Tango Vaccine

Parodying the endanger-supporters, far-wrong, freeDUMB scam ...

22-2-7 THE TANGO: VACCINE - A Randy Rainbow Song Parody > .

Anti-Vax CON

2021 Tim Miller on The Big Anti Vax Con - Bulwark > .

Fatal FreeDUMB

I find it impossible to be polite about obdurate sheep who follow equally ignorant, arrogant sheep ...

21-8-23 Dying in the Name of Vaccine Freedom | NYT Opinion > .

Human Behavioral Response to COVID

 What scientists have learnt about human behavior from the pandemic:

"Several governments worried that their pandemic restrictions would quickly lead to “behavioural fatigue” so that people would stop adhering to restrictions. In the UK, the prime minister’s former chief adviser Dominic Cummings recently admitted that this was the reason for not locking down the country sooner."

[So Cummings says. I wonder whether the government was actually much more concerned about economic impacts and future votes than "obedience fatigue". Either way, the optimal way to control an epidemic is to impose lockdown earlier, rather than later. Duh!]

"Meanwhile, former health secretary Matt Hancock revealed that the government’s failure to provide financial and other forms of support for people to self-isolate was down to their fear that the system “might be gamed”. He warned that people who tested positive may then falsely claim that they had been in contact with all their friends, so they could all get a payment." 

[Then why not test the contacts before imposing subsidized isolation? Duh again.]

"These examples show just how deeply some governments distrust their citizens. As if the virus was not enough, the public was portrayed as an additional part of the problem. But is this an accurate view of human behaviour?"

[As raves, maskless anti-lockdown protests, and vaccination "hesitancy" demonstrate, never underestimate the stupidity of a lamentably large subset of the population.]

"The distrust is based on two forms of reductionism – describing something complex in terms of its fundamental constituents. The first is limiting psychology to the characteristics – and more specifically the limitations – of individual minds. In this view the human psyche is inherently flawed, beset by biases that distort information. It is seen as incapable of dealing with complexity, probability and uncertainty – and tending to panic in a crisis.

This view is attractive to those in power. By emphasising the inability of people to govern themselves, it justifies the need for a government to look after them. Many governments subscribe to this view, having established so-called nudge units – behavioural science teams tasked with subtly manipulating people to make the “right” decisions, without them realising why, from eating less sugar to filing their taxes on time. But it is becoming increasingly clear that this approach is limited. As the pandemic has shown, it is particularly flawed when it comes to behaviour in a crisis.

In recent years, research has shown that the notion of people panicking in a crisis is something of a myth. People generally respond to crises in a measured and orderly way – they look after each other.

The key factor behind this behaviour is the emergence of a sense of shared identity. This extension of the self to include others helps us care for those around us and expect support from them. Resilience cannot be reduced to the qualities of individual people. It tends to be something that emerges in groups." 

[False-dichotomy alert! Actually, resilience is ALSO a characteristic of individuals.]

"Another type of reductionism that governments adopt is “psychologism” – when you reduce the explanation of people’s behaviour to just psychology. But there are many other factors that shape what we do. In particular, we rely on information and practical means (not least money!) to decide what needs to be done – and to be able to do it.

If you reduce people to just psychology, it makes their actions entirely a consequence of individual choice. If we get infected, it is because we chose to act in ways that led to infection: we decided to go out and socialise, we ignored advice on physical distancing."

[Yup, as noted above, some (including Matt Hancock) did exactly that. Why? Blame the longer-term impact of every-opinion-counts and anti-establishment individualistic rebellion promoted by sections of anti-social media. If governments were truly unaware that context and information matter, then they would not spend money to hire the above-mentioned "nudge units", would they?]

"Covered in Jesus' Blood"

Thou Shalt Stay the Hell Home! > .

Coronavirus & CONtrol-freaks .. 

Coronavirus & CONtrol-freaks

[edited to emphasize realities] The Road to Coronavirus Hell Was Paved by Evangelicals CONservative, proselytizing pseudo-Christians: DUHnocchio's response to the pandemic has been haunted by the science denialism of his [odiously] ultraconservative religious religionist allies.

Putin's-Puppet-in-Chief "rose to power with the determined assistance of a movement that denies science, bashes government and prioritized loyalty over professional expertise. In the current crisis, we are all reaping what that movement has sown.

