Hello, everyone. Welcome to decode in the gurus. It's the podcast where an anthropologist and a psychologist listen to the greatest minds the world has to offer. And we try our best to understand what they're talking about. I'm Matt brown. And with me is Chris Kavanaugh. It's been great to see you again, Chris, it's been what two weeks welcome.
don't pull back the curtain. Matt people have no idea. Maybe it was the day after maybe we were recording this immediately following the three and a half hour period of time of Michael O'Fallon
No, this is, is cinema verite. This is a little window into our lives and just you haven't seen your grumpy Arice face for some time.
Yep. That's right. And I've got a lot of complaints stored up math. If you've missed me moaning applied stuff week boy, have I got some material for you?
Yeah, absolutely. So, uh, yeah, we got, uh, another Dewar, another double team act happening this week, but before we talk about them, let's do our little bit of housekeeping that we'd like to do before the proper episode. Now, last episode, we of course, had the wonderful Aaron Rabinowitz on, uh, do we have any, any feedback about that episode? Come to mind, Chris.
yeah, there was quite a bit of feedback, but it was mostly positive, which just signs like we are. Back patting ourselves if we talk about it. but there were some critical comments. We talked about a couple of them on the perimeter episode, but that's behind the pH on feed. So, uh, if people want to hear in-depth feedback, they can go there. But there was one point that, people realized that I thought was interesting and we could discuss a bit.
So some people, I think this was in the Reddit, could have been on Twitter as well, but we're talking about, when we were covering high or fallen, likes to link all of these culture wars, shenanigans to. These instant, historical events, right? The Jacobins and all, all of this stuff that it's, it's never enough to just talk about an individual school made a shitty policy or something like that. it's all as part of a ground, their narrative, and the issue was raised.
Are we not guilty in some respect of doing the same thing when we link or following them Lindsey into, you know, an ecosystem which focuses on the protocols of the elders of Zion and, into this grounder right-wing conspiratorial ecosystem. Why is it not enough to just say this? Guy's, uh, you know, he is what he is like, you can listen to them.
yeah. A bit of fellowship. Uh, I think that's a pretty good, that's a pretty good point actually. And I think you do have to be cautious there because it is easy to detect those residences. And I remember, you know, Aaron was good at that because he's familiar with a lot of the history of anti-Semitism and could detect those similar threads coming through that uh, Fallon was picking up. From with, with structurally very similar to yeah. Protocols of the elders of Zion and so on.
And it does rely slightly on making that correspondence between say globalists and international, neo-liberal capitalists and Jewish people, for instance. So there are some small leaps to be made, and I remember at the time I felt it might've been a bit of a stretch, but then, you know, thinking about it and reading a little bit more, it was hard to deny that those residences were a pure coincidence.
So on the other hand, the parsimonious scientist in me, urges, caution, always in making those links. So yeah, I think it's a good bit of feedback and I'm ambivalence is my response. yeah.
Mm. Like one point I would make though, is that if you start out somewhat skeptical that globalists are standing for Jews and lots of, conspiracy theories, the more time that you spend around conspiracy theorists folks like Alex Jones and whatever. It always shows up. There's always anti Semites coming in and it's always linked in eventually.
So yes, you want to be careful if you make those accusations, but on the other hand, there are so often seem to crop up that it would be perverse the the NY that there's any relationship there. And even if you. Disregard all those, right? If you think no Fallon he isn't talking about that. He's just talking about the UN and the globalists. And if he's drawing on motifs, he doesn't know, uh, you know, he's not doing it intentionally.
I think you can, take that position and still see why the reasoning there's still so faulty and still problematic and why it could easily land itself with just one extra step to demonizing, the Jews and adding them in as the ultimate puppet masters behind anything. It's just who the label is. That's attached. That differs.
So yeah, I also agree that you do have to be careful, and it is certainly possible that you could overstay, individual parallels or whatever, but the, the broader connections are impossible to deny, uh, in not specifically about full falling, just with conspiracy theories and anti-sematic tropes
Yeah. Yeah, I think you're right. I think, look, it could, well, just be a coincidence. The George Soros seems to feature so heavily in so many of these globalists conspiracies, but even if it is purely a coincidence, it doesn't make them any less stupid. So yeah. Yeah.
so as the patrons already knew from the grandmother episode, O'Fallon promptly blocked me after the episode, when I asked him some questions about what was in the documents from 10 years ago that he received, whether they outlined the, the specific details of the global pandemic that was planned or not. And so I was promptly blocked as, a non-serious interlocutor. Despite our previous friendly interactions, he'd been very nice to me on Twitter previously, but you didn't right.
You're still you enough luck. Nobody has any call to take you to task. So you just skate in the past when you're like luxury Spears, communist, airy fairy dances. I'm, I'm the bully I'm really unfair, critical dark hearted mom.
I'm I'm the nice one. You're you're John Lennon and I'm here's the other guy?
uh, uh, Ringo
not Ringo. I don't want to be Rigo. John Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul McCarthy. I'd love to be the Yoko to your John Curtis, but no, no. I'm paul McCartney. Yeah,
the true creative mind.
Yeah, well, I'm, I'm the nice one. People perceive me as more moderate, just more gentle generally. And interestingly, they see you as more extreme, both in a left-wing direction and a right-wing direction. It's it's, it's really quite interesting.
I'm the, magic I, for your political prejudices, wherever they may lie. So yeah,
Yes. It's antivirus sentiment. If that's all it is. I mean, it's not your paranoia. It's real.
They just think all Northern Irish people are extremists. And I will say no, ma'am that is not true. We are never, never, never, we haven't done an unfair reputation, which, which comes with my little thing draw. So yeah, that's what it is. You're just all wrong because you're picking up on the accent. don't be swayed by mats soft, Elvin pronunciation, and there's come hell or looks, which you can't see on the podcast, but you can, I know you're visualizing them. I know you are. So yeah.
Yes. I started to do to get a pass. I think
you get the Gwyneth Paltrow bump. This is what it is. You know, people have often called you that Gwyneth Paltrow of this podcast. So.
we get advice. But apart from that, I think the feedback from that episode was pretty good and I was pretty happy with it. I thought Aaron was amazing and you and I played just excellent supporting roles. looking forward to following that up. So what about our next episode? You had a suggestion, Chris, that was sort of out of left field and I remember being open to it, but I can't remember what it was
oh, I think you're talking about Anthony de Mello, the Jesuit, who was. a Christian mystic, who was very influential to me as a teenager and whose material I haven't revisited and he's not a girl and he once requested, but I might be interesting to visit as a like secret Chi of mine to make me feel uncomfortable. As I peel back all his grief techniques, which have infiltrated my mind for 30 odd years.
I wouldn't mind something refreshing something. that you're not going to hear about on Twitter. Somebody that nobody cares about or has any strong political adherence one way or the other. So yeah, I might into that,
you know how to put your finger on the pulse ma hi, to meet this podcast popular, let's pick someone that no one cares. Nobody is even the word is that's, the one for us, but I I mean, I'm done for that. I'm also, I'm interested to go lefty for awhile, be Jimmy door or Zach, or even, you know, left Aish Sam Harris. I want to get the God side and various ULAR Hyper morons in that I read that, but I think I need the palette cleanser after this episode that we're about to record
Yeah, well, one of the things I really like to see on the subreddit was that, a few people actually have mentioned that we've covered people that they really like, that they've got a strong affinity And they know that we, pretty, pretty tough on the characters we cover and. They're actually very keen to hear us do the, do the decoding and to find a little flour's and all the niggling problems with the people they're really quite, a fan of.
So I find that really encouraging that this is not just about, fanboys or haters of various characters, but actually people that are just interested to hear and maybe be provoked into a bit of a critical reflection on stuff. So that feels very DTG. That's That's our, that's our thing.
does. That's definitely the majority of our listeners. It's not that they're getting vicarious enjoyment from hearing the Nemesis is torn apart intellectually. That's a very tiny minority if I listened to ship. I agree. I agree. Um, I just, well, I would also add that, like, I think it would actually be painful for me to critically devour my erstwhile girl, Anthony develo. So that might be in the alert in his fever If I can inflict it on all those, why is the Gander not good for the
Yep. That's that's, I'm sure there's a very appropriate reference for the appropriate use of that. Um,
Yeah, that's it?
Look, if I think it's someone who was hugely influential on me when I was younger, it's it's definitely,
me like that, man. I don't feel
uh, I, I hadn't, I had no, no awareness of you until I was well and truly into middle-aged, I think Richard Dawkins was actually instrumental in getting me to go ahead and do a PhD. like I, I had very little awareness of science-y type stuff. I was more of a humanities type kid and I read the selfish gene and I read and weave in the rainbow. And I read basically all of Richard Dawkins books.
