Note: My brain feels a little fried today, so I thought I’d give it the day off and repost this Provocative Question post from February 20, 2019. If you answered this FPQ back then, feel free to put a link to your post in the comments. Or if you’ve never answered this question before, write your own post and create a pingback to this post, but please check to see if the pingback worked.
Welcome once again to Fandango’s Provocative Question. Each week I will pose what I think is a provocative question for your consideration. By provocative, I don’t mean a question that will cause annoyance or anger. Nor do I mean a question intended to arouse sexual desire or interest.
What I do mean is a question that is likely to get you to think, to be creative, and to provoke a response. Hopefully a positive response.
This week’s provocative question is based upon a quote by Bertrand Russell, the British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, writer, essayist, social critic, political activist, and Nobel laureate. Whew, that’s a lot of cred. Anyway, Russell, who died in 1970, suggested that…
“The fundamental cause of the trouble is that, in the modern world, the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubts.”
Do you concur with Mr. Russell’s perspective? Why or why not?
If you choose to participate, write a post with your response to the question. Once you are done, tag your post with #FPQ and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Or you can simply include a link to your post in the comments.
And most important, have fun.
This, That, and the Other 
“Go to work, boys and girls; get on with it[!]” Contradicting the cocksure assertions of the Infectious Disease Society of America, their fundamental “hours” to a day (in some cases) assurance of a very “short” time (expectation of natural decomposition and ostensibly-authoritative statement of no mRNA detected after 10 days) is inconsistent and negligent — mRNA Found in Blood Beyond 28 Days in almost ten percent of patients (empirical controlled study done in Denmark because Americans are too stupid despite Pfizer and Moderna having labs in the US) | “How dare the IDSA (on CDC website) speculate (in public declarations) about such things without actually having done the work[!]” | “We don’t guess [supposedly], in this field; we have to know.” | Would these findings be hidden in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia, or New Zealand? | “Why are these people not being regulated to make sure they do the research BEFORE?” Why, indeed. (We’re over two-years on, rather, and incidentally surprised rather than intentionally scientific.)
LikeLiked by 2 people
I might like this if I had a clue what you are actually talking about. That the CDC didn’t do sufficient research? Well, they aren’t a research organization. They are an information and disease control group. They don’t DO research. They gather the research purportedly done by others and send it into the world. That’s their JOB.
Now, did Pfizer and Moderna do the research? They say they did. And considering how many millions of people got their vaccinations, I’d say they probably did what they needed to do. Could they have done more? Absolutely — and had we not been in the middle of a lethal epidemic and had they enough time, maybe they would have. Or not. You can never tell with Big Pharma if they really properly research anything — and that goes for every big pharmaceutical company on earth.
AMERICA is not THE WORLD.
Other companies in other countries do the same corrupt crap as American companies. We seem to be of the opinion that we are the literal hub of the universe, but we are not. Given how stupid we are behaving over so many things, I suspect our position as leaders in this world is crumbling and will probably never be restored.
LikeLiked by 1 person
As for the CDC, no I didn’t say they should’ve done the research. I did a lot of summarizing, but the meat of the meaning can be found in the video itself. Scientists who are more interested in research and real data and health than in profit come up with more scientific questions and value carrying out the experiments and studies. As for Pfizer and Moderna, sure they led us to believe they’d done the work. We’ve found out things we thought were addressed that they’ve admitted weren’t in fact (not the topics of the above recorded presentation). We’re finding other things they haven’t come clean on. Further, they had to be court ordered to release information they didn’t want us all to know until 75 years later. I shared, on another day, the fact the Lancet is displaying a collection of work [pretty sure not from Moderna or Pfizer at all] that was already out but that is being treated as new because the CDC (plus IDSA and so on) ignores so much out of convenience or for whatever reason(s). It appears we have a regulatory and policy-making capture underway. Anyway, yes certainly it goes for every big Pharma company on earth that it’s not a given they get things right or do the best they could. For example, this same YouTube presenter has pointed out (at other times) that we in the US demoted use of the J&J type vaccine for reasons of threat to health; the UK demoted use of their version per similar technology, but sort of hush the health threat angle by saying the decision was because they came upon something better.
