‘A deadly societal force’: A Q&A with author Dr. Peter Hotez on the anti-science movement

[RayC]

18 minutes ago, tgw said:

stupidity meets social media ...

 

result : instead of being just ignorant, the stupid nowadays find some drivel they are happy to believe.

 

 

... and inflict on the rest of us.

[still kicking]

21 minutes ago, bignok said:

Back 5,000 years ago?

You lived 5000 years ago?

[cdnvic]

I've cleaned up the personal attacks, and a lot of misinformation. Many posts didn't have to be deleted but were anyway because the poster for whatever reason felt the need to quote the misinformation. We don't have time to edit individual posts. If you quote a post that breaks the rules, yours goes in the trash with it.

[dhupverg]

Follow the money.  If you look into how much this self-admitted unhealthy guy has received in the way of grants, you might have an inkling of why he says what he says. 

[Dan O]

3 hours ago, placeholder said:

Humans came from Africa which doesn't actually feature Cacao trees. I don't know how the species survived without it.

You might wanna check that as they do have cacao tree there

[placeholder]

4 hours ago, bignok said:

I find that hard to believe in many cases. Inland people didnt have much seafood and catching animals wasnt easy.

Human beings didn't evolve on the seashore, and as the article pointed out, even if your point about catching animals is valid, paleolithic people also ate insects.

[placeholder]

1 hour ago, Dan O said:

You might wanna check that as they do have cacao tree there

Yes they do. Now.

Cacao, (Theobroma cacao), also called cocoa, tropical evergreen tree (family Malvaceae) grown for its edible seeds, whose scientific name means “food of the gods” in Greek. Native to lowland rainforests of the Amazon and Orinoco river basins, cacao is grown commercially in the New World tropics as well as western Africa and tropical Asia. 

https://www.britannica.com/plant/cacao

[placeholder]

2 hours ago, dhupverg said:

Follow the money.  If you look into how much this self-admitted unhealthy guy has received in the way of grants, you might have an inkling of why he says what he says. 

A typical dodge of the denialist is the claim that scientists are only doing it for the money. But if personal gain is the motivation, you might want to consider how much RFK Jr gets paid for heading his organization, which for him is only a part-time job.

 

"The details came in a financial disclosure form filed Friday with the Federal Election Commission. It shows that Mr. Kennedy earned $5 million at his environmental law firm, Kennedy & Madonna, and a $516,000 salary and bonus as chairman and chief legal counsel of Children’s Health Defense, a nonprofit group he formed that has campaigned against vaccines."

https://archive.ph/3ugUa

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/30/us/politics/robert-f-kennedy-jr-money.html#:~:text=It shows that Mr.,that has campaigned against vaccines.

 

"Then there’s the Children’s Health Defense, a nonprofit Kennedy founded to “fight corruption, mass surveillance and censorship that put profits before people.” Kennedy profited plenty from it, earning more than $500,000 in salary and bonuses."

https://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2023/07/01/how-rfk-jr-brought-in-more-than-9-million-over-the-past-18-months/?sh=423846287760

[BritManToo]

5 hours ago, placeholder said:

So human beings, unlike other animals, evolved to be nutritionally deficient? You really want to run with that? Domesticated animals tend to live a lot longer than their wild counterparts. Is their diet healthier? You don't think it possible that other factors might be the cause? It's ludicrous to claim that stone ages peoples  lived shorter lives because they didn't have access to magnesium tablets.

Bible says life is 3 score + 10 = 70 years.

As far as I have seen that's pretty much correct.

No need for science, the bible has already said it all!

[Red Phoenix]

'A Deadly Societal Force' - for once Hotez is honest using that title for his auto-biography outlining his career...

He is currently working on a sequel, provisional title: 'Riding with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse'.

[impulse]

8 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

And Hotez maintains it's aimed at undermining democracy and pushing the rise of authoritarianism.

He's got it bass ackwards.  Like most lefties running academia today.

 

Anarchy, maybe.  But how can freedom to discuss even the fringe wingnut ideas lead to authoritarianism?

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Anti-vaxxers loathe Dr. Peter Hotez. In his new book, he mourns their unnecessary deaths

Sept. 19, 2023

...

"In a new book, published today, Hotez describes the expansion of the anti-vaccine trend to COVID-19 vaccines, and now to scientific expertise more broadly.

 

In "The Deadly Rise of Anti-Science: A Scientist's Warning," Hotez outlines the parallels he sees between this push and the anti-intellectualism promoted during the Nazi and Stalin periods of the 20th century.

 

Hotez compares the mass murders under those authoritarian regimes to the at least 200,000 Americans who died after COVID-19 vaccines were introduced, but who refused to get protective shots because they had been convinced not to."

 

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2023/09/19/peter-hotez-new-book-vaccines/70884219007/

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

How Many Republicans Died Because the GOP Turned Against Vaccines?

