Looking back do you think some corona measures were an overkill?

[StarStruck]

I feel like a lot of measures were implemented from fear.

[DefinitelyNotARobot]

Impossible to say. There is a chance that it would've went far worse if it wasn't for the harsh measures, but that's not a certainty. All we can do is speculate about alternate realities.

You could look at the measures implemented in different countries and how it worked out for them, but even that gets complicated once you factor in the differences in cultural development (like how seriously the average person took these measures, how seriously the government was enforcing them, the relationship between the government and the population and etc.)

Edited October 4, 2023 by DefinitelyNotARobot

[Leo Gura]

It is reasonable to err on the side of caution when it comes to a highly contagious novel virus.

Why is the citizenry so stupid?

Edited October 4, 2023 by Leo Gura

[Yimpa]

The USA has a fear of legalizing cannabis on a federal level. 

Did ya really think the world was ready for a pandemic?

[Girzo]

2 hours ago, Yimpa said:

Did ya really think the world was ready for a pandemic?

Kind of was. I have lasted the period until getting vaccinated and vaccine starting to work before I caught coronavirus for the first-time. So in case it was a terrible shit and the situation evolved in a dangerous direction, a lot of people got semi-protected in-time.

[Consept]

At the time you had to err on the side of caution, fear comes from the unknown and there were a lot of unknowns hence the fear was justified. No serious leader would gamble with their citizens lives even trump pushed the vaccine 

[zurew]

In general when it comes to epistemic stuff, we want to reduce risk and reduce guessing as much as possible (unless you can somehow justify it).

I would be curious if someone here could give a more reasonable epistemic process (that isn't erring on the side of caution) that could be used (as a general approach) in situations where there is a pandemic that we don't know shit or know little about. - this is one interesting philosophical question, that we should have (as a collective) thought about a long time ago.

Edited October 4, 2023 by zurew

[Leo Gura]

@zurew This is was far too serious for epistemology. This issue was life and death, which means raw survival. None of your philosophy matters when things get life and death. Everybody stabs each other in the heart with pitchforks. There's your epistemology.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Leo Gura

[zurew]

55 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

@zurew This is was far too serious for epistemology. This issue was life and death, which means raw survival. None of your philosophy matters when things get life and death. Everybody stabs each other in the heart with pitchforks. There's your epistemology.

Im surprised you are talking shit about epistemology, you cannot take such a stupid stance on this.

Having shit epistemology will make you less effective at literally everything, because you won't know how to properly assess and or approach situations.

The very reason why it was life and death, is because we collectively havent  thought shit about how to approach the unknown in the context of viruses and health. - relying on being impulsive is not very smart of us, and then we are surprised why so many people die or why our global system breaks down over and over again.

[Leo Gura]

@zurew I was being hyperbolic.

You should never forget how mankind behaves when shit hits the fan.

[zurew]

2 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

You should never forget how mankind behaves when shit hits the fan.

sure, I agree with that.

[Leo Gura]

2 hours ago, Consept said:

No serious leader would gamble with their citizens lives

Bolsonaro says, Hold my beer.

[Consept]

45 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Bolsonaro says, Hold my beer.

Keyword 'serious'

[DefinitelyNotARobot]

5 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

You should never forget how mankind behaves when shit hits the fan.

That's very true. Imagine what it must've been to be alive around the time of the black plague. I don't even want to imagine what it was like. You probably got your ass killed and burned in a big pile of corpse "just to make sure" that you weren't of any risk. Not saying that we should use medieval times as prescription for the modern age, but I feel like a lot of "anti-vax" people misunderstood the harsh reality of survival. You've got to make life-or-death decisions in the face of the unknown, even if it means injecting an unknown substance into your veins. If I had to choose between the worst consequences of the vaccine and the worst measures implemented during the black plague, I would take the vaccine any day. l think people have lost touch with how far humanity is willing to go for the survival of the species. Was I totally happy with the measures taken? Not really, but if that's what it took to allow me the freedom to walk into the doctors office without a mask (at least here in German) then I'm fine with it.

Edited October 5, 2023 by DefinitelyNotARobot

[StarStruck]

Sweden didn’t take any measures and it was just fine. Everybody knew this virus was not life or death for civilization. It was a “virus” that targeted the old who were already couple of heart beats away from death anyway. 

[Schizophonia]

yes

[something_else]

Quote

I feel like a lot of measures were implemented from fear.

Another argument is that responding with overkill is good practice for when a virus comes along that is significantly more deadly.

Quote

It was a “virus” that targeted the old who were already couple of heart beats away from death anyway. 

I mean, I was 21 when I got covid and I got it really bad. I was reasonably healthy too. It wasn't so bad that I was near death or even hospitalised, but certainly worse than almost any other cold or illness I've had. My dad who is also reasonably healthy and only in his 50s has permanently lost his smell from covid.

It might not be life or death for most people, but it's certainly much worse than regular flu or colds. It also spread around the world exceptionally quickly. It deserved humanities' full attention.

Edited October 5, 2023 by something_else

[sholomar]

Yes. They did more damage than the virus would have done, but I don't really blame anyone for reacting the way they did. Its normal for the fear response to drive people to actions like these.  I see people to a degree as preprogrammed NPCs operating on genetic imperatives embedded into their DNA over a million years.

That said the lockdowns and money printing drove most of the inflation.  I believe the political left got a bit too authoritarian for my liking during the peak. Its human nature for people not liking being told what to do and there are numerous examples over the decades on both the political left and right where people rebel when they're being told what to do. I mean, they were locking the bathrooms in local parks and they didn't even want people outside walking around.

You shouldn't be surprised that the right reacted how they did when governments tried to mandate all these things like the vaccines. Everything in life should be optional where people should be allowed to make their own choices within reason. Of course everybody's going to argue what reason actually is and that's always the classic argument in the fight of order versus chaos.

There's been a significant decline in academic performance from the way they locked down the schools unnecessarily also. But hey, you live and learn. One of the biggest supporters of defund the police in Minneapolis got brutally attacked by some of the same criminals she pushed to be soft on crime with and suddenly reversed her stance. Sometimes real life changes your perspective when you realize human nature is not compatible with socialist utopian ideals or some philosophy you may hold strong beliefs on.

We could argue Forever on the correct form of government and the correct way to live but it benefits us all to be tolerant towards each other because authoritarianism can backfire and turn on any of us. Basically having good intentions and thinking you have all the answers for how people should live their lives and being some sort of social engineer who then tries to force your belief system on others. That sums up any large group of people no matter what their political affiliation.

To me the whole thing was a fascinating sociological look at human nature to see how we respond to fear. The way everybody just kind of followed orders even though they didn't agree with them was fascinating to me also. Those people in middle management who just do what the people higher up tell them to do fascinate me.

Edited October 5, 2023 by sholomar

[UnbornTao]

5 hours ago, sholomar said:

They did more damage than the virus would have done.

Okey-doke!

Seriously, no.

Edited October 5, 2023 by UnbornTao

[hyruga]

America did the worst in their handling of COVID-19.