When I was sick at the end of August and into September, I spent an inordinate amount of time on CDC, FDA, and other similar sites. the CDC website (or any of them) didn’t state upfront that the J&J wasn’t approved; all were put in one basket (with the grayness amongst authorized and approved carried on as before) whereby the unsuspecting pedestrian is more likely to miss the point. I’ve previously shared a story of a vaccine-injured American woman who discovered her health insurance company doesn’t want to cover help for her because she got the J&J form of the inoculation when it wasn’t an emergency despite the word “emergency” being right there in the term “emergency authorization” — aka right in the midst of the pandemic when her school district said she should go right out and do it. I think things like that are problems. There are countries who not only exist but have done better than the U.S. too in that they adjust when warranted. If something wasn’t investigated or disseminated and then was, they would acknowledge and let it influence their policies. Denmark is one (switching to a superior process of administering shots being among the changes). Additional European nations didn’t forget all previous viral disease knowledge and recognized immunity from infection to count (that’s just biology). Our country didn’t want to risk saying that because the “authorities” thought America is too dingbat to understand.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ah, Thank you for the explanation. I don’t trust pharmaceutical companies to EVER do great research — and I used to work at Pfizer. I think they ALL push everything into the market as fast as they can. If a few people die, hell, it’s just collateral damage.
The COVID vaccines were an exception since it actually was an emergency — something rare in the Big Pharma universe.
Let’s not even get started on insurance companies. I pay (slightly) more to stay with BCBS because they don’t hassle you over stuff like that, maybe because they aren’t also insuring cars, trucks, motorcycles, and homes. They are and have always been only a medical insurer. They are very good at it. Not cheap, but you can call them and discuss things with them and they will stay on the phone with you for hours if that’s what you need. I can’t think of ANY other organization that will do that. Believe it or not, they will actually change their mind. ON the phone. Without paperwork. It’s worth the extra dollars if only for their intelligent and well-informed customer service.
I have been furious with our so-called medical system and ALL insurance companies for a very long time. I don’t read about them much because even with a pacemaker, I think they are out to kill me — except for BCBS, but even they are limited by your ability to pay. We have a dreadful medical system. It’s the worst in the modern world and it doesn’t seem to stand a chance of improving.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I liked Blue Cross Blue Shield when I had it. My insurer is still employment -based, so the contracting company gets to choose and has switched from time to time. I have “💜aetna” currently [they have put a (smaller) purple heart on their logo]. I’m with you, I don’t want to start comparing companies. I agree, though; having a plan that doesn’t hassle people — and doesn’t impose networks — is best. I’m glad you know how to talk to your representatives on the phone, and that there are employees available. It’s so frustrating when any establishment doesn’t allow human contact.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I have had some really AWFUL health insurers, so getting a good one? I’ll pay the money just for the support they offer!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Between Medicare and my Medicare supplement plan, the benefits for medically necessary physical therapy are excellent.
LikeLike
I had Humana as my medicare supplement plan one year and it WAS great. But it was also expensive and I couldn’t keep up the payments.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The — mistaken — expectation of a clean process can be seen from three minutes in on the video below to three-and-a-half. So hopeful. So assured, really (if the person speaking isn’t a salesman and saying what is required to move product regardless of being confident on anything pertaining to scientific data). I trusted this type of explanation (with a benefit-of-the-doubt approach as I don’t go right ahead and fully believe what someone tells me even if it is the standard line) albeit from a different video creator or scientist/doctor (which I can’t locate at this time but was the standard theoretical talking point being disseminated as is this). I am disappointed it wasn’t true.
{Additionally, while a statement is made there that the spike sequence won’t make you “sick” and is true in the sense that a body (in response to the introduction of foreign material by injection) would be making large quantities of pieces of virus — spike — and not making entire sars-cov-2 virus content, viruses aren’t the only thing that make people sick. Inflammation is the source of many diseases, common to uncommon, and spikes cause inflammation… mRNA substance from a shot or the resultant spike content, either of these that were expected to be cleared quickly… intact or broken particles… floating around in the body are not good for health.}
How mRNA Vaccines Work| Simply Explained in Dec. 2020
LikeLike
On the topic of the CDC ignoring studies, you might recall my wondering why the Grammys were categorizing a musical artist as new who had been making music publicly for at least six years. I’d been enjoying his music for maybe four, and not due to him being local to where I live or anyplace I’d been in that time. He’d been on YouTube and made an album or two prior to 2022. It was nice that he was nominated, for sure, but it was quite the curiosity that the music academy hadn’t noticed him until planning for the televised spectacle (without a performance by him though) this time around. What the CDC pays attention to in a timely manner is far more consequential, no doubt. I wonder when or if the CDC will be noticing and integrating facts, and policy implications which would follow logically, that have been scientifically demonstrated. I hope they won’t forget that they should, whenever they get up to speed on such details, remove false statements from their website.
