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Reblogged:It Is Not 'Self-Interest' to Take Illness Lightly

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An example of the corrupted thinking about Covid and lockdowns, poor journalism in a respectable newspaper:

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/dec/27/covid-poses-greatest-threat-to-mental-health-since-second-world-war

No, it is not "Covid" which created the mental health threat -- the direct cause were the irrational responses to it!

Edited by whYNOT
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4 hours ago, whYNOT said:

Was there ever an individual right to NOT be infected by, say, influenza?

Influenza is not an individual.

If it was between you and the virus itself, the concept "rights" does not apply. Rights is only applicable in a social context. The only relevant question would be "does someone have a right to infect you with a disease"?  And the answer is always no.

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4 hours ago, whYNOT said:

Was that - liability and culpability - ever brought into law? "You infected that person with influenza so will be held criminally (or accidentally) negligent"? Not that I've heard. No such right or law exists. Just *proving*- beyond doubt - who infected whom is impossible, so cannot be an objective law.

There are multiple cases regarding being infected by someone with HIV. Granted it is very difficult to prove in many cases, but it is not impossible and in some cases one can find a direct link. In those cases the law would apply consequences.

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4 hours ago, whYNOT said:

The flu also, is/was of danger to some people and a regular cause of death. And went almost totally unnoticed by the general public until now.

Can you succinctly say what your position is on the issue. I'm having a hard time following.

Are you saying because it was not known to be the cause of death ... implies that now that we know, we should ignore the flu as a potential danger?

Kind of like: Since we didn't know before, we can still act like we don't know. (You must be meaning something else)

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2 hours ago, Easy Truth said:

Can you succinctly say what your position is on the issue. I'm having a hard time following.

Are you saying because it was not known to be the cause of death ... implies that now that we know, we should ignore the flu as a potential danger?

Kind of like: Since we didn't know before, we can still act like we don't know. (You must be meaning something else)

Did We know? Yes, implicitly the public was aware. Epidemiologists knew for the last century, and did they insist on governments enforcing any "protocols" for flu? The influenza is transmissable and could be fatal to a few.

Did anyone take strict actions to avoid passing on the flu? No. Usually one would take off work, take some meds and take himself off to bed. Was there an obsessive fear regarding transmission of the flu? No. Were children taken out of schools?

The blame was not *personalized* onto individuals as Covid has been by authorities (and self-righteous citizens).

I ask that one considers what the only logical outcome can be to making people personally responsible and personally liable. We can see the economic and psychological effects to lockdowns, actually could have foreseen them. Add to that - mass arrests for those who don't mask and who gather in numbers, didn't properly sanitize, and charge them with culpable homicide, concluding in a police state or nanny state.

Or,

Everyone takes care of himself and those close. One doesn't give up his life to favour the anonymous other 'out there' who *might* be susceptible, or who *might* die - so chooses to take reasonable risks to continue normal functioning. Neither the Gvt or other people can interfere with that choice.

 

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The point that I am insisting on is that it is possible to violate someone's rights by putting them at excessive risk.  We can argue about where and how to draw the line; this may involve technical issues.  We can acknowledge that most people have faulty premises which make their conclusions unsound at best and that this contaminates policy, journalism, and debate.  We can acknowledge that under present circumstances, any crisis, no matter how real or how serious or how clearly understood, tends to result in a wrongful increase in government control.

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It is not possible to violate one's own rights.  Any time anyone violates the principle of individual rights, they are violating the rights of others.  This does not mean we should blow off concern about violating rights as altruism, social metaphysics, collectivism, statism, or other evils.

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2 hours ago, Easy Truth said:

There are multiple cases regarding being infected by someone with HIV. Granted it is very difficult to prove in many cases, but it is not impossible and in some cases one can find a direct link. In those cases the law would apply consequences.

Yeah, proves the point. Hard enough to do with HIV, now work out for and prove to the court 1. that X infected Y with the flu or corona. And 2. did X act in the knowledge of his own infection? And 3. was his a deliberate and malicious act?

A non-objective law is irrational, immoral and unworkable.

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2 hours ago, Doug Morris said:

It is not possible to violate one's own rights.  Any time anyone violates the principle of individual rights, they are violating the rights of others.  This does not mean we should blow off concern about violating rights as altruism, social metaphysics, collectivism, statism, or other evils.

The most egregious offense on the principle of individual rights is to remove anyone's freedom of action. As one sees fit - which can be one's choice to interact with co-workers or family and friends, to continue one's career, livelihood and all other valued and necessary activities he deems good for his life.

It seems you are making a secondary concern, that one *may* be of risk to others health, and therefore  -perhaps- violate their rights, the primary.