And I've read that a lot of other sites type books as well, but I think it was those that really stood out to me in terms of making me very serious about Scientific, theoretical stuff and led me down the path that, you know, led to me being where I am here today. So where I'm going with this is that
you want to do
No, I don't want to do Dorkins because you were talking about how painful it would be to do one of, uh, I grew up yours. Somebody who'd been influential on you and I wouldn't have any problem with doing Dawkins in terms of analyzing the stuff. That's the content of his books on evolution. But if we had to do an episode, which was decoding his tweets, then that would be painful. Very painful for me, Chris
somewhere in the middle. That might be interesting to look at. Given the topic of today Richard had a run in with one Brett Weinstein on stage where they discussed primarily evolution. I believe so. I think that people might accuse us of making Dawkins. Look good by selecting a comparably mad baseline. but but even still, I think that would be a good content listener. Cause I've never listened to that. Um, Yes, I know it hasn't Weinstein and I'm not, this is not my reason. just mean it.
The kind of material we cover, we can't really cover chapter of Dunkin's book and there's interviews we could do with him that might be suitable for him on his own. But that one seems like it be a good candidate talking about evolution, culture, war.
yeah, look, I agree at the very least look at will accomplish two things. One it'll give us a good excuse to talk about evolution, which is always fun, um, because it's awesome. It's a great topic
gonna come up this time.
sort of will. Um, And secondly, it'll give us the opportunity to make fun of breaths. So there's two wins. I see.
no, they haven't. You just filled the quota for the heaters who will take that and say, this is a heated cast. He at timestamp 14, Matt admitted what this was all by I'm. Eric has insinuated that this entire podcast is just a means to, get at him this discredit. Um,
Okay. Well, the thing is kind, I don't need to discredit him because he discredited himself with that because I remember one thing you said in that debate, he was arguing that
that's breath, breath.
Brett did I say Eric got, sorry. The thing that Eric in that debate or was that the Nazi invasion of Russia. He tries to direct evolutionary psycho.
selection,
Oh, God, that was So bad. So that was me where the Dawkins reaction to that proposers claim.
It it was so they would go look. Hi, nice little, important, deep coding, the gurus, logistical planning exercise. And we have some candidates. Maybe we'll put up the top three or four vote from the patrons well, what can I I'll work it out? But you heard our discussion. So it'll be one of those people we just discussed. Um, this week, like you said, Brett and Jordan are. The subject of our attention.
And there's actually two podcasts because they did a crossover episode on each other's podcasts that kind of quit protocol. If you will, where Brett appeared in Jordan's Jordan's appeared in breaths. And we were going to the judge to look at one of them, but due to our incredible organizational skills, have I believe I made you watch the wrong one. so the long and short of it is that we've cut bits from both of them. this is Jordan Peterson is back Brett Weinstein's dark horse podcast.
And, the Jordan B. Peterson one is season four, episode 10, Bret Weinstein. just bret
Yes, there is a to get mixed up aren't they? Because they're not very informative titles. That's why we ended up listening to both, but that's fine. We'll post links to both of them in the episode. And, uh, yeah, they covered some pretty interesting ground. let's review it. Shall we?
no, because before I have another surprise to spring on a special TriNet to sprinkle into your ear holes. So it's completely dicing the flames of this being a Weinstein heater podcast. We have had several requests to do a, shall you say, short update on what the Weinsteins are up to in each episode? if we don't have to, if they're not doing anything, if they've got no hot ticks and we have covered Eric's unwillingness to release the, phishing technology tweet from last time.
I've got a thing from both brothers this time and the Eric one will be short. It's an electric classic tweet and the Pratt one will be a bit longer I think we need to cover because we're not going to jump back into the Weinstein world for a good few episodes after this. So I don't want the mess that the most recent Darko episode was dedicated to outlining, why Brett and Heller will not be taking the vaccine and will be instead be taking I've erected, dummy.
I need to check the pronunciation of that effect the mean, any anti parasite treatment that is. According to various public health bodies, no more effective than hydroxy chloroquine for treating COVID, but the Weinsteins disagree. So I want to just cover a little bit about the coronavirus stuff, because this has been the primary focus of the podcast And they only touch on that in the Jordan and, Bret crossovers. but first not the BI done Eric. So here's, uh, Eric treat.
And at this time I'm not going to analyze it. I'm just going to read that. here we go. When our experts normally talk openly about all these UFO's, they talk about their technology and every time they do, I would play as the word technology with the word physics for the obvious reasons. Because if non-terrestrial craft are here, physics is greater than technology.
Imagine if these you AP were actually visitors from beyond the local solar neighborhood, you wouldn't be focused on their technology first. You'd want to understand how they got here and if they use new physics to do so, most importantly, you'd want to know about dimension hockey. That's a tape.
Chris. I've never been more nonplussed. I, I, don't know how
Don't you think that that is the ultimate galaxy brand tweet. It's actually into the solar system with trans dimensional hacking and when all the, experts are, all of them are openly talking about UFO technology. who could blame Eric for you issuing this very mild rebuke.
oh my goodness. I don't even really understand what it means. could you break it down for me to somebody who's
you requested that night? Well,
not very galaxy braid, you know, help me out here.
I think what he's trying to say is that even if people are talking about these UFO videos that the Pentagon or whatever releasing, they should ultimately realize that what's important is Eric and his new ideas about physics and how these UFOs may in fact be supporting various geometric theories that he's got. So I think it's just a way for Eric to speculate about how the things that he's interested in are really fundamental, including for extra terrestrials.
okay. So I'm not even aware of the context here. has there been a particular spite of UFO sightings
I think the on or somebody has been releasing a couple of things with the usual greeny footage of some shiny object viewed on some, radar screen or on some camera that shoots off and pilots being bewildered.
I I see. Okay. Now I understand. So he is attempting to link this to saying that what we really should be trying to do is understanding that if these aliens are here, how they got here and how they did some geometric folding of space time in order manage it,
The question that if we have one question, we should basically be saying, what do you guys think about geometric units?
uh,
I think that's what he wants to say, but yeah, so that's, the, humorous galaxy Brene tick of one Briller um, let's turn the slightly more dine to our ticks of the Oliver ruler. So this is slightly less amusing because Brett has been quite strongly on an anti vaccine, banned awfully yet. And it's framed as It's just asking questions. It's about the long-term CFDs off these new vaccines, which haven't had time to be tested properly identified safety concerns, as we all know in the drug process.
So this is just scientifically thinking through an issue and he hosted a good fund the Bosch, I think his name is, a researcher who has argued that the vaccines could be extremely damaging causing the virus to, habit selection practices, which make it evolve in the more deadly strain and that taking the vaccines may suppress the natural immune system. So it could actually be very dangerous for children not dementia in adults to engage in.
So we should help all the global vaccine rollout and reconsider things. So
You have argued that in fact, the vaccine campaign that we are currently engaged in is so dangerous that it should be halted. And I will say, I don't know if you're right. I cannot, I cannot determine based on what I understand if you're right, but what I can say. Is that you are making sense, right? This is frightening in and of itself that your argument is completely coherent, whether or not it is true.
This is at least a question that should be engaged by those who are making policy around this, because the possibility of making our viral situation with respect to COVID worse is present. And, you know, we, we are creating the hazard of the future that we will be confronting a year or two down the road by our actions now.
So that was also framed as just asking question, but that researcher is considered. Very much on the fringe of, coronavirus, disinformation, um, whatnot. So, yeah. Disclaimers are, are useful things,
You know, again, I don't know that your argument is right, but I can say it's very clearly plausible and the hazard is potentially immense. Yep. No, this, uh, tracks perfectly with, uh, what I understand of the system. And it does raise the specter that our intervention is actually not only going to become ineffective, but render things far worse than they are.
That in fact, we, you know, we take the immunity of the young to COVID-19 as somehow God given and permanent, and it is anything, but it is dependent on a system we know not enough about. And that system is capable of being disrupted by a ham-fisted intervention in the adaptive immunity system that, uh, strikes me as all too plausible. All I'm saying is that it's interesting.
We have seen patterns here that are suggestive of the importance of innate immunity in the COVID-19 story in a way that you know, is under appreciated. And the idea that now we're talking about, uh, rendering that immune system, the innate immune system ineffective. Uh, at the same time, we are failing to create proper immunity in the adaptive immune system. That is, you know, it's a perfect storm at some level, right?
We're taking the thing that works and appending it without creating the thing that would replace it. And, uh, it does seem a very frightening prospect.
will so. Thank you, Chris. Bye.
Bye. Yeah, I think that's okay because that'll be easier for us to add it
Yeah, well, you know, we should be making sure that we should be making shorter episodes. you know, we doing no, no, it's it's too big. Uh that's okay. So that's good. Like we'll We'll we'll we'll shut Well, we'll edit it. We'll see how it we'll
Ma can I, can I
how it looks.