Spike Protein Spills in the Blood of
the Vaccinated Individuals: Study
published in spring of last year
While mRNA — the coded segment in our most famous vaccines — was discussed in the recent video I posted on February 22 (a day and a half ago), this one gets into additional debris that was supposedly going to be quickly cleared by one’s immune system. (Yes, the vaccine was to be considered debris or trash at best and not desirable for staying in the body. A refuse good for nothing right after this medical approach had made contact with muscle cells in the arm and then contact with the nearby lymph node, ongoing spike activity was not the goal, publicly stated at least.) The medical educator herein is mostly focused on one study, but brings in a few others for context.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m pretty sure they weren’t sure what to expect because their weren’t enough long term studies done. Given how fast people were dying at that point, I forgive them for not knowing what they really couldn’t know. And you can bet that Pfizer and Moderna lied to the CDC and told them what they knew they wanted to hear. In this case, the rush had some justification.
But they’ve done this before when there WAS no rush and all they were doing was trying to make more money faster. And you know what? Until we put some curbs on capitalism and capitalists, the problems will never go away. Since we have no likelihood of ever limited — heaven forfend — the rich from getting richer, banging your head against this is just going to give you a headache.
They have no shame. They also don’t care. Mostly, the vaccines worked. Eventually they’ll have it right, especially now that COVID is settling down. Don’t hold our breath for an apology.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m pretty sure they weren’t sure what to expect because
[there were no] long term studies done.
I’ve tweaked my quoting you.
Although it was impossible for there
to have been long-term studies: when
I spoke to live scientific/medical people,
they acted like I was a conspiracist to note
the time element in our situation… ignoring
that I had complied with the vaccination push.
Onward in your post:
Given how fast people were dying at that point, I forgive them for not knowing what they really couldn’t know. And you can bet that Pfizer and Moderna lied to the CDC and told them what they knew they wanted to hear.
I do bet they did, for sure.
In this case, the rush had some justification.
But they’ve done this before when there WAS no rush and all they were doing was trying to make more money faster. And you know what? Until we put some curbs on capitalism and capitalists, the problems will never go away. Since we have no likelihood of ever limited — heaven forfend — the rich from getting richer, banging your head against this is just going to give you a headache.
They have no shame. They also don’t care.
I totally agree.
Mostly, the vaccines worked. Eventually they’ll have it right, especially now that COVID is settling down. Don’t hold our breath for an apology.
https://news.feinberg.northwestern.edu/2023/02/21/first-covid-19-vaccination-can-hurt-subsequent-boosters/
In experiments in mice, scientists found the updated Omicron vaccines are superior to the original vaccines at clearing the Omicron infection, if the animal’s immune system has never “seen” the original SARS-CoV-2 via vaccination before.
But the relative superiority of an Omicron vaccine is more limited if the animal has already had the original vaccine.
Why increasing time between vaccinations is important
The new findings also suggest why increasing time between vaccinations is beneficial for the immune response, Penaloza-MacMaster said. “We showed in prior studies – as did other labs – that the longer the interval between vaccinations, the better the response. … We have thought this could be simply due to the time-dependent maturation of the immune response. But another reason is that waning of antibodies would allow the booster to persist in the body for a longer time. If the booster shot in your muscle perdures for a longer time, you are likely to develop robust immune responses.”
These data could guide future vaccination regimens, he said.
Next step: temporarily block antibody activity to boost immune response to vaccine
“What excites me about this study is what we can learn in terms of how to make better booster vaccines,” Penaloza-MacMaster said. “This new [not, in fact, actually new as the concept has been demonstrated in studies years ago before the pandemic with different vaccines] basic mechanistic understanding can be used to improve mRNA boosters, which are being administered to millions of people worldwide.” Because the experiments in this paper show that high levels of antibodies induced by prior vaccines or infections can be detrimental for vaccine boosters, the scientists plan new experiments to administer drugs that transiently block antibody activity. They plan to give these drugs at the time of boosting to allow the vaccine to be sensed better by immune cells. “Although antibody responses are an essential component of the immune system, our data suggest that a very transient blockade of these responses during vaccination (for only a few[*] hours) could have a profound beneficial effect on mRNA vaccines,” Penaloza-MacMaster said.
*This “few hours” thing is what they said about the original vaccine (and spike and so forth) clearing. They’ll keep acting like they already know, and people will keep believing them. I’m going to recommend my sons stop believing.
LikeLiked by 1 person
This was supposed to be in boldface as well:
Prior-induced anti-bodies can be detrimental for vaccine boosters, [therefore] the scientists plan new experiments to administer drugs that transiently block antibody activity.
“Although antibody responses are an essential component of the immune system, our data suggest that a very transient blockade of these responses during vaccination (for only a few[*] hours) could have a profound beneficial effect …” Penaloza-MacMaster said.
