Coronovirus III

[T.Lex]

In any scientific model of prediction, statistically it should be correct more than half the time and incorrect the other half.
We usually get the "dire" model, which has to dialed down as reality reveals itself.

Funny, how the model predictions are always an over-reach, & not ever an under-reach.
Over-reach sells.

In the last week or so, the IHME model under-predicted reported deaths. That is what you appear to label an "under-reach."

Which kinda sounds dirty.

 

[Ingomike]

Well, "that" which you posted has alot to unpack.

The models are to help policymakers make better policy and for us, the governed, to understand why those policies are being put into place.

To that end, the models absolutely helped. Based on the mainstream models, they were accurate enough based on then-available data to inform solid policymaking. Sure, fault can always be found in narrow applications.

To the extent people were alarmed by the numbers, that was rational. Those were alarming numbers early on.

To the extent people use those early numbers to say there was never a danger, that is irrational.

The purpose of the models is to forecast. They did that and continue to do that reasonably well (at least the ones that I look at).

Their models failed to even be close to the reality. We can effectively use moneyball in games with man made laws reasonably well, not so well with just the laws of the universe...

Where we differ; the models f*****d up...

Any politician making choices based on them and not common sense is falling like a rock in my estimation and that of millions of other voters...

 

[Ingomike]

In any scientific model of prediction, statistically it should be correct more than half the time and incorrect the other half.
We usually get the "dire" model, which has to dialed down as reality reveals itself.

Funny, how the model predictions are always an over-reach, & not ever an under-reach.
Over-reach sells.

That we would shut down the economy over something with less than 60% certainty is beyond ridiculous. The people were not told the odds, just the dire news, and it was presented with certainty. Still going with the boy cries wolf. After the whole global warming farce, the farce of excessive deaths they told us originally and the like the people will begin to not react at some point...

 

[T.Lex]

Their models failed to even be close to the reality.

That's actually not true. For the time that the conditions were the constant early on, they were accurate.

They generally became inaccurate when things changed.

Your reference to moneyball is interesting. It doesn't predict the result of any given game, nor does it take into account an injury or intervening change to circumstances. It forecasts a general result over the course of a season.

That's effectively what you're asking the early modeling to do - take into account future events.

Any politician making choices based on them and not common sense is falling like a rock in my estimation and that of millions of other voters...

Doesn't common sense dictate that one should not step out into an avalanche, but stay out of the way? That's basically what the elected leaders said to do. There's an avalanche coming, stay out of the way.

 

[T.Lex]

That we would shut down the economy over something with less than 60% certainty is beyond ridiculous. The people were not told the odds, just the dire news, and it was presented with certainty. Still going with the boy cries wolf. After the whole global warming farce, the farce of excessive deaths they told us originally and the like the people will begin to not react at some point...

Ok, let's go with the boy who cried wolf.

The villagers were aware that wolves were out there. And that wolves were dangerous. Ultimately, the boy saw the wolf that was dangerous.

SARS and MERS may have been "WOLF."

COVID is actually killing significant numbers of people.

It is the wolf.

 

[drillsgt]

Bull****. YOU guys are the anti-science party. Most scientists are democrats, libertarian or independent.

You are the odd man out. Smart enough to know better, but stubborn enough to love Trump.

Research requires funding and relying on privated industry to fund outside of their strategic direction doesn't happen. They have more than enough demand for their R&D $ internally. My company spent 9% of revenue on R&D and never could finance all the worthy projects.

Industry won't fund virology unless it shows long term benefits to the company. I wouldn't expect them to think otherwise.

This type of R&D requires government grants and assistance. Or large contributions from the wealthy through endowments.

I'd call myself a scientist and i'm Republican, I tend to work with physician-scientists a lot and many of them are Republican as are a lot in the STEM areas, the democrats tend to be the academic researchers in non-STEM areas. Now in places like the NIH, CDC, and the rest of the alphabet research institutions I would say most of those are democrat deep staters. As to your other post about funding we give these agencies plenty of money they just don't spend it wisely and tend to fund a lot of nonsense.

 

[Ziggidy]

Ok, let's go with the boy who cried wolf.

The villagers were aware that wolves were out there. And that wolves were dangerous. Ultimately, the boy saw the wolf that was dangerous.

SARS and MERS may have been "WOLF."

COVID is actually killing significant numbers of people.

It is the wolf.

There are many "wolves" that we, john doe, is presented with daily.