So just on what happens here. Well, you know, the time durometer finally
the
we've come back from the
term because it felt like, an extended
it's the episode. That's not what it is. you're you're a bite to be, uh, rewarded in that sense with a special that is actually, uh, looking at the Brett Weinstein and Heller Heinz at dark horse podcast, episode 80, what COVID reveals a standalone episode, but it, it turned out that way. So, uh, yes. Uh, sorry about But, um, yeah, I thought we should warn
the universe spoke to us and we responded
episodes are extended And, uh, coming the future to this point, we know most successful episode. The day plaudits awards where, you know, zip, zoom didn't work. So, yeah. And, um, cause I, you know, is like a So my umbrella, I've created another time paradox where we're back from, back in the future again, we're like we're coming back with created paradoxes. We've killed our own around followers. Um, your mother's not having sex with your father, so your disappeared.
Oh, no, that's not good. As long as I've tried to seduce my mother that I couldn't, I couldn't deal with that psychologically.
Yeah. travel references are all back to the future. Not very heavy, time travel
No, not for contemporary either, but that's that generation's thing.
unlike our references, the Blackstone crying, which are cutting edge, contemporary culture, in any case, that's not why we're here, man. We're not here to talk about bad pop color to references we're here because, you didn't meet that reference. You're not guilty for it. And you don't know who
I didn't, no, I didn't get the reference. Don't tell me, don't tell him.
since we're going to get into an extended segment on. Breadth and the Heller's dark horse episode about a Corona virus, vaccine skepticism, and alternative treatments and lab like hypotheses and whatnot. It seems that we should not neglect to introduce, breadth and Heller. I think most people that listen to this podcast will already be familiar with.
Brett, covered in the first episode of the podcast, filmed because of his, in with students at evergreen college, the famous culture war event, and Heller is his wife who was a teacher in our own respect. I think actually she was the original person. that was employed by evergreen and Brett came along as a package data, but she is a culture war, participant in their own, right. And an evolution, my biologist, or a, at least a lecturer and not to Bert.
So I it's worth mentioning that, the kind of context this is in the dark horse podcast, which purports to give a critical scientific appraisal of modern events and in particular over the past year or two, the coronavirus, topics related to that. The dark horse podcast started out in an interview, Paul with Brett, in the same vein, the portal, Brett interviewing people like Andy, no, and Douglas Murray, the usual suspects for extended interviews.
But when the pandemic came out, it instead pivoted to Brett and Heller. Talking about the pandemic and trying to, give a scientifically informed view of the news of the week. So, that's the weekly format for this episode that we end up looking at in some
Hmm. And they spent a lot of the time focusing on the lab leak, hypothesis, as compared to the natural origins. explanation for, the, origination of COVID w were there any other topics associated with COVID? we're going to talk about ivermectin. soon in the past. And I'm just trying to remember whether they talk about any other hot button issues.
yeah, they have, it's almost constant. It's not that all their information is wrong. Like for example, they were pro masks They fought that locked times alone, you know, should have been. better that there were still reasons for them. So it isn't that they just have adopted every contrarian position.
However, it's not that far off it where there's an angle that, people aren't talking about this They have sought the exploit that, but they have done some episodes where they've critiqued, researchers coming out and presenting this information, in a obvious way about infection rates and that kind of stuff. So While I wouldn't recommend the podcast as a source for information because of the tendency towards hot takes and their tendency to demonize mainstream researchers.
They're not like JPC or, uh, like that. they are like him when it comes to the vaccines or when it comes to how they frame, the community or that So it's hard to draw a firm line between there I'd put under the more extreme stuff that we've looked at, but. yeah. It's, like, they're more of a mixed bag
well, it sounds good. I think that's a pretty good introduction to Britain, Heather and the dark horse podcast. Anything else we need to cover?
um, well just one thing that we might mention is that we're probably, probably as if we don't know, like going get a little bit, he did a little bit of harsh in the upcoming section on to extend charity advance in the past. We did talk about afterwards that we recognize that Brett and Heller are both. I would judge entirely sincere. They believe themselves to be giving people a perspective that is.
Scientific and critically informed on they're providing people with the tools to think about these issues in a nuanced and evolutionary way. They believe that that's the impression I get they aren't doing that just, cynically to sit guide rewards We've talked about high, it's hard to disentangle.
Top-down and bottom-up influences you're always rewarded for hotter ticks, and I think their tendency towards scientific hipsterism and the various forms of contrarianism and right-leaning politics or at least heterodox, TX, it does skew things, but I think they're genuine in. Believing what they're selling and that's probably why it's so effective.
I think what I want to say is I don't want to give the impression that I'm seeing them as mustache, twirling, villains, who don't believe in what they're claiming.
Yeah. but we do, disagree, that they're doing a good job of what they're purporting to do. And yes, we, uh, quite, quite frankly, about that and that's okay.
Yeah. And part of it is that ALO we sick Terry, Apply to some extent, right. More detached land. When we're looking at these kinds of contexts, I know like Iran, the bite things and all that kind of stuff.
But we do try to address the arguments and look at things, from not just a, I disliked these people on, the, that kind of emotional response, but it is fair to say in this case, When they're demonizing scientists and the people researching vaccines and whatnot in the middle of a pandemic, that's killing hundreds of thousands of people. And they're, assigning not demonization to the application of science and critical thinking.
It it's things like it, it registers emotionally because it feels like that they're violating something that I hold dear or that I think is important. I think you see him,
Yeah, absolutely. And I think the other thing too, is that they're not the only ones doing this kind of thing, pushing conspiracy theories, talking about hydro chloride. comprehensive
Hydroxychloroquine.
um, or ivermectin or various other things. And there's an awful lot of disinformation out there so much. In fact, they're trying to engage with it as like trying to wrestle with a fine mist. So we focus on particular people because it's the only practical way to, to grapple with, what we think is the misinformation out there.
And the other thing too, is that we think that there's some fundamental issues in terms of the paranoid and conspiratorial worldview, which can easily be seen as, Completely. Implausible, views of the world in which there is, a grand conspiracy cooperation, among, researchers and scientists across. A range of different countries, all to keep the truth from the public and in fact, it is only some brave podcasters or co cultural commentators would like Joe Rogan. who can see through that.
You know, I think it's. It's healthy and important to just point out that such a worldview is inherently implausible. And if you're going to make such strong claims, you need really, really strong evidence to back them up. And as we'll see, that seems to be lacking.
yeah. And just better at your appointment today. As we record this team's Lindsey has released a podcast explaining why he's not going to get vaccinated needed and, why he considers the, to have been no good case meat towards vaccination. And, you know, James Lindsay is a, right-wing demagogue night, but there's so many echoes of the things that you will hear in the dark horse podcasts, including the promotion of.
Ivermectin, as an alternative treatment and the issues with, long-term safety being unclear, the trade offs, not being reasonable for young, healthy people and, and the approval process along like he needed, he wedges it all in, but it's, it's so familiar and I've heard the same thing and, JP Sears content and, Scott Adams content and so on.
They're advocating for their position, except that they're suppressing the idea that things like, you know, adequate zinc and vitamin D and exercise and health and youth are, are. Sufficiently protective to where I don't have to particularly worry about the virus. They've also much more concerningly suppressed. The idea that there are what they might call ambulatory treatments, or that there are treatments for this virus, which are known, uh, I don't know, a great deal of them.
I've watched a handful of people get relatively severe cases of COVID and go on what they said does not work hydroxy, chloroquine, and then watched them almost immediately watched their symptoms like with an hours vanish on a treatment that they've vigorously suppressed. There are treatments for this virus. There are prophylactics for this virus and that's all been downplayed. It's all been denied. It's all been hidden. It's all been shuttled shoved away.
Why they all necessitate or they all undermine the necessity. I should say of the argument that we need the vaccine at all, or especially to quote unquote, get back to normal. Right. They undermine that. And so this is, this all looks very shady.
So Brett and Heller, they're like on the more reasonable and of that spectrum, but they're all in the same waters. And it's the same water that the hardcore anti-vaccine people are in as well. And these kinds of narratives have consequences, real world consequences.
We are discussing the safety or lack thereof of a effective prevention for a disease that is clearly out of control and which we regard as highly dangerous. Okay. That has implications. People may hear what we say, decide not to get a vaccine and some of them may die. Some of them may get sick infect, somebody else who dies, who had no choice in the matter. That's a very terrible position to be in.
The reason that we are in this position is that the lies that cause people to, to believe things are safe when they are not safe are vastly more dangerous.
Yep. And I think it's really important to evaluate their argument and encourage people to think about whether or not what is getting proposed as plausible and whether or not there is actually the evidence to back up such strong claims. So the weakness and the strength of the scientific worldview is to actually allow for all possibilities and not to have this cast iron confidence in one explanation. So it. In principle was perfectly possible saying that the MMR vaccine could have caused autism.
And it was looked into. And a great deal of evidence was brought to bear. And lot of researchers who are acting in complete good faith evaluated it, and it was found to be lacking and completely unsubstantiated. Likewise, right now, as of today, It is theoretically possible that I've a is a fantastic thing to take, to protect you against COVID. It's entirely possible that COVID originated from, the Wu Han lab rather than from a, natural source. that's the scientific approach.