But again, if those others are at health risk, they could or should stay out of the active, healthy individual's way, not he, mainly, to stay out of theirs.

 

Edited by whYNOT
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Rights are indivisible.  If we divide rights up into categories such as "primary"and "secondary" and say the "lesser" category can be violated, we are destroying the concept of rights.  You remind me of someone - definitely not an Objectivist - I was arguing with once.  He was defending aggressive demonstrations for the purpose of disrupting job interviews.  He said the right of free speech was more important than the right to interview.

If the requirement is to wear a mask and to wash hands more frequently, and exceptions are allowed, this does not really interfere with the primary.

Everyone is at risk from Covid-19.  Even young, healthy people can die.  Some children get a severe inflammatory condition.  It is gradually becoming apparent that some survivors suffer serious long-term effects.

Typhoid Mary wanted to continue her career.  But she was infecting people with typhoid by doing so, and had to be stopped out of respect for their rights.

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4 hours ago, Doug Morris said:

 

If the requirement is to wear a mask and to wash hands more frequently, and exceptions are allowed, this does not really interfere with the primary.

 

Allowed by whom? The "requirement" as you put it, is a straw man. If it were only that simple, only one's choice, such behavior is easy to follow, good hygiene and simple good manners (I've said).

You must have seen that the governments are strenuously enforcing masking and social distancing. With the threat underlying that if they so decide, we will return to a level of lock down, with large fines and possible arrests, therefore police powers. (Which has been enforced today by the South African Gvt. - drunk on power - because of slight new outbreaks at coastal vacation regions). You people didn't behave, so now the whole country must be punished.

Additionally, the social pressure to conform isn't pleasant, by those who are enshrining helpless victims, as is their favorite narrative, against the 'selfish' oppressors (The Granny killers). Those who rationally and selfishly want to live and work.

With these together, by fear of force and social intimidation/shaming, fewer people venture out, economic life is far from recovery and businesses are still failing around the world. More people are suffering further.

"Requirement"?

Edited by whYNOT
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4 hours ago, Doug Morris said:

Rights are indivisible.  If we divide rights up into categories such as "primary"and "secondary" and say the "lesser" category can be violated, we are destroying the concept of rights. 

Scratch that. I withdraw my remark. One has the right to freedom of action, period. That goes for all, the healthy and those at possible risk, no distinction.

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5 hours ago, Doug Morris said:

I am not talking about trying to prove exactly who infected exactly whom.  I am talking about wrongful endangerment.

But how does one prove wrongful endangerment? One has to show a cause and effect somehow.

The fact is that we conclude transmission route in general but via specific proven transmission events between people.

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20 hours ago, Easy Truth said:

But interacting with people in public even without symptoms increases the risk of catching the virus. In fact that is problem with this disease that allows it rapid transmission. Some other diseases like ebola have higher mortality, but have symptoms that people can identify and stay away from. 

So the statement "isn't dangerous" is false.

For the majority of the general public what is specifically dangerous re rapid transmission ? In the context of actual threat to health and safety , what makes this particular danger more dangerous than other dangers faced in a modern division of labor society with the given state of medical and technological sophistication we enjoy?

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1 minute ago, tadmjones said:

For the majority of the general public what is specifically dangerous re rapid transmission ? In the context of actual threat to health and safety , what makes this particular danger more dangerous than other dangers faced in a modern division of labor society with the given state of medical and technological sophistication we enjoy?

Your previous remark was that it was not dangerous.

Now you are saying it is less dangerous than other things. Yes, depending on what characteristics you have, there may be more or less danger. But one cannot say there is no danger.

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"A zoonosis is an infectious disease that has jumped from a non-human animal to humans. Zoonotic pathogens may be bacterial, viral or parasitic, or may involve unconventional agents and can spread to humans through direct contact or through food, water or the environment".

Declaring this virus to be the enemy to be combated by the population was a mistake. The coronavirus of the family corona of the family virus, is an act of nature,so to speak, like a lightning strike or hurricane. We have abundant knowledge of what these ancient viruses generally are and do (where and whom they most likely 'strike' and how severely) and proceed from there, soberly but without panic. The scientists and medics and so on, are the ones who do the serious combating.

Next mistake, a subconscious one, is that because we can't in real terms *see* the presence of a virus, instead the zoonotic carrier, a human animal, becomes the feared/hated 'enemy' by transference. Sometimes, the enemy is us. So this virus was personalized through guilt onto every individual (the one time altruist-collectivists recognize individualism, btw) .

The metaphysical given and the man made need to be carefully separated. You didn't catch it from HIM or HER, by their evil acts - you caught a natural infection, full stop. That was the healthier, sane and rational attitude to previous flu outbreaks.