Party leaders are unquestionably complicit in the premature deaths of their own supporters.

 

December 23, 2022

...

"We know that unvaccinated Americans are more likely to be Republican, that Republicans in positions of power led the movement against COVID vaccination, and that hundreds of thousands of unvaccinated Americans have died preventable deaths from the disease.

 

The Republican Party is unquestionably complicit in the premature deaths of many of its own supporters, a phenomenon that may be without precedent in the history of both American democracy and virology."

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2022/12/covid-deaths-anti-vaccine-republican-voters/672575/

 

 

 

[Red Phoenix]

6 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

Anti-vaxxers loathe Dr. Peter Hotez. In his new book, he mourns their unnecessary deaths

Sept. 19, 2023

...

"In a new book, published today, Hotez describes the expansion of the anti-vaccine trend to COVID-19 vaccines, and now to scientific expertise more broadly.

 

In "The Deadly Rise of Anti-Science: A Scientist's Warning," Hotez outlines the parallels he sees between this push and the anti-intellectualism promoted during the Nazi and Stalin periods of the 20th century.

 

Hotez compares the mass murders under those authoritarian regimes to the at least 200,000 Americans who died after COVID-19 vaccines were introduced, but who refused to get protective shots because they had been convinced not to."

 

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2023/09/19/peter-hotez-new-book-vaccines/70884219007/

 

Quote > Hotez compares the mass murders under those authoritarian regimes to the at least 200,000 Americans who died after COVID-19 vaccines were introduced, but who refused to get protective shots because they had been convinced not to.

And if that does not convince you that Hotez is a hysterical idiot, nothing will!

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

14 hours ago, bignok said:

Doctors live up to 10 years shorter than average

 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6611328/

 

More to the point:

America’s Surprising Partisan Divide on Life Expectancy

Centuries-old settlement patterns — and the attitudes they spawned about government — are to blame for differences in longevity between red southern states and bluer parts of the country

 

09/01/2023

 

...

"If you live pretty much anywhere in the contiguous U.S., you can expect to live more than 78 years, unless you’re in the Deep South or the sprawling region I call Greater Appalachia, a region that stretches from southwestern Pennsylvania to the Ozarks and the Hill Country of Texas.

 

Those two regions — which include all or parts of 16 deep red states and a majority of the House Republican caucus — have a life expectancy of 77, more than four and a half years lower than on the blue-leaning Pacific coastal plain. In the smaller, redder regional culture of New France (in southern Louisiana) the gap is just short of six years."

 

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/09/01/america-life-expectancy-regions-00113369

 

 

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

And the recent developments with COVID vaccine refusal have likely only worsened an already existing Red State-Blue state mortality divide:

People in Republican Counties Have Higher Death Rates Than Those in Democratic Counties

A growing mortality gap between Republican and Democratic areas may largely stem from policy choices

July 18, 2022

...

“In 2001, the study’s starting point, the risk of death among red and blue counties (as defined by the results of presidential elections) was similar. Overall, the U.S. mortality rate has decreased in the nearly two decades since then (albeit not as much as in most other high-income countries). But the improvement for those living in Republican counties by 2019 was half that of those in Democratic counties—11 percent lower versus 22 percent lower."

 

 

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/people-in-republican-counties-have-higher-death-rates-than-those-in-democratic-counties/

 

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Smart people first in line for COVID-19 vaccines, study suggests

September 9, 2023

 

"Intelligent people get their COVID-19 vaccines much faster, suggests a study of more than 750,000 people in Sweden published in the Journal of Health Economics.

...

140-day difference between groups

A total of 80% of the most intelligent people were vaccinated within 40 days of vaccine availability, while it took 180 days for those with the lowest cognitive ability to reach that level. The results, the researchers said, suggest that the complexity of the vaccination decision may make it difficult for people with lower cognitive abilities to understand the benefits of vaccination."

 

(more)

 

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/smart-people-first-line-covid-19-vaccines-study-suggests

 

 

Cognitive ability, health policy, and the dynamics of COVID-19 vaccination

4 September 2023

 

"We examine the relationship between cognitive ability and prompt COVID-19 vaccination using individual-level data on more than 700,000 individuals in Sweden. We find a strong positive association between cognitive ability and swift vaccination, which remains even after controlling for confounding variables with a twin-design. The results suggest that the complexity of the vaccination decision may make it difficult for individuals with lower cognitive abilities to understand the benefits of vaccination."

 

(more)

 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167629623000796

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

15 hours ago, Keep Right said:

Another quack scientist

Right.... ????

 

From the OP:

 

"Peter J. Hotez, MD, PhD, is the founding dean of The National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, as well as director of the Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development. He is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine of National Academies as well as the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. A pediatrician and an expert in vaccinology and tropical disease, Hotez has authored hundreds of peer-reviewed articles and editorials as well dozens of textbook chapters."

