207 Comments
User's avatar
Richard Mazon's avatar

When I worked as a graduate student our research director had one student who was consistently wrong. I mean EVERY time. It wasn't random either. He claimed to reason it out, but he always came to the wrong conclusion. One day in total frustration I heard our boss tell him "Ron, if you flipped a coin at least you will be right 50% of the time." So profound, but one of the most devastating insults to someone in a Ph.d program ever. Let's give Karl a coin.

Expand full comment
SomeDude's avatar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d696t3yALAY

Kung Pow - Wimp Lo, 47 seconds

"we have purposely trained him wrong as a joke"

Expand full comment
Jorj X McKie's avatar

This is up there with Idiocracy 😂 Saved to my folder labeled medical/financial/political

Expand full comment
Beginnings - A Writing Journey's avatar

Oh I’m stealing the shit out of this. So many applications I’m giddy about it.

Expand full comment
SomeDude's avatar

the entire movie is awesome, but the clip was most relevant.

next up, the "product placement with taco bell" bit

Expand full comment
Perry Simms's avatar

"I am bleeding. That makes me the victor."

thanks for the laugh :)

Expand full comment
joe stuerzl 85's avatar

Dear Karl ,why don't you get yourself a big set of Micky mouse ears ,and wear them instead of the snot pouch ?.You will look sooo much better and the kids will love it

Expand full comment
Agent-86's avatar

Yes, he and Falsi can be a clown duo show together.

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

hahaha

Expand full comment
Grape Soda's avatar

Confirmation bias masquerading as science. Yet again. Does anyone understand what science is anymore?

Expand full comment
Level The Matrix's avatar

Yes, the people being censored understand science. The lunatics are running the asylum.

Expand full comment
The Wiltster's avatar

The lunatics are damned close to subletting the asylum now. It's a rental property!

Expand full comment
Rikard's avatar

The option which pays more for less risk to career and income is the scientific one. It's called rational choice/objectivism with free agents making individually optimal decisions which will in sum total create the most beneficient outcome to everyone, and is seen as virtuous.

It is also the sum total of its ethics: if /I/ profit from it, it's morally good, otherwise it's not.

There are of course other moral systems, but they are rapidly falling out of fashion.

Expand full comment
Crixcyon's avatar

Science is the invention of fake facts used to support a specific agenda.

Expand full comment
Level The Matrix's avatar

True that’s what it’s become. Whoever pays the most gets the results they want.

Expand full comment
CygneRouge's avatar

No. No they don't.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
GrimFandango's avatar

Nothing new, the masses have been skimming the headlines ever since different size type fonts were invented.

Expand full comment
AM Schimberg's avatar

I truly think we'd be better off disbanding and abolishing all health ministries.

Expand full comment
John Bowman's avatar

Why not just abolish Governments and get rid of ALL ministries and bureaucrats.

And for those who might say it would be mob rule, it already is.

List of mobs ruling us: environmentalist; climate change; woke; alphabet people; transgender; Big Pharma; Bank & Finance; WEF; UN; Unions & Professional bodies; Victimology, grudge, grievance; Big Tech.

Expand full comment
Grape Soda's avatar

A lot of people seem to like to tell other people what to do. We must find ways to restrict their ability to do so. Not easy but more realistic than expecting this kind of person to disappear.

Expand full comment
John Bowman's avatar

The best way is to keep speaking out, not letting them get away with their nonsense unchallenged.

Expand full comment
Laura Creighton's avatar

Except that we thought we already had these ways -- human rights' laws -- to prevent them from doing so. We have to do better, but how?

Expand full comment
Grape Soda's avatar

Accountability has to be built in somehow. A law that isn’t enforced equally can’t do the job

Expand full comment
rickrolled's avatar

Indeed.

I’ve seen it posted elsewhere -

The new political spectrum is no longer “left vs. right” but “authoritarian vs. libertarian” - on either side of the supposed political “aisles”.

Ie. people who want to tell others what to do - versus those who don’t.

Expand full comment
this little authoritarian's avatar

It has always been that way. It might be a little more overt but it's merely a matter of degree to which one acknowledges it or enacts it. No one has any existential authority over anyone or anything else. The fact that we exert power over others, knowingly and unknowingly, is an uncomfortable fact of existence. Humans may justify it politically, morally and rationally but that doesn't change the nature of it.

The best you can hope for is to deal with that dilemma as an individual.

There will never be a solution for it en masse.

Expand full comment
Perry Simms's avatar

Authority and conflict can't be wished away though. It helps to explain libertarian ideals, but wolves and sheep will be with us til armageddon.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022Edited
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

We have no national sovereignty. No borders

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022Edited
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
rickrolled's avatar

“ But if you'll don a mask in a restaurant to go for a piss ten feet away you probably believe people who can't build roads in their home country can somehow design satellites for a living in yours”

Nailed it 😝

Expand full comment
Moritz's avatar

Actually, Belgium gave it a try a couple of years back. They didn‘t have a government for almost two years. The result? The economy was growing and it was the first time in years there was a budget surplus.

