Cont: Corona Virus Conspiracy Theories Part IV

[Petra]

Blindly accepting the claims made in a YouTube video is not 'thinking for yourself'. Can you please link to the specific pages on Euromomo that you looked at to substantiate this claim?

Do you see how you assert something that has no foundation? You say "blindly accepting ... video on YouTube" as if that's what I've done. Oh dear, a YT video - where's the credibility? A YT video. It was a YT video ... but then YT started censoring Sam because Sam's supposedly a misinformation agent so now it's only on Odysee. I don't "blindly accept", I analyse. Sam puts links to all her sources in the info panel of her videos so if you go to her channel and look for Excess Mortality: What you aren't being told, you'll see in the info panel that the 4th link is to the euromomo data. I'm not quite up to 15 posts to put the URL but if you put euromomo's base URL and follow with this you'll get it.
/graphs-and-maps#z-scores-by-country

 

[Petra]

Another little quibble, if I may. As I said before, the 3^rd edition of 'Virus Mania' was published in 2021. Wolfgang Weuffen died in 2013. As with Dr Stewart, I doubt he was reviewing the 3^rd edition.

Nope. Yes, I guess it's a bit of a problem because both those men might disagree with updates made to the book so perhaps their endorsements should now be removed but I hope you won't hold it too much against the authors/publishers for retaining them.

 

[Petra]

You misspelled "follow the trail of opinions that match my own"

If you can find debunking of those I follow please give it to me. How I found PolitiFact's debunking was by actively looking for a debunking of the article they debunked, I wanted to ensure there was no credible debunking of it. I didn't realise that PolitiFact's article had already been rebutted by the authors and so I wrote one myself.

I always look for debunking of who I believe and I actively approach fact-checkers and ask for their response ... what is it? Zero.

I approached five fact-checkers and a Queensland virologist for a debunking of the article, Phantom Virus: In search of Sars-CoV-2. No one responded. I wrote to Jon Cohen of sciencemag who had no trouble debunking Judy Mikovits in the article, Fact-checking Judy Mikovits, the controversial virologist attacking Anthony Fauci in a viral conspiracy video, who I could easily debunk too. She spouts nonsense but not a word on Phantom Virus, not a word.

I don't want what I believe to be true, I want to believe what is true. Sure, I might take a little while to change my mind on something when I've believed it for a long time but when a belief I hold is challenged in a credible way, if I can't change my mind immediately I just "park" the challenge to come to terms with in time.

 

[Petra]

Ignoring the errors in her claims and repeatedly referring to their medical grades and credentials is called "argument from authority" btw. So maybe don't call out false logical fallacies while committing one

You simply cannot win. I don't really care about her credentials but on this website people seem very hung up on source and credentials so that's why I put them forward. I'm far more about content, not source or credentials.

Where do I ignore the errors in her claims? I've asked for her false claims to be stated and so far no one has provided them.

Why don't you give me her alleged false claims and we can discuss them.

 

[Petra]

I think it's a matter of different default assumptions.

My default assumption is that an expert consensus is correct, until and unless there is good reason to think otherwise.

The default assumption of the Petras, Bubbas and Tippits of this world seems to be that an expert consensus is very likely to be wrong. They then seek out, and accept without due diligence, anything they can find that supports that assumption, no matter how dubious the source.

You are making unfounded assertions. You have no idea what my default assumptions are and my method is absolutely not to simply find anything that supports my assumption. What I wish to do is create a watertight argument that others cannot argue against, that is my aim so in that endeavour I need to ensure I've got my argument correct.

For the record, I 100% accept the evidence for the astonishing achievement of the moon landings and I used to be a very active climate activist although I have to say now when I realise so much fraudulence goes on in science I'd need to re-look at climate science. The thing is though that when I looked at the climate science I always looked at the for and against arguments and the AGW arguments always seemed to win.

 

[Georg]

As you admit to not being a scientist, on what basis do you throw out the verdict of the vast majority of qualified medical professionals, in favour of a handful of outliers, if it's not confirmation bias?

As said by 16th century Italian philosopher and mathematician, Giordano Bruno, and many other sages:

"It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people."

majority of qualified medical professionals ≠ majority of the people

The majority of "the people" believes in gods, astrology, souls and other nonsense.

The majority of scientists doesn't.

As someone without background in science I see no other reasonable approach than this one:

My default assumption is that an expert consensus is correct, until and unless there is good reason to think otherwise.

