I also got the vaccine and have an appointment to get the booster next week. What I found odd is that the most progressive people I know support the mandate. My friends that are ACAB prison abolitionist anti-racists are perfectly fine with a mandate that has data showing it will disproportionately disadvantage non-Asian POC and poor people. They don't even argue that point - they mostly just ignore it.
I may disagree with you sometimes, but this article is, again, why I subscribe.
I'd just point out one thing. The shots aren't "free." That's why there is so much distrust. They are expensive. It's just that insurance, Medicare, etc., pays for them, so no one sees the bill. But we didn't mint nine new billionaires (with a "b") over a "free" vaccine. I love living in America. I don't think there is a better country on the planet, nor one more likely to stomp out this authoritarian bent. But I also understand it. Nothing is ever free in this country. Money drives everything. Once you understand that, you have a really hard time trusting the "advice" and "expert opinion" of those who stand to gain money or power or both, especially when they start mandating things and oppressing questions, much less dissent, in a near rabid way.
Another thoughtful article, Leighton. This is a good articulation of the position the ACLU would have staked out were it still an organization concerned with civil liberties. It is the vax equivalent of "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" - "I disapprove of your vax decision, but I will defend to the death your right to make it."
However, I strenuously object to this statement: "Those are all points you could argue over for days, trading peer-reviewed studies back and forth that neither you nor your interlocutor really understand."
This increasingly common trope, that we cannot truly understand scientific literature outside of our own narrow field of specialization, is itself a slippery slope to authoritarianism. While non-experts are unqualified to actually conduct original research in a specialized field, all intelligent people can and should critically read the relevant literature and assess the evidence and competing narratives related to matters of public concern. Indeed, this is the whole idea behind liberal arts education. Otherwise, we cede democracy almost entirely to soulless bureaucrats like Dr. Fauci. While I can't explain in any detail how viruses interact with the body at the cellular level, I can understand data and statistical analysis, and that's what most of these debates come down to.
According to Bertrand Russell, “The triumphs of science are due to the substitution of observation and inference for authority. Every attempt to revive authority in intellectual matters is a retrograde step.”
Karl Popper warns us against developing “an obscurantist faith in the expert's special skill and in his personal knowledge and authority.”
Carl Sagan tells us “Arguments from authority carry little weight – authorities have made mistakes in the past. They will do so again in the future. Perhaps a better way to say it is that in science there are no authorities; at most, there are experts."
Nassim Nicholas Taleb notes, "Had science operated by majority consensus, we would be still stuck in the Middle Ages."
These luminaries not only caution against accepting the word of the "leading experts" on the basis of authority, but go further to warn of future totalitarian regimes destroying liberal democracy under the weight of authoritarian “scientism.” See, e.g., Russell’s The Impact of Science on Society; Feyerabend’s How to Defend Society Against Science; William Easterly’s The Tyranny of Experts.
Not only can we understand these peer-reviewed studies, but we must. Democracy depends on it.
I agree with everything you’ve written here, but there’s one argument the pro-mandate side often makes that you’ve neglected to address: the notion that a Covid vaccine mandate is, in principle, no different from mandating that children be vaccinated against measles, rubella, and mumps in order to attend public schools. The analogy seems compelling given that in each case the mandate is government-imposed. Put differently, how do you deal with what we might call the “Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. problem”?
Yes, good article. A note on the conversation about “studies” and efficacy the other day—a Missouri federal Judge, I believe, just halted a mandate declaring that vaccines are not effective. His reasoning: empirical evidence of infection and vaccination rates. There is no correlation. Interesting development…
I was already curious about the liberal centre's tendency to authoritarianism as a reaction to extreme fear (Brexit & Trump triggered it in my circles) so I wasn't so surprised when a scary pandemic tightened that screw. Let's face it, the people who want vaccine mandates are the same people who would like to see everyone take a knowledge test before being allowed to vote. Or spend their lives 'fact checking' by recourse only to *their* permitted information sources.
Amusingly I just published a flippant piece which endorsed your previous article on transmissability. I'm vaccinated, soon to be boosted & dead against mandates too.
