It's definitely good to be skeptical, and yes it is a risk-balancing exercise. But it just comes back to the point that a person's decision to take or not take the vaccine affects others, not just themselves. If it was the case that young people couldn't pass the virus on to old people, then "young people do not need the vaccine" would be a valid argument. But it isn't, so it's not.


You make the comparison of the pro-vaxx side of the side argument to a religion, as if we're the side that relies on a faith-based argument. And yet we're the ones presenting the data.
You also often say that the pro-vaxx side believes whatever the government tells them. I don't believe anything my government says; they're a bunch of self-serving sociopaths.

Yes, very difficult to tell. Hamilton should still have some advantage from his newer engine, but he's been behind Bottas in both practice sessions... this might suggest that he's holding something back.

Regarding the FIA throwing out the Mercedes appeal from the last race... does this mean that overtaking from the outside is now effectively impossible? If the driver on the inside line is able to force the one on the outside line off the track, with no requirement to make the corner, then it seems that's the way it will go now. Not sure if F1 haven't set a bit of a strange precedent here.

Verstappen was much quicker than Hamilton in first practice just now, nearly a second clear. Not sure how representative the times will be, given that it's only first practice, and also that the race will be at night whereas this was during the middle of the day. But first impressions are that this might be a Red Bull type track, as we would have expected from the layout. We'll see more as we go into second practice.

Also the Mercedes appeal against Verstappen in the last race has now been rejected. Again, I think we all saw that verdict coming a mile off. It's not often that F1 overturn their own decisions.

Okay. This is turning into a new Flat Earth thread. Presumably we'd have been on opposing sides in that debate, too.

I think that out of the remaining tracks, this is the one where Red Bull should be strongest. The task for Mercedes will be staying close enough to Red Bull around all the corners, so that they can emerge close enough at the start of the long straight to pull off an overtake. Will be interesting to see how much (if anything) Hamilton's new engine advantage has degraded after Brazil.

At those odds, I'd be tempted to bet on Verstappen for the race win, as I think it's too close to call. If the start line had been at the very beginning of the straight rather than halfway down it, I'd be tempted to bet on Hamilton getting the lead on the first lap. As it is, I'm not sure the run-in to turn one is long enough for Mercedes to use their raw pace.

Fastest lap I never bet on, it has nothing to do with the driver and everything to do with the relative positions of everyone towards the end of the race. If it's Hamilton and Verstappen vying for the lead, then you'd expect Perez and Bottas to be trying to take the fastest lap away from the lead driver of the other team (assuming they don't lose position in the race to do so).

Weird. Looks like they've now quietly raised it back up to 120,000 when no-one was looking.  

I may as well post the second chart, too, in anticipation of the familiar "they didn't die of Covid, it was something else" argument.


https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/italy

https://ourworldindata.org/excess-mortality-covid

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All anti-vaxxer arguments are faith-based, at least you're being open about it. I don't think the 'mark of the beast' argument is any different to a 5G/Bill Gates/population reduction/the-elites-trying-to-take-control-despite-the-fact-that-they-already-have-control arguments.

The example is not about hiring a black female candidate on the sole basis of gender and ethnicity, it's about hiring the black female candidate because she is better at the job.
If there are obstacles and biases that prevent the best person from getting the job, "on the sole basis of their gender, skin color, origin, or whatever other "politically correct" reason", then this needs to be addressed.

This is certainly true. And as an additional difficulty, Djokovic is fitter and more skilful than anyone else out there. I do think the only player who can really beat Djokovic is Djokovic himself, which is what I think we saw in the US Open final. Medvedev is the closest challenger, and will sometimes have a chance... but no-one else really has any chance at all, if Djokovic turns up fully motivated and in the right frame of mind.

I know a few people who've been vaccinated but have contracted the virus. Their symptoms have been mild, but nevertheless they could easily transmit it. If we were at a stage where everyone was either vaccinated or had natural immunity, then we'd see case numbers dropping rapidly. We're not yet at that stage.



Anti-vaxxers regularly try to frame vaccination as an individual freedom issue. They either can't grasp that viruses pass from person to person (in which case they're all idiots, which I don't think is true), or else they do understand it but just don't care (in which case empathy is certainly a factor).



I'm not sure if this is paranoia or hysteria. Perhaps a little of both? It's difficult trying to debate with someone who holds such creative beliefs.

He has nothing to lose by making that guarantee. If they don't qualify, he'll lose his job anyway, regardless of whether or not he'd made the guarantee. I do think though that if you are going to say something like that, it could be counter-productive... but at least he's said it before the draw is made. If they got a tough-ish opponent like Czech Republic, and he made that statement, it would really galvanise the opposition to want to prove him wrong. Saying it before the draw is made makes it less personal... unless he's suggesting that Portugal can beat all these other teams easily, including Italy. 