At least since the 19th century, when the proslavery theologian Robert Lewis Dabney attacked the physical sciences as “theories of unbelief,” hostility to science has characterized the more extreme forms of religious religionist nationalism in the United States. [Why the antagonism to science? Scientific evidence/explanations FALSIFY unfounded religionist "creation" LIES.] Today, the hard core of climate deniers is concentrated among people who identify as religiously conservative Republicans CONservatively religionist RepuGNicans."

[Why the antagonism to science? Scientific evidence/explanations FALSIFY unfounded religionist "creation" LIES.].

"And some leaders of the [decidedly unpatriotic] "Christian" [white] nationalist movement, like those allied with the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship Theocratic Promulgation of Creation, Creatardism, which has denounced environmental science as a “Cult of the Green Dragon,” cast environmentalism as an alternative — and false — theology.

[Why? Scientific evidence/explanations not only FALSIFY unfounded religionist "creation" LIES, but threaten the profits of the Fossil Fuel Corporations that purchase politicians and sponsor AGW-denying propaganda.]

"This denial of science and critical thinking among religious ultraconservatives now haunts the American response to the coronavirus crisis. On March 15, Guillermo Maldonado, who calls himself an “apostle” and hosted Idiot-in-Chief earlier this year at a campaign event at his Miami megachurch, urged his congregants to show up for worship services in person. “Do you believe God would bring his people to his house to be contagious with the virus? Of course not,” he said.""

[Congregate en masse with fellow CONservative, proselytizing pseudo-Christian RepuGNicans because you foolishly believe that a non-existence gives a toss about protecting you from your own deluded stupidity? Go ahead, but don't take ICU beds and ventilators from the more deserving who do NOT have Authoritarian Personality Disorder.]

Dangerous pseudo-Christian arrogance

Jerry Falwell Jr — a [chip off the old CONservative blockhead and] "staunch ally of UNpresident Ignoramus-in-Chief and an influential voice in the [power-mongering CONservative] evangelical proselytizing pseudo-Christian world — reopened Liberty "University" last week, igniting a firestorm. As of Friday, Dr. Eppes (the physician who runs Liberty’s student health service) said, nearly a dozen Liberty students were sick with symptoms that suggested Covid-19, the disease caused by the virus. Three were referred to local hospital centers for testing. An additional eight were told to self-isolate.

As of 8 p.m. on March 29, of those three students tested, one was positive, one was negative and one student’s results are still pending, according to Dr. Eppes, who added that the student who tested positive for Covid-19 lives off campus."

[Did the brainwashed fool imagine that praying to a non-existent Sky Daddy would protect his profits?]

"For critical weeks in January and February, the nation’s far right wrong dismissed the seriousness of the pandemic. Falwell derided it as an “overreaction” driven by liberal desires to damage LIAR-in-Chief."

...

"The university was founded by Falwell’s INfamous father as a bastion of social CONservatism, one that was unabashedly combative as it trained what it called “Champions for Christ.” If anything, the younger Falwell has made it more so since his father’s death."

...

"Falwell runs Liberty his own way, and his word is law. Professors are not tenured and can be fired at will. The [Falwellian] Badministration controls the student newspaper."

Hancock has Resigned

.Hancock is a *****! - Pie > .

2021 Job Market for Graduates

As the US economy emerges from COVID-19 ....

.What Class of 2021 Grads Should Expect in the Job Market | WSJ > .

Higher Education and Employability - SeSc > .

Demographics and development explained - Circles >> .

Education - Essentials - Δημόκριτος >> .

Education Industry - Debts, Benefits - Weighs >> .

Education vs Sheepskin - Alētheiai >> .

Intelligence and Education - Serious Science >> .

Sheepskin Industry - Weighs >> .

Red Ed - enDürer >> .

Tech in Classroom post-COVID

2021 COVID-19: how tech will transform your kids' education | Economist > .

Demographics and development explained - Circles >> .

Education - Essentials - Δημόκριτος >> .

Education Industry - Debts, Benefits - Weighs >> .

Education vs Sheepskin - Alētheiai >> .

Intelligence and Education - Serious Science >> .

Sheepskin Industry - Weighs >> .

Red Ed - enDürer >> .

The pandemic not only disrupted education—it also thrust technology onto a sector which historically has been slow to adopt it. 
00:00 How the pandemic has affected education.
03:08 Why the education sector has been slow to adopt technology.
05:02 Technology helps children have a personalised learning experience.
07:50 How technology can help teachers
09:08 Could remote learning be here to stay?