w4read

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Posts posted by w4read


  1. 5 hours ago, Hardkill said:

    That still doesn’t change the fact that the more this virus spreads the more worrisome variants we will likely have in the future.

    As I said, everybody will eventually get it. So it desn't matter what you do, a new variant could always emerge. In a best case scenario you will be able to flatten the curve. But because hospitals are doing mostly fine, there's really no point. In fact, because vaccines becomes less effective with time you would actually in some sense want more people to get the virus now rather than later. 


  2. 4 hours ago, Hardkill said:

    I am very concerned that this may lead to much more unnecessary spreading of the virus throughout entire UK. I am worried that more variants may arise because of this decision.

    Almost everybody will get it either way, so measures won't really reduce that risk to any significant degree. The whole point was to reduce the risk of health care collapse, now that threat is gone in many countries, particularly in the UK which is way past their peak with daily cases going down for over a week now.


  3. 7 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

    Well, of course there is no objective standard. This is all highly relative and subjective. Which is why it's hard to get a consensus on it.

    When it comes to an unknown virus what you must remember is that this is a potentially very dangerous situation, therefore caution is reasonable. You have no idea what kind of deadly variant could emerge if we just let Covid run wild without any checks. So governments and scientists erring on the side of caution is reasonable. Especially early on back in 2020 when none of us knew how Covid might unfold and we had no vaccines. It's easy to do Monday morning quarterbacking 2 years later.

    At this point what I see is that lockdowns are impractical in the US simply because people will not strictly adhere to them. So lockdowns in the US have failed and I don't think they will ever work here. But for some nations where lockdowns are more strictly adhered to, they might be worthwhile. I don't know exactly. There is no simple answer. I would not do any more lockdowns in the US because it will just piss people off without producing much benefit I think.

    I would only do lockdowns if there was a much more deadly variant or if hospitals were at capacity. Mask mandates I have no problem with because it's a minor inconvenience. The cost/reward on masks is very favorable. Vaccines also have a very favorable risk/reward ratio.

    I would certainly agree with you that with the earlier variants, it has made sense the way governments around the world generally have handled the situation. And then we can always discuss details of course, but overall measures have been justified to a large degree I believe. 

    But now, with the omicron variant taking fully over most places, the situation has changed drastically imo. Apparently, everybody is going to get the virus because it's so transmissible, so the risk of mutation will probably be there whether we have lock downs or not. In fact, lock down like they have in China now for instance will only delay the problem. 

    The main argument for lock downs has always been the risk of the health care system collapsing. And the focus here has mainly been on ICU because that's where the hospitals are most vulnerable when it comes to resources. Now, with omicron cases exploding and also peaking some places like in the UK, the number of patients has goes down as a result of delta cases checking out from the hospital, while at the same time not that many new cases with omicron cases come in. In addition, people with omicron are staying in hospital for a shorter period of time which has also contributed to this reduction.

    So now the new argument is that people are getting covid everywhere so that absence from work will be a threatening factor in the health care as well as in other important sectors. But this becomes a problem partly because of the measures that was taken against covid such as quarantine and staying home when you have a positive test, even though your'e not ill. 

    So at this point, it seems to me like we are digging ourselves a hole and not facing the reality that essentially everyone is going to get the virus. Imo the focus should be on how to make this process as smooth as possible for all parties, with an emphasis on reducing all the hassle that comes with different measures as much as possible. 

    We also don't now if the measures we take right now helps at all. In Scotland they have a higher and steaper curve than the rest of the UK, with relatively more cases than the other countries compared to earlier waves, despite having more restrictions. So that's something to consider as well.

    When it comes to masks they seem like low hanging fruits not necessarily because they help that much, but the costs are minor as you say. 

    Vaccines undoubtedly positive also.


  4. @Leo Gura I'm curious to know more specifically how you evaluate whether or not political measures are good or bad. Personally I tend to have a very pragmatic cost benefit approach when dealing with these large scale society issues. Frankly, because that's all I really know. But it seems like this way of thinking doesn't suit the covid case for some reason. Maybe it's to complex and I'm not able to consider all factors, I don't know.

    So taking the example with lock down measures, how would you go forward if you were going to decide whether or not to prolong a lockdown with one week? 

     


  5. Here's an interesting math experience for you:

    Let's say the government is unsure if they want to prolong a lockdown. And let's say that they do it for a week only in order to reduce the damage and open up as soon as they consider it beneficial. So let's use the US as an example: 

    With a population of 330.000.000 you are essentially taking 330.000.000/52= 6.346.153, which is 6,3 million years of quality life from people. So assuming the average person has 40 years left to live or so, this would be 158.653 lives. 

    But hey, it's not like their taking away our lives, their just reducing our quality of life a bit. Let's say that the avarage persons life quality is cut in half, by 50%. So then it would be 158.653*50%= 79.326 lives. That is the collective damage just in quality of life not even talking about all the economic and social ramifications outside of that. 

