Of course it’s true that, to some extent, everything we hear from the media, politicians or scientists is tainted by bias. But there’s a limit to what we can ever learn from our own experience, and that’s far less than we need to make sense of our complex, international world.
What’s the alternative? Rumours from friends of friends of friends on Facebook? Voting in politicians who don’t even bother to pretend to tell the truth? Believing our own uninformed impressions above those of people who have studied a topic?
We need to pay for media, and hold them to account if they report untruths. We need to demand more from our politicians, and vote them out if they are not upholding basic standards of competency and probity. And we need to value expertise, whilst respecting those who express uncertainty about those things that are not yet written in stone.
There’s no point in trusting those who are untrustworthy, but I see no way for society to function that does not involve putting some faith in authorities.
The alternative is understanding that what we hear is typically the output of some simplified model, with a limited range of applicability, parroted by somebody who is both naive and limited. Then assessing our individual circumstances, which we understand very well, in relation to the ‘facts’ we’ve heard, and acting in accordance with our individual assessment.
Nobody is authoritative in this situation. The message from government should be ‘understand these facts as well as can be done given our limited understanding, act in your own interest, understand that you individually may or may not be a priority if you get sick and will live with the health consequences of your choices whatever they may be.’
If everybody is acting solely in their own interest, then surely society as a concept ceases to exist. Some balance is necessary.
Reality and useful action is people acting in their own interest, and that of those close to them. The rest, the politics and media, is blab, window dressing.
Society is not government, nor vice versa. Government has had a useful role in this situation, largely in providing funding for vaccine development and manufacturing. For example the Federal Government has apparently spent something like $18 billion of the US taxpayers money on that, and it’s beneficial. Also in transferring money for unemployment benefits from those working to those who cannot safely work. Also ongoing control of requirements to operate a licensed business. That’s a reasonable role. Beyond that, government has been its usual blunt instrument, screwing up as much as it achieves. It has been neither properly respectful, knowledgeable nor competent at directing and policing people’s individual lives, and to think it ever would be if allowed that role is nuts.
Silvaire wrote:
Government has had a useful role in this situation, largely in providing funding for vaccine development and manufacturing. For example the Federal Government has apparently spent something like $18 billion of the US taxpayers money on that, and it’s beneficial. Also in transferring money for unemployment benefits from those working to those who cannot safely work. Also ongoing control of requirements to operate a licensed business. That’s a reasonable role
Arguably vaccine development would have gone ahead without government involvement, other than facilitating the regulatory regime required to develop, test and sell such a product.
What government has done ‘for us’ other than what I described as a proper role is a completely unprecedented power grab, invading our lives in a way that I personally see as the most dangerous development of any kind in my lifetime to date.
The good news from my individual POV is almost all of the worst and none of the best in the US has been done by specific state governments, not by Federal Government so far, and moving myself and my assets to a different state will follow for me if and when it’s in my overall best interest. Ninety minutes in my plane and I’m gone, no flight plan filed and no notice given, as a number around me have already proved.
Yes, given profits on (especially US) sales, the pharmaceutical industry can do a lot. I live in an area where that industry has sited a lot of its research activity, and there are a lot of people involved from all over the world. Fairly obviously however, the local sites of international companies are here to solicit Federal money.
I found parts of it startling – though perhaps I shouldn’t – such as dialysis being allocated in the 1960s partly based on how active you were within your church community.
Please save us from the editorial stylings of the Atlantic Monthly 
Even worse than the BBC.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
Therefore, free papers and other content which is purely advertisement dependent or politically funded have a huge impact on how people make up their minds about very important things.In the Covid situation we do see that brutally.
Yes. Some papers have realised this. Sweden’s largest serious paper has let people access their website free of charge for most of this year. Unfortunately they still require registration which kind of defeats the purpose. No one who isn’t already reading that paper will register just to follow a link to an article.
Silvaire wrote:
Understanding that most of what you hear is untrue, to one degree or another, is the start of understanding reality.
There is certainly a lot of truth in that. The problem starts when you think that, just because nothing you hear is 100% accurate, you understand something you have never worked with (e.g. epidemiology) better than people who have spent a substantial portion of their lives trying to understand it.
