Mandatory Vaccinations (Part 2)
POSTED BY: canttakesky
UPDATED: Tuesday, March 7, 2023 21:57
VIEWED: 12509
PAGE 15 of 16
cts,
By your definition, I'm a scientist, not a technician and not a doctor. I work in the field of atmospheric chemistry, and yes, I'm well grounded in the statistics of research. I actually do understand those things far better than you suspect, and probably far better than you, since I have to use them in either setting up experiments or interpreting the results of others.
I ALSO have a medical background and I understand that there is a body of work YOU don't understand. It's roughly 99% lab work into things like 'what triggers the immune system', or 'what is the configuration of this enzyme and how does it work'. It founds, generates, investigates clinical work, like a new vaccine. B/c YOU don't understand the research, you think the results are vodoo.
As I said, I'm not about to try to teach you, or waste my time in debate with you. But the depth of your ignorance is profound. I also find your extraordinary bias and ability to reject data as bordering on the dellusional.
But go ahead. You know everything. No one else knows anything, except of course when they agree with you. Whatever you do to your own life is no skin off my nose. And though I would hate to think of your children being hurt, that's between you, CPS and local authorities.
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6-string,
It just occurred to me to give a word to the wise. While I understand you have the same position as CTS, don't try to take her arguments into anything that matters. They'll fall apart like tissue paper and if you are depending on them, you'll lose.
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Quote:CTS- Without knowing a thing about what we do you decided that we don't understand the scientific method. I assure you that we do. In fact, Rue was helping me figure out the appropriate statitics to use on a particular set of data, including whether the variances among several sets of data were equal and which variables were- and weren't- included in the experiment. We understand... well, Rue does anyway... about sample size and confounders because Rue is a biologist and a statistician. (I'm a chemist and a bureaucrat.) We also both know that the scientific method goes way beyond statistics. Because behind any correlation there has to be some sort of model explaining HOW two phenomena are related to each other. This is where your approach falls apart. You can't tell me how vaccines might be harmful. You've wiped the map clean of all data and painted a big HERE BE DRAGONS on it. That is not a productive or scientific approach.
Cough. I believe you that Rue works in a field that is considered a science....
Rue, physicians, and many others who work in technical fields, know a lot of facts and beliefs that are thought of as "science." But the same people can know very little about how one arrives at these facts and beliefs, and how they are determined to be "true," and the rigors and standards of the discovery process of science. For me, a scientist is someone who is educated and trained in the latter, as opposed to the former. The scientists I know in real life, who I know have graduate training in science (the method), understand how to DO research, and therefore how to interpret research. They understand about confounders, validity, reliability, control groups, meaningless vs. meaningful statistics, sample sizes, statistical error, etc. They understand that every study has confounders and how the conclusions of each study is limited by those confounders. They understand that correlation does not equal causation. By and large, physicians and technicians don't understand these things, and neither does Rue.
On a more personal note, I understand your fears for your children. I have a medically complicated daughter that the medical system has failed time and time again... not because of ill-will on the part of the doctors, but simply because she isn't covered in the literature. I know her issues are wrapped up with the immune system and the brain, and some day they'll figure it all out. Unfortunately it will be too late for her. Like you, I've been LIVING in a situation of the unknown. I even found a temporarily successful treatment on the internet, and it was Rue who pointed me in that direction. (BTW Rue is not the robotic proponent of medical dogma that you paint.)
I've faced a situation where I had to either apply a time-critical experimental treatment (intravenous immonoglubulin) right at the beginning of the mad-cow scare. Think about that: I could have been saving my daughter's brain, or destroying, or saving it in the short-run only to see it eaten away in the long run. At the time, almost nothing was known about either choice and I was racked with fear. I know all about "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence". I also know it can sustain irrational fear.
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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Quote:Well, I was careful to not include you in my comments. You seem to understand science better than Rue. I have never heard YOU say that "correlation does not equal causation" is "bogus."
Originally posted by SignyM:
CTS- Without knowing a thing about what we do you decided that we don't understand the scientific method.