    A simple, but illustrating example which also underlines why individual freedom is important, and how we can end up undervaluing it. I mean what does one week matter for each and one of us individually? I mean, you would be selfish if you couldn't handle ONE more week?


  6. On 1/9/2022 at 9:14 PM, hoodrow trillson said:

    Also, people on this forum haven't been discussing or bringing up Omicron as much as anti-vaxx stuff which is concerning.  I was going to make an Omicron thread but Leo did, unfortunately it got shut down due to the typical anti-vaxx discussion.

    Omicron's wide net style spread, along with it being extremely contagious; could easily collapse society and the economy in Western countries.  The first few waves of 2020 didn't do that but that was always a concern along with the massive global deaths--so lockdowns were issued.  This made society and economy unstable and kind of rocky when things opened up and began to be more "normal".  Social unrest, etc etc soon followed along with spikes in violence in America, for example.

    With Omicron, I suspect things will start getting shut down soon-ish because too many people still start to get sick, hospitals are full but workers are too sick, airlines, electricity, water system, food, petrol/gas, etc might be hit.  And the fact that we're all so connected this could be very tragic.  The reduction in the window to go back to work from 10 to 5 days by the CDC, I suspect was because they know if they shut down again we are done.  If they let people stay out for 10 days sick, we are done.  5 days is maybe salvageable but this is a "i hope so" play by the CDC.

    The chickens are coming home to roost.  Keep in mind this is a huge lag in term of data--we are JUST getting South Africa data and deaths are going up. This data is matched to when South Africa started getting a huge spike in positive cases by Omicron.  We are soon to follow along with the rest of the world.  

    We shall see what happens.  I am no doomer but please prepare if you're reading this.  Essentials.  Maybe some luxury things that you've wanted

    I also wish we could discuss omicron, so tired of this vaccine stuff.

    Fortunately, we haven't seen the things you fear, at least not when it comes to deaths. Some countries such as South Africa, UK, Denmark and Norway have had omicron for 6-7 weeks now and the cases has increased exponentially. This is not the case with hospitalizations though which has increased linearly in Denmark, but even gone down in Norway. New confirmed deaths have also gone down quite a bit the last weeks for most countries. This may be because of omicron replacing delta still some places, but nothing so far is supporting your suspicions. I guess it's pretty safe to say at this point that omicron is significantly less severe than delta, and the risk of needing oxygen and dying is far less. Anyway, it will be interesting to see in the next couple of weeks when the cases potentially skyrocket certain places.


  7. W

    On 1/8/2022 at 10:54 AM, Gregory1 said:

    Well it is not really your free descision because when Covid hits you really hard, you will expect society and it's hospitals to help you. And they WILL help you. You are not an individual, you are part of a society. Not taking the vaxx is anti-social because with your silly attitude you are causing the hospitals to get overly filled and now we have to endure stupid lockdowns to save people like you who habe childish beliefs of being an individual and to save the hospitals from overflowing...

    This is way to simplistic.

    First of all, there is no guarantee that a third dose has less risk to it compared to having COVID, or in particular Omicron, after two doses. If you are a healthy young individual you may be better off just having the virus at this point. In my country they don't recommend the vaccine to people under 29 who are healthy with no underlying diseases. That doesn't mean that they recommend not to take it though, but still, it is not as obviously preferable as you might think. 

    And if we are going to take your collectivism a further step back: Why don't we give our third and forth doses to people in certain poor countries where 90% of people haven't even had ONE dose? A more even distribution of the vaccines has been praised by WHO for months now, and this is what will give us the best odds of getting out of this pandemic with the least damage.


  8. @BlackPhil I can agree with you that after the rising of omicron, which by all means seems to be a significantly less lethal variant ( between 90-50% less severe than the delta if Im not mistaken) and where there is questionable whether the vaccine have any effect when it comes to actually getting the disease, it is harder to say whether taking the vaccine at this point is nesscessary or not.

    In my country, they are no longer "recommending" young people to take the vaccine, or more specifically the booster dose. The argument that you should take the vaccine to protect the elderly no longer counts with the new variant, which seemingly infects anyone, vaccinated or not. So it is more a question of personal risk at this point. Although, if you protect yourself you also protect society in a sense by reducing the risk of the health care system collapsing.

    Tbf I'm not actually sure why they push out booster doses in a lot of countries when still huge parts of africa haven't even gotten their first dose. In Israel they are even proposing the 4th dose which makes me shake my head a bit. Bare in mind that this is what can bite us in the ass ( and already did with omicron in south africa). Countries with less vaccination coverage where the virus can mutate freely without any limits. WHO has been pushing for a more evenly distribution of vaccine for a long time now, which is one of the key factors in mitigating covid risk. 