Expand full comment
rickrolled's avatar

My thesis once again:

“Government ruins everything that it touches”

Expand full comment
John Bowman's avatar

I think that happened in Spain too, General election was a close call, nobody could form a Government. The economy picked up there too.

Expand full comment
Perry Simms's avatar

Mises.org is a wonderful positive site, lots of lectures and podcasts and articles in this general vein. I listen to it for the uplifting sanity.

They don't understand war and conflict though, and the nameless war. But that's dangerous to talk about.

Expand full comment
Dr Linda's avatar

Bold move but I am onboard

Expand full comment
John Bowman's avatar

Welcome!

Expand full comment
rickrolled's avatar

Thesis:

Government ruins everything that it touches.

Disprove?

Expand full comment
John Bowman's avatar

Overwhelming evidence supports the thesis.

Expand full comment
CygneRouge's avatar

BINGO!

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
John Bowman's avatar

I am ‘older people’. I believe in self-government.

Maybe those who believed in this are dead. It is certainly something passed on to me by my parents & grandparents.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Jaunie's avatar

I am 67

I say take it all down… become ungovernable

Expand full comment
CygneRouge's avatar

...Which no longer exist, it would appear.

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

same people who were so anti-establishment in the 60s and 70s

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

New Zealand seems to be at the gulag stage

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Grape Soda's avatar

I can understand this. But there is another way. It does involve a reversal of the current philosophy of telling people what is best for them. A better way is to empower the public to make decisions for themselves, such as how much risk to accept. During covid here in the US, there was very little information available on the IFR or the difference in covid outcomes among age groups. The authorities didn’t trust the public and in return the public can no longer trust the authorities.

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

That kind of BS began with the whole "eggs and meat cause heart disease" lie, the data was provided by an opportunist and funded by corn oil and cereal companies.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

yess!

Expand full comment
Aardvark's avatar

"Ketchup is a vegetable"

Expand full comment
rickrolled's avatar

You mean… critical thinking?

As in thinking for myself?

Shock! Horror!

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022Edited
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
rickrolled's avatar

“Government ruins everything that it touches”

Expand full comment
CygneRouge's avatar

SUPERLIKE.

Expand full comment
Level The Matrix's avatar

Fabulous idea. All we need to do is take away their pens and microphones and they’re useless.

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

and keep them away from useful idiots

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

I concur, enthusiastically.

Expand full comment
Crixcyon's avatar

A most brilliant idea! I wholly concur.

Expand full comment
Big Grey's avatar

A great analogy - "When pants and underwear stop us from smelling farts, I will believe masks stop Covid particles." - No further study required.

Expand full comment
Flo's avatar

Well, farts are a gas, methane and sulfuric gases, whereas Covid spreads via much larger aerosol particles.

Expand full comment
Paul Ashley's avatar

The aerosol particles may be large but when the carrier evaporates the remaining small virus itself can be inhaled through a mask

Expand full comment
Oregonian's avatar

Please quantify “larger”. Aerosolized virus was able to circulate in the air for 17 hours(!) and then subsequently grown in Vito.

Expand full comment
SheThinksLiberty's avatar

"...grown in 'Vito'"? Do you mean "in vivo" or "in vitro"?

Expand full comment
Perry Simms's avatar

Happy to oblige: 10

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Aerosol-particles-size-distribution-schematic-diagram-for-various-parameters-in-an_fig1_263011250

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32717211/

Anyway the size of an oxygen molecule O2, or Methane, is much smaller than the size of a virus. The virus has many many atoms.

Expand full comment
The Wiltster's avatar

...well, pFauci sez that if you double-underwear, the smell is reduced to safe levels!

Expand full comment
Jestre's avatar

Yep. I posted an article on this yesterday. It is a bizarre study and the Minister should resign for tweeting it. I do wonder if the professor that is listed as the last author on the paper knew his name would be on it. If so, he should probably resign in disgrace as well

Expand full comment
HardeeHo's avatar

I thought a bunch of grad students, poorly supervised, yet the authors can be found on Goggle scholar.