 

 

[xylophone]

10 hours ago, placeholder said:

A typical dodge of the denialist is the claim that scientists are only doing it for the money. But if personal gain is the motivation, you might want to consider how much RFK Jr gets paid for heading his organization, which for him is only a part-time job.

 

"The details came in a financial disclosure form filed Friday with the Federal Election Commission. It shows that Mr. Kennedy earned $5 million at his environmental law firm, Kennedy & Madonna, and a $516,000 salary and bonus as chairman and chief legal counsel of Children’s Health Defense, a nonprofit group he formed that has campaigned against vaccines."

https://archive.ph/3ugUa

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/30/us/politics/robert-f-kennedy-jr-money.html#:~:text=It shows that Mr.,that has campaigned against vaccines.

 

"Then there’s the Children’s Health Defense, a nonprofit Kennedy founded to “fight corruption, mass surveillance and censorship that put profits before people.” Kennedy profited plenty from it, earning more than $500,000 in salary and bonuses."

https://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2023/07/01/how-rfk-jr-brought-in-more-than-9-million-over-the-past-18-months/?sh=423846287760

Thanks for that info placeholder, as I had no idea about this RFK jr, so had to look it up online and I can see how he fits in with some of the conspiracy theorists on this thread, and others for that matter............ 

 

Robert Francis Kennedy Jr., also known by his initials RFK Jr., is an American environmental lawyer and writer who promotes anti-vaccine misinformation and public health-related conspiracy theories.

[rattlesnake]

2 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

Smart people first in line for COVID-19 vaccines, study suggests

September 9, 2023

 

"Intelligent people get their COVID-19 vaccines much faster, suggests a study of more than 750,000 people in Sweden published in the Journal of Health Economics.

...

140-day difference between groups

A total of 80% of the most intelligent people were vaccinated within 40 days of vaccine availability, while it took 180 days for those with the lowest cognitive ability to reach that level. The results, the researchers said, suggest that the complexity of the vaccination decision may make it difficult for people with lower cognitive abilities to understand the benefits of vaccination."

 

(more)

 

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/smart-people-first-line-covid-19-vaccines-study-suggests

 

 

Cognitive ability, health policy, and the dynamics of COVID-19 vaccination

4 September 2023

 

"We examine the relationship between cognitive ability and prompt COVID-19 vaccination using individual-level data on more than 700,000 individuals in Sweden. We find a strong positive association between cognitive ability and swift vaccination, which remains even after controlling for confounding variables with a twin-design. The results suggest that the complexity of the vaccination decision may make it difficult for individuals with lower cognitive abilities to understand the benefits of vaccination."

 

(more)

 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167629623000796

 

This study confirms what we already knew, John. You're the smartest guy on this forum.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

As the referenced study reported:

 

"The results, the researchers said, suggest that the complexity of the vaccination decision may make it difficult for people with lower cognitive abilities to understand the benefits of vaccination."

 

Plenty of evidence of that here.

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

So what exactly has the rise of anti-science and anti-intellectualism as a political movement been leading to:

 

From the American Medical Assn: earlier this year:

Amid growing attacks, top cop’s message for doctors: Be prepared

"There is a disturbing trend that has worsened since the COVID-19 pandemic: The rising incidence of violence, intimidation, threats and attacks directed toward physicians and the other health professionals who work to heal."

 

https://www.ama-assn.org/practice-management/physician-health/amid-growing-attacks-top-cop-s-message-doctors-be-prepared

 

AND

 

Two-thirds of physicians and biomedical scientists report harassment on social media

Alarming rates of personal attacks since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic

June 15, 2023

 

"A new research letter published yesterday (June 14) in the journal JAMA Network Open found doctors and scientists are experiencing alarming rates of personal attacks on social media.

 

Two-thirds (66%) of survey respondents reported harassment on social media, compared to an earlier pre-COVID 19 survey conducted in 2020 by the same group of scientists, which found 23.3% of physicians reported receiving personal attacks on social media."

 

https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2023/06/two-thirds-of-physicians-social-media-harrassment/

 

AND

 

Vaccine expert Dr. Peter Hotez harassed outside Houston home after weekend of online attacks

The attacks against Hotez began after he criticized a podcast hosted by Joe Rogan and featuring Democratic presidential candidate and anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

 

Posted on June 19, 2023

 

"Houston vaccine expert and scientist Dr. Peter Hotez was the target of intense online attacks that culminated with two people showing up at his home Sunday, he said.

 

"Ugh I just was stalked in front of my home by a couple of antivaxers taunting me to debate RFKJr," Hotez tweeted. "Of course I was looking my Sunday best in our brutal heat wave. What is it with people?"

 

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/health-science/coronavirus/2023/06/19/454720/peter-hotez-harassed-houston-house-joe-rogan-rfk-attacks/

 

 

[cdnvic]

Removed a post discussing moderation. Please contact support with any concerns.

