Fauchistas Have Egg on their Faces.

roscoe

Well-known member
Both- this is classic science under Marx's dialectic materialism... problems are solved by changing society not the hypothesis. Luckily for the rulers the changes are often temporary

If you are arguing that science is Marxist, present your case.
 

theotherwaldo

Well-known member
If you are arguing that science isn't Marxist, present your case.

I suspect that you will have no more success than @Selena.
Much of modern science is a matter of faith, with the faithful viciously attacking the heretical disbelievers.
Of course, many of the disbelievers will be proven correct (or partially correct) in a generation or so.
Then they will become the faithful and will proceed to persecute the new generation of heretics.
I believe in science. Its truth will eventually win out.
I don't believe in most scientists. Too many are indistinguishable from cultists.

Much like the Marxists, who declare that no one has ever done communism correctly up to this point, but the new generation will get it right... .
 

Selena

Active member
If you are arguing that science isn't Marxist, present your case.

I suspect that you will have no more success than @Selena.
Much of modern science is a matter of faith, with the faithful viciously attacking the heretical disbelievers.
Of course, many of the disbelievers will be proven correct (or partially correct) in a generation or so.
Then they will become the faithful and will proceed to persecute the new generation of heretics.
I believe in science. Its truth will eventually win out.
I don't believe in most scientists. Too many are indistinguishable from cultists.

Much like the Marxists, who declare that no one has ever done communism correctly up to this point, but the new generation will get it right... .
I'm not trying to argue science is Marxist, I am arguing Lysenkoism is Maxist. The difference may be slight but it is important.
 

wiscoaster

Well-known member
...
Much of modern science is a matter of faith, with the faithful viciously attacking the heretical disbelievers.
Of course, many of the disbelievers will be proven correct (or partially correct) in a generation or so.
Then they will become the faithful and will proceed to persecute the new generation of heretics.
I believe in science. Its truth will eventually win out.
I don't believe in most scientists. Too many are indistinguishable from cultists.
...
Nicely put.

Suppression of facts that don't support the favored hypothesis is not science, but it's the method du jour for "science" these days.

No, correction ... not just these days, but most always. Just ask Galileo Galilei ....
 

theotherwaldo

Well-known member
Actually, old Galileo was an example of the vicious faithful.
His positions and attacks were almost always based on his personal opinions rather than his scientific observations.
His second trial before the Papal Inquisition was a matter of him implying that Pope Urban VIII was a fool and that almost all of his fellow scientists were idiots.
This was some 17 years after his trial over his belief in heliocentrism, which he had presented before he had full evidence to support his theorem.
This theorem was mostly accepted during his lifetime and probably why he was such a pompous jerk in later years.
His sentence to house arrest was as much to protect the feeble old man from his violently offended fellow scientists as it was a punishment.

I became interested in Galileo when I found that he had the same coat of arms as my mother's foster father... .
 

wiscoaster

Well-known member
OK, I stand corrected. ;)

Was just offered as a possible example of opposition to accepted dogma being nothing new.
 
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roscoe

Well-known member
I'm not trying to argue science is Marxist, I am arguing Lysenkoism is Maxist. The difference may be slight but it is important.

There are no Lysenkoists any more, whether you are referring to his kowtowing to Stalin, or his theories on epigenetics.
 

roscoe

Well-known member
If you are arguing that science isn't Marxist, present your case.

I suspect that you will have no more success than @Selena.
Much of modern science is a matter of faith, with the faithful viciously attacking the heretical disbelievers.
Of course, many of the disbelievers will be proven correct (or partially correct) in a generation or so.
Then they will become the faithful and will proceed to persecute the new generation of heretics.
I believe in science. Its truth will eventually win out.
I don't believe in most scientists. Too many are indistinguishable from cultists.