Wolves include, but not limited to:
Automobiles
Cigarettes
Alcohol
Cell phones
Obesity

Do we need to shut down the country until we get people to change their behaviors? After all, these "wolves" can cause similar results we see with the china flu; possibly even worse. Is it the governments job to protect us from ourselves, if so, what exactly is freedom and liberty?

 

[foszoe]

There is a glaring difference to me between your list and COVID...
We know with a fair degree of certainty based on statistical evidence the mortality rates.
Automobiles: Backup lights, seatbelts, ABS?, speed limits
Cigarettes: Can't sell to minors, must have warning labels, advertising limited
Alcohol: BAC laws, age restrictions
Cell Phones: Laws around cell phone usage in moving vehicles
Obesity: Food labels, ad campaigns

All of those wolves have been combated through government action. Curious how you feel about lifting all government restriction on those wolves? I would guess, based on your COVID position, you would like to see all those restrictions plus I am sure others I couldn't think of, lifted.

There are many "wolves" that we, john doe, is presented with daily.

Wolves include, but not limited to:
Automobiles
Cigarettes
Alcohol
Cell phones
Obesity

Do we need to shut down the country until we get people to change their behaviors? After all, these "wolves" can cause similar results we see with the china flu; possibly even worse. Is it the governments job to protect us from ourselves, if so, what exactly is freedom and liberty?

 

[T.Lex]

There are many "wolves" that we, john doe, is presented with daily.

Most of them are choices, but things like diseases aren't.

But, let's play.

Wolves include, but not limited to:
Automobiles

We can choose to put ourselves at risk on the road. Most of us choose to do so because of the benefits it brings - better jobs, better scenery, better style.

Cigarettes

Clearly a choice.

Alcohol

Clearly a choice, although addiction issues make that problematic.

Cell phones

Not sure how this is on the list, but still a choice.

Obesity

Tricky one, but some portion choice and some portion medical issue and some portion genetics. But, also, not sure what .gov can do about it.

Do we need to shut down the country until we get people to change their behaviors?

COVID is not a behavior. COVID is a disease.

After all, these "wolves" can cause similar results we see with the china flu; possibly even worse. Is it the governments job to protect us from ourselves, if so, what exactly is freedom and liberty?

Within that framework, it is generally accepted that in a government like ours, the obligation domestically is to protect us from each other.

With coronavirus, you can have people spreading it who: a) don't know they have it; b) may not care. Those who protested various governors for not opening up the states were putting their own interests in a certain gov't action above the risk they would then post to others as carriers. That's just a fact.

This was (hopefully past tense) an extraordinary time. Like Pearl Harbor and 9/11. Like those other events, it required an extraordinary gov't reaction. Also like those other events (9/11 perhaps notwithstanding), things eventually got back to normal. The authoritarian pendulum swung back the other way.

C'est la vie.

 

[nonobaddog]

In any scientific model of prediction, statistically it should be correct more than half the time and incorrect the other half.
We usually get the "dire" model, which has to dialed down as reality reveals itself.

Funny, how the model predictions are always an over-reach, & not ever an under-reach.
Over-reach sells.

Those are both kind of self-fulfilling prophesies.

If you predict dire consequences(over-reach) then there is at some part of the population that will react to avoid the doom and gloom(whatever it is) and thus affect the outcome by reducing the doom and gloom. This automatically makes the over-reach more over-reached. Fewer people die.

If you predict minor consequences(under-reach) then there is at some part of the population that will not react to avoid the doom and gloom(whatever it is) and thus affect the outcome by increasing the doom and gloom. This automatically makes the under-reach more under-reached. More people die.

This creates a motivation for the politician/pseudo-scientist/witch-doctor to present an over-reach to the people. Fewer people die is good.

 

[jedi]

Wendy's removes burgers from its menu!
The reason is its beef supplier can NOT supply it with beef due to C-Virus.

I recall someone telling us this was going to occur here due to meat/food shortages.

https://www.tmz.com/2020/05/05/wendys-locations-take-burgers-off-menu-meat-shortage-coronavirus/

When the masses cant buy their nuggets we will have riots!

 

[chipbennett]

Well, "that" which you posted has alot to unpack.

The models are to help policymakers make better policy and for us, the governed, to understand why those policies are being put into place.

To that end, the models absolutely helped. Based on the mainstream models, they were accurate enough based on then-available data to inform solid policymaking. Sure, fault can always be found in narrow applications.

To the extent people were alarmed by the numbers, that was rational. Those were alarming numbers early on.

To the extent people use those early numbers to say there was never a danger, that is irrational.

The purpose of the models is to forecast. They did that and continue to do that reasonably well (at least the ones that I look at).