Since I do not think that the overwhelming majority of the experts is either gulled or part of a worldwide conspiracy I'll follow their advice.


And saying the virus simply does not exist is funny and sad at the same time.
How many people would need to conspire and keep quiet for that one not to come out?
While Clinton as president couldn't even keep a blowjob secret?
Please........

 

[MBDK]

Why don't you give me her alleged false claims and we can discuss them.

Aside from the ex vivo evidence I mentioned earlier, take your pick.

https://factcheck.afp.com/new-zeala...trys-pcr-testing-regime-widely-shared-youtube

FYI, I will be going to sleep soon, but am confident others can continue your education, or I will return later to deal with anything unanswered.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

But what says they had covid and not another respiratory illness? Covid, as indicated on the CDC website, doesn't have a distinctive set of symptoms and the PCR test is shown not to be fit for purpose. If testing stopped tomorrow there would be no way to say that anyone had covid and not another respiratory illness.

Citation needed for the highlighted.

 

[Foster Zygote]

True (although I think David Icke says some good things at least) but the book also has endorsements made by reputable, relevant professionals.

"The book 'Virus Mania' has been written with the care of a master-craftsman, courageously evaluating the medical establishment, the corporate elites and the powerful government funding institutions."
Wolfgang Weuffen, MD, Professor of Microbiology and Infectious Epidemiology

"The book 'Virus-Wahn' can be called the first work in which the errors, frauds and general misinformations being spread by official bodies about doubtful or non-virus infections are completely exposed."
Gordon T. Stewart, MD, professor of public health and former WHO advisor

And the authors themselves are well-credentialled.

Torsten Engelbrecht works as investigative journalist in Hamburg. In 2009, he received the Alternative Media Award for his article "The Amalgam Controversy." He was trained at the renowned magazine for professional journalists "Message" and was a permanent editor at the "Financial Times Deutschland," among others. He has written for publications such as "OffGuardian", "Süddeutsche Zeitung", "Neue Zürcher Zeitung", "Rubikon", "Greenpeace Magazin" and "The Ecologist". In 2010 his book "Die Zukunft der Krebsmedizin" (The Future of Cancer Medicine) has been published, with 3 doctors as co-authors.

Dr. Claus Köhnlein, MD, is a medical specialist of internal diseases. He completed his residency in the Oncology Department at the University of Kiel. Since 1993, he has worked in his own medical practice, treating also Hepatitis C and AIDS patients who are skeptical of antiviral medications. Köhnlein is one of the world's most experienced experts when it comes to alleged viral epidemics. In April 2020, he was mentioned in the "OffGuardian" article "8 More Experts Questionig the Coronavirus Panic." A "Russia Today" interview with him, published on Youtube in September 2020, on the topic "fatal COVID-19 overtherapy" achieved almost 1.4 million views within a short time.

Dr. Samantha Bailey, MD, is a research physician in New Zealand. She completed her Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree at Otago University in 2005. She has worked in general practice, telehealth and in clinical trials for over 12 years with a particular interest in novel tests and treatments for medical diseases. She has the largest YouTube health channel in New Zealand, and creates educational health videos based on questions from her audience. Bailey has also been a co-presenter for a nationwide television health show in New Zealand that debunks common health misconceptions, called The Checkup.

Dr. Stefano Scoglio, BSc PhD, is an expert in microbiology and naturopathy. Since 2004, he has been working as a scientific researcher, publishing many articles in international scientific journals and coordinating scientific and clinical research on Klamath algae extracts, and on microalgae-based probiotics, in cooperation with the Italian National Research Center and various Universities. He is the inventor of 7 medical patents. For his important scientific publications, in 2018, Scoglio was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Medicine.

Young earth creationists use the same tactic. They cherry pick a short list of people with credentials of one sort or another, but not necessarily in the specific field in question. And some of the "credentials" are invariably fluff used to impress the rubes. But such lists can be assembled to promote any sort of quackery. You can produce lists of "reputable, relevant professionals" who endorse miracles - the earth being no more than 6,000 years old - alien abductions - ghosts - demon possession - perpetual motion machines - global conspiracies of Jewish bankers, Illuminati, whatever - racist ideologies...

