Science: Beware, the B117 variant is now predominant in Europe! Let’s vaccinate! Quickly!
EU: Yes, but blood clots.
Sc: Same in the test groups as in controls, right?
EU: Hmm... Just in case
Sc: Hasn’t the UK vaccinated *millions* with that vaccine?
EU: We can’t risk it
👇
Sc: What about the 1000s who will die of COVID?
EU: No worries, we’re going to lock down again
Sc: But that’s going to destroy the economy *again*
EU: Sometimes we need to make sacrifices
Sc: But not clot sacrifices
EU: Duh
Sc: OK so let me get this straight.
You hear some blood clots, which are to be expected just by chance when you’re vaccinating millions, and you decide to stop vaccines, just in case, to prevent them.

Meanwhile you stop vaccinating, which will kill many more, create a new wave of deadlier B117,...
...destroy the economy again, and make it much harder to vaccinate ppl later because of their fear?
EU: 💯
Sc: But that makes no sense!
EU: Who needs to make sense when we can just follow other countries?
Clarification: when I say EU I mean European countries. I’m a big fan of the EU in general. Thanks for the comments pointing that out

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More from @tomaspueyo

11 Mar
Who should you trust?

The government? An influencer? A think tank? The CDC? Experts? What does “expert” even mean?

First, you should trust yourself. Everybody else might be wrong or have an agenda

But sometimes you might be wrong / be biased/ lack expertise. What then?
We then say “trust experts”. But which one? You can find an “expert” for any opinion.

What is an expert?
Traditionally, it’s a credentialed person or one named to a position of authority. Both of these things are the same.

A credential is just other ppl vouching for you
If you have a PhD, it’s because you passed some tests made by other ppl who also have PhDs, who got theirs through other PhDs. A PhD is trustworthy insofar as the chain of previous PhDs is.

An authority figure is legitimate only insofar as those naming her are legitimate.
Read 9 tweets
24 Feb
The 5th estate (social media and its influencers) is destroying the 4th estate (the press and its reporters).

Exhibit A:
This was impossible even a decade ago. But as leaders build their own channels, they circumvent the traditional gatekeepers and turn them redundant
This echoes how the 4th estate took power away from the 1st estate (church) and gave it to the 2nd (aristocracy)

stratechery.com/2019/the-inter…
@benthompson
Read 4 tweets
20 Feb
We’re entering a world where sanctions to countries might start disappearing.

They never were very successful anyways. Look at Cuba, North Korea, Iran. Did they really change behaviors?

Not much.

Did their elites suffer and feel pressured? Much less than the ppl
Sanctions were always a pretty bad deal.

Now on top of that, they will be unenforceable.

The US based its ability to sanction based on its grip over the global financial system. That is disappearing.

It won’t be able to size the assets of elites, safeguarded in Bitcoin.
It won’t be able to freeze the pipelines of global trade, because DeFi will replace the legacy use of systems like SWIFT. The requirement to buy oil in dollars will likely suffer workarounds, if it doesn’t simply disappear as the % of US’s global GDP shrinks.
Read 5 tweets
19 Feb
The efficacy of Moderna and Pfizer vaccines is probably ~92% , very close to 2 doses (~95%).

Huge ramifications: we should ramp up single dose for these vaccines as quickly as possible. Postpone the 2nd dose.

This doubles the # of ppl protected & ~halves the time to herd immun.
This is what @Bob_Wachter defends in @NEJM
nejm.org/doi/full/10.10…

Here are the calculations
nejm.org/doi/full/10.10…
This reversal is truly ground-breaking. We could be getting out of the woods much faster.

It doesn't mean we stop the 2nd dose, but by postponing it we build up production capacity for when it's needed, and protect many more ppl in the meantime
Read 4 tweets
15 Feb
Look at this map intently. I'm going to ask you a question about it.

Don't cheat, look at it well.
Ready?
Ok.
Where was the Austro-Hungarian empire?
Or Hungary, before that.
For the last 1000 years or so.
If you guessed right, congratulations!
Here's how Hungary evolved over the last 1000 years.
(Austro-Hungary for ~70 years before WWI)
Read 6 tweets
14 Feb
I was looking at some maps for a future article and saw something interesting about Italy.

The Po River Valley is the richest and highest-density area because it's the most fertile.

But then there's this line of cities. That's so weird. Why?
So I turned to look at what's there, and a bunch of cities are on a near perfect line! From Piacenza to Rimini through Parma, Reggio Emilia, Modena, Bologna or Forli.

They're all connected by the E45. So I wondered: What's the history of E45?
Turns out it was the Via Aemilia that Romans built to control the Po Valley.

They built it on the mountainside of the Appenine Mountains, as straight as they could for efficiency, and then built cities along its way!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Via_Aemil…
Read 4 tweets

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