*I no longer trust people like this.
Meanwhile, in other
facets of toxic capitalism…
New Report — on FDA [Additive and Nutritional] Failures
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hey, I’ve been nearly poisoned by medication MORE than once. They keep stuffing you full of it anyway. I particularly dread hospitals who can’t seem to help themselves and pump me full of opioids even though they make me desperately ill. I nearly died of it once and if Garry hadn’t intervened, I think they really would have killed me last time. It was fentanyl and I was sinking like a stone in deep water.
At least I now have doctors who are very careful with me. I had a really ugly (but only one day) reaction to the Moderna vaccine, running at its peak a temp of 104.5. If it had gone any higher … well, it didn’t. At that point, it turned around. But that was bad reaction. The next time, I had a slightly less horrible reaction, but still bad — but just ONE day. I don’t think I’d have lived through one more day. I did not rush to get this last vaccination and in fact, didn’t get it. Nor, interestingly enough, was any medical person in my life urging us to get it.
I hate how medicine is a free-for-all in this country. We don’t have a system. We have a mess.
LikeLiked by 1 person
FDA’s Marks and Califf push false statements about
bivalent boosters to rebut Offit | Dangerous
LikeLiked by 1 person
I noticed that none of my medical people were urging us to get that “next” vaccine, so we haven’t the previous ones, we were strong advised to get, but this one? There’s a lack of enthusiasm for it in the medical community. I trust my doctors and if they don’t think it’s important, I’ll go with that flow.
LikeLiked by 1 person
https://jimadamsauthordotcom.wordpress.com/2023/02/22/troublemakers/
LikeLiked by 1 person
My views
http://lifeafter50forwomen.com/2022/09/29/fandango-provocative-question-15-2/
LikeLike
It’s definitely a problem. Intelligent people in general are more curious, openminded, and willing to entertain doubts and alternative views.
LikeLiked by 2 people
http://metabolizinggodsword.com/2023/02/22/humility-a-sadly-lacking-grace/
LikeLike
It’s a nonsense quote because everybody considers themselves intelligent, whether they are or not.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I dunno. I think that while everyone considers themselves to be smart, what Russell is suggesting is that those who are truly smart don’t accept things at face value, question things, and use critical thinking, whereas those who are not so smart lap up conspiracy theories, misinformation, and fake news and embrace them without questions.
LikeLike
Show me someone who’ll admit to being “not so smart”.
LikeLiked by 1 person
If I don’t know something, I say so. And if you know and I don’t? I’ll ask you to tell me all about it. THEN I’ll look it up. I’m not brilliant about everything. Smart people know where they are smart — and where they aren’t.
LikeLiked by 2 people
So to clarify in the context of the quote, do you think you’re stupid?
LikeLike
About some things, totally. And frankly, as I’ve gotten older, I’m also definitely stupider. I’m great with words — when I can remember them — but other than simple arithmetic, awful with numbers. I was always a total dunderhead about math and I’ve always envied anyone who was better at it than me — which is almost everyone.
I think most people are not entirely stupid or entirely brilliant. We all have areas of greater and lesser understanding. Words are my thing. History. General knowledge if you don’t probe too deeply — typical of writers. We tend to have a lot of general knowledge, but deeper knowledge is limited to areas into which we have delved.
Of course there are some genuinely mentally limited people who admit it and a few who are convinced they are stupid, but really aren’t. In defense of those admittedly not very sharp people, they often understand SOME things very well. They just don’t realize that none of us are made of a single cloth.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Worse than conspiracy theories — or observations of conspiracy — which can be investigated… are evil plans; which turn into conspiracies and certainly exist. There are people convinced we (anyone who agrees on this subject) are conspiracy theorists or conspirators (and something like gossipers in a Christian parlance) to think or say Trump was or is at all in cahoots with or preferential toward Russia/Putin and other tyrants and oligarchs.
The statement sure can be taken in a few different ways. It’s difficult to just ascent with a teaser. Being “full of doubt” (whether hyperbole or accurate of the intelligent when thinking can be smart) can cause pause (not necessarily a fault), during which time the bulls amongst the porcelain cups and figurines can gain advantage for themselves [but that might be more the “troublemakers” as Jim put it]. Most statements like this are overly-simplified.
Still, I’ve noticed a phenomenon of some people having more acumen for doing as they will with catchy sayings or admonishments.
LikeLiked by 1 person
LikeLiked by 1 person
LikeLiked by 1 person
There seems to have been an increase in superciliousness…or as I prefer to call it – supersillyness.
LikeLiked by 1 person