Edited by whYNOT
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1 hour ago, Easy Truth said:

Your previous remark was that it was not dangerous.

Now you are saying it is less dangerous than other things. Yes, depending on what characteristics you have, there may be more or less danger. But one cannot say there is no danger.

I still stand with my original remark . 

Of course no one can say there is no danger. I assess the danger of highway travel every time I go to the store and act accordingly.

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3 hours ago, Easy Truth said:

You mean "rightful" freedom of action. We are not absolutely free as in murder, fraud etc.

I admit, it is circular in that now you have to know what your rights are.

Okay, however one has to accept the probability of mishaps. This is not initiation of force, not infringement of one's rights, although you haven't suggested such. Forceful harm can be done to one completely accidentally, as with a truck ahead on the road which suddenly swerves into your path. You could call him a damn fool, but the driver wasn't 'out to get you', personally - to infringe on your rights. One habitually takes avoiding action with these unpredictables. Such potentially dangerous episodes don't keep one from ever driving, they come with the territory and one remains alert and adaptable to any situation.

The rights argument for masking etc. is inadequate, I think. One person claims that the protocols/harsh laws are impeding his freedom to lead a proper life of quality, another claims the protocols are allowing many their rights to go on living. How can there be a dichotomy between life and living? Both coexist and will continue so. Without any restrictions at all on anyone, but - with a non-sacrificial ethics.

And if even there were irrefutable evidence that the protocols were slowing and stopping the corona spread, I would still maintain that much greater, incalculable damage was being done to individuals/mankind than the (reasonably avoidable when self-responsible) risk of death, or actual deaths themselves.

Edited by whYNOT
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11 minutes ago, whYNOT said:

The rights argument for masking etc. is inadequate, I think.

Yes, the rights argument for masking, similar to taxation, is inadequate. When it comes down to one size fits all mandates from the government, individual rights are infringed. But the argument that a person does not have a right to NOT get infected by another, or that COVID poses no public danger also goes too far.

One could make a more successful utilitarian argument since the current mentality is utilitarian. The fear was that no government could stand, that there would possibly be civil unrest and governments falling if 1 percent of the population died and nany state government was seen as having done nothing.

But it seems that even with everything that has been done, almost 1 percent will in fact die anyway.

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9 hours ago, Easy Truth said:

 But the argument that a person does not have a right to NOT get infected by another, or that COVID poses no public danger also goes too far.

 

Oh the second statement I don't deny. Of course Covid poses a public health danger. That's fundamental to all of this. Originally I put it that one does not have the right to not get infected (leaving off "by another" - since one can be infected by coming in contact with a surface). Still, including by others, I was trying to show (with possible auto accidents) that mishaps happen. With the best of intentions and prophylactic care someone else might infect you by chance, stumbling against you, coughing spontaneously, etc. .

(And here I'm slipping into the common jargon I strongly oppose: i.e That he -personally - "infects you" - personally. One needs to depersonalize this thing, to be objective).

So I think that's true to the reality, not being extreme - One doesn't have the right to NOT be infected.

Reality ahead of rights.

There is, one can observe it, a certain amount of hyper-control exhibited by most people's attitudes to the pandemic for one, among many other areas, a reliance on -the magic- of science and technology to 'save' them, which is self-defeating. Not suggesting fatalism and determinism, but I think we understand that not everything is totally under one's powers all the time and also not under the total control of science or medicine - which is where some scientists themselves criticize what they view to be the contemporary "scientism" - science treated by people, especially modern secularists, like Faith and Dogma.  

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11 hours ago, Easy Truth said:

But it seems that even with everything that has been done, almost 1 percent will in fact die anyway.

I made a mistake here. I thought that 300k was one percent of the US population. In theory that will be the death toll.

But 3 million would have been the death toll (1 percent) and that would have been seen as unacceptable. If one could make the argument successfully that "if this was handled by the free market, the death toll would have been the same or less", that could change minds. Sweden seems to have backed off from their experiment. So the question still remains what has been the ultimate cost of lock downs from a statistical utilitarian perspective.

The question is still open because South Korea was the other success story but is having an outbreak.

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15 hours ago, whYNOT said:

Allowed by whom?

 

15 hours ago, whYNOT said:

"Requirement"?

 

I am not defending the exact policies of currently existing governments, and I am certainly not defending the bad philosophy underlying those policies.  I am saying that there can be a legitimate role for government in combating wrongful endangerment.

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16 hours ago, Easy Truth said:

But how does one prove wrongful endangerment? One has to show a cause and effect somehow.

The fact is that we conclude transmission route in general but via specific proven transmission events between people.

Proving that various actions can put virus-containing droplets into the air can show cause and effect, without proving anything specific about who infected whom.

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