I have heard Rue say enough shockingly ridiculous things (such as the above comment) that demonstrates unequivocally that he does not understand the scientific method. I don't need to know what he does for a living. His words here on RWED speak for themselves.
And if you recall, I did mention that amongst the sciences, the sciences that have the lowest and least rigorous standards are biology and medicine. There are quite a number of biologists who do not know the first thing about the scientific method. Some are even research biologists. I don't know how that got to be, but it happens. Of course, this is not true for all biologists. And of course, sometimes you'll find a physicist or chemist or geologist who doesn't understand the scientific method either. But in my experience, it is rare in the physical sciences, more common in biology, and highly probable in medicine.
Anyway, I hang out and speak with enough real-life PhD research scientist to know the difference when I see it. [Edited to add:]If I had to summarize the main difference between someone who knows scientific method, and someone who doesn't, it would be this:
Given any study, a scientist sees more questions than answers, more unknowns than knowns, more confounders than controls. A scientist then is the paragon of caution, qualifies conclusions carefully (and if the scientist is good, precisely as well), and avoids generalizing past the limits of actual data.
Here is an afterthought. It may be the difference between undergraduate and graduate education in the sciences. Undergraduate training focuses on science consumption, memorizing vocabulary and basic assumptions, theories, and facts in a field. Graduate training teaches the skepticism of science. When I talk to people with graduate training in scientific methodology and statistics, I don't need to explain how confounders limit the conclusions of a study. They are already thinking about those confounders before we get done discussing the study. It's a different mindset you learn in graduate training, to automatically think about what a study DOESN'T prove and where the controls fall short.
Can't Take My Gorram Sky
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CTS,
Right now you're making what's called a straw-man argument. Which is, you're arguing against a point no one else is making. But then, your entire position is based on more than one lie - isn't it.
What I said was that it was 'bogus' as a straw man argument. But you seem to keep 'forgetting' that little point.
BTW, I work as a CHEMIST doing research, and have for over 20 years. And why is that you might ask? It's b/c my academic background qualifies me for the job. But I don't say a lot about what I actually do b/c frankly I can't. And my bio/ med background is just a hobby which I've used to help many people towards good, if unconventional, medical care.
Now I realize you're a little frustrated - no job, no recognition, no rewards for your 'brilliance'. But trying to knock other people down in order to put yourself up is cheap and obvious.
So lighten up. Get a job. Do something meaningful so that your ego isn't riding on this poor website. New Year's is just around the corner.
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Quote:In our department, we collectively think about this quite a bit because we're presented with data all the time, typically generated by industry. After a while, you learn to separate fact from incomplete truth and from fiction. I'm pretty old, so is Rue. I would say that meither of us is naive about the uses and misuses of data.
Here is an afterthought. It may be the difference between undergraduate and graduate education in the sciences. Undergraduate training focuses on science consumption, memorizing vocabulary and basic assumptions, theories, and facts in a field. Graduate training teaches the skepticism of science. When I talk to people with graduate training in scientific methodology and statistics, I don't need to explain how confounders limit the conclusions of a study. They are already thinking about those confounders before we get done discussing the study. It's a different mindset you learn in graduate training, to automatically think about what a study DOESN'T prove and where the controls fall short.
Two items of interest:
There is more information on the Indiana girl who spread measles to 34 people. While I didn't want to jump to conclusions, I was fairly certain that this girl is a "never vaccinated" variety because she seemed to be part of a family, church, or other non-vaccinating subgroup which made it extremely easy to "find" 32 unvaccinated people.
It turns ou that this girl... "became infected after visiting a Romanian orphanage while on a church-mission trip, health investigators said. The others became infected after they attended a church gathering with her the day after her return.
"Orphanages are known to be higher risk" for measles, said Dr. Philip Gould of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "The main point is to ensure that people do get vaccinated, especially prior to leaving the country, going to a place that physicians suspect that measles is a risk."
Thirty-three people in Indiana and one from Illinois became infected. Three people were hospitalized, but no one died. Only two of the 34 people had been vaccinated against measles.