Much like the Marxists, who declare that no one has ever done communism correctly up to this point, but the new generation will get it right... .
Science isn't Marxist because Marxism is a politico-economic philosophy, and science is based on a search for material reality. You can use science to inform on your economics or politics, but it doesn't go the other way. If it does, it is no longer science, but something else.
 

theotherwaldo

Well-known member
If it does, it is no longer science, but something else.
I believe that that is what I'm pointing out.
We have large sectors of our population (of all political flavors) that seem to believe that they have a lock on scientific truth and that their political opposites are all anti-scientific heretics... .
 

Fine Figure of a Man

Well-known member
You can use science to inform on your economics or politics, but it doesn't go the other way. If it does, it is no longer science, but something else.
It is called the pursuit of continued funding, MONEY.
Now try and tell us that “Scientists” are above that. Be sure and impress us with a list of your credentials to validate your opinion.
 

roscoe

Well-known member
It is called the pursuit of continued funding, MONEY.
Now try and tell us that “Scientists” are above that. Be sure and impress us with a list of your credentials to validate your opinion.

That is why it is not Marxist. the competition (for funding, for results, etc.) is as competitive as any in industry you will find. There is a fixed pool of research dollars and the scientists are in a stiff competition to earn them.
 

roscoe

Well-known member
And scientist that wish to retain government funding deliver results that the government wants.

The government doesn't do the NSF reviews - it is independent panels of scientists across the field, and the panels are appointed by outside people who take the position for brief (2-3 year) terms. It is done that way specifically to avoid any kind of favoritism within the government. I have served on panels, and I can assure you the government's desires never even entered anyone's mind. I can't imagine that a single person in the government ever cared who got that funding.
 
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roscoe

Well-known member
Some may find this interesting.

This is why I think people need to study science more. I only had time to look at part of the article, but let's look at that email that supposedly made 'true believers out of skeptics':
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Phylogenetic analysis places the COVID 19 coronavirus with animal variants. The virus is ~30000 bases long. If 0.01% (or =0.001) of the virus looks engineered, then you are talking about 30 nucleotide bases (adenine, cytosine, uracil, and guanine). Note that viruses don't use DNA, in which the base pairs are chemically 'locked' by the double-helix. Coronavirus genetic code is RNA, which is in a single strand, and which is far more chemically exposed and therefore mutagenic. This is one of the keys to viruses' mutability in general.

But just to put that number of 30 in context - here is the variation among just bat coronaviruses:

Here are two papers on RNA virus mutability:

This means that seeing 30 unexpected bases is nowhere near grounds for declaring that it was engineered. Evolution does funny things all the time, and convergence is common (which is why porpoises, fish, and mosasaurs looks alike). It is much harder in more complex genomes, especially with the mutation-resistant DNA in a double helix. But it happens. And it happens far far more often in viruses.

I want to point out the comment 'inconsistent' with evolutionary predictions from the email. They are definitely not stating that the there is evidence the virus was engineered. Unpredictable mutations are is not uncommon in nature - it does unpredictable things all the time. This is why the annual flu shot often is ineffective - scientists predicted the evolution of the flu virus incorrectly. It just so happens that this particular virus was more dangerous. Anyway, subsequent genomic research has not borne out the comment (see below).

Analysis of the COVID 19 genome has not supported the idea of an engineered virus. Here is the scientific literature, from non-US government sources. You might note the relative speed of the appearance and wide distribution of the Delta variant. That is evolution at work right there, and speaks to the mutability of the virus. This is how nature does its thing.

If you want some relevant scientific literature from the actual scientists around the world doing the hard work:

a good recent summary:

and more:

although a lab incident is a possibility:

Anyway, the question is not whether there was lab spillover (which is theoretically possible), but whether Fauci was somehow intentionally funding weaponization of coronavirus variants in China. That is the conspiracy, and it is entirely politically driven. You simply don't see anyone in the legitimate scientific community (who are the only ones in a position to know) pushing that narrative.
 
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roscoe

Well-known member
Your pretty hung up on the weaponizing thing.
That is the underlying accusation. That he funded research that created the virus, and that the Chinese were weaponizing it when it escaped from the lab, like in the movies.


 
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