I`m too waiting.

I will add my notes in 5 years - I`m pretty shure that most of

"we have to go that way"

is obsolete and will be reflectet very critical by public media. We will ask us, at which time we did stop thinking by ourself.

And the media will again try to look what has happens - like they did after any recent "happening" - why they didnt was critical, why there was no discurs.

Guess it will be readable in articles like here:

https://en.ejo.ch/ethics-quality/fakes-in-journalism

It is not similar, not a lie itself. But we will see that the media/who/goverment did use scientists with a given mindset. And notbody did even talk with scientists with another point of view. No discurs itself. We will see that we did waste cash and time, with that habit. What did lead to actions who was wrong...

Surfy

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About Overlanding, Travelogues, Equipment
Trans-Africa over the west coast

I received the shot a couple of nights ago. No side effects (so far) other than a shoulder that feels like someone punched me in the arm hard.

The vaccine was Moderna, which surprised me, as almost everyone I know who has received a jab was given the Pfizer one. Apparently Moderna has had a hard time keeping to its commitments for shipments to Canada.

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Bruce Clarke - 2020 Yamaha XV250

Apologies, but I do not at all understand what you are trying to convey. That a collective science community is wrong? That we are stupid to act a society to solve a common problem? That we are never right to listen to experts?

A common theme with "anti-establishment" debaters are that they never really make proper statements, but raise doubt by "just asking questions". I say that is not good enough. Any decent participant in a debate should state their opinion on the topic in question and their falsifiable reason for holding it. Otherwise there is no point in communicating.

A common theme with "anti-establishment" debaters are that they never really make proper statements, but raise doubt by "just asking questions". I say that is not good enough. Any decent participant in a debate should state their opinion on the topic in question and their falsifiable reason for holding it. Otherwise there is no point in communicating.[/QUOTE]

I wouldn't waste my time getting into an online discussion with some people about this, look at one of the previous comments;

'Just sit back and enjoy the show' said another contributor on p4 of this thread, they are a waste of time, and I think that particular comment sums them up, pot stirrers.
Kind regards
James

Well as it says in my signature ""A wise man makes his own decisions, an ignorant man follows public opinion" (public opinion being social media)

Be this guy.



Mezo.

Now look at the man behind, talking to his neighbour (just above circled bloke's head)

'Hey, this bloke in front here, he's not saluting'

Neighbour - 'You're right, what the matter with him.'

< leans forward and taps him on the shoulder>

'Hey pal, why're you not saluting? You got a problem with saving our country? You not patriotic? You're not a foreigner are you, sneaking in here, taking jobs away from honest Englishmen. I didn't spend two years in the trenches just to give my country up to the likes of you.'

Circled man - 'No, I'm just here to hear what he has to say and make up my own mind'

'Make up your own mind! Who the hell do you think you are Mr la-de-da foreigner.' <Shouts out angrlly> 'Hey everyone, this foreigner here doesn't think Mr Mosley is talking sense. He thinks he knows better and we're just working class scum.

Next bloke along - 'Working class scum! I'll give 'im working class scum <pulls knife from pocket> ...

Just like Twitter really.

DISCLAIMER: On reviewing the thread, I just realised that I probably have read the completely wrong context into Mezo's post, and attributed opinions to them that are probably incorrect. My apologies for this. If it is OK with Mezo, I'm leaving the post up, as I think the argument was worth making, even if Mezo was not be the right person to make it against. Mezo, message me if you want me to delete it.

In short, your argument is "ever listening to an authority is like being a nazi". I think it is prudent to start with pointing out that the movement against mask mandates and vaccines is riddled with nazis, so I don't really think you want to go there.

If you want, we can have a discussion around different types of authority and why it is different to listen to an authoritarian leader is different from assuming truth in the consensus of the science community. We can do that through power theories (e.g. French & Raven), paradigm theories (e.g. Kuhn) or whatever you want, but freedumb memes are not really a way for adults to discuss something that kills thousands of people every day in India alone.

I am vehemently against forcing anyone to do anything, as long as it does not affect the rest of society. More so than most people, I believe. I don't give a flying f*ck about your choices when it comes to drug use, speeding on a deserted highway, or the sex you choose to consent to. Your risks, your choices.

But your freedom ends where mine begins. When your actions put others in danger, they're not OK. If you drive a car intoxicated, speed on a street next to a school, or have sex with someone without telling them you have an STD, you are putting other people at risk. For a society to work, we cannot allow that. I am assuming we agree on this principle, if not, please tell me.

Public health decisions are based on risk analysis in the same way that speed limits are set next to schools. They are limiting the rights of each single individual to make it possible for every single individual to exercise their fundamental rights, such as the right to life. There are some warning signs to look out for, e.g. if a decision targets a specific group. It's therefore vital that we view the decisions made with a critical eye.

