LogFAQs > #962772382

Kyuubi4269 posted...

Anybody unwilling to debate science doesn't get what science is for.

Any scientist worth their salt can and will back up their claims with observations, show how it was controlled for and explain how they assert their margin of error. Part of what makes science great is that you can and should have back and forths to air potential vulnerabilities and show how they either don't apply or don't matter.

adjl posted...

Nothing about [this] is a legitimate effort to have intellectual discourse on the subject. It's a never-ending torrent of ridiculous arguments that even a high school science education can see through, presented in such a manner that it's extremely laborious to reach the standard of proof they're demanding despite the claims being so clearly wrong. It's specifically designed to wear out the patience of people that know what they're talking about so they stop trying, at which point the science denier claims victory and the audience he's attracted by doing exactly this eats it right up because they're all too stupid to know any better.

You're not wrong that the anti-science crowd's rhetoric has been a major stumbling block for the pandemic response. Heck, I might even go so far as to say that rhetoric gaining the traction it has is the only reason Covid is still a thing (Might. That is a considerable stretch and there have been many other factors). Debating them on their turf, though, is a complete waste of time. Rogan is not extending this invitation for the sake of inviting legitimate debate and educating himself and his viewers. He's extending this invitation because he knows accepting the invitation would be an exercise in extreme, disingenuous frustration for the experts in question and because his audience wants to see the experts discredit themselves (in their eyes) by rejecting it. Even if the invitation is accepted, I can guarantee Rogan has lined up enough bad faith arguments that even if the scientist does spend the entire week painstakingly picking them apart by repeatedly explaining rudimentary science and showing the same incontrovertible evidence again and again, he'll still have enough left un-debunked (just bunked, I guess) that he'll claim victory and his followers will accept that (if they haven't already disregarded the explanations because they think using the same evidence to answer the same question worded differently means the scientist has run out of proof).

This is a waste of scientists' time because it is brazenly designed to be a waste of their time. This is not an educational opportunity, this is an opportunity for Rogan to profit off of reaffirming his audience's pre-existing, misinformed beliefs. I really cannot overemphasize what utter pieces of shit Rogan and his ilk are, given the success they are building by encouraging people to kill themselves and others with their ignorance instead of learning how not to.

Kyuubi4269 posted...

It's hardly a waste of time considering their sentiment's majorly detrimental effect on pandemic suppression.

Speaking as somebody with a background in science and medicine and a near-front-line seat to the public health response to Covid, who has devoted countless hours over the last two years to correcting and arguing with Covid deniers and anti-vaxxers, it is almost invariably a waste of time to argue with these people. You cannot teach those that are unwilling to learn, and the extent to which dismissing Covid's danger and fearmongering about preventative measures has become a matter of personal and political identity means these people feel that they would be compromising who they fundamentally are as a person to accept that they have anything to learn.

I continue to try, on the off chance that I might manage to chip away at their ignorance enough to make a difference, but my main focus in doing that is making sure that their misinformation doesn't go unchallenged. The science deniers themselves are generally a lost cause, but there are still a lot of people out there who genuinely don't know what to think (this being a pretty confusing, scary situation for most laypersons, and most people having the basic integrity to not let that fear lead them to completely deny everything) and are still weighing their options. I feel that, as somebody who can inform them, I have a responsibility to do so. I don't know how to fix the overt deniers (they refuse to learn, and any attempt to force them to do so or stifle their ability to influence others only seems to galvanize the position), but there's still hope for the people that are just confused.