What such lists can't obfuscate is that there is still a massive scientific consensus contradicting the claims they are being presented to support. So we're still left with the same problem. Either the vast majority of the world's experts on epidemiology and medical care are are committed to maintaining a hoax in a globally pervasive conspiracy too credibility straining for a Roland Emmerich movie, or they're all too incompetent and stupid to see what a bunch of completely untrained people, such as yourself, can clearly discern.

So which is it? Are the vast majority of the medical science community nefarious conspirators, or are they all just that dumb compared to you?

 

[W.D.Clinger]

This might save someone a bit of time and head-scratching.

At 0749 UTC, Petra posted a moderately long message that contained this paragraph:

Sam is co-author of the latest edition of the book, Virus Mania, which has a great number of laudatory reviews and has also been endorsed by relevant, reputable professionals. Another of the co-authors, Torsten Engelbrecht, has co-authored a couple of articles, one of which, COVID-19 PCR Tests are Scientifically Meaningless, had a debunking attempt made by fact-checker, PolitiFact. Even the layperson can identify its complete lameness. Unsurprisingly, PolitiFact were unable to respond to the response to their debunking.

At 0909 UTC, Petra posted almost the same moderately long message, in which the only change was the word inserted in red below:

Sam is a co-author of the latest edition of the book, Virus Mania, which has a great number of laudatory reviews and has also been endorsed by relevant, reputable professionals. Another of the co-authors, Torsten Engelbrecht, has co-authored a couple of articles, one of which, COVID-19 PCR Tests are Scientifically Meaningless, had a debunking attempt made by fact-checker, PolitiFact. Even the layperson can identify its complete lameness. Unsurprisingly, PolitiFact were unable to respond to the response to their debunking.

Both of those posts ended with this sentence:

Source means nothing.

At 1245 UTC:

You simply cannot win. I don't really care about her credentials but on this website people seem very hung up on source and credentials so that's why I put them forward. I'm far more about content, not source or credentials.

Sources matter because life is too short to drop what you're doing and rush out to defend the sheep every time the village idiot cries wolf. That's not to say the village idiot is always wrong. As Aesop's fable #210 concluded more than 2500 years ago: "this shows how liars are rewarded: even if they tell the truth, no one believes them". And the reason no one believes them is that it's a waste of time to give credence to liars and idiots just because they aren't always wrong; when they aren't wrong, someone more credible will state the same truth and draw attention to it.

Science is not consensus OK?

Bertrand Russell, "On the Value of Skepticism":

There are matters about which those who have investigated them are agreed; the dates of eclipses may serve as an illustration. There are other matters about which experts are not agreed. Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. Einstein's view as to the magnitude of the deflection of light by gravitation would have been rejected by all experts not many years ago, yet it proved to be right. Nevertheless the opinion of experts, when it is unanimous, must be accepted by non-experts as more likely to be right than the opposite opinion. The scepticism that I advocate amounts only to this: (1) that when the experts are agreed, the opposite opinion cannot be held to be certain; (2) that when they are not agreed, no opinion can be regarded as certain by a non-expert; and (3) that when they all hold that no sufficient grounds for a positive opinion exist, the ordinary man would do well to suspend his judgment.

That's good advice.

In that same essay, Russell also wrote:

When there are rational grounds for an opinion, people are content to set them forth and wait for them to operate. In such cases, people do not hold their opinions with passion; they hold them calmly, and set forth their reasons quietly. The opinions that are held with passion are always those for which no good ground exists; indeed the passion is the measure of the holder's lack of rational conviction. Opinions in politics and religion are almost always held passionately.

 

[Pixel42]

Where do I ignore the errors in her claims? I've asked for her false claims to be stated and so far no one has provided them.

Why don't you give me her alleged false claims and we can discuss them.

In your first post here you said this:

On FB last year someone posted figures indicating an excess spike in mortality in Europe in April 2020 and challenged me to explain the excess spike assuming covid not to be the cause. I was stumped, I didn't believe it was covid because I don't believe covid has been proven to exist but at the same time while I believe many lies have been told I didn't believe that the mortality figures would be falsified and I had no other explanation. I told the FB poster that I would chew on those figures. A couple of weeks later, NZ doctor, Sam Bailey, a former co-presenter of the medical myth-busting series, The Checkup, and a bit of a media darling who is now persona non grata because of her views on the pandemic published a video explaining how the excess spike corresponded well with aggressive drug trials conducted in certain European countries.

