Hacker News Reader

Comment by Buldak | Hacker News Reader

What is a controversial scientific view that you wouldn't characterize as "conservative"? The article mentions aversion to GMO, does that count?

View on HN

- men and women being physiological equivalent.

- women having equal innate interest in Stem

- no mental differences between races

- gay,bi,trans being entirely genetic

just off the top of my head. scratches the surface.

The last is particularly interesting because its the opposite viewpoint with regards to protected classes of people and genetic psychology.

Aversion to GMO is a sort of aversion to the unknown.

Something like "regulation of long guns (shotguns, rifles, other things that aren't handguns) in various states in the US has had a non-negligible impact on crime in those states" would be more on par with climate change denial because in both cases you really have to pick a lot of cherries to back up the claim.

"nuclear power is the safest on earth"

(cf forbes article which show death/kwh is even lower than wind / water energy)

That article is not a very good example. It makes some pretty twisted arguments, the sort of thing boys in college say to make themselves feel smart.

Its just numbers.. you can interpret as you want.

You can interpret as you want, but start interpreting in a way that reflects poorly on the intellectual habits of the average HN reader, and you get downvoted to oblivion.

Anything along the line of Rind et al. Not that paper in particular, but anything that is even remotely in the same region.

Anti-vaxxers tend to be described as middle/upper-class liberals. GMO/Organic trends do also tend to be similar groups

>Anti-vaxxers tend to be described as middle/upper-class liberals.

I've heard this, but it doesn't square with my own impressions, and a cursory Google search suggests that anti-vaxxers are not, in fact, predominantly liberal.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5784985/

[2] https://medium.com/the-future-is-electric/conservatives-are-...

I've never heard anybody say that anti-vaxxers are anything but mostly conservative, and those opinions seem to match my own experiences, so this comment is a genuine surprise for me. Is there really a belief in the opposite in some circles?

Contrary to my downvotes, yes. I don't really think of it as any specific political thing, but there was a lot of emphasis, at least originally, put on the hollywood left (Jenny McCarthy comes to mind) pushing an anti-vax agenda.

I'm not trying to make any kind of political point here. Someone asked >>What is a controversial scientific view that you wouldn't characterize as "conservative"?

It's a stereotype. Like all stereotypes, it's attempting to make a broad proclamation of a large group of people, something that I generally try to avoid. I don't even agree with this one being accurate, but it's out there in the world.

[1]https://www.precisionvaccinations.com/childhood-vaccination-...

> the hollywood left (Jenny McCarthy comes to mind)

McCarthy is clearly connected to Hollywood, but left? Basically her entire political activity is anti-vaxxers, and her brief foray into Presidential politics involved first trying to get McCain to take a meeting with her on the vaccine issue when he was running and, only when that failed, trying to do the same with Obama (who also declined.) Not exactly what you'd expect of someone committed to (or even inclined towards) the left.

(Which isn't to say there aren't Hollywood left anti-vaxxers, but McCarthy is an odd choice as an example...)

> I'm not trying to make any kind of political point here. Someone asked >>What is a controversial scientific view that you wouldn't characterize as "conservative"?

Anti-GMO would be a better example than anti-vax.

>> Gary Baum of The Hollywood Reporter has investigated childhood illness and vaccination rates around Los Angeles County. He discovered that some schools in the most affluent L.A neighborhoods have vaccination rates lower than Southern Sudan. Let that sink in for a minute; one of the poorest regions in the world that is unable to supply clean drinking water for half of its inhabitants has a greater vaccination rate than schools that educate the offspring of Hollywood’s elite. [1]

I don't think LA is a hotbed of Republicanism or conservatism.

[1] https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/vaccination-r...

I always heard of anti-vaxxers as bipartisan stupidity - although also largely middle or upper class because the poor and working class - partially because literally can't afford to pass up something that might make them sick and partially because they are often well aware that they aren't well educated.

Stereotypically vaccines are too 'unnatural and not flattering to their holisticism' for the left branch and the right are too scientific elite or government conspiracy for the right.

Err literally can't afford to pass up something not that might make them not get sick.

That's the stereotype, but it's not clear that it's actually true [1]

1. http://theconversation.com/anti-vaccination-beliefs-dont-fol...

> Anti-vaxxers tend to be described as middle/upper-class liberals.

While conservatives who aren't anti-vaxxers like to point to anti-vaxxers as the left equivalent of whatever anti-science group on the right is involved in a conversation (most often climate deniers), but while there are definitely some anti-vaxxers on the left, there's plenty, and from what I've seen more of them, on the religious right, too.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com