You don't rule things out, but you evaluate things in terms of the balance of evidence and you don't, buttress the flimsy evidence and the lack of it and the preponderance of evidence for the alternative explanation, by simply saying that all of those people. I ran on some sort of grand conspiracy to hide the truth from us. That is the wrong way to practice. that, that is a poor epistemology, essentially.
Yeah. And you know, all possibilities are open or can't be ruled out entirely. But the probability relative probability matters and this isn't to say that, a fringe theory can never be proven. Correct, but it isn't wrong for people to dissect and unlikely, hypothesis initially, right?
when the weight of evidence leans against something, then you're not wrong to doubt that even if it eventually turns out that when better call the evidence becomes available, that, the weight of evidence shifts, then your opinion ships, but it's not wrong to take account of where the weight of quality evidence currently lies.
I keep in contrary, Matt, that people have this problem where they, they can't handle that our research literature could be mixed or that it would be possible in good faith to reach different conclusions about, for example, the effectiveness of cloth masks in community settings, right. That public health bodies could have in good VF been working night different cost benefit analysis on that, on the basis of uh, mixed literature.
Um, even, even though, as things going on, that the evidence shifts such that the vast majority and I believe all public health bodies come to recommend the mosque wearing is not only. preferable but necessary, right? Like it's a, it's a recommended practice. So the standards shifted, but it doesn't mean that the initial judgments were done in bad faith or we're completely invalid. It's just like yeah. Cost, cost benefit ratio can be worked out differently.
And I, I don't think people ever have these very good insights about things like, The bandwidth for public health messaging and what they can influence or how many messages they can include, to get the public, to react to something. And so on. Like, it's feels like there's a lot of armchair epidemiologists, public health experts, and virologists.
Who have never had to actually manage interventions or design public health messaging and, and those that have no, that it's, it's like Massey and I, doesn't always go the way people, would want. So yes, there are mistakes made under our conclusions, which are, changed over time, but it doesn't require that there was a conspiracy. At some point, by people to hide the truth.
And we've said it before. There's There's no issue with proposing that there's a possibility of a lab leak or proposing that there's a possibility that something like a victim could be helpful. as you say, there's, there's next to evidence there's you're operating under uncertainty. So anyway, I hope, I think we've made our objections clear. We've foreshadowed
no worry, man. This is all gonna get
it's all going to be
this,
Cut. Cut. Cut. Cut. Cut.
Yeah, that's it. Well, uh, so back to the. Past the past past when we're going Chris and my away you go, you think back again, enjoy it. It's the, it's the past and the future. So, uh, yeah. Disclaimers are, are useful things, but there's a particular disclaimer that comes in this episode and, you know, we are kind of sewers of this clamorous right. That people issue where they're saying something, but they're trying to avoid saying as if they're
Yeah,
just want to hear you this, cause this is poetry.
I do because, um, are scientists who are about to talk about scientific evidence, that scientific evidence may have implications for what we collectively ought to be doing and what you individually might think we are not going to make any recommendations as to what you should do. And we are not going to say anything conclusive about what the data say, because the data are not themselves conclusive. However, it doesn't mean the data don't imply things.
And, um, you know, I think YouTube ought to think very carefully about whether it wants to confront to people who have the proper credentials have demonstrated. Uh, a willingness to be responsible about evaluating heterodox scientific, um, uh, processes. Uh, and in this case are, have just been through a circumstance where a hypothesis that they were suggesting needed to be investigated is now understood to be necessary, to be investigated, uh, you know, in science, et cetera.
So that's the context. Okay.
Okay. Just for the context for people who are listening, this is claiming vindication because there was an opinion piece article published in science saying basically that we need to continue investigating and origins of the coronavirus, including the possibility of a lab. And it was signed by a bunch of. Relevant researchers, including some prominent figures. he strongly on the side
Chris
Chris
that
likely. And he publication of this letter
again
vindication that he's
Hmm.
Right so
My understanding Chris, that the consensus among the scientific establishment is that the origins of COVID were never established beyond reasonable doubt. And although natural origins appear to be most likely, nobody has ever rolled out the possibility that it was something to do with, a lab
yes, this a, this is right. So like the part about claiming vindication, like it doesn't sit well with me because you know, people will quibble about this and say that researchers were vilified if they discussed the possibility of lab, like, but I would push back that it's not that possibility. That was criticized. It's the way that people were arguing. So there's, there can be a thing where there's a legitimate point, right?
That we shouldn't read like completely the possibility of a lab leak, but there are various reasons that virologists are skeptical, that the vast majority of biologists have reached the conclusion that this is very unlikely. It's more likely to be a natural origin. Now you can still talk about the possibility of there being a lab lead, but to be responsible, you do it in the context of acknowledging the possibilities are not equal.
And that there at least is a large, we in the favor of relevant experts towards a natural origin. there's one statement that wants to read I so Ralph Barak, who is, was heralded in, in this episode with Brett and Heller as, reversing his position on the lake,
but I would point out that one of the really important things about this letter and, you know, it isn't just Ralph Barrick, but the fact that he shows up there is the jaw-dropping fact of it. By showing up here, he is implying that not only is SARS cov two, as we find it consistent at a technical at a molecular level with techniques that might have been used to enhance it in the lab.
He is saying that the denials that he has heard are not compelling to him as a leading expert in the field, one of two top labs in a position to know what is, and isn't possible, what might or might not have been done. So this is absolutely stunning to have him emerge. And I will say he has said before, he has indicated one can not rule out lab leak, but he has done it. Uh, when pressed here he is coming out in front and that's really important.
And although I do think it's very late and he should have done it much earlier.
He's one of the authors on this published letter saying that we should continue to investigate the origins on, look into the possibility of a lab lake as well. But there was a statement he gave to PolitiFact. who wrote an article, covering this the bit about the lob lake and the relative possessions on it. And I, I just want to read the statement that he gives the PolitiFact for this article. okay.
Barack told PolitiFact in a statement that he believes that SARS cov two is a zoonotic virus that passed from bats to humans based on the primary sequence of the virus. It's phylogeny and relationship they all are about strains, historic precedent, and it's incredibly complex disease mechanisms. Consequently, I do not believe it was January did from gain of function research.
While also noting that many independent research groups have demonstrated that SARS COVID two is distinct from any of the recombinant coronaviruses being studied prior to 2012. Barack has said that he fought, the virus came from Bateson, Southern China perhaps directly or possibly via an intermediate host.
And they, he suspected the disease evolved in humans over time with I'd been noticed eventually a person carried it, the wound and the pandemic took off Barrick, told New York magazine in January. Can you rely the laboratory escape? The answer in this case is probably not. So that's it right? He holds open the possibility, but the whole part before that, there's, here's the reason I don't consider that likely that's perfect. And that isn't him reversing a position.
That's the normal position for the researchers in the field. They say, there's this weed of evidence that leads me to clues include. That's very unlikely. It's alive. Like, but I don't completely relate. And That's what people do. When I see papers, I've seen a couple occasions where people are very dismissive, right. And basically say the people pushing labially a hypothesis are cooks conspiracy theories.
But that is because lots of them are They're not all very carefully caveating statements and whatnot. What they're pushing back on is the people who assign that 95% probability or who suggest that anybody reaching that conclusion is lying to cover their own asses. That's what I want to say.
It's frustrating. This is, this is why you get frustrated. I had to stand Chris. I had to stay
Just to give one illustration of this, this is a point that Heller brings up
And that the problem is people who have been to certain, right. And it puts the fault. Yeah, exactly. It's our fault. Even though we haven't been certain, we haven't been certain at all. In fact, uh, I've been saying, you know, it's a clever pivot, right? And my point has been stopped saying theory. It's not a theory. It's a hypothesis as is the other. We're not certain, here are the rules.
You know, when you say it's a hypothesis, you're saying, here are the exact rules of engagement what's going to come back at you is that you made a flow chart and you said, you know, here and also on bill Maher or something. Like, I think there's a greater than Well, and that is red. Um, apparently as certainty,
Greater than 95% chance
read as certainty.
why, why would somebody read a 95% higher warming it's
in science no, very unfair. Look it reminds me so strongly of
that
certainty That's nothing is known with a hundred percent probability. There is, always, a possibility, for the alternative. There is always these margins of error around the, consensus opinion. But there's been an awful lot of confidence around. human caused global warming and yes, there is natural dissension and that's a good thing.
Yes. There is uncertainty bounds around the, rate and the, extrapolations about what's going to happen in the future, all that kind of thing and debate around that stuff is always good. But exactly the same thing that these guys are proposing is going on with COVID was happening with that. There is a consensus. Yes, there are tales on that consensus in, in both directions and yet.
There is, there are still an awful lot of conspiracy theorists who claim that there is this, orthodoxy, which enforces this, view around global warming refusing to allow for the possibility that actually humans have done is to do with it. Actually the earth start getting warmer, or maybe the earth is getting warmer, but humans have got nothing to do with it.
