I do not enjoy WWN or anything like it. Justin, if you do like that stuff, do not read Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World". That was the world when there was nothing BUT the equivalent of WWN - news was altered for maximum interest and enjoyment, so the tale-teller would get another beer. A world of superstition, lives lost from ignorance,…
I do not enjoy WWN or anything like it. Justin, if you do like that stuff, do not read Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World". That was the world when there was nothing BUT the equivalent of WWN - news was altered for maximum interest and enjoyment, so the tale-teller would get another beer. A world of superstition, lives lost from ignorance, paranoia.
That's still the problem with "journalism" versus "science". Scientists have learned from bitter experience that you let the data lead, and be humble with your theory in the face of data. Journalists like to find a narrative and stick to it, pretty much like a medieval jongleur enriching the tales from the next shire. (Right-wing journalists are still sticking to the "trickle down" narrative, the underlying prior assumption in all their analysis.)
I think a scientist would sign off on the high probability that whether the virus got loose in Wuhan because it leaked out of a lab, or got loose in Wuhan because it came out of a wet market ... it got loose FROM Wuhan, into the world (unlike SARS being contained in Toronto!) because of the secrecy, desire to cover-up, and suppression of medical response, by the current Wuhan and China governments. It's their fault, either way. So the question is frankly boring.
Biden is almost certainly the same guy that gave an interview to TIME.com at the end of May, and will probably repeat that feat tonight on ABC. The rest is imposed narrative. Biden does need, preferably tonight, to say that he can't work nights any more, should mostly stick to a 40-hour work week. Then say that this should be enough, with good staff work - that other presidents besides Reagan and Trump only worked about 20 hours of real, non-schmoozing work in a week.
I absolutely agree that the question of origins is mostly boring — either way, it should behoove us to get cracking on preventing the next coronavirus epidemic. We're onto 3 over the past two decades, and I suspect we've got more to come.
It was funny, I was having dinner with friends last night, one of whom reads this newsletter. He starts talking about how wild it is that we spent so long denying the lab leak theory because it's now been confirmed. I, confused, say: but...it hasn't been. It's still very unlikely. Him and his partner look at me befuddled. "But the New York Times said it's been confirmed!"
So, yeah, media does love a narrative. And people pick up on the topline, even when we try desperately to shove in all the nuance below.
I do not enjoy WWN or anything like it. Justin, if you do like that stuff, do not read Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World". That was the world when there was nothing BUT the equivalent of WWN - news was altered for maximum interest and enjoyment, so the tale-teller would get another beer. A world of superstition, lives lost from ignorance, paranoia.
That's still the problem with "journalism" versus "science". Scientists have learned from bitter experience that you let the data lead, and be humble with your theory in the face of data. Journalists like to find a narrative and stick to it, pretty much like a medieval jongleur enriching the tales from the next shire. (Right-wing journalists are still sticking to the "trickle down" narrative, the underlying prior assumption in all their analysis.)
I think a scientist would sign off on the high probability that whether the virus got loose in Wuhan because it leaked out of a lab, or got loose in Wuhan because it came out of a wet market ... it got loose FROM Wuhan, into the world (unlike SARS being contained in Toronto!) because of the secrecy, desire to cover-up, and suppression of medical response, by the current Wuhan and China governments. It's their fault, either way. So the question is frankly boring.
Biden is almost certainly the same guy that gave an interview to TIME.com at the end of May, and will probably repeat that feat tonight on ABC. The rest is imposed narrative. Biden does need, preferably tonight, to say that he can't work nights any more, should mostly stick to a 40-hour work week. Then say that this should be enough, with good staff work - that other presidents besides Reagan and Trump only worked about 20 hours of real, non-schmoozing work in a week.
I absolutely agree that the question of origins is mostly boring — either way, it should behoove us to get cracking on preventing the next coronavirus epidemic. We're onto 3 over the past two decades, and I suspect we've got more to come.
It was funny, I was having dinner with friends last night, one of whom reads this newsletter. He starts talking about how wild it is that we spent so long denying the lab leak theory because it's now been confirmed. I, confused, say: but...it hasn't been. It's still very unlikely. Him and his partner look at me befuddled. "But the New York Times said it's been confirmed!"
So, yeah, media does love a narrative. And people pick up on the topline, even when we try desperately to shove in all the nuance below.
"Scientists have learned from bitter experience that you let the data lead"
Yeah, nothing can erase an ego like physics and logic can!