But to do that in an effective manner, we need to base our criticism on facts and proper analysis. Unfortunately, most of the criticism is NOT based on facts, and therefore it stops any sensible debate. This defeats the purpose of the criticism, and builds up a feeling among some that they are unfairly marginalised. It breeds conspiracy theories that take away the focus on the actual conspiracies. It creates fictional enemies that detract from the real ones. At this point, I think you may want to refer to the history on how Germany went from the very liberal Weimar state to the picture you used. Was that through rational debate, or through anti-establishment thinking and conspiracy theories?

So you see, I'm very much against accepting authoritarianism, and I happily resist. But I also know that to do so in a way that does not break society, I need to use facts, words, and arguments, not feelings, fear, and memes.

Finally, I would just like to point out that no-one stops you from living alone in a cabin in the forest without a vaccine. So, your freedom still exists where it does not intersect with other people's freedom. Most of us just don't want your rather simplistic understanding of your liberty to take away ours. In this case, my freedom includes the ability to safely go to a shop or restaurant without risking you infecting me.

The weather's nice, I'm gonna go out riding for a few hours, not speeding where there are kids playing on the road.

Ironically where most of the anti's for anything get the science/facts/whatever they blindly believe to be true in the face of overwhelming evidence its wrong

You hit the nail on the head in this and your previous post. Thank you for the reasoned response.
Unfortunately it's pointless.
It's hilarious how some complain that there's no room for reasoned debate, they're shut down by........who ever.
Well why would I engage with people spouting utter nonsense that they're unable or unwilling to corroborate?
Or they continually attempt to lay pathetic little traps by asking (what they claim to be) valid questions. In an over inflated intellectual ego trip.

There are three reasons to always engage in debate.

Research tells us that people who hold strong, but unfounded beliefs are most likely to change those by being informed by people they have a personal relationship with. This is why the less qualified family doctor has more sway than the researcher when it comes to informing people about their health, but less sway than friends and family. That in turn means that we need to arm those friends and family with good arguments to bring up in conversations.

We, as motorcyclists, are a quite close knit community. This means that we can influence each other, but more importantly, we can arm each other with good arguments to take out into our other social circles. The "sensible" arguments are less sticky than the emotional ones (see below), so we need to practice them whenever we can. So while I'm sure my rather arrogant style does not convince too many people, I hope that I can inspire those nicer than me.

Secondly, we may want to police our spaces to instigate change. This is how we're succeeding in fighting racism, homophobia, sexism, etc. When racist remarks can no longer be excused, people stop making them. They start self-policing, which in turn makes them question their attitudes. So policing our social spaces should always be with the goal that people start changing themselves.

The third reason is really perfectly meta in this discussion. In the 90s, Richard Dawkins, Susan Blackmore and some others launched the concept of the meme. While it now means something else, the original meme theory was that ideas work like viruses. They infect the brain, and mutate, evolve, and spread through evolutionary processes. Unfortunately, correctness is not the best selector, but compatibility with other existing memes (memeplexes), evocation of basic instincts and feelings, etc, are.

An example of a meme in this context is that vaccines contain dangerous (non-specific) stuff. The meme does not define what the stuff is, so seen from a rational angle, it should be rejected. But since it plays into our fear of being harmed by pollution (and fits very well with memes saying that organic produce is superior, etc) it easily takes root, and since it is simple in form, it is easy to transmit to others. It is an example of a harmful meme, or rather, a meme that is harmful to its host, while succeeding in its own transmission. Just like a virus that can kill you.

The memes building up the Q-anon conspiracy theory is a great example. They are compatible with some very strong existing memes like protecting children is good (a benign meme), white men are losing out (a harmful meme), etc. They build up a memeplex, where each meme is quite compatible with the whole, even if some of them may be mutually incompatible. And even if the meme that Clinton is raping babies in a basement that does not exist falls, the memeplex survives and readily accepts new memes.

Other examples of memeplexes are religions and cults, political views, cultural identity, etc. Figuring out which is good and which is bad can be left as an "exercise to the reader" - but in itself this is a morally neutral phenomenon.

Continuing this train of thought, we want to find out how we can avoid exposing ourselves to dangerous memes, and if we can vaccinate ourselves and others against memes. The exposure part is pretty obvious, but the meme vaccine is interesting. Why do we today reject memes that were previously strong? Examples are the right of men to rape women, violence as a righteous solution to most conflicts, etc. It's because we're infected by other memes that vaccinate us against the dangerous ones. So, in very complex thinking, hopefully our efforts to teach people to think properly around conspiracy theories etc can train their mental immune responses to resist the attractiveness of harmful memes.

So we trudge along, fighting the good fight, knowing that the only thing worse than making what seems like a futile effort is giving up. But we also know that what we're fighting for is a better world - or is that just a meme that has infected us? Damn...