There, are various versions of it, but there is natural pushback among the scientific community, to the people who play up those extreme low probability. Not very plausible views because it is them in fact who are playing up that potential explanation, despite it having very little evidence to support it because of political or popular opinion reasons. And I feel like exactly the same thing is happening here with COVID. I feel that the parallels are very strong.
yes. And so what they want to argue here is this isn't a episode focused on the lob lake that comes up for the first half of it, but the second half gets into vaccines. And why they think an alternative This treatment, which is approved for, kind of the anti anti parasitic or, it's a drug called ivermectin ivermectin.
I didn't need to check the pronunciation for that, but it's a, it's a well-established drug that has good effects I'm having earlier candidacy for potentially having relevant antiviral properties, which have not been explored in various trials. And they're still, trials ongoing and whatnot, but the results are not looking good. It's almost exactly what we've seen with hydroxy chloroquine, low quality, small sample studies that showed promising results.
As soon as the, replicated with larger samples or better quality, the effects disappear. And so all public health bodies don't advise to use this NY and the majority of them either take the position that there's currently no good evidence to support it. Um, we have vaccines which are effective, right? But this has become basically the new version of hydroxychloroquine.
and I want to just give an example of why Brett thinks the evidence is strong and as a statistician, I think you'll appreciate the reasoning here.
So, let me pause us there. So you will see frequently in the discussion of why we mustn't think about, talk about ivermectin. You will see the claim that, uh, there are no large scale studies that would give us the evidence. What there is, is meta analysis. That actually looks at many studies as you've just described. And that is in fact a better kind of evidence, right?
So it would be nice if we had a really large long-standing study, but a meta analysis that gives you a consistent indication is. The equivalent or more of a large study, a large study can be biased, a meta analysis, the biases of various different, uh, researchers will tend to be canceled by the fact that they won't be consistent between these things. The other thing to say is large studies are great because they reveal very small effects.
When you have a very large effect, you do not require a very large study to see it. And so the, uh, the compilation of all of these things is very strongly suggestive. That ivermectin does work. And, uh, what we know about it from the context in which it has been used as an antiparasitic, uh, suggests it's very safe, which then we would have to put in to juxtapose it to the alternatives here.
the thing is there's lots of stuff sprinkled in, though. That's true. Right? Large parts studies can detect smaller effects. meta-analyses are useful for Canceling out potential biases of individual studies, but. There's lots of stuff, which is also just wrong. Brett doesn't seem to have learned anything from the replication crisis, right? Which is if you have a large selection of low quality studies, it doesn't produce better quality evidence to meta analyze them.
Also meta analysis, depending on your selection criteria and the various ways that you select the effect sizes and whatnot can totally be biased by researchers. So you can get meta analysis, which come out positive, a meta analysis, which come at negatives. And when I did some research into this, there are some higher quality meta analysis and there are higher quality studies and the pattern is exactly what you expect, Better quality studies with control conditions. Tend to be negative.
but there aren't that many of there's only a handful and the pattern is exactly what you would expect, especially when there is a cadre of motivated people pushing this specific Right. Right As a
obviously haven't
I think he's treating if that's how it
said
they can compensate bad quality phrase is garbage and that
for PIP members of laypeople to do. And I'm a lay person when it comes to virology is to you step back a moment and ask yourselves, what is the likelihood that or a pair of podcasters had stumbled upon? Not just one, but two very large conspiracies about the origins of COVID and also the alternative treatments for COVID in terms of the risk benefit ratio of normal vaccines versus in vimentin.
And if you are to believe them, they have figured this out from their home and the entire virology community has not only not figured it out, or they have figured it out and they're not telling anyone.
Right. And at some level here we have. Um, the hazard that as the elites often do, when they are unable to control a story, they are going to do everything in their power to not allow the implications of it, to be understood. The implications are something is wrong with our institutional structure, that it got this one so very wrong. And that forces us to ask the question, what else might it be getting wrong?
So, um, we can leave it at that, but, uh, I very much want people to keep an eye on what was actually said and, uh, what this pivot is going to do in terms of portraying what was being said.
Now there is this conspiratorial ideation lying underneath this, which requires you to just trust absolutely everything that has ever come out of the scientific or academic community. So if you have that level of distrust in terms of what people are telling you, why on earth would you believe the published studies that. Breton Heather a sizing because you can't trust anything. In fact, the only source of information that you can trust is them.
You know, it's exactly these organizations who are in part in the, or their representatives who are saying, well, we can't assess this because there are no large-scale studies exactly. While, um, I think we are seeing evidence that they may be helping make sure that there are no large scale studies so that, you know, that's, that's a problem right there.
So, you know, what landscape are we in? Pretty hard to know whether the NIH is integral to why the big studies don't exist, maybe, but I think the point is you. Somehow at the root of all of this is some weird license with no limit to a double standard. Right? So if some, if the powers that be decide, they don't like something like ivermectin, they can establish any standard up to a ridiculous degree that nothing can overcome, right.
When it comes to the thing that they favor, there's almost no standard at all. Right. There's no level of danger that could be sufficient to call it into question. And so we don't know what that looks like on the inside, but what you can see is the hallmark of it. Is a double standard that is glaring. If you know how to analyze what's being said.
So I, you know, I, I tend to rule these things out on, on first principles. If I had several weeks to spare, I could stop what I'm doing in terms of my everyday work and review that literature and so on and come up with those revivals but really for me anyway, it falls at the first hurdle in that I don't believe that there is an international conspiracy among an entire scientific discipline, any more than I believe that there is a huge conspiracy among all climate scientists.
if you're going to make such a strong claim and outlandish claim, then you need equally strong evidence to back it up, not just hand-waving and, supposition
yeah. And in case it sounds like we are unfairly, inserting that they are positing a conspiracy about Why this treatment is not being, considered. Let me just play two short clips discussing the reasons for
The relevant large-scale clinical study is on ivermectin and thus it not being approved by the FDA for use in COVID, uh, that opens the door for EUAs is for emergency use authorization for the vaccines. Um, that we are now all living with an a month. This is stunning. If that is the explanation, then we are talking about something for which I'm not even sure we have a proper term because anger, inducing. Uh, it is that, but let's just say, um, This would have elements of malpractice.
This would be gross negligence.
I think it verges on deprived in difference, given that we're talking about a life or death situation for vulnerable people who get this disease, in addition to effectively the crippling of the world economy and who knows how much harm, we'll never be able to measure all the harm that came from this pandemic and the way it has forced us to alter our behavior, all the businesses that have closed, all the people who've been rendered homeless who's to say what all of the costs actually are.
And if there is a, if this is effective and you we can't say for these two can say, look, evidence works a this certainly seems like a whole lot of evidence that points in a
do I mean, Chris, I my disdain knows no bounds but I have to hand it to them. And in some ways, because they've found a way to conspiracy hypothesizing in a tone of voice that makes them sound not like Alex Jones. they've found a way to do it. That makes them sound. As if they are respectable scientists, applying their generalist knowledge, applying the evolutionary lens and applying scientific, critical thinking, but that is such a thin veneer to what they're actually doing.
And, that is nothing more than Alex Jones level conspiracies about any popular topic that seems like it would gain them some attention.
Yeah. And so, this runs so counter to the claims of, we're not saying anything's being settled. We're just talking about various possibilities no, listen to the way that they frame it. The other people in their stories are villains and they are then the caveat, you we're not strongly suggests that. And if you listened to scientists who, you know, have got so many things right. In the recent period of time, there's really only one conclusion that you're reaching
probability saying
evidence exists
just in excessive, a 95% probability.
Yeah. And again, like, listen, this is them framing. It is hyperbolic. So here's another clip about the, conspiracy to keep these results know
our viewers ought to be considering this question in light of conspicuous. Patterns like that. And in light of the fact that the drug in question has a very long extreme safety record, why wouldn't you test it? Right? Why wouldn't you do that large scale study? Why wouldn't you deploy it somewhere to see whether it had the effect and then discover whether or not this was, uh, you know, eminent?
I don't think we've said this time, but this appears to be, uh, effective in controlling COVID from people who've already contracted it and preventing contraction, right on prophylaxis, treatment and prophylaxis. If you imagine the thing blocks the spike protein, that's integral to how it gets between people. It's also integral to how it gets between cells, right? So this is highly effective in both cases, it would appear. So what on earth is the excuse for not testing this.
well, first of all, my, they have tests that like, there's research and there's ongoing clinical trials. There's also that, it's just a constant insertion. Oh for qualifier so here's one point where they respond to the point that some critics have raised about the problems with the studies, So just isn't this
Like the actual fact and the critique, like the, the actual critique is something like the studies that suggest that ivermectin is effective are not the gold standard, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And the point is, well, that's not an argument at all. Yes. It is an argument that you might want a, you know, a study that didn't have the defects of the ones that exist, but that's hardly the same thing as there's no evidence for it.
I just like, you know, the way that the studies are low quality is really framed as like, blah, blah, blah. They're just, they're saying there's no evidence. Like if you take that criteria, almost every, medical treatment has evidence for it, including. Things like homeopathy. if you don't care about the quality of the studies or who are promoting the studies, then you can find evidence for every single medicine.
