I want to share my thoughts, as someone who has been so alarmed by the so-called "dissident" scientists like Gupta, Heneghan, Kuldorff, Bhattacharya, & Ioannidis who consider themselves brave Galileos unfairly treated by "establishment scientists." I will try not to swear. 1/n

I want to talk about 3 things:
‼️Their fringe views are inhumane, unethical junk science that promotes harm
‼️They complain that they've been marginalized but this is simply untrue
‼️I am sick of people telling me we have to "listen to both sides." There aren't 2 sides here 2/n
These 'dissident' scientists have consistently downplayed COVID-19, urging policymakers not to take aggressive control measures. They claim it is not a serious threat. Gupta even went on TV saying people under 65 shouldn't worry about it!

RECEIPTS ⬇️3/n

https://t.co/GyfV528Y9T
They have consistently argued that policymakers should just let the virus rip, in an attempt to reach herd immunity by natural infection. Kuldorff *continues* to argue for this even now that we have many highly effective, safe vaccines.

RECEIPTS⬇️4/n

https://t.co/QCaWS6xXXv
We've never controlled a deadly, contagious pandemic before by just letting the virus spread, as this approach kills & disables too many people. In Manaus, Brazil, 66% of the city was infected & an astonishing *1 in 500* people died of COVID-19

5/n

https://t.co/72g0qmGE1N
Gupta, Kuldorff, & Bhattacharya argue that we must let the virus rip while locking away the vulnerable, a grotesque dystopian view. Here's who you'd have to lock away: elderly people; medically vulnerable people; people of color; disabled people. 6/n

https://t.co/NPh1f977T2
Let's not forget: these authors were funded by corporate interests. It's Merchants of Doubt all over again. Corporations want to see "opening up of society" and they fund academics to push a pro-corporate view.

RECEIPTS⬇️7/n

https://t.co/BrUD4FP6lc

https://t.co/MmlCuiZ5km
Now to the silly notion pushed by these edgy "dissident" scientists that they've faced censorship for being Galileos. OK, this is when I may swear a little bit.

Are you f**king kidding me?

Since the start of the pandemic, every time you turn on your bloody TV there they are 8/n
In fact, they've had the largest megaphone of all: THEIR VIEWS HAVE BEEN ADOPTED IN THE USA BY TRUMP AND IN BRITAIN BY JOHNSON.

Don't give me your bullshit about how they've been marginalized. Their views = Trump policy & Johnson policy.

RECEIPTS 9/n

https://t.co/NuF34J8edm
These dissidents did all they could to shape Trump's policies; looking at the cases now in the US, they got what they wanted. In Scott Atlas, Trump's coronavirus czar, & in Florida's governor, they found champions

RECEIPTS⬇️10/n

https://t.co/EmvkR01xdy

https://t.co/wnjWu6aj22
Time & again, these fringe views BECAME Trump's policies or Johnson's policies. So when you say "well, debate is important & it is critical to hear all views," I agree that debate matters but these nihilistic views won the day in US/UK policymaking 11/n

https://t.co/6ksS0QOi1q
There are East Asian & Pacific Rim nations that have controlled the virus, without even a vaccine. They used science-based measures, acted fast, had great leaders. They listened to @who & did test/trace/isolate/support. The US/UK ignored these successes & here we are today. 12/n
Last, I cannot tell you how many times I have been scolded & reprimanded for "not giving the Great Barrington Declaration authors serious consideration." Two Duke professors, for example, told me academics like me must stay open minded & universities must show both sides 13/n
I respectfully disagree. THERE AREN'T 2 SIDES. The public health science on pandemic control is established, & nations that followed the science did better, both from a health AND economic view. Shouldn't we be basing policy on, um, science? We need VACCINE herd immunity FFS. END

More from Science

1. I find it remarkable that some medics and scientists aren’t raising their voices to make children as safe as possible. The comment about children being less infectious than adults is unsupported by evidence.


2. @c_drosten has talked about this extensively and @dgurdasani1 and @DrZoeHyde have repeatedly pointed out flaws in the studies which have purported to show this. Now for the other assertion: children are very rarely ill with COVID19.