She showed, for example, using figures from the European mortality monitoring site, euromomo, that while Spain showed an excess spike in mortality, neighbouring Portugal actually had a lower spike than in 2017. Spain conducted aggressive drug trials while Portugal did not.

I have no idea what "aggressive drug trials" might refer to, let alone how they could explain excess deaths, but my degree is in Mathematics so I know how easy it to data dredge for spurious correlations.

I recalled that Spain had been one of the first countries badly hit by the pandemic (mostly because of Madrid, an international travel hub) so an alternative explanation for the difference between Spain's and Portugal's Covid 19 deaths at the start of the pandemic immediately occured to me. I suggested you look for alternative explanations yourself, but you refused.

So I did it myself, as follows:

First I went to this website:

https://vac-lshtm.shinyapps.io/ncov_tracker/

I selected Region Plots, and then just Spain and Portugal (deselecting everything except Spain and then adding Portugal), so I could compare how the pandemic progressed in those two countries during the early months of 2020 using the various measures provided.

It's clear that Spain was hit much earlier and harder by the pandemic, with both cases and deaths per million significantly higher than Portugal's in March and April.

I then looked up the progress of the pandemic in the two countries.

Spain's first case was recorded 31 January, and by 13 March cases had been confirmed in all 50 provinces of the country.

Portugal's first confirmed case wasn't until 2nd March, over a month later.

Both countries implemented mitigation measures, but as Portugal's cat wasn't already out of the bag, as it were, I would expect theirs to be more effective, which it clearly was.

As for the claim that Portugal's excess deaths were actually lower than normal in April 2020: I haven't checked if it's true [Edited: see Cosmic Yak's later post].

 

[Cosmic Yak]

No. I follow the debunking trail so I look at the to and fro argument and see who sustains their argument and is able to have the last word. PolitiFact had no response to the rebuttal of their debunking.

Again, you assert this, and again provide no evidence.
Moreover, you have not specified exactly what factual disagreements you had with PolitiFact's debunking.

It's got zero to do with numbers. Science is not consensus OK?

You clearly don't understand the concept of peer review, and you are (possibly unintentionally) confusing scientific consensus with argumentum ad populum.
If the majority of experts in a field agree that the evidence supports a particular conclusion, then it's pretty safe to say that conclusion is valid.
If you are going to dispute that, then you need some extraordinary evidence.
So far, you have presented none, nor do you appear to have actually looked at the evidence regarding Covid-19 or PCR tests.
Furthermore, you keep saying you rely on the experts, because you're not a scientist, and the rejecting what the experts say because you don't agree with it. Once again: this is confirmation bias.

Unfortunately, I still cannot post URLs and this is not the edition I refer to. If you go to the third edition which has four authors including Dr Sam Bailey the reviews are of a completely different calibre.

These are two endorsements by reputable professionals.

"The book 'Virus Mania' has been written with the care of a master-craftsman, courageously evaluating the medical establishment, the corporate elites and the powerful government funding institutions."
Wolfgang Weuffen, MD, Professor of Microbiology and Infectious Epidemiology

As has already been pointed out, Professor Weuffen died in 2013, so he cannot have been reviewing that edition of the book. Did you check this yourself before posting? If not, why not?

"The book 'Virus-Mania' can be called the first work in which the errors, frauds and general misinformations being spread by official bodies about doubtful or non-virus infections are completely exposed."
Gordon T. Stewart, MD, professor of public health and former WHO advisor

Stewart died in 2016. Same questions: did you check this before you posted and, if not, why not?

If you search for "debunking the debunkers: exposure of fraud stands strong" you will see my blog post where I provide evidence for PolitiFact not being able to respond to the rebuttal of their debunking and also the debunking of their debunking by the authors as well as my own debunking that I wrote before I realised the authors had debunked the debunking themselves. Additionally, in that post is evidence of a similar situation of Italian scientist, Dr Stefano Scoglio, (also a co-author of the 3rd edition of Virus Mania), debunking a debunking of his article by Italian fact-checker, facta, with no further response by facta.

Interesting. I'll look at that response in more detail later.
For everyone else, here it is:
https://occamsrazorterrorevents.wee...ebunkers-pcr-tests-scientifically-meaningless

A quick look tells me that blog is a smorgasbord of crazy. 9/11, obviously, but also Sandy Hook denial, Manchester bombing denial, mind control. Wow.