Expand full comment
The Wiltster's avatar

So, I have mentioned this about a hundred times, but it is pertinent, so here goes. Back in October of 2020, when I was *still* somewhat unsure of the banality of masking and therefore mask mandates, I visited the CDC website. My goal was to complete what I was calling my Masking Nomological Network of Cumulative Evidence, mask-nom-net, for short. Basically, all the evidence I could find, pro or con on masking, from all sources I could find. Upon that visit to the CDC cite, I downloaded EVERY link to the studies they cited, and started reading. They had 19 studies cited at that time. The first 9 did not mention masking. They were not even about masking. (No, I am not kidding.) The rest of them were dicey or sucky, or both. So then, to hear this dude cite a study that IS about masking, but is crap, is actually an improvement in approach for these people. They will not give up on masks. At this point, and people like Jerome Adams' on Twitter is another example, they will keep gaslighting in favor of masks. Why? Unclear. The die is cast, though.

Expand full comment
Lisa Brown's avatar

And Fauci too not giving up on masks. Pushing them on children. Just evil.

Luckily in April '20 I happily came across Denis Rancourt's, 'Masks Don't Work', where he cites over 20 studies ( most 10-30 yrs old), showing surgical masks and N95's offer little, if any, significant protection against respiratory borne illnesses.

And Fauci, Walensky, etc. know all this. It all comes down to control, try to keep the people in fear, to promote their agenda and profit from it.

Expand full comment
C Daryl H's avatar

At one point, the only source cited by the CDC for their dental guidelines was an unsourced PowerPoint from about ten years ago.

They know nobody actually reads beyond the headline. Well, almost nobody.

Expand full comment
The Wiltster's avatar

That is a fascinating point! As one more bit of trivia during my quest, I offer this. I returned to the CDC website, probably a year later, looking to update my mask-nom-net. They had, as one might expect, increased the number of studies cited. They had also kept the citations of the studies I mentioned above that said *nothing* about masks. However, they had removed the links that would take you to the PubMed (or wherever) website where the actual study could be found. If you wanted to see the cited study, you had to copy the words from their citation and search on your own! Cheeky bastards *knew* those studies were B.S., but kept them to make their list bigger! The levels of raw bullshitery to which the CDC will stoop has no limit.

Expand full comment
Perry Simms's avatar

Funny also, i don't find a 'Center for Disease Control' anywhere in the 30 enumerated powers of the Constitution.

Expand full comment
The Green Hornet's avatar

Bet he has a picture of Fauci on his wall that he uses to pleasure himself.

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

hahaha...eeww!

Expand full comment
Dr Linda's avatar

O my gosh! That is a desperate act. I hope he fulfilled.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Marona Engvall's avatar

Biden forgot his when he visit the pope:)

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

Ewwww! The visuals!

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

"written in crayon"--priceless wit

Expand full comment
Pthalocyanine's avatar

this is going to be used to mask the college students again this fall in the US. that's probably the only reason for its existence - and they were paid to produce garbage that looks legit enough to mask all the kids.

Expand full comment
eugyppius's avatar

no, i don't think so. it honestly looks like something a few naive/stupid medical students pooped out in 2020 and decided to put up as a preprint on a lark. too bad for them lauterbach (and other desperate mask brigadiers) seized on it and brought it to prominence.

Expand full comment
Irena's avatar

::cringe::

Imagine being an overworked student, trying to get some extra credit, and then having a Health Minister tweet your nonsense for the whole world to see. What did they do to deserve this?! It's not like students don't come up with nonsense all the time. Most of the time, it just ends with a B+ (grade inflation and all that).

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

I don't feel sorry for them. Laziness and harm and those kids have a great future in the NIH.

Expand full comment
jim's avatar

At this point anyone that goes along with masking is getting what they deserve. College kids could simply en masse not wear masks, against any mandate. Instead They will just wear it because they want to or don’t care either way and it’s easier. I for one will never wear a mask again anywhere, and if asked to do so will simply ignore the request. I will have to be forcibly removed from places.

Expand full comment
The flying pig's avatar

I’m currently at a food science conference in Pittsburgh - I’d say about 10-15% of people are masked. But the vast majority of mask wearers are young healthy students at minimal risk of adverse effects from covid. It’s just another virtue signal for them and they’ll comply en masse when the mask mandates are enacted again

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

God help us

Expand full comment
Paul Ashley's avatar

I, too, have noticed that many of the remains maskers in my neck of the woods are the young. Sad.

Expand full comment
Martin's avatar

They are just plainly stupid, nothing more. The same is the LGBT and the gay community.

Expand full comment
SacredCowPies's avatar

Stupidity due to indoctrination.

Expand full comment
SacredCowPies's avatar

Stupidity due to media indoctrination.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Paul Ashley's avatar

That reminds of these scenes from Close Encounters:

https://youtu.be/n_rvE_8naJI

https://youtu.be/_ys28U7dskw

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

I was thinking of that back in 2020.

Thank you!

Expand full comment
Martin's avatar

Welcome in group, some of us started to do that last winter - it's very exciting exercise.