And, it just reeks of the same kind of reasoning that we heard with, on the group podcast, right? It's this, the same kind of thing that it's all about. The mainstream doctors hiding the really effective treatments. They don't care about people like this pandemic, the unprecedented effective vaccines, which are now countries where they're being deployed. That's all that's all
the the in
hiding. What's the
sound like Hmm. Hmm. working it's, it's
in the
and they sound,
know
good Right They science-y people. And I think it's very upsetting to, to yourself and to me, because that's just a very thin veneer because implicit under every little thing they say is that they're all lying too. It's all a big scam.
why are they trying to suppress this alternative, point of view, they're clever and that they don't go quite as far as Alex Sharon's they use the qualifies and they use the appropriate language, but I'm sure their audience are in no doubt about what they're saying, but go ahead.
Yeah. And let me let you know you're right. That they do qualify things, but I think they're not as good as we might be giving them credit for like this guy's in the point that they're wanting to make. So listen to this.
The fact is I room act isn't new. We could have been investigating this all along. If there needed to be a campaign to ratchet up its production, it could be underway. And if it turns out that it's disappointing, I mean, frankly, if it was half as good as it appears to be, it would be tremendous. So, you know, if it's as good as it appears to be, then how much did we lose dragging our heels and on whose behalf and how many people participated in shutting down this discussion and why? Right.
That just it's That's
that's a thin
hopefully somebody is still young, but it seems like a good contender.
So
I kind of clastic contrarianism right. The video very there tilting at windmills in that it's very important for scientific hipsterism and their, that there is this, rampant orthodoxy, which has this tunnel vision and refuses to see other options,
I
mean, what reasonable the person wouldn't yeah. What reasonable person wouldn't if they were actually. If they actually cared about the things they say they care about. If they're actually interested in the health of humanity and the societies that we live in.
but I'm, I'm looking here at something you shared, uh, quite, which goes along the lines of, um, as far as who is concerned, all hypothesis remained on the table. this report is a very important beginning, but it is not the end. We have not yet found the source of the virus and we must continue to follow the science and leave no stone unturned as we do.
That's about the lab lake and not about this, but I think it, goes to the same point, which is they want to promote a worldview in which there is this tunnel vision, orthodoxy with probably very nefarious, hidden, goals or objectives and presenting themselves as the only ones who have the courage to even consider that there might be alternative explanations or alternative avenues.
It's a dangerous world when corporate marketing determines public health policy, global vaccine roll out to everyone is the policy. So
is there a polite way of saying what the fuck is going on, right? Yeah. Like we're talking about a situation in which life and limb. Is on the line at a scale, that's almost impossible to comprehend. We're talking about millions of deaths worldwide. This is an immense number of people who stand to benefit, not to mention all of the suffering that comes to people who have lost a family member, right?
That is an immense immense amount of harm before you ever get to the massive disruption of planet earth. Right? And it appears that there's something just on the shelf cheap to make safe, to distribute long longitudinal safety data that comes from the fact that millions of people take this thing. In fact, I believe 4 billion doses of this thing have been administered already on planet earth.
And that simply isn't the case. As you said there's been a heap of studies done on ivermectin. There's been a heap of people calling for, further investigation on the source of virus. Of course, people want to know where the virus is coming from. Nobody has confirmed is off natural origin. so it's, it's really quite frustrating that they vape. They craft a fake demon in the form of the scientific orthodoxy and the who, the CDC and so on, to, set themselves against this thing that doesn't exist.
yeah. and I like, I will say you can always find like people will point to stuff in the media coverage that covered the lob leak as a conspiracy theory. But I want the keep hammering this point. It's a conspiracy theory for lots of the people that advocate for it. I listened to Alex Jones weekend and we go talk about it.
And yes, there are scientists who are more careful about what they say, but it's in this context that people are talking about largely and the relationship of conspiracy theories, because there are tons of conspiracies around it. And the people who are relatively detached scientific properly. And even if they assign the PRI higher, Or much higher than all the people in the field, yes.
They will be seen as fringe people because when you assign a high probability to something, which everyone else in your field, or the majority consider a low probability that does get you, negative attention. But if you're right, you'll be vindicated in the end, but no one is. Saying we should just shut it all down. let's stop looking at these things. It's like The the origins of the virus are unimportant.
Like, no, they're not saying that they keep open the possibility and say we can't rule it out, but here's the reasons that we don't think it's true. And if the evidence changes, the opinion will change, and this is the thing with the IVR Mac thing, pretty much all public health bodies. Have I've converged on this finding, which is there's not strong evidence for its effect.
The studies are too low called the higher quality studies are needed, but we have alternative vaccines at the minute, which don't make this a priority.
That's not a big conspiracy like, that's exactly what you would expect if the evidence is what all of agencies, all of, you know, the Cochrane reviews and whatever, if they're actually just assessing the evidence and finding it's low quality, just like hydroxy, chloroquine was not a conspiracy so Brett inhaler freedom that as opposition to that was like completely because Trump, took that up. Right.
And it's not to say there's no knee-jerk responses, but it's more like that becomes this convenient deflection that they have where they're saying, okay, Anybody who, who addresses this is immediately painted being sympathetic to Trump. And that's what it is. It's Trump derangement syndrome, which is preventing the consideration of this. And it's, it's a really convenient rhetorical technique,
Um, with regard to ivermectin quote, it's like the new hydroxy chloroquine said Angela Ross mucin of virologists at Georgetown university center for global health science and security, referring to the malaria drug published, pushed by president Donald Trump that proved ineffective against COVID-19 quote. It would be great if I ever met and did work, it's been around for years and it's cheap. But to my knowledge, there is no data that suggests it's good for COVID-19.
And of course, that's just thinly veiled code for this thing. Smells like Trump. And if it smells like Trump, it must be bad. So good people, not just can, but indeed should, must safely ignore this thing. It's probably better if you mock and deride anyone who takes this seriously as well, right?
it's framing it as that reasoning that she gave saying, there's not good quality evidence support. It would be good if it was, but it's not there.
That's then reframed by ah, this is just to try and black get a black guy because his association with Trump and it's like, no, if Trump was right, if he was right, it would come through the evidence and the scientists who are devoting of arcane, like careers to trying to treat these kinds of viruses, they wouldn't care that Trump said it was good because, the evidence would support it. The fact that the evidence doesn't support it. That's the crucial thing.
The fact that Trump is pushing it is just an indication that, you know, is, the it is
ironically,
it
through
but by
and
Heller want to claim are, innocent uh like politicized people
war lens,
or don't let it determine everything, right? Like the. The scientists the public health bodies, it's all by giving Trump eye that's the last clip I'll play for this is that it sometimes seems that like Brett is willing to go farther than Heller. And she's the more reasonable one holding him back, raising objections and stuff, but, but just just one clip the highlight toy in a very real way. She's completely on board and, adding on
we still don't have the giant clinical trials with regard to efficacy against COVID, but maybe especially given the problem in school. And especially given the variants may be now figuring out how to leap into kids because more and more the adult population is vaccinated and there's less reservoir on the adult population, maybe ivermectin, um, to, you know, 18 year olds and under would be a legitimate way to start rolling this out.
And, you know, maybe if you really have to play your damn games, you can do it in such a way that, you know, the, the vaccines are only for over 18 year olds and the kids are for the ivermectin is for younger people, but you know, really why, why do you need to play those games with all of our lives like that? That's that's the big question. Yeah, that is the big
questions
mark. Why are these just playing games, keeping away
instead
vaccines, have terrible
just asking questions, Chris, just asking head And
effective treatments
is far reaching deep, conspiracy, but they don't go full Alex Jones.
And they're, they're the lone bastions of science, like the real science, still and to, critically evaluate the evidence where all of the relevant fields are completely corrupted by all their incentives and politics. So these two nor virologists known epidemiologists, uh, have. against political Not yet, not even, for researchers, although they would contest that. But you know, you have to use to produce research.
I'd picked to be categorized as researcher, yeah, like there's a, there's another episode the week before Brett brought up this, analogy, which he likes, where he likens taking the vaccine to playing Russian roulette.
no, I
would say I want to correct. Two things. One, I am saying this is unsafe. I am not saying it is harmful enough to matter. But previously we've been very careful. And we have said that something that does no harm is not necessarily safe playing Russian roulette and clicking the trigger and having no bullet come out does not harm you, but it is not safe. So your
distinction, I think, um, is, or safety is, um, in the same space as risk and harm is the actual harm. Right? And so like, I do think this needs real clear language. Every time you say it, because it's not, these words are not used cleanly by anyone. And so you're saying. I understand that there has to be risk, and I'm not saying that that therefore means there is harm, but prefer the word
risk here to save, to upgrade that because I've been super careful about that. And I've said I've used this example deliberately the fact that you have put a gun to your head and pull the trigger is not inherently harmful, but it is inherently unsafe. Okay. So that distinction is the important one. Now I think with greater clarity about the mechanism of action, when things go right, we know that there is harm being done to tissues in the course of action of this vaccine.
