Or, if you'd prefer, there's the FDA approval of the HPV vaccine where...

a recent review showed that design problems in the HPV vaccine trials, most of which were led by academics but sponsored by industry, made it difficult to evaluate the extent to which the vaccine prevented cervical cancer — Rees CP, Brhlikova P, Pollock AM. Will HPV vaccination prevent cervical cancer? J R Soc Med2020

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

I do not deny the existence of arrogant prevarication and certainly even of graft within such agencies as the FDA, but I think given the high-profile nature of the COVID epidemic, most if not all of that type of "hanky-panky" was surely forestalled.

I think given the high-profile nature of the COVID epidemic, most if not all of that "hanky-panky" was surely forestalled. — Michael Zwingli

Why would you think that? What would be the comeback on the FDA if the vaccine was not as effective as they claimed? They're hardly going to be taken out and shot are they? The main aim is the revolving door into a well-paid consultancy job with one of the major pharmaceuticals. So long as that's not at risk, I don't see why they'd take any more care here.

You apparently have no idea what the word means or signifies, nor when nor how. Get a life; learn something. — tim wood

Educate me then. What is it that links 2=2+4 and the issues around the Covid vaccination. What properties do they share such that both are apodictic?

Why would you think that? — Isaac

There is too much at stake, politically. The FDA is part of the Executive Branch, which is now headed by a man who, unlike former President Trump, is highly concerned about optics.

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

There is too much at stake, politically. — Michael Zwingli

Explain? Say, the FDA claim the vaccine is 95% effective,but it turns out they were overplaying their hand and it's only 60% effective, less after six months. What political fallout are you anticipating? Won't the FDA just blame the rush, the emergency, the limited data they had to work with... I'm not following what it is you think would be at stake.

We have an organisation with a proven track record of approving drugs which later turn out to be largely ineffective or whose effectiveness is found to be overstated, an organisation heavily lobbied by the industries who benefit from these approvals, whose data is provided by the organisations who benefit from these approvals and which has a demonstrable revolving door of cushy consultancy jobs as reward for good behaviour. They're tasked with testing the effectiveness of a vaccine, but unlike their usual vaccines, this one is set to be a veritable gold mine for the pharmaceuticals and they have a whole slew of excuses already lined up for why they fluffed the approval. You're suggesting that in those circumstances it's less likely that they'd give an overly confident approval?

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

The similarity between 2=2+4 and Covid vaccination was the question. The properties they share. We could do Bullet-proof vests in the case of being shot at if you like. Find me an professor in gunshot wounds at a bone fide university who claims that you'd be better off without the vest.

To repeat, I'm asking you what properties these matters share such that they can both (all) be referred to by the same term in some sense.

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

Certainty. And in each its own sense, but still certainty. Your mother loves you. Your girlfriend loves you. Both certain. But the same kind of certainty? Are you safe in a sinkable boat, as opposed to being in the sea? Yes. Are you safe in an unsinkable boat as opposed to being in the sea? Yes. Both the same, at the same time both different. And so forth. Work out the rest for yourself. — tim wood

You're associating the Covid vaccine response to things like 2+2=4, wearing a bulletproof vest, and (in other places) the earth being flat, and other such clearly true matters. But these matters differ from the case of Covid vaccinations in one key way (that way being crucial to their veracity). No-one disagrees with them. Not one professor of geology will claim the earth is flat, not one battle-medic will claim bullet-proof vests are worse than nothing, not one mathematician will claim 2+2=4...not a single one.

There are dozens of properly qualified experts, professors in relevant fields employed at bone fide universities who disagree with the Covid response to various extents. I don't see how you can claim certainty (rhetorical or otherwise) when there's disagreement among the experts on the matter.

How would science progress if the theory of only a few experts were to be treated always as a certain falsity?

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

Minor means child in this context: a person less than 18 years old.

Then you simply do not understand the difference, a failure of understanding having nothing to do with any current or any past issue. Ask your experts not what the vaccine is, but whether taking it is better than not taking it, both in terms of individual and family well-being, and the well-being of the larger community. And the consensus becomes, yes, it is better to take it. — tim wood

Consensus was not the claim. Certainty was.

So demonstrate the necessary link between consensus and certainty.

Start by listing the factors that make a theory more certain.

Then show that theories which benefit from consensus necessarily (or even mostly) have greater values in these variables than theories which do not.

That would support your argument. Anything less is just assertion.

You're more than old enough to cease playing socially approved games of keeping up appearances.

Some people have no decency and they don't deserve to be treated decently. They are just assholes. — Olivier5

A gentleman is supposed to be different than ordinary people in some important way. Hence the word "gentleman".

But here you are, proposing that one should behave exactly the way ordinary people do.

Consensus was not the claim. Certainty was. — Isaac

A bit of unrealistic goal. I think Sartre said somewhere that the human condition involves making decisions based on insufficient information.

As I said, I'm a "gentleman of fortune" (i.e. a pirate). We go by different rules.

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

And thus anti-vaxxing is a taking from me for no good reason something that is mine. And that leaves no room for respect, nor is fair. — tim wood

If something can be taken from you, it was never yours to begin with.

So what's the big scandal in COVID, as seen by dissenters? — Olivier5

That mankind has allowed brute capitalism to be the norm of human relationships.

An imposition of a Covid vaccine, shown to save lives and reduce both incidence and severity of an otherwise incurable and contagious sickness seems reasonable. — tim wood

That you are unable or unwilling to provide any semblance of consolation for those damaged by the covid vaccines shows your cold, hard heart.

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

There is dialectic apodicticity and rhetorical apodicticity. — tim wood

Remind me never to argue a point with you, Tim.

Why must we view scientistic capitalist apparatchiks as the ideal of humanity?

Before the common peasants employed the term gentleman, it was exclusively used by nobility. The theme of the gentleman always was superiority. Originally, superiority by birth - later it became superiority by virtue. I think this shows to this day and anyone who desperetaly tries to identify and present themselves as a gentleman likely has a superiority complex hidden somewhere inside them.

It shows in this discussion as well. Be it pro- or anti-vaccination. There is nothing gentle in this approach. It's all about denouncing the other which in turn pronounces ones own superiority.

When do the gloves come off? I think force only ever is justified in self-defense. This is not a case of self-defense though. Vaccination offers protection to the vaccinated, hence there is no need for the vaccinated to go ballistic against the unvaccinated.

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.