more knowledgeable. One thing I tend to be concerned about a lot of the COVID talk is figuring out how much information people are taking in and whether they are able to figure out what makes sense or what may be noise.
I have also noticed this sudden politicization in science. I have recently attended a professional meeting (transplant related) and was lectured on how to create my own land acknowledgment statement. Several lecturers also commented on the Ukraine conflict. I haven’t been to a meeting in several years so maybe this has been a gradual regression, but it was definitely unexpected.
The NEJM has been rather notorious about this which makes it all the more weird. They've published several editorials outlining things such as gender ideology. The fact that these ideas are making their way into medical journals and influencing science is what's so scary.
This was such a weird piece since it was so blatant in their writing of social justice ideology. The Discussion section spent paragraphs describing all the -isms it could.
Your comment about that professional meeting is interesting. I generally don't notice much of these things in science aside from a few prior coworkers who would bring this stuff up. However, I did go to a conference a few years ago and watched a presentation where this concern was artificially introduced by someone in the crowd. I can't recall what it was about, but I remember someone raising some concern about gendered language or something ridiculous along those lines.
It makes me think of organic chemistry and how Sn2 reactions are described as "back-sided attacks". That certainly wouldn't fly now and this incessant need to control language from outsiders is seriously harming science.
"It’s frustrating to see that many of our premier scientific journals continue to move in the direction of politicizing science, something that many mainstream “scientists” have argued against."
I think "frustrating" is too mild a word. I prefer something more like "chilling". Others may disagree and I am OK with that, but I see this as an indicator of the existence of a relentless drive of the cattle into the chute, with far more power behind it than most people imagine or can imagine.
I don't think we are going to stop this through our own efforts. I think we need to re-think what we are seeing and what the active force is behind it. And I think we need to consider how our own behavior could have led us into this situation. I also believe that there is a way out, but not by trying harder to stop it ourselves. I believe that to pursue that approach is to behave like an animal caught in a trap, clenching the jaws more firmly through struggling.
I generally use milquetoast or mild language since I'm rather passive in my writing. I try to stay away from the more extreme styles of writing, but know that I find all of this just as ludicrous as others even if it may not seem so in my writing.
The biggest problem with this introduction of language into science is that it is influencing how actual scientists conduct science. It's seriously damaging since the public already has difficulty in understanding science and may not understand some of the language used, so when language as the one in this paper gets introduced it influences how the public views these topics.
I certainly believe there is a way out, and the general way is to actually have people become knowledgeable about true science. Take a lot of this absurd talk about turning puberty on and off, as if there is some scientific basis for it. There absolutely is not, and yet we have therapists and sociologists making this claim yet never needing to show evidence of this phenomenon of turning puberty back on.
People can be taken advantage because of their ignorance, so the best way of fighting that is to make them more knowledgeable.
My language is becoming less mild as more and more evidence piles up. I hesitated posting that reply, but unfortunately that is the image I had and have and I decided to just say it. I won't make a habit of that here.
I also believe there is a way out, and I see a variety of possible courses that that events might take from here. My understanding could be completely wrong, and that would not be a bad thing. But I am now seeing a uniquely urgent situation in the history of the world, and "mild" no longer works for me. If I end up making a fool of myself, fine, but I would rather err on that side than downplay what I think I see happening. We really do need to look closely at our assumptions, and quite possibly revise our beliefs.
How much of this move to push masking again is actually driven by the need to protect unmasked kids from shedding and immunocompromised clot spotted kids from the everyday flues and sniffles that can now potentially KILL them as these shitty "vaccines" have destroyed their defenses? The CYA aspect of this is underappreciated.
I generally consider the aerosolizing of spike to be more of a red herring in some sense. To the extent that it's happening generally comes down to anecdotes of not feeling well when around vaccinated people, and I have to wonder to what extent that is an influence of something psychosomatic. No one has explained the actual mechanisms in which spike would leave the body, and by that point would spike be more concerning or would COVID infection?
We also have to remember that spike protein alone is much smaller than virions, so if we make an argument that the virus can easily escape a mask wouldn't that same argument work for the spike which is a much smaller construct?
I take this dire need to bring back masking to be an attempt to regain control, or to present it in a manner that appeals to ideologues, like policymaking wrapped up in a bow of social justice activism.
I am at a loss for words. This is despicable.
I thought we were past this.
What, exactly, have we become as a nation, a culture? It astounds me and is highly disturbing!