And He says that, if you play Russian roulette and you don't get the con, doesn't go off, you can say that you weren't timed, but you can't say that the game isn't dangerous. And this is how he freedoms, ticking the vaccine, right. That like maybe people won't be harmed.
Maybe there won't be long-term effects, but we're essentially playing with a loaded gun not considering the potential with the blower I can bring inside such an most evocative, but demonizing analogy and it's completely wrong because course, health, uh, vaccine, CRE Asian scientists and virologists, and all of them care.
If we were creating a vaccine that was going to kill or bodily harm people dying the line, these are like, you know, major concerns, including for the people who will pass it as verified, you know, see if the acceptable. So the notion that like, people don't really care about this and it's the people that are left to really think through these issues are Brett and Heller.
It's just so irresponsible because it demonizes the very people who are making vaccines, who are doing safety tests, who are working on these very things.
I
mean, what reasonable the person wouldn't yeah. What reasonable person wouldn't if they were actually. If they actually cared about the things they say they care about. If they're actually interested in the health of humanity and the societies that we live in.
And. Just these podcasters them, the Bretton Heller, or just, you know, a small fish in a big pond weekend week, God demonizing the scientists hinting out nefarious motives public health bodies.
across
end with
as less extreme version
And
Yeah, exactly.
behind like
came I've thought of them really a far more innocuous of Eric And really didn't think there was anything too bad about them. But as time has gone on, they have staked their claim really heavily in that conspiratorial anti-vax worldview, I mean, I'm sure they've convinced themselves of the correct and their moral righteousness, but I feel that underlying it is, simply a pursuit of attention and clicks and more views and developing an audience very similar to our other jurors.
And I think that they're actually well-placed to do that, because they do have PhDs. In, this relatively unconnected field of evolutionary biology, but they do a pretty good job of convincing people that it is applicable to our whole range of socially contentious issues, everything apparently. And even though they really have no research track record.
And frankly, if I just look at their output from the point of view of somebody assessing, a job application a promotion to view, I would judge them as having no research track record. And in fact, a very disappointing career when it comes to research post PhD, or even during their PhDs, they've successfully managed to present themselves as Intrepid, researchers, people who are eminently qualified to, evaluate and make judgements. On entire disciplines.
So th the fact that they are making any headway whatsoever is immensely dispiriting to me. I see them as, as an enhanced version of Alex Jones, like someone like Alex Jones will always have very limited appeal. He will only appeal to a certain segment of society. And the rest of us will laugh and not take someone like that. Seriously, they yell too much and they say crazy stuff.
These guys have enough education to put really the same kinds of messaging together in a way that's far more plausible. And yeah, so it, uh, it just makes me sad.
I'm with I'm with beautiful disclaimers. Like I, they are crafted so expertly that, when you point out hype stream, the positions are it's easy for their fans to come back and say, look, they said, they're not certain. They said to not want them to convince anyone. About what they're doing, their decisions, they're leaving everything up to the audience. They're not pushing a specific narrative, but obviously they are. I mean, from the clips here. It should be completely obvious about that.
But the last thing I'll mention about this is on the stream, Brett, the sides to demonstrate the courage of his convictions that he's going to tick the ivermectin on the podcast stream.
uh
this is how he sets that up.
if you haven't, uh, when confronted with COVID, if you think you've been exposed and the patient, the treatment of patients. And so anyway, the guidelines are fairly simple. Um, and so anyway, I feel like I should be on it because as much as no drug is perfectly safe, I feel the danger of COVID in the world is much greater than the danger that comes from taking this stuff, which, uh, among other things. Very cheap, but it's also, it doesn't have to be taken frequently.
You take it two doses, 48 hours apart, and then I think it's weekly. So anyway, uh, I think cost benefit for me, it makes sense to sounds similar to a prophylactic dosage regime for most of them are anti-malarial drugs. Yeah, exactly. So, um, you know, for those, you wouldn't want to be on forever, but you know, we used to spend a long, long, long, you know, many months at a time, uh, in places where malaria was endemic and were on malaria prophylaxis and yeah.
Yeah, so you can hear the, capsules being opened there, and he's gonna like asked Carola and she's gonna, hesitant and say, well, look, I don't want to do this on the stream. You know, I want, I probably will, but I need time to consider,
okay, so you just, you just did that. You just took your first prophylactic dose of, of ivermectin and you offered it to me as well.
And I said, you know, I, I, I think I will and I'll report out next week if, if I did, but, um, upon being confronted with it in real time with an audience, um, you know, I feel about it about like, I would, if, uh, if you had asked me to marry you in a very public place, no matter how I felt, it's like, that's not, I'm going to go someplace private and think on this and make my decision
but just imagine that in another account tax, right? Imagine like this weekend virology where they start like taking their pills on the podcast, it feels obviously performative, obviously not inline with the lurk. Everybody can do, make their own mind up about this. And there are different opinions available. It's it's more like a girl. In the classical sense, demonstrating to the followers. This is what responsible scientists do.
We work out the probabilities like this, then we have the courage of our convictions to take the pill. And so this isn't about us being, not the vaccine. This is about us selecting the right kind of treatment. And like I think people assume that anti-vaccine people come out and say, I'm a huge guy against vaccines. I think all vaccines.
So, going to transform you in the mutant and anyway, who knows if chicken pox is real and all this, and that's not what they say, all anti-vaccine advocates say, I'm just concerned about the safety. I'm not anti vaccine. I I'm pro CFT and there's concerns with the safety profile of these specific vaccines and so on. So that's the norm, But like act like it disqualifies them from the category of anti-vaccine hypothetically they are, pro ULAR
yeah. that's not
not
I, appreciate this stuff about
vaccines
in such a way that seems on the surface to be reasonable. I guess who don't think about this stuff that for whom, And thinking about vaccines or thinking about scientists, not a day-to-day thing for them, could be quite easy to be. lulled into a false insecurity by their presentation.
it's very compelling. It's signs convincing. It's signed scientific, and it's signs like the kind of deep dive that you want the here. And I'm not for one minute saying that their audience by not picking up on this are somehow deficient because I don't think it's easy to pick that up. And I'm not even talking about that, Oh, what a big science. Brie and I have, and, you know, hi, fantastic that you and I can see for them.
No, like part of this is I've spent so long around, down the vaccine kind of rhetoric and conspiracy theory side flashes up. But the other thing is that a lot of academics will be familiar with doing critical reviews about the effect or the effect size of something and high misleading. A lot of the, various games can be, especially around, the whole replication crisis. This was exactly it, the word small local, these studies, which had, plausible signing affects, but they couldn't be replicated.
And it's very familiar, but I think it would be unfair to present it as if anybody falling for this is just a Rube who has no interest in science and doesn't have any critical faculties. It's exactly what you said. it's presented in a really convincing way. And that's why the Weinsteins in a way are so interesting to me because I know they don't have the reach of all the conspiracy theorists, but they've done this, I think better than most of them. Where they can maintain that air of legitimacy.
and yes, there's lots of like more extreme conspiracy fairs who do the same thing, but I think their scientific background lets them do it in a way that doesn't work so well for alors It's
where
leverage the the
certainly
the terminology and stuff But
the background
winners So
now you I don't know, it seems what 30, 40% of the population is unwilling to take a vaccine. so there is vaccine hesitancy out there that Has been a whole bunch of stuff that's been politicized about this and these guys, I guess. capitalizing on this, this weird culture war around things that there shouldn't be a culture war on that it really should be a simple matter of public health and virology and epidemiology and scientific consensus.
Yeah, it's quite frightening to me, the way that, I guess the public discourse has projected their own political hangups, their political concerns on to entire disciplines, which are filled with people like you and me that actually spend their lives in a very nerdy, dorky way, trying to get to the bottom of it. It's very, niche things like spike proteins, or like melting of ice caps or whatever, which when they embarked on that, They had no idea that it had some great political ramifications.
They were just into that, right. That was their job. And now it has, been the subject of this rampant political projection. And so, yeah. Look I'm with you, Chris, that, the fact that the people are taking advantage of this, and projecting their, political culture wars on to purely scientific questions is really concerning.
And I don't have a good solution to it because, I don't think any of us should be expected to, get into the literature and study the matter analyses and understand the intricacies of, of how, the, ivermectin or other substances work really. We need to. Have confidence in our scientific communities. And there's no reason not to, except for the fact that political actors, have, a real incentive to incite it.
But that's yeah, that will be free as like naivety, right? Because the argument will be that scientists have revealed that they are just as politicized as anyone else. And I will, one point I would make that is like the, like take this week in virology, right? This is an alternative podcast I listened to, which is a hosted by virologists. And as you say, it didn't come out of the pandemic. It existed prior to the pandemic, just for all just sitting around and talking about viruses.