Long-term, there are two legitimate (related) questions about the models:

1) What was the predictive value of the models against actual outcomes?
2) Did the models accurately predict, with any statistical significance, differences in outcomes based on differences in policy?

The first question will be easier/faster to answer. The second one will take some digging, and I'm not sure it will prove to have been true. I have a growing suspicion that COVID-19 model curves will, in the end, be pretty much like the climate-change junk-science models, that yield a hockey stick curve regardless of any random data set input into the model. What if, in the end, the COVID-19 curves will have been pretty much the same, regardless of social policy implemented?

 

[chipbennett]

I'd call myself a scientist and i'm Republican, I tend to work with physician-scientists a lot and many of them are Republican as are a lot in the STEM areas, the democrats tend to be the academic researchers in non-STEM areas. Now in places like the NIH, CDC, and the rest of the alphabet research institutions I would say most of those are democrat deep staters. As to your other post about funding we give these agencies plenty of money they just don't spend it wisely and tend to fund a lot of nonsense.

Exactly. The problem is that too much of "science" today is Science, Inc. - the neverending quest for public funds for research, and outcome-biased research that keeps the money coming.

There are plenty of conservatives and Republicans in STEM. They just aren't as vocal. (Much like conservatives in Hollywood.) And, they tend more toward the engineering side of STEM than the pure science side.

 

[nonobaddog]

Wendy's removes burgers from its menu!
The reason is its beef supplier can NOT supply it with beef due to C-Virus.

I recall someone telling us this was going to occur here due to meat/food shortages.

https://www.tmz.com/2020/05/05/wendys-locations-take-burgers-off-menu-meat-shortage-coronavirus/

When the masses cant buy their nuggets we will have riots!

Yes! I recall smokingman predicting the shortage of toilet paper and masks and other ppe and ventilators and pork and beef as well as the food supply-chain issues.
Thanks to him I did get a supply of what I need to get by for a while and I lined up a farm meat source. Except I didn't get any masks until just recently I picked up two N95 masks which I can rotate and get by indefinitely.
The heads-up is greatly appreciated.

My grandson is going to be really pissed at the nuggets thing.

 

[T.Lex]

Long-term, there are two legitimate (related) questions about the models:

1) What was the predictive value of the models against actual outcomes?
2) Did the models accurately predict, with any statistical significance, differences in outcomes based on differences in policy?

The first question will be easier/faster to answer. The second one will take some digging, and I'm not sure it will prove to have been true. I have a growing suspicion that COVID-19 model curves will, in the end, be pretty much like the climate-change junk-science models, that yield a hockey stick curve regardless of any random data set input into the model. What if, in the end, the COVID-19 curves will have been pretty much the same, regardless of social policy implemented?

I have far greater hope for the COVID modeling than climate change. For one thing, the time scales are MUCH different.

Instead of climate change, let's try another difficult-to-predict endeavor: the stock market.

Would the stock market as of today be the same as if the US gov't wasn't printing money and bailing out businesses?

We can't really know HOW much different it would be, but I think it is a solid premise that it would be considerably different. And not in a good way.

 

[Snapdragon]

Well, I was regretting the 30 lbs of ground beef I recently bought. Now notsomuch.

 

[Old Bear]

Wendy's removes burgers from its menu!
The reason is its beef supplier can NOT supply it with beef due to C-Virus.

I recall someone telling us this was going to occur here due to meat/food shortages.

https://www.tmz.com/2020/05/05/wendys-locations-take-burgers-off-menu-meat-shortage-coronavirus/

When the masses cant buy their nuggets we will have riots!

Wendy's in Valpo have been steadily limiting the burgers you can buy for about a week now. No doubles or triples. They are really pushing chicken and they are now selling fish!!

 

[Ingomike]

I'd call myself a scientist and i'm Republican, I tend to work with physician-scientists a lot and many of them are Republican as are a lot in the STEM areas, the democrats tend to be the academic researchers in non-STEM areas. Now in places like the NIH, CDC, and the rest of the alphabet research institutions I would say most of those are democrat deep staters. As to your other post about funding we give these agencies plenty of money they just don't spend it wisely and tend to fund a lot of nonsense.

It is funny how the left cannot imagine in their wildest dreams that the right and conservatives are not the knuckle dragging bafoons they have always believed and that it is they, perceiving themselves so worldly and scientific, that have turned what was once a bipartisan idea of cleaning the planet up into a religious cult complete with very unscientific dogmas...

 

[qwerty]

The mastermind behind the models...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/20...ent-scientist-neil-ferguson-resigns-breaking/

 

[T.Lex]

"Hey, you interested in some modeling?"