  9. Seems like an important factor determining the risk of the heart disease myocarditis is whether or not they use "aspiration", which is a technique meant to ensure that the vaccine doesn't go to the blood. Denmark has been following this procedure during the whole pandemic and has a significantly lower occurence of myocarditis ( 129 cases or 0,003% of the amount vaccinated) compared to for instance Norway ( 274 cases or 0,0073% of the vaccinated) who hasn't had this as a part of their routine. 


  10. 10 minutes ago, Lyubov said:

    People are just tired of this. Either take the vaccine or don’t but shut the f up. We are in war times so to speak, but it isn’t between countries but a virus. Wishy washy democratic measures for all sorts of various takes on an issue are not prioritized during war time. You don’t have time to discuss this stuff and unite the conflicting parts when a unified enemy is at your gates. I hope they start forcing this more on people who are healthy to take it.

    Well that's the whole issue. People view this totally different. Some people view this as a serious crisis where the entire health care system is going to collapse within weeks. For these people it obviously makes sense to enforce lock downs and reduce contact as much as possible. 

    Others however, look at the situation from South Africa and translate that into what is gonna happen in other parts of the world. And they are of the impression that this will be a regular innocent flue that passes within a month or two.

     

     


  11. Vaccines are just becoming an outdated subject at this point. They obviously have a significantly positive effect and should be taken by anyone who cares to reduce the harm of this pandemic. 

    I wish we could discuss other aspects of the pandemic such as the new omicron variant and how serious this seems to be. I saw that Leo made a thread about it, but that it was locked due to the thread just derailing into a large vaccine discussion. Now, new data is coming out and we aquire more and more knowledge as time goes by. 


  12. 19 minutes ago, rnd said:

    There're thousands of viruses in the world. All amoung us. Many very dangerous. Why don't  you praise God every day that passes by, that you haven't gotten infected with those?

    Well, I guess there's nothing wrong with doing that. At least during the covid pandemic I've been pretty thankful for all the good news that have come, when fear of something much worse was present. 

    But then I'm not a fortune teller like those anti vax people you are talking about, so I guess it does't count lol.


  13. 2 minutes ago, rnd said:

    And that's what those, I fugure, "against vaccines" somehow invisioned and therefore resisted vaccination, among other reasons,  whereas those "vaccine will save us all once everyone gets 2 shots" -- did not.

    As far as i understand, we can praise ourselves extremely lucky that omicron is, most likely, significantly less lethal than any other variant we've had. It could might as well be the other way around, which with the same transmissibility would be a totally new proportion of crisis.

    And vaccines seem to help, as with the other variants, with relatively less vaccinated people being hospitalized with omicron so far.


  14. @Matt23 It sounds like counselling is at least within some roam of what you want to do, so probably not a terrible choice in and of itself. It is a pretty wide field too, which can lead you in many different directions when your'e uncertain about your purpose. 

    If you want to pursue and pay for a whole masters degree in it is a different question. I think I at least would become clearer about my purpose before i did that. If it turns out to be a stepping stone to your actual purpose, then go for it.


  15. @Preety_India I think your title is misleading. "Shit tests" are not the same as "screening methods" which is what I think you mean. Shit tests can mean to actively put guys in weird spots to see how they react. I think it would be reasonable to say that shit tests in general can be somewhat manipulative, even though most women do it unconsciously. Screening methods however, I would say is not only reasonable but also prefreable. You should absolutely screen guys for certain traits.

     


  16. Interesting discussion to follow. I would say that it makes sense that being succesfull as a woman could sometimes back fire in the sense that you reduce your options in a way. It's not like you become less desirable or anything, but as the guy in the video says you end up in a situation where your options are less so to speak. So if you go into a career thinking that it will enhance your sexual value or relationship opportunities, I think you would be mistaken. However, thats not the same as saying that you shouldn't do it. And honestly, if you did go into a career with the intention of following your dreams, growing as a person etc you wouldn't really care about how it affects your sexual value, would you? I think women most definitely should focus on their career, but they should do it for themselves, not anyone else.


  17. 1 hour ago, wwhy said:

    Consider the concept of beauty for a moment.

    Do you feel that something of beauty:

    a) has to have some other functional purpose or

    b) can just be exist for its own sake

    Does it have to have some functional purpose? 

    -No 

    Does it have a functional purpose? 

    -Yes

    It can exist for its own sake though, such as nice paintings, music and so on, but personal beauty is a too big part of our survival at this point.

    Maybe in a 1000 years.

     

     


  18. Do you have a job and are looking for a side income? Could you get a/another job that you are either qualified for or that is unskilled? 

    The difference between your thread and the examples  you refer to here is that they ask about how to earn money which opens the discussion about life purpose, while you ask about how to make quick money which only opens the discussion for get money quick schemes. Your situation may be unique but that doesn't change the fact that this has nothing to do with your life purpose and only to do with you getting easy, quick money.