3. Children seem to suffer less with acute illness, but we have no idea of the long-term impact of infection. We do know #LongCovid affects some children. @LongCovidKids now speaks for 1,500 children struggling with a wide range of long-term symptoms.

4. 1,500 children whose parents found a small campaign group. How many more are out there? We don’t know. ONS data suggests there might be many, but the issue hasn’t been studied sufficiently well or long enough for a definitive answer.

5. Some people have talked about #COVID19 being this generation’s Polio. According to US CDC, Polio resulted in inapparent infection in more than 99% of people. Severe disease occurred in a tiny fraction of those infected. Source:
Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance - an overview | ScienceDirect Topics

https://t.co/mzS7vVSREJ

https://t.co/353PdAX2fa

https://t.co/3yBImjOdd4

In some cases, almost 100% of the light energy can be converted to the second harmonic frequency. These cases typically involve intense pulsed laser beams passing through large crystals, and careful alignment to obtain phase matching.

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The first ever world map was sketched thousands of years ago by Indian saint
“Ramanujacharya” who simply translated the following verse from Mahabharat and gave the world its real face

In Mahabharat,it is described how 'Maharishi Ved Vyasa' gave away his divine vision to Sanjay


Dhritarashtra's charioteer so that he could describe him the events of the upcoming war.

But, even before questions of war could begin, Dhritarashtra asked him to describe how the world looks like from space.

This is how he described the face of the world:

सुदर्शनं प्रवक्ष्यामि द्वीपं तु कुरुनन्दन। परिमण्डलो महाराज द्वीपोऽसौ चक्रसंस्थितः॥
यथा हि पुरुषः पश्येदादर्शे मुखमात्मनः। एवं सुदर्शनद्वीपो दृश्यते चन्द्रमण्डले॥ द्विरंशे पिप्पलस्तत्र द्विरंशे च शशो महान्।

—वेद व्यास, भीष्म पर्व, महाभारत


Meaning:-

हे कुरुनन्दन ! सुदर्शन नामक यह द्वीप चक्र की भाँति गोलाकार स्थित है, जैसे पुरुष दर्पण में अपना मुख देखता है, उसी प्रकार यह द्वीप चन्द्रमण्डल में दिखायी देता है। इसके दो अंशो मे पीपल और दो अंशो मे विशाल शश (खरगोश) दिखायी देता है।


Meaning: "Just like a man sees his face in the mirror, so does the Earth appears in the Universe. In the first part you see leaves of the Peepal Tree, and in the next part you see a Rabbit."

Based on this shloka, Saint Ramanujacharya sketched out the map, but the world laughed
https://t.co/6cRR2B3jBE
Viruses and other pathogens are often studied as stand-alone entities, despite that, in nature, they mostly live in multispecies associations called biofilms—both externally and within the host.

https://t.co/FBfXhUrH5d


Microorganisms in biofilms are enclosed by an extracellular matrix that confers protection and improves survival. Previous studies have shown that viruses can secondarily colonize preexisting biofilms, and viral biofilms have also been described.


...we raise the perspective that CoVs can persistently infect bats due to their association with biofilm structures. This phenomenon potentially provides an optimal environment for nonpathogenic & well-adapted viruses to interact with the host, as well as for viral recombination.


Biofilms can also enhance virion viability in extracellular environments, such as on fomites and in aquatic sediments, allowing viral persistence and dissemination.
So the cryptocurrency industry has basically two products, one which is relatively benign and doesn't have product market fit, and one which is malignant and does. The industry has a weird superposition of understanding this fact and (strategically?) not understanding it.


The benign product is sovereign programmable money, which is historically a niche interest of folks with a relatively clustered set of beliefs about the state, the literary merit of Snow Crash, and the utility of gold to the modern economy.

This product has narrow appeal and, accordingly, is worth about as much as everything else on a 486 sitting in someone's basement is worth.

The other product is investment scams, which have approximately the best product market fit of anything produced by humans. In no age, in no country, in no city, at no level of sophistication do people consistently say "Actually I would prefer not to get money for nothing."

This product needs the exchanges like they need oxygen, because the value of it is directly tied to having payment rails to move real currency into the ecosystem and some jurisdictional and regulatory legerdemain to stay one step ahead of the banhammer.