In the nation’s hospitals, this Covid wave is different
washingtonpost.com
washingtonpost.com
Every effort to suppress information, whether justifiable or not, leads inexorably to more interest in that information.
I’m so tired of people who can’t look at simple numbers and conclude correctly that vaccination is a funking order of magnitude less risky than the virus itself and, yes, even shitty masks help reduce transmission and infection and, yes, keeping filthy strangers further away is healthier than hanging around in heterogeneous crowded groups.
I’ve always been misanthropic but this past two years have proven that humans are a lot more stupid, selfish, and self-destructive than my sour cynicism ever conceived.
Like most people I’ve spent thousands and thousands of hours getting good at something that employers pay me for. Outside of that, I’m no smarter at anything than any other person. And there is no way for me to spend thousands of hours learning what the best medical treatments are, how to make the best financial decision, the best way to raise kids, hire to work and manage teams remotely, etc.
The only way I can figure out how to deal with all the communications is to listen to experts. Why would I listen to anyone else who hasn’t the spent thousands of hours learning to be an expert? Obviously this doesn’t work perfectly all the time.
The problem seems to me we listen to our tribe/group/friends knowledge, even though the world has gotten too specialized for most of their ad hoc knowledge to be useful.
Don’t we have conflicting needs here? We don’t want scientists waiting for perfect information before providing guidance on a constantly evolving situation but then we are unhappy with the guidance they provide?