"The third reason is really perfectly meta in this discussion. In the 90s, Richard Dawkins, Susan Blackmore and some others launched the concept of the meme. While it now means something else, the original meme theory was that ideas work like viruses. They infect the brain, and mutate, evolve, and spread through evolutionary processes. Unfortunately, correctness is not the best selector, but compatibility with other existing memes (memeplexes), evocation of basic instincts and feelings, etc, are."

Great explanation. I didn't know where it came from, but I absolutely recognise that
Unfortunately (or maybe its an old age, no time for ridiculous stuff) we tend to self select our acquaintances. I'd do my best not to fall in to this trap in the work environment. Selecting individuals who were of different character traits, who would challenge stuff. Didn't always work....some days it would come down to "f##k it. Just do it my way"

Again thanks for your posts. You're far more articulate and patient than myself :-)

That new AstraZenica Memevac will fix that. We'll be back to normal Neanderthal thinking just as soon as the full Twitter and Facebook volunteer trials are concluded and they get it distributed. 90% effective is the hope. The other one, the Pfizer anti meme SoulVac, doesn't seem to be as effective as it works by injecting you with an artificially produced morality meme designed to induce a degree of innate conscience. It seems that, after centuries of exposure in churches, so many of the population are already immune to its effects that herd immunity via a high R number may not be possible. All I can suggest in the meantime is to keep that thought mask on your keyboard. It doesn't prevent you from catching right-on thinking but it does help stop you spreading it to others.

Where it came from, well, that's still a mystery (a bit like the changing of the seasons or the tides of the sea ). Some experts have suggested it might have jumped species (from women, one said, but he was dismissed as being sick already). Of more concern is LongMeme, where it takes over your life and you can't do anything at all without worrying yourself to a standstill that you're getting it wrong. So many sufferers unable to leave their house, take a step into the outside world, even open their mouth because of it. Sadly the vaccines won't help them (other than perhaps that unproven Chinese one SinoBootgrind) and the only available medications are of dubious provenance or banned outright. It's not my area of expertise though so I'm going to leave it to those who know about these things. Only thing I can say is thank goodness I'm not in the vulnerable demographic. If you're 12-35 these days this stuff spreads like wildfire.

At first I would like to thank you for your statement - sad to say that I don`t read such clear words often these times!

Maybe why I recognized as longer I am stuck in that pandemic situation that people, media, social media and politicians are loosing more and more the ability to debate. Means the ability to be open and stay in discussions by oppossing arguements for oppossing viewpoints to eachother while to hold clear defined discussion rules for the participants.

One reason for forcing this behavior is that today informations spread through social media are assessed to be more trustful than informations spread through other ways.

Another reason that drives a kind of social media peer pressure is that valueable or evident information was and still is too often hidden behind paywalls in the internet. Especialy in case of C19 this was and is a major reason why memes were exploding.

Let`s remember, when the pandemic startet and got the awareness of scientists from different disciplines worldwide they all really fast decided by mutual agreement to publish and share all upcoming knowledge to fight the desease effectivly and fast.

By this time press media active in the commercial internet was suddenly hit by a big dilemma because they realized that informations must be shared while they had to solve the issue of a permanent income through making informations available. Some press organs decided to publish this informations without a paywall but most didn`t. Meanwhile after 1,5 yrs being in the pandemic most paywalls are up again and memes are still fueled by this.

I think it doesn`t matter where you are living on the world, we all have been seperated by the availability informations. We are in 2 class information society, one can afford to pay the price of paywalls, the other cannot and believes they find truth in social media or in memes often spread there as truth.

P.S.
I knew about Susan Blackmore/Richard Dawkins and the theory of ideas that replicate themselves from brain to brain like a virus. And I remembered watching it at TED Talk :
https://www.ted.com/search?q=memes

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As a species, have we really degenerated to the degree where we believe discredited internet "experts" rather than peer reviewed scientists? Do we really subscribe to conspiracy theories rather than evidence based science? Do we really need to don our tin foil hats rather than believe reason? Are we so degenerate that "it doesn't affect me, so it doesn't matter" is the prevalent mindset? Are we so selfish that "my rights" trump "my responsibilites"?

I would say that in some circles that would certainly appear true. There was one politician that stated during the UK referendum campaign that we don’t need experts anymore. The anti-vax lobby certainly seem to fit into “my rights trump my responsibilities” camp.

In part this is an outcome of social media and the computer systems that they use that create an echo chamber which just reinforces the beliefs of an individual - no contrary voices coming through to challenge the perceived orthodoxy prevalent in the echo chamber.

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You will have to do without pocket handkerchiefs, and a great many other things, before we reach our journey's end, Bilbo Baggins. You were born to the rolling hills and little rivers of the Shire, but home is now behind you. The world is ahead.