I also got the vaccine and have an appointment to get the booster next week. What I found odd is that the most progressive people I know support the mandate. My friends that are ACAB prison abolitionist anti-racists are perfectly fine with a mandate that has data showing it will disproportionately disadvantage non-Asian POC and poor people. They don't even argue that point - they mostly just ignore it.
I may disagree with you sometimes, but this article is, again, why I subscribe.
I'd just point out one thing. The shots aren't "free." That's why there is so much distrust. They are expensive. It's just that insurance, Medicare, etc., pays for them, so no one sees the bill. But we didn't mint nine new billionaires (with a "b") over a "free" vaccine. I love living in America. I don't think there is a better country on the planet, nor one more likely to stomp out this authoritarian bent. But I also understand it. Nothing is ever free in this country. Money drives everything. Once you understand that, you have a really hard time trusting the "advice" and "expert opinion" of those who stand to gain money or power or both, especially when they start mandating things and oppressing questions, much less dissent, in a near rabid way.
Another thoughtful article, Leighton. This is a good articulation of the position the ACLU would have staked out were it still an organization concerned with civil liberties. It is the vax equivalent of "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" - "I disapprove of your vax decision, but I will defend to the death your right to make it."
However, I strenuously object to this statement: "Those are all points you could argue over for days, trading peer-reviewed studies back and forth that neither you nor your interlocutor really understand."
This increasingly common trope, that we cannot truly understand scientific literature outside of our own narrow field of specialization, is itself a slippery slope to authoritarianism. While non-experts are unqualified to actually conduct original research in a specialized field, all intelligent people can and should critically read the relevant literature and assess the evidence and competing narratives related to matters of public concern. Indeed, this is the whole idea behind liberal arts education. Otherwise, we cede democracy almost entirely to soulless bureaucrats like Dr. Fauci. While I can't explain in any detail how viruses interact with the body at the cellular level, I can understand data and statistical analysis, and that's what most of these debates come down to.
According to Bertrand Russell, “The triumphs of science are due to the substitution of observation and inference for authority. Every attempt to revive authority in intellectual matters is a retrograde step.”
Karl Popper warns us against developing “an obscurantist faith in the expert's special skill and in his personal knowledge and authority.”
Carl Sagan tells us “Arguments from authority carry little weight – authorities have made mistakes in the past. They will do so again in the future. Perhaps a better way to say it is that in science there are no authorities; at most, there are experts."
Nassim Nicholas Taleb notes, "Had science operated by majority consensus, we would be still stuck in the Middle Ages."
These luminaries not only caution against accepting the word of the "leading experts" on the basis of authority, but go further to warn of future totalitarian regimes destroying liberal democracy under the weight of authoritarian “scientism.” See, e.g., Russell’s The Impact of Science on Society; Feyerabend’s How to Defend Society Against Science; William Easterly’s The Tyranny of Experts.
Not only can we understand these peer-reviewed studies, but we must. Democracy depends on it.
This is a great discussion, but according to Webster's you're still an anti-vaxxer: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anti-vaxxer
So off to the camps with you!
I agree with everything you’ve written here, but there’s one argument the pro-mandate side often makes that you’ve neglected to address: the notion that a Covid vaccine mandate is, in principle, no different from mandating that children be vaccinated against measles, rubella, and mumps in order to attend public schools. The analogy seems compelling given that in each case the mandate is government-imposed. Put differently, how do you deal with what we might call the “Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. problem”?
Yes, good article. A note on the conversation about “studies” and efficacy the other day—a Missouri federal Judge, I believe, just halted a mandate declaring that vaccines are not effective. His reasoning: empirical evidence of infection and vaccination rates. There is no correlation. Interesting development…
I was already curious about the liberal centre's tendency to authoritarianism as a reaction to extreme fear (Brexit & Trump triggered it in my circles) so I wasn't so surprised when a scary pandemic tightened that screw. Let's face it, the people who want vaccine mandates are the same people who would like to see everyone take a knowledge test before being allowed to vote. Or spend their lives 'fact checking' by recourse only to *their* permitted information sources.
Amusingly I just published a flippant piece which endorsed your previous article on transmissability. I'm vaccinated, soon to be boosted & dead against mandates too.