And then it became very big because of the pandemic. But these people are people with decades of research in viruses and some of them, relevant expertise in coronaviruses specifically. Now, when I hear them talk about these issues, first of all, they're human, right? So they sometimes overstate things or they're snippy, or they're like, They might, like even some political naivety about the Chinese government or something like that. Right. That's true. They're human.
So they, they don't always choose the word so perfectly But on the other hand, when you hear them talk about virology and the science of the, specific papers what you don't get is any sense that these are people who are just playing there, people with like such a depth of knowledge, and that are communicating with all our experts, that they, they talk about an issue and they pick up immediately why this is important and they relate it to research that they've done for 20 years and why this is
unlikely and so on, and almost universally on that podcast. They are very skeptical of a lab origin outbred and they'd give tons of reasons of identity. It's a mutation and, how long even serial passage stuff were taken with. So on. And I know that there are alternative. There is some researchers who disagree with them, but the vast majority do. And it's Lizzy and, and frankly, just completely wrong to view it that these people hold those opinions because of their political biases.
No, they hold it because of their expertise. and and if they're wrong, they're wrong because of the evidence that will emerge that will prove that, but it isn't about a conspiracy to cover their ass. And it isn't about denying effective treatments to shore up, vaccines because they, they, don't care about long-term homes. That's a Yeah Yeah cartoon of And
that
this specific episode at Heller people to them they are some of the criticizing
And therefore we have to wonder about gain of function research. We should also then be wondering about the people who pushed it, you know, Fowchee, Peter Dasic right. All of the things that got that in motion, we should now be questioning all of the newspapers that signed up for the standard
line. Right. It's clear that this weekend fire ecology podcast this week in virology, they were very instrumental in making sure that no one. Who took loudly seriously was taken
seriously early on. Right. And you know, if we've got entire fields of biology, the fields that we most need, which are apparently compromised by some political willingness to shut down discussions, they find inconvenient or threatening to their future prospects or whatever. So we have to look at this
I it's just a
is
recommends that have been and denying
denying the possibility of a lab lake, because they are concerned that if the truth were to come to light and that, a leak from that Chinese laboratory and will hand was confirmed, then that would damage the reputation of their field and imperil their future funding. Now, that is just a perfect example of what you described, which is this cartoonish.
Pseudo skeptical conspiratorial view of the world, which is just, it's hard for me to find words, to explain how implausible that is, the idea that there could be such coordination and shared interest among disparate professionals all over the world and that they would put aside, basically all of their training, their, that their entire, I guess, purpose of their career, in, in favor of some nefarious, conspiracy to hypothetically, improve their chances of funding in the future.
because they think that the shade or the power that might, that might hang over their field from a lab leak in a far distant country by a completely different group, might somehow affect them. It's. Yeah, it's I, I just, I can't
well, they definitely, I mean, look, they would get demonized because people would draw a connection warranted or not. But you know, the vast majority of biologists are not doing gain of function research, and they're not, I don't know the exact split that are focused on Corona viruses, but I imagine there's a lot of viruses out there. So I've grown up. Viruses are going to be a big topic. I died there, taking up the vast majority of everyone in the field.
But I think the point that you emphasize that what they are positing, isn't just that the people are wrong in their assessment. It's that they're lying there. They're lying about the. The likelihood that it's a lab outbred, they're lying about the effect is the effectiveness of specific medicines. That's the bit, which is a conspiracy and it's also a, a brutal characterization of the sign traffic community.
And that is not the same thing as saying, scientists don't have egos scientists don't have conflicting interests from, pharmaceutical companies that they're involved with, or like, no, these things are all, there are issues, websites that have well-documented publication biases, real. There can be conservative tendencies in the field to not address specific, theories, which they must establish. But all of that being true does not meek.
The conspiracies that Brett and Heller and other like them are weaving any less convincing.
And in fact that they don't know about these issues with meta analysis or that they never talk about open science endeavors on the replication crisis, except as a means to address cultural war topics that should be telling, because if you really avoid science reform, if you're really abide, like improving the standards of science, what your output looks like is like Ben Goldacre or Stuart Richie, or someone like that. Right. You don't look like Eric and Bret Weinstein.
That's what you look like when you want to be an online group with a YouTube channel. Like you hear that first clip. It sounds reasonable. They're adding all these disclaimers and they've got like everything mapped out. As you go on the words that this gamers, what are they worth? It's a global conspiracy of the worst crime of the century, right? Like the, the difference is obvious.
And I think we feel sometimes that, okay, we ranted about that and we didn't extend the fullest amount to charity that we could, but that's because they've demonstrated in the wrong content, why they can't be taken at face value when they issue those disclaimers. And if those disclaimers were sincere, they wouldn't go on to say what they say. And I, you know, the other context is that there's a global pandemic where millions of that, right?
Like all over the world and their contribution to the public discourse is to demonize vaccines, argue that scientists are not to be trusted and are lying about effective treatments. It's okay to be pissed.
well said, a good
That, so that's the intro to that.
That's that's that's that's uh, as an amazing intro, I feel like this was more therapy than intro, but you know,
Well, well, doesn't it feel like we probably should split this off into its own standalone, uh, pre Jordan and bready
yeah It's Like in the interim It does feel That, way. Like in like an interim rent, not so much full episode, but a bit of rent to the weekend. Put in. I feel it had to be said, we'd said, we said important things that need to be said that the powers that be don't want said that we had the courage to say, I think it was good.
What we're not saying is that we are completely right. We could be wrong. We're just raising possibilities. And we just, the scientific method requires that you apply a critical mind to the output that people have.
well, I'll just say that I'm 95% confident that, Heather and Brett are rampant conspiracy theorists. I'm not saying they are. I'm just saying that there's a 95% probability. If I follow my decision tree, that that's where I end up. That's all I'm saying
Yeah, could fault you like anybody that says you're expressing certain people at that point, what food is map, they don't likely hood. They barely understand Basie and analysis. I so these are, these are things to consider. So I guess we should probably do a sign off that we can package this into a,
special edition edition a missive.
yeah. So consider this at this term for the actual target for this week, which is Brett and Jordan. And I promise you that there's very little talk of Corona viruses. But there's plenty of talk about revolutionary theories, conspiracy theories, and various scorching hotcakes, about a wide range of topics. And, you know, Jordan Peterson being there, I think actually adds a nice dynamic to it because there is a contrast between the two of them. and it's a, it's an interesting one.
So, we also do get, actually there's a link to this episode because we get Brett explaining how he tests his theories in the flaming hot fiery oven of from his family, Eric and Heller. And in that respect, he knows if he's going to be going out in the lemon saying stuff, because they give them the push back his needs. So we've just seen some of that valuable pushback in action.
Yeah. no, it's a good episode. There'll be talk of lineage selection. the evolutionary psychology basis of rape and genocide. and John Pearson seems baffled through least 50% of this.
everybody is, think Bob is a constant because like Jordan Pearson is baffled, but his predicament, but I actually have a specific folder, which is just Brett and Jordan saying we don't know anything about X and there's a lot of Xs it's, we don't know anything. We don't know anything about evolution. What, whatever the topic may be. I think it's the internet and various other things that we don't know anything about it, but, Yeah, it'll be, it'll be fun.
The Covey are maybe less heavy than the coronavirus stuff things heavy, know, when coronavirus skepticism comes
It does. It does. Well, look, we don't know how to sign this off because, well, first of all, we don't know how to sign off even at the best of times, but in this case doubly. So, because it's not really appropriate beside it's just us talking about stuff. That's annoying us. Uh,
kinda, what, what do you call it? Like a staff episode? It just came, it just flew it. You know, the, it was even with the clip pretty prepared. It just emerged from the naturally and organic
it was a self-organizing emergent episode and I think think that's okay sometimes.
this is the universe. Attempting to inoculate itself against this information,
Yeah Where, where does the advertise of the instruments of the universe, Chris? I like it.
universal scientific mind. That's what I, I often refer to myself as, so, so yes, I will see you again soon, maybe with, a little less negative energy to bring. but yeah, so, you know, we're not going to do the reviews and stuff because we'll leave that to the next episode, but that will be the fabled Jordan Umbra episode. And really only one thing I can say to Matt and that's grumble at the feet of your muscle muster.
will most certainly do so. Thank you, Chris. Bye.
Bye.
Really it just pisses me off. I like, like, I don't get upset about Alex Jones. I really don't. I've heard this do as much as him as you have, but I've listened to some pretty extreme shit. and cause he's he, to me, he comes across as a madman.
You know, he comes across as a ranting lunatic and I can accommodate that in my, in my scheme of the universe and yeah, these, these people that, that add that veneer of the thing that I really love, you know, the thing that I love, scientific, objectivity and dispassionate analysis. And, of logic and so on. I really loved that. And they, they use it as a fucking tool to just smuggle in the Alex Jones shit. And it makes, it makes me upset.
I, you know, maybe I'm not as just demonstrative about it as you, but I, but I, it does upset me. Yeah.
Maybe I'll include that little
all means, by all means.
after the music
I'm an open book, Chris. Sorry. I stand by it.
I've got it
good. That's good.