'I've examined the to and fro and believe the experts' is actually 'Everything around me is fake and I'm the only one who can see it'.
Look in 'other events'. Petra is basically saying that everything is fake. All of it.
Yeah, rational debate is not gonna happen here.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

Do you see how you assert something that has no foundation? You say "blindly accepting ... video on YouTube" as if that's what I've done. Oh dear, a YT video - where's the credibility? A YT video. It was a YT video ... but then YT started censoring Sam because Sam's supposedly a misinformation agent so now it's only on Odysee. I don't "blindly accept", I analyse. Sam puts links to all her sources in the info panel of her videos so if you go to her channel and look for Excess Mortality: What you aren't being told, you'll see in the info panel that the 4th link is to the euromomo data. I'm not quite up to 15 posts to put the URL but if you put euromomo's base URL and follow with this you'll get it.
/graphs-and-maps#z-scores-by-country

The claim was that, according to this data, the spike in Portugal in 2017 was higher than the spike in 2020.
That is completely untrue.
https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps#z-scores-by-country

 

[varwoche]

You simply cannot win. I don't really care about her credentials...

And there lies part of your problem. This naive approach has led you to swallow abject garbage hook, line, and sinker.

 

[carlitos]

Another little quibble, if I may. As I said before, the 3^rd edition of 'Virus Mania' was published in 2021. Wolfgang Weuffen died in 2013. As with Dr Stewart, I doubt he was reviewing the 3^rd edition.

You seem to be following the debunking trail^TM.

 

[Tippit]

But what says they had covid and not another respiratory illness? Covid, as indicated on the CDC website, doesn't have a distinctive set of symptoms and the PCR test is shown not to be fit for purpose. If testing stopped tomorrow there would be no way to say that anyone had covid and not another respiratory illness.

That is not true. When I had what in all likelihood was Covid in June ‘20, I had viral symptoms that were distinctly unique. It does not, in fact, lead to respiratory symptoms in everyone. Some people like me experienced neurological symptoms, some people experience cardiovascular symptoms.

While I agree that Covid testing is highly problematic for a number of reasons, its pretty clear to me that a novel illness began circulating a few years ago that ravaged naive immune systems. Perhaps you have to experience it to realize it, but I wonder how you can so easily dismiss the claims of everyone you know who has had it, unless you are a total shut-in


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Resume]

When I had what in all likelihood was Covid in June ‘20 . . .

You were never tested so you do not know this.

 

[Carrot Flower King]

Where do I ignore the errors in her claims? I've asked for her false claims to be stated and so far no one has provided them.

Why don't you give me her alleged false claims and we can discuss them.

I already did that: I provided 2 links taking apart her "arguments". And I gave a link to that awful excuse for a paper of her husband's.

As for "inappropriate ad hominem": if it looks like a duck, waddles like a duck, comes with a topping of orange sauce...I reckon it to be a member of Anatidae. So, benefit of the doubt, could be a swan or goose.

Oh, and I've known enough medics over the years to realise that any medical degree is not a guarantee of competence or understanding science and research and statistics, so trotting out all the "degree from wherever" doesn't wash, especially as many of us here can plahy the degree from...years of experience in healthcare...years of experience reading papers game.

 

[EaglePuncher]

You simply cannot win. I don't really care about her credentials but on this website people seem very hung up on source and credentials so that's why I put them forward. I'm far more about content, not source or credentials.

You clearly tried to tie her credibility to her degree.

Where do I ignore the errors in her claims? I've asked for her false claims to be stated and so far no one has provided them.

Why don't you give me her alleged false claims and we can discuss them.

I will not play this silly game. Anything shown to you will be "Nuh Uh"-d away by you. Maybe try "thinking for yourself"

Also laughable offer in general, since "discussing" a pandemic with a random stranger on the www is going absolutely nowhere. Evicence: This thread so far. Also: You are very clearly not here to discuss.

 

[sackett]

Truly inspired tortured verse
Now I'll try for something worse
Won't be long, I'm always terse
Something, something, something purse.

On topic: The vaccines are not gene therapy because they don't alter your genes.

Also, they don't altar your jeans.

Spired verse!
'N spired verse!
Startin' bad
'N gettin' worse!!
Call for tha doctor
Call for the nuss
Call for the preacher
'N hear him cuss!

[Triple speed: 123456789 trip fall crash, tangle of grubby legs, broken shoes, and muddy underpants, except Ivanka cuz her Pap don't let her wear none. Hah hah hah!]