olofscience
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Everything posted by olofscience
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It's why we're called "Great" Britain. More seriously, it's because the UK government tried half-hearted contact tracing until around March 11th but didn't back it up with testing. Then people were arriving from all over the world, especially Italy and Spain, without any testing, screening, or self-isolation. Then there was about a 2 week delay since the government seemed to think "herd immunity" was the right strategy, if only to play the maverick as opposed to what the other European countries were doing. Only when the Imperial College model was released that they realised it was a stupid strategy, then made a u-turn and locked down on 23rd March. The thing with exponential growth is that the slightest delay will punish you severely. They're under-testing for a reason, it's to hide the fact that we're a lot worse than Spain or Italy. We've overtaken Spain in deaths, we'll overtake Italy within the next 3 days.
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I know, I know, we need to lower our standards for the US...
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If the US had kept to the same level of deaths per capita as South Korea, there would be 1,659 deaths in total by now. Currently it's 62,378. South Korea even had that "oh no" moment when 1 person attended an event with 9000+ other people. Yet they kept deaths under 250.
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The Snowden leaks about the NSA spying on Americans showed that capability is not an issue, and the response showed that most people were okay with it to combat islamic terrorism. As for leadership...where? Have you found any? We can't just claim hindsight when there was the SARS outbreak in 2003, Swine flu in 2009, MERS in 2012, Ebola in 2014, Bill Gates warning about a pandemic in 2015. If there's another new virus in 2 years' time, I really hope someone with a brain is in charge.
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What were the 2 impedances?
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Sorry, as much as some conservatives like conspiracy theories, the left isn't centrally organised and I like to do my own thing
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I don't blame Trump for the coronavirus. But I blame him for the incompetent way he dealt with it. See the difference?
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They did use surveillance in South Korea that might sit uncomfortably with americans. But here in the UK, we have way more CCTV than South Korea. The only difference is that the South Korean government was actually competent at using it (alongside testing). But if South Korea had DZs they would be jumping now. Would you accept a bit more government surveillance for more freedom to go out? No guarantee though, as the UK example shows. You also need a government who are not complete idiots.
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Yes, I just read that article. If you read it again, there was nothing about universal restrictions or closures. It describes how they tracked down the few cases they had and responded really quickly, but for the 99% of the country that wasn't affected, life went on as normal.
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No they did not cancel schools. Restrictions were placed only on one city, Daegu. Most of South Korea is operating close to normality, and that includes its main city Seoul. The US lockdown is far more strict than what they have done in South Korea.
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Are you sure? In the UK we're on track to overtake Italy in deaths soon. I think you have this backwards, they didn't lock down at all. They didn't have to. Same with Taiwan.
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Yeah but if you want to be the best in the world, you can't make exceptions to who you compare to.
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Many of those are just prayer rooms, and those with photos just look like ordinary buildings which are probably just repurposed. No wonder I didn't see any when I was there. The UK has strict laws on the appearance of buildings. You can buy an old church, but the architectural modifications you're allowed to make to it is very, very limited, and almost under no circumstances will you be allowed to demolish it. In the same vein, when you build a new structure strict rules are placed on its appearance. Edinburgh is one of my favourite cities, and I say Mark's allegations are complete rubbish. Was it intentional? No idea, but bullshit is bullshit.
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Hopefully.
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Although I don't live in Edinburgh, I have several friends who live there, and I've visited a few times. I don't even remember seeing a single mosque, and there are LOTS of churches there. There was also the outcry after Trump said there were "no-go" zones in London and Birmingham if I remember correctly. There are valid reasons to criticise Islam, so why completely make things up? It just makes you untrustworthy.
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Hanlon's razor: "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." I never assumed malice with Trump's statements, and so far I haven't seen any articles that say he was malicious. However, he is very very fucking stupid - see Hanlon's razor above.
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I'll save you the wait - I've done that ages ago with the Tweeter in chief, and it's painfully obvious to me how stupid he is. Even now, when confronted by ridiculous media headlines, I head for his Twitter account just to check if they're embellishing or mis-interpreting. Usually not. You're welcome.
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Most of the media are private, for-profit companies if I'm not mistaken. How could we demand anything of them if we don't pay them? The closest you can get to influencing them via the free market is boycotting their advertisers. So either: go to twitter and get it direct from the president boycott media's advertisers get government to regulate them (and possibly violate 1st Amendment) I think the 1st option is the most practical, feel free to try the 2nd, and I am very much against the 3rd option.
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Then just tune them out, and decide for yourself if you want another 4 years of someone who appears to be so stupid that even 10 year olds know better, at the highest position in the country. If you think that the media is biased against Trump - if so, cut out the middleman! Just follow his Twitter feed, unfiltered and unedited by any media. He can make a complete fool of himself with no assistance at all from the media. Seriously, do it - stop listening to the news and just look at his Twitter. Straight from the man himself.
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Well to me it sounded like he was instructing labs to research using disinfectants or UV internally. This is like a whuffo asking PD to investigate using nets to make canopies because Luke Aikins used one in his stunt. It's a waste of valuable lab time, extremely stupid and would get people killed if they tried it. Would you rather have labs researching this very stupid suggestion, or working on actual treatments or vaccines?
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Nobody has done more to weaken the US than Trump. From handing China a trade win by abolishing the TPP, trusting Putin over the US intelligence services, alienating allies like the EU and Canada, then becoming himself a laughingstock of the world by suggesting that people inject or inhale disinfectant or bring UV light inside the body. It's sad. I don't want China to become the world superpower, but that's what you get when the US is led by a narcissistic toddler.
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Islam is frequently criticised for its treatment of women and the LGBT community. Conservatives angrily attack the left for trying to push for closing the pay gap, defend Trump's treatment of women, and also vehemently oppose the LGBT movement for greater inclusivity. I'm all for opposing all kinds of religion, but when a conservative starts criticising Islam I find it ironic that they have more in common than they would like to admit.
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I really don't get right-wingers' obsession with this and Islam. FGM is *not* an islamic thing, it's an african tradition. Yes sometimes there are african muslims. Yes it is bad. But please stop confusing the two.
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COVID-19: Astroturfing the "reopen" demonstrations
olofscience replied to ryoder's topic in Speakers Corner
In any case, no matter what Trump's intentions were, asking scientists to investigate these is a dangerous waste of time. Research time and funding is a precious resource that needs to be allocated carefully. More so in the middle of a pandemic! -
COVID-19: Astroturfing the "reopen" demonstrations
olofscience replied to ryoder's topic in Speakers Corner
Relax guys, it's actually quite fun to think of other things that could kill Covid-19 that we could test. UV light disinfectant boiling water ethylene oxide highly concentrated sulfuric acid highly concentrated nitric acid aqua regia just cook the patient, simmer for 30 minutes I'm pretty sure all of them would get rid of it