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

I was thinking the same thing

Expand full comment
Michael DAmbrosio's avatar

Suppose we make a graph of all mask studies, with the Y axis representing "Efficacy / Impact" found in the study, and the X axis represents the "Quality" of the study - using the EBM pyramid for reference, where as you move along the X axis you go from models, to case reports, to cohort studies, eventually to RCT, then to systemic reviews of RCTs, etc.

You would plot, for example, the Georgia Salon maybe at coordinates (X = 1, Y = 10), as it has low quality of evidence but claims high impact. The Bangladesh Mask study might be plotted at (X = 10, Y = 1), as it is a more rigorous level of evidence, but found weaker impact than Georgia Salon predicted.

Here is what is interesting about this thought experiment -

If you restrict this to only studies prior to 2020, plot the studies, and run a trendline, it's mostly a straight line. The impact (Y) doesn't have much variation as you move left to right on the evidence standards.

This is because the scientific community was dispassionate about community masking - there was no political allegiance to the masks, no need for them to work. You weren't guaranteed to be published by the CDC, Nature, Science, or other "prestigious" journals merely for writing about the value of masks.

Repeat the process for the post 2020 mask studies, and suddenly the trendline has a sharp negative slope as you move from weak evidence to the stronger evidence - a clear sign that bias and intent has corrupted the hypothesis. All the strongest "evidence" is found in the lowest tier of science which is the easiest data to spin and corrupt to meet your claims (see, Wakefield). The Kansas Mask, Salon, the various models - all of which failed real world replication ("If 80% wore a mask the virus would be extinguished" - lol) are suddenly high on the efficacy Y axis.

It's crazy that these morons can't easily see this.

Expand full comment
Rikard's avatar

Why can I only "like" this once?

Expand full comment
cm27874's avatar

I wonder what the intersection is between the hand-picked 13, and the studies Hector Drummond has dissected in his book.

Expand full comment
TommyV's avatar

Every person I know that wore a mask religiously over the last two plus years got covid (of course they were vaxxed too) and every person that didn't didn't! In fact, some of them got it twice!

Expand full comment
The Wiltster's avatar

Multiple bouts of covid is a feature--not a bug--of being vaccinated. #ROFL

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

but drag us into horrible situations

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Perry Simms's avatar

Eh, instinct is to 'fit in'. We are the abnormal, we who think.

Expand full comment
Jayne Doe's avatar

Face diaper stupitity study again lol. The best mask I've seen to data is of a Mexican laborer getting off work, jumping into his beatup pickup truck, wearing his Huggies babywipe softpack cover homemade mask, turning on the radio, opening the dispenser flip top on his mask, and taking a big long swig of his ice cold Corona bottled beer. Hilarious. The best ever ha, ha, ha. PS I think the clip was on TikTok last summer.

Expand full comment
Dark Thomas's avatar

i wish there was a way to do a double-blind study of one group wearing surgical masks and the second group in bullet proof vests & compare results

Expand full comment
Rikard's avatar

This goes really well together with your earlier point about how to lie without telling lies: the study lies in its intent, but not in its words, so neither does Lauterbach.

We've seen it before, haven't we? "90% of climate scientists agree..."

Now, if we could only find a way to inoculate people against believing stuff like this before having checked it out...

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Rikard's avatar

Not discounting or disputing that in any way. My memories of university is mainly that it was a competition in social and cognitive conformity and ditto creativity and research only allowed along already set and predetermined vectors.

I'd add real life experience to that sentiment you express, due to that all the really knowledgable and competent teachers (as in knowing how to teach, not just parroting 'lookupable' facts) were men and women who had come to academia and teaching after at least ten years of real life outside the institutions.

One man I remember had been crew on trans-oceanic cargo ships, done time for fighting, put himself through mechanic's school and the added a teacher's degree when he was almost 40.

I think that's what's needed. I mean, who knows economy best: a university economist, upper middle class background, never lacking or wanting for anything, well read on all theory, knows all the big names and terms and can do the "advanced" math of economics and finance - or a single mother of three, working 60 hour weeks as a cleaner or at a laundry or sitting behing the register at Lidl?

My money is on the mother, because she knows what's what in reality.

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

Yes! The mama bears know. The mama bears won't take it either.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 2, 2022
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Perry Simms's avatar

I was lucky enough to be at Uni in the 80s. And people debated me, and sometimes even changed my mind.

Expand full comment
Pitchfork Papers's avatar

What can I say..? My neck is tired from shaking my head in disbelief....

Expand full comment
Dhammafarer's avatar

Still haven't gotten COVID. Unvaxxed and unmasked. Took Ivermectin for 8 month prophylacticly. But also haven't been sick since 2007. And I travelled internationally by late. Are there many out there never got it yet? What's the percentage?

Expand full comment
Bootsorourke's avatar

You probably had it and shook it off.

Expand full comment