'The outbreak occurred because measles was imported into a population of children whose parents had chosen not to vaccinate their children because of safety concerns' "
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061222/ap_on_he_me/measles_traveler
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AFA your approach to exposing your child to various foods:
"Study: Overcoming allergies possible
...Here's how it worked: First, youngsters spent a day at the Duke hospital swallowing minuscule but increasing doses of either an egg powder or a defatted peanut flour, depending on their allergy. They started at 1/3,000th of a peanut or about 1/1,000th of an egg, increasing the amount until the child broke out in hives or had some other reaction. Then the children were sent home with a daily dose just under that reactive amount. Every two weeks, the kids returned for a small dose increase until they reached the equivalent of a tenth of an egg or one peanut — a maintenance dose that thhttp://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061225/ap_on_he_me/healthbeat_food_allergiesey swallowed daily."
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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Quote:Thanks for digging that up. I appreciate knowing.
Originally posted by SignyM:
While I didn't want to jump to conclusions, I was fairly certain that this girl is a "never vaccinated" variety
Still, it doesn't change the fact that this story is anecdotal. What does it mean in the grand scheme of things?
So to reiterate, I am dreadfully sorry to hear about an unvaccinated person infecting failed-vaccine recipients. But these instances do not provide scientific proof of anything. I can find documentation where index patients of outbreaks were vaccinated, but that would also be anecdotal. All these stories prove is that yes, vaccinated and unvaccinated people infect vaccinated and unvaccinated people--a point I do not dispute.
All right.. way too much rehash. I've probably said all this 2 or 3 times before. (See, with my scientist friends, I only have to say it once, if at all. They automatically understand that anecdotal evidence, while sometimes useful, does not constitute scientific proof of anything. Here, on RWED, I felt like I had to say it several times, and yet anecdotal or uncontrolled evidence keeps being brought up as if it proves something. This is just one example of why I feel that the people I'm talking to here do not understand the scientific method very well.)
Anyway, done with rehash.
Thanks for the info on allergies! Appreciate it.
Can't Take My Gorram Sky
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cts,
You're digging yourself a hole of the type PN is in. Stop digging.
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Hostility is counterproductive. I think vaccination has the weight of evidence in terms of being effective. I also think it is safER than catching the disease itself. But it is not 100% effective, nor 100% safe.
SOME vaccination is prolly mandatory, especially with our godforsaken medical system. But some vaccines remain optional to this day. Perhaps exploring the gray area will help clarify when vaccines should be made mandatory, when they should be optional, and what exemptions should be made.
For example, it occurred to me that maybe there is NOTHING "inherently" wrong with either the vaccines or the child who reacts badly to them. Perhaps it is a stochastic event... a temporary permeability of the blood-brain barrier that everybody experiences from time to time time... that simply opens up the brain to very normal, useful antibodies.
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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I'm certainly not relying on anybody's arguments here Rue. I don't need anyone to validate my opinions here because I know that I am 100% right on this, no matter how much support or lack thereof I have. I think your point of view and those who agree with you on this issue is very imposing on my body and my privacy.
Medical results mean absolutly nothing to me as you're never going to get me to agree that, by law, we should be forced to be injected with anything, no matter how sinister or benign. Though I respect that you are completely within your rights to throw out all of the scientific facts from your big science books to us ignorant common folk, you're never going to get me to be okay with forced vaccinations.
They're brainwashing our children in school as we speak though, so you won't have much to worry about my way of thinking anymore in a generation or two. They know they can't teach an old dog new tricks, so I'm pretty confident that they're not going to waste their time forcing me to take shots or even trying very hard to convince me how I can't live without them, prefering instead to target and manipulate the beliefs of the collective youth, who will be the adults of tomorrow.
Yes Rue, you can smile and rest peacefully at night with the knowledge that there won't be any free thinkers like me left in 60 or so years and we will all blindly follow the laws that Science dictate to us without question.... and in our druged up waking-life states, we'll probably be all the happier for it.
"A government is a body of people, usually notably ungoverned." http://www.myspace.com/6ixstringjack
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