 

Thank you

[rattlesnake]

22 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

So what exactly has the rise of anti-science and anti-intellectualism as a political movement been leading to:

 

From the American Medical Assn: earlier this year:

Amid growing attacks, top cop’s message for doctors: Be prepared

"There is a disturbing trend that has worsened since the COVID-19 pandemic: The rising incidence of violence, intimidation, threats and attacks directed toward physicians and the other health professionals who work to heal."

 

https://www.ama-assn.org/practice-management/physician-health/amid-growing-attacks-top-cop-s-message-doctors-be-prepared

 

AND

 

Two-thirds of physicians and biomedical scientists report harassment on social media

Alarming rates of personal attacks since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic

June 15, 2023

 

"A new research letter published yesterday (June 14) in the journal JAMA Network Open found doctors and scientists are experiencing alarming rates of personal attacks on social media.

 

Two-thirds (66%) of survey respondents reported harassment on social media, compared to an earlier pre-COVID 19 survey conducted in 2020 by the same group of scientists, which found 23.3% of physicians reported receiving personal attacks on social media."

 

https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2023/06/two-thirds-of-physicians-social-media-harrassment/

 

AND

 

Vaccine expert Dr. Peter Hotez harassed outside Houston home after weekend of online attacks

The attacks against Hotez began after he criticized a podcast hosted by Joe Rogan and featuring Democratic presidential candidate and anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

 

Posted on June 19, 2023

 

"Houston vaccine expert and scientist Dr. Peter Hotez was the target of intense online attacks that culminated with two people showing up at his home Sunday, he said.

 

"Ugh I just was stalked in front of my home by a couple of antivaxers taunting me to debate RFKJr," Hotez tweeted. "Of course I was looking my Sunday best in our brutal heat wave. What is it with people?"

 

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/health-science/coronavirus/2023/06/19/454720/peter-hotez-harassed-houston-house-joe-rogan-rfk-attacks/

 

 

"The rise of anti-science and anti-intellectualism" aka waking up!

[stevenl]

4 hours ago, rattlesnake said:

"The rise of anti-science and anti-intellectualism" aka waking up!

How anyone can not using your brains as waking up, or in general as something good, is beyond me.

[rattlesnake]

26 minutes ago, stevenl said:

How anyone can not using your brains as waking up, or in general as something good, is beyond me.

Context is everything, Steven. I will gladly clarify for you:

 

"Waking up" here means breaking free from the paradigm under which "science" is the de facto way forward and all those who challenge it are somehow lacking intellect or "education".

 

What Hotez refers to as "the rise of anti-science" is in fact the rise of awareness: awareness that the parmaceutical industry is worth billions of dollars and does not profit from healthy people.

 

Hotez and his pharma-sponsored acolytes don't get to decide who is smart and who isn't anymore. People are doing their own research and feeling a lot better for it, and nothing can change that.

[placeholder]

2 minutes ago, rattlesnake said:

Context is everything, Steven. I will gladly clarify for you:

 

"Waking up" here means breaking free from the paradigm under which "science" is the de facto way forward and all those who challenge it are somehow lacking intellect or "education".

 

What Hotez refers to as "the rise of anti-science" in fact means "the rise of awareness": awareness that the parmaceutical industry is a billion-dollar industry which does not profit from healthy people.

 

Hotez and his pharma-sponsored acolytes don't get to decide who is smart and who isn't anymore. People are doing their own research and feeling a lot better for it, and nothing can change that.

Which is why when vaccines became available, the death rate from covid in Republican voting areas became substantially higher than it was in Democratic leaning areas. If "feeling a lot better" means feeling nothing at all, then you have a point. Otherwise, not so much.

[stevenl]

5 minutes ago, rattlesnake said:

Context is everything, Steven. I will gladly clarify for you:

 

"Waking up" here means breaking free from the paradigm under which "science" is the de facto way forward and all those who challenge it are somehow lacking intellect or "education".

 

What Hotez refers to as "the rise of anti-science" is in fact the rise of awareness: awareness that the parmaceutical industry is worth billions of dollars and does not profit from healthy people.

 

Hotez and his pharma-sponsored acolytes don't get to decide who is smart and who isn't anymore. People are doing their own research and feeling a lot better for it, and nothing can change that.

Stupidity is as stupidity does.

[rattlesnake]

13 minutes ago, placeholder said:

Which is why when vaccines became available, the death rate from covid in Republican voting areas became substantially higher than it was in Democratic leaning areas. If "feeling a lot better" means feeling nothing at all, then you have a point. Otherwise, not so much.

"Nothing can change that" includes dubious statistics of course.

[rattlesnake]

14 minutes ago, stevenl said:

Stupidity is as stupidity does.

Undeniably.