Knicks Morning News (2025.09.03)

After ess-dog’s post I wrote: “now it’s a race between Bunge, Bob, and Doogie to see who responds first”, but I didn’t post it because I didn’t want to influence the outcome.

Kudos to Neptune for his restraint (which I think he exercises quite well in his second iteration).

There is nothing to be restrained about here. My ideas on politic are in the minority here and it has been made clear that politics isn’t to be a major discussion here, so I respect it.

My background in science is better than most here and I had the great good fortune of working in the Division of Artificial at the University of Utah when Dr Robert Jarvik was developing the artificial heart.

Science isn’t the word of God… it is a collaborative pursuit of knowledge. It is never settled or as Carl Sagan used to say about science, “The only sacred truth, is there are no sacred truths.”

“Science” received a well deserved black eye and bloody nose for cavorting with politics during COVID.

I feel like the best a nation can do is to defer to the top and most accredited people in their respective fields. Will they always be 100% correct? Of course not. But it’s the best bet.

Appeals to authority figures are generally shunned here, plus, in this case, the accredited people (Birx and Fauci) made shit up all the time and lied through their teeth.

That’s the problem with deferring automatically to authority figures… they are humans and lie all the time for other purposes with absolute disdain for the people they are speaking down to.

Jacques Strappe

Nice touch.

glad you brought this up bob, was thinking about this from an earlier post…from what i can tell – the main crux of your position seems to be: everyone lies, cheats and deceives, with the added caveat of it being “all or nothing”, no spectrum, no range…

That isn’t my opinion.

My opinion is when dealing with science, proclamations from authority figures are worthless unless they are buttressed by data that is repeatable. Simple.

Scientists are no different that the rest of us and they sometimes lie, cherry pick data and cover their asses.

If you want a good laugh, do some research into Ancel Keys and the Diet Heart Hypothesis (the ‘scientific’ research that the notion coronary artery disease is a function of ingested saturated fats and cholesterol). Then look up his ‘data’ the “Seven Nation Study”. The data lines up nicely, until you realize he had data from a previous study from 22 countries where the data was inconsistent with his hypothesis. Imagine that.

“He also fought to quash the Great Barrington Declaration of pre-eminent scientists when they were clearly correct.”

The Great Barrington Declaration was sponsored by the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER), a libertarian free-market think tank associated with climate change denial (according to Wikipedia).

Blame the messenger? Did you look at the CV’s of the fellows that signed it? And, unsurprisingly, they were correct .

Waving the climate change wand doesn’t win the day in an objective discussion. Maybe in a dorm room somewhere it does.

The entire reason we have an unofficial “don’t discuss politics” rule has less to do with politics and more to do with BrunsonPeroneus’s complete inability to understand scientific literature.

Bob, taking a million freshman science courses does not make you a scientist. Regurgitating alt-right conspiracy forum posts does not make you a scientist. Misreading scientific studies, does not make you a scientist.

You are not a scientist, and if you were capable of understanding that there’s a difference between a 100-level course and a PhD, then we wouldn’t need to have this discussion.

Do you have a specific point I made that you would like to refute other than you disagree with my politics which isn’t the point of discussion here?

Yes, only the immune compromised will be affected. And fuck them anyway, right?

‘I don’t know where you get that idea other than some prejudice of your making. I have 3 kids and they were all vaccinated.

Now, do I think a newborn needs a Hep b vaccine at birth… no, mom can be tested and I don’t think Junior is going to do IV drugs or pimp himself out at one day of age.

Do I think the vaccine schedule should be looked at by others than those who manufacture vaccines and those that profit from administering them, yep.

So the Yankees have been playing better lately…

As predicted. Enter the streakbuster Devin Williams.

This is your whole spiel. There is no data. There is no analysis. It’s just Bob whinging on about stuff. There is no science to object to or argue against, there is only Bob himself claiming he knows better.

My position is always question authority. Look for the data behind their opinions.

Bob, we eliminated the food pyramid in 2011 and replaced it with the plate, which was based on nutrition science. The movement you’re talking about began over a decade ago under the leadership and influence of Michelle Obama. He’s not doing anything that wasn’t done a long time ago.

My Plate while an improvement is still at odds with the recommendations of Harvard’s Healthy Eating Plate and other best practices.

My Plate doesn’t mention healthy oils such as olive oil. where Harvard emphasizes them. My Plate classifies potatoes as a veggie to be eaten where Harvard doesn’t. My Plate doesn’t mention essential omega 3 fats ( specifically DHA and EPA) that the body needs and cannot synthesize. My Plate DOES say eat 8 oz of “seafood” a week, but if you eat tilapia , cod or yellowfin tuna you will get about 1/15th of the EPA and DHA per serving you get from fish like salmon, sardines and mackerel.

Raven, I assume you are arguing in good faith. If you believe Fauci is as pure as the driven snow in funding the Wuhan Lab, let me refer you to Senate Resolution 718 of the 118th Congress”

“…. Whereas in 2014, after the Obama Administration mandated a pause on gain-of-
function research, the National Institutes of Health (referred to in
this preamble as “NIH”), led by Francis Collins, including the
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (referred to in
this preamble as “NIAID”), led by Anthony Fauci, continued to
authorize grants and research awards to organizations that study the
spread of viruses from animals to humans;
Whereas some such awards went to EcoHealth Alliance and its President, Peter
Daszak, who then disbursed research money to the Wuhan Institute of
Virology (referred to in this preamble as the “WIV”) and East China
Normal University;
Whereas experiments advanced by EcoHealth Alliance during the pause included,
among other projects, combining genetic material from a “parent”
coronavirus, known as WIV1, with other viruses;
Whereas the results of such experiments demonstrated varying pathogenicity of
SARS-CoV-2 with different spike proteins in humanized mice;
Whereas a majority of scientists and researchers, including Dr. Lawrence Tabak
and Dr. Ralph Baric, an EcoHealth Alliance collaborator and top
coronavirus expert, when made aware of such experiment, admitted that
EcoHealth Alliance’s coronavirus research appeared to meet the standard
criteria for gain-of-function research;
Whereas NIH and NIAID continued to support EcoHealth Alliance and other
organizations conducting gain-of-function research, according to the
Obama Administration’s definition, through 2017, even though the pause
remained in effect;
Whereas on July 7, 2016, NIAID identified possible gain-of-function research
concerns in an experiment proposed by EcoHealth and conducted by the
WIV;
Whereas in May 2021, Anthony Fauci conceded that during the period between 2014
and 2017 that “it is impossible to guarantee that researchers at the
Wuhan Institute of Virology did not use American funds to perform gain-
of-function research on coronaviruses.”;
Whereas Anthony Fauci and NIAID did not alert senior White House officials
before lifting a ban on gain-of-function research in 2017;
Whereas in November 2019, 3 researchers from the WIV became sick enough to
receive hospital care, and according to United States officials, those
sick researchers were involved in coronavirus research;
Whereas the Chinese government deliberately delayed notifying the World Health
organization that it had detected SARS-like infections from an unknown,
novel pathogen well before it sent official notification in December
2019;