I think the latest data suggest that children are around half as likely as adults to transmit the virus. However there are certainly clusters of outbreaks in schools, which is not surprising given this is an environment where children are in close proximity to one another all day every day. A decent-sized school with say 1,000 pupils can easily act as a transmission hotspot, even if each individual child is less likely to be contagious than an adult. Particularly when you add in the consideration that of course children - especially younger children - will be less adept at social distancing, etc.



The vaccines are not suitable for everyone. There are vulnerable people who can't take it, people coming from other countries, etc. And you can still catch it if you've been vaccinated, it's just that the chance is reduced, and the symptoms will be less severe. Vaccination is the best solution we have, but can never be 100% perfect.



I don't understand this argument. There is likely a misunderstanding within society due to varying levels of empathy. I've been vaccinated, I wear a mask in public, but I am not worried about myself if I contract the virus. What I don't want to do is to catch it and pass it to someone more vulnerable. Masks are predominantly to protect others from the mask-wearer, not vice versa. Vaccination obviously protects the individual, but this is secondary, the main purpose is to increase immunity within society in order to prevent exponential spread and thus protect everyone. More and more I think this is a question of empathy.

I think the point is transmission. Most young people suffer mild or no effects. But they can still pass the virus on to more vulnerable people. So it's better that this risk of transmission is reduced.

It's the same reason that we want the vaccine-hesistant people to be vaccinated. And this is why it's not a freedom issue... because your action in not taking the vaccine can kill others.

Thanks, you saved me from having to explain this exact point yet again!



You'd think that, but here we are.



I infer from this that you are making a distinction between the Covid ('pseudo') vaccines and other (genuine? effective?) vaccines. But I thought you were against all vaccines? I remember having a long discussion with you a while back where you were arguing against the Polio vaccine. I think the 'pseudo' is redundant here.

If 'some' is a minority, then maybe. But what if 'some' is all? If we are talking about an inequality of opportunity that is embedded within society, then 'some' is likely to be either all or very nearly all.
If the most talented football player in the country is black, but every football team only hires white players, then no team is at a disadvantage.


You want someone who can do the job at a minimum of '100%' ability level. The best white male candidate can do 105%. The black female candidate can do the job at 108%. The HR manager has hired the white male at 105%, he's hired someone who is more than qualified to do the job well... he can't really be fired for that.

It does seem like there should be a preliminary stage, where the smaller teams play each other first. Even in a shortened calendar there should be time for this, the preliminary stage could take place at the same time as a major tournament, where the small teams aren't participating in any case.

I don't know how the San Marino players remain motivated. Imagine that you're the best player in San Marino. You break into the international team at age twenty... and then you know that you face a career of maybe 100 international games, where your team loses just about every single one, maybe very occasionally scraping a nil-nil draw. How do you deal with that?

Your statement contradicts the evidence. A huge meta-analysis has demonstrated quite conclusively that "The truth is that there are no universal, species-wide brain features that differ between the sexes".

Any differences in behaviour, inferred capability, etc. between men and women are based entirely on societal factors. The biological difference is effectively zero.

I've also heard of this new thing called 'bitcoin'. Sounds promising, might be worth a look. 

One way to not generate funds for retirement is to read breathless news articles about someone who bought Shiba Inu on day 1 and is now a gazillionaire, and then try to do the same thing by dumping money into some random over-hyped sh*tcoin pump-and-dump scheme. Way more losers than winners on the more speculative alts.

There are a hell of a lot of CCTV cameras, though. They're proliferating like crazy. As you might expect, China leads the way... but for those of us in the UK, it's worth noting that London is very high on the list.


https://www.statista.com/chart/19256/the-most-surveilled-cities-in-the-world/



24/7/52.14ish. Yes, I'm a pedant.

It's clear to me that the vast majority of those who have taken the vaccine (close to 100%) will be rubbed out within the next hundred years. Of course 'official' reason for death will be cancer, heart disease etc... because that's what they want you to think.


Yes, agreed. I didn't bother reading your post past this point - presumably you were just expanding on why it's a good idea to take it.

I'd certainly agree that equality of opportunity is the aim. The issue is that in certain situations, you can't have that without forcing (or encouraging) some outcomes, at least initially, in order to address historic inequality of outcome.

Say you have a company with 100 employees, all white men. You have a job vacancy. The interview panel will be comprised of 5 white men. Two people show up for interview, a white man and a black woman. You can't argue that both have been invited for interview, therefore there is equality. The situation clearly favours the white male candidate, based on ethnicity and gender rather than ability to do the job. Say both candidates are good, perfectly capable, but the black woman would be 3% better at the job... do you really think they wouldn't hire the white male?




In an ideal world, yes. In the real world, no.