I know so many very smart people who went along with it.
I'm dumb as rocks, but I have a functional BS detector and a natural distrust of authority. That seems to be the winning combo, these days. Go team dropout.
Oh, credentials or perceptions of 'being smart' have nothing to do with wisdom or the ability to recognise BS. Look, I'm an academic, and most of my co-workers, for all intents and purposes, are 'intellectuals-yet-idiots'. Go figure where they stand on this issue…
Dec 29, 2022·edited Dec 29, 2022Liked by epimetheus
I wonder if credentials might be a handicap.
My social circle is heavily biased toward non-college-degree-holders. My siblings and I have GEDs. Most people I know didn't get the shots (and of those who did, most were degree-holders: the divide was very noticeable). Reasoning for non-compliance was all over the place, everything from "It's the mark of the beast" to "I've read the studies and they don't support what the CDC is saying" but in every case, I think the decision was gut instinct, and the rationale came later. I like to pretend I was making a logical decision based on evidence, but actually, it was my inner voice screaming "SOMETHING'S WRONG! STAY FAR FAR AWAY!" That voice has never done me wrong, it's smarter than I am, and I listen to it. My guardian angel?
I don't have the acumen or the reading speed to evaluate all the studies on the subject. Instead, I evaluate the people giving orders on it. Do I trust them? Do they have hidden motives? Do they know what they're talking about? Are they competent? I have rarely seen a larger pack of weasels and pompous blowhards.
Are academics really so blinded by credentialing? Like, do you actually make decisions about someone's trustworthiness based on the letters after their name, or their job title, instead of their behavior? Do you lock your guardian angel out of your head, to get a degree?
I think Chomsky got it quite right when, decades ago, he emphasised that it's (even) easier to 'fool' academics and other white-collar professionals: they are already conditioned (by 'training', or 'higher education', that is), so there's not much else to do but use the already-existing channels.
As to my circles, well, my work environment is heavily credentialled (and vaxxed to the hilt); we live in the countryside, and my neighbours are overwhelmingly 'regular' people, with or without vocational training: they're all vaxxed (although I'd wager not all of them are boosted, for the 3rd jab uptake stands at around 54%), but still, I suppose this can be explained by a variety of Norwegian specifics (high trust in gov't, social cohesion, etc.).
You write:
'I don't have the acumen or the reading speed to evaluate all the studies on the subject. Instead, I evaluate the people giving orders on it. Do I trust them? Do they have hidden motives? Do they know what they're talking about? Are they competent? I have rarely seen a larger pack of weasels and pompous blowhards.'
This strikes me as a wonderful way to assess the situation.
'Are academics really so blinded by credentialing? Like, do you actually make decisions about someone's trustworthiness based on the letters after their name, or their job title, instead of their behavior? Do you lock your guardian angel out of your head, to get a degree?'
I'd think so; academics are a quite pathetic bunch; no-one moves without looking sideways. A lot of this is actually due to credentials, for sure, and the like: elite degrees, schools, and experiences are very much what people follow. (I'm a bit different, because I didn't make my career with the help of others, hence I am a bit more insisting on merit-based considerations, which, I'd argue, helped me in this case; my wife tells me I can't shut up and stick with my own opinions, based on me reading CVs, literature, etc.)
People injected are sick and sicker. The sickest. I read in the juices are supposed immune activating (deactivating?) nano-particles. In the flu shots too. Nano-particles?
What the hell are in these juices should the citizen ask.
Not an IQ test. A compliance test.
I know so many very smart people who went along with it.
I'm dumb as rocks, but I have a functional BS detector and a natural distrust of authority. That seems to be the winning combo, these days. Go team dropout.
Oh, credentials or perceptions of 'being smart' have nothing to do with wisdom or the ability to recognise BS. Look, I'm an academic, and most of my co-workers, for all intents and purposes, are 'intellectuals-yet-idiots'. Go figure where they stand on this issue…
I wonder if credentials might be a handicap.
My social circle is heavily biased toward non-college-degree-holders. My siblings and I have GEDs. Most people I know didn't get the shots (and of those who did, most were degree-holders: the divide was very noticeable). Reasoning for non-compliance was all over the place, everything from "It's the mark of the beast" to "I've read the studies and they don't support what the CDC is saying" but in every case, I think the decision was gut instinct, and the rationale came later. I like to pretend I was making a logical decision based on evidence, but actually, it was my inner voice screaming "SOMETHING'S WRONG! STAY FAR FAR AWAY!" That voice has never done me wrong, it's smarter than I am, and I listen to it. My guardian angel?
I don't have the acumen or the reading speed to evaluate all the studies on the subject. Instead, I evaluate the people giving orders on it. Do I trust them? Do they have hidden motives? Do they know what they're talking about? Are they competent? I have rarely seen a larger pack of weasels and pompous blowhards.
Are academics really so blinded by credentialing? Like, do you actually make decisions about someone's trustworthiness based on the letters after their name, or their job title, instead of their behavior? Do you lock your guardian angel out of your head, to get a degree?
I think Chomsky got it quite right when, decades ago, he emphasised that it's (even) easier to 'fool' academics and other white-collar professionals: they are already conditioned (by 'training', or 'higher education', that is), so there's not much else to do but use the already-existing channels.
As to my circles, well, my work environment is heavily credentialled (and vaxxed to the hilt); we live in the countryside, and my neighbours are overwhelmingly 'regular' people, with or without vocational training: they're all vaxxed (although I'd wager not all of them are boosted, for the 3rd jab uptake stands at around 54%), but still, I suppose this can be explained by a variety of Norwegian specifics (high trust in gov't, social cohesion, etc.).
You write:
'I don't have the acumen or the reading speed to evaluate all the studies on the subject. Instead, I evaluate the people giving orders on it. Do I trust them? Do they have hidden motives? Do they know what they're talking about? Are they competent? I have rarely seen a larger pack of weasels and pompous blowhards.'
This strikes me as a wonderful way to assess the situation.
'Are academics really so blinded by credentialing? Like, do you actually make decisions about someone's trustworthiness based on the letters after their name, or their job title, instead of their behavior? Do you lock your guardian angel out of your head, to get a degree?'
I'd think so; academics are a quite pathetic bunch; no-one moves without looking sideways. A lot of this is actually due to credentials, for sure, and the like: elite degrees, schools, and experiences are very much what people follow. (I'm a bit different, because I didn't make my career with the help of others, hence I am a bit more insisting on merit-based considerations, which, I'd argue, helped me in this case; my wife tells me I can't shut up and stick with my own opinions, based on me reading CVs, literature, etc.)
Trying to makeup for accidentally handling Covid not as badly as other nations, Sweden's governement is desperately trying to drum up new panic.
Including claiming that the "vaccine" stops the virus from spreading, something the manufacturer has stated thatit doesn't do.
But then swedish media and governement exists like some kind of human centipede...
Oh my, I'll write something more about public health in Austria soon (it's too stupid to do so right away), but it sounds eerily familiar.
Check out the 'latest' on Norway: same shit, different smell.
People injected are sick and sicker. The sickest. I read in the juices are supposed immune activating (deactivating?) nano-particles. In the flu shots too. Nano-particles?
What the hell are in these juices should the citizen ask.