Time for Camping?

Personally I don't like to hear anyone's music, regardless of the genre, while camping. I'm looking for a natural experience, not an urban one. That's one reason I got rid of the class A and got an rPod, smaller is better to get to the nice quiet out of the way spots. 

As to the comment that "experts can often be mistaken", I'm honestly not sure what to make of that. Does it make more sense to take guidance from non-experts? Who is more likely to get it wrong, the experts who have made that subject matter their career or someone who knows nothing about it? And why would someone who doesn't understand a subject want to pontificate about it anyway? What is their agenda? 

Frankly I am concerned about the prevalence of this apparent negative attitude toward expertise. We used to respect and recognize our experts and encourage our young people to get the education needed to achieve that expertise in their chosen field. Now not so much it seems, even though we live in an age where the global economy is more knowledge based than ever. This doesn't bode well for the future I don't think. 

 

As the famous comedian/philosopher said

" good judgement comes from experience. experience usually comes at the expense of bad judgement" or something like that

so, experts do indeed have their place, but we still need to evaluate and question anyone's opinion. Opinions are based on knowledge, experience and other unknown factors that are influential to the opinion givers. True facts and science are not generally influenced . sometimes it's hard to discern the truth

Vann

Part of South Korea's success is in how people interact. Hand shaking and hugs are not common. Also, if anyone feels ill, he/she wears a face mask. Both of those contribute to a lower rate of spread. What they are doing to treat cases, possibly much earlier than we start treating, is helping but we don't hear in the news how they are treating this.

As for science, scientists can and do confuse cause with effect and later on have to change their theories. My citation for doctors (who may not be "scientists" per se, but are conducting research show that there is conflict in opinion as to the validity of hydroxychloroquine, which was my point. Low-dose use with antibiotic (alternative if Zithromycin is not tolerated) plus zink given earlier seems to cut the severity in most patients. Remdesivir may be effective if it reaches the latter stages, but the cost will be many times that of hydroxychloroquine, which is generic and inexpensive. Which one will the drug companies want to make? Right now, the major source of hydroxychloroquine is India.

I wouldn't use duct tape. Perhaps Gorilla tape.

The beauty of science is its methodology.  No other human endeavor tests and retests established doctrine as does science.  No, science hasn't reached perfection and does go off track from time to time, especially when science gets influenced by large research funders who demand, either subtly or not so subtly, that the results are skewed in their favor.  But by and large, it sticks to the objective evidence better than everyone else.  

In non-scientific human activities, that are not peer reviewed or are peer reviewed based on whether it conforms to an earlier body of accepted beliefs, we tend to make up what we believe and treat it as fact when it is really an invention of the human mind.  Our arguments tend to be over whether the current belief fits an established doctrine and, where it doesn't, whether it is expedient to change the doctrine.  In my profession, for example, we argue about the law as though it is something that exists apart from human beings imaginations, but that is pure poppycock.  The entire legal system is a creation of the human mind that we "adjust" whenever we feel like to achieve the results we think we want at the moment.  So when we talk about legal "theories" we are arguing inside a tautology, or a manmade fiction filled with circular reasoning.  Science, on the other hand, is always testing, retesting, and looking outside the accepted doctrine to see if it is really describing the world objectively.

StephenH, you are confusing scientific hypotheses with scientific theories.  The use of various drugs to fight SARS-CoV-2 are being examined as we "speak."  Their efficacy is not scientific "theory" but rather a hypothesis that is being tested.  In the testing of the hypothesis that one or another drug actually works, plenty of mistakes will be made.  Research, when rushed, tends to not stand the test of time and peer review.  Preliminary findings in the testing of an hypothesis are often wrong.  This was the case with Hydroxychloroquine, which we are now finding has little effect on the virus and increases the mortality rate for those who take it.  

It is not that drugs like that should not be tested, but the testing process is inherently a trial and error process that will raise hopes, then dash them on a rocky shore when they turn out to be wrong.  The problem with the lay world is we tend to cling to these false hopes and blame the scientists when they prove that what we wished for does not achieve what we wanted.  Humans are impatient and want immediate solutions.  Objective reality doesn't conform to our wished for instant answers.  We are going to have to get used to the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in our lives for a long time to come.  Whether we can develop a vaccine or drugs to fight the disease are still open questions.  We must, if we are going to defeat this terrible disease, use the tools we have to stop the spread while we give real science, not radio announcers and politicians, the space and time they need to test each hypothesis and subject it to peer review so that whatever drugs we find will actually be efficacious and not dangerous to use.  There are plenty of chemical compounds that exist in the world that will kill the virus.  The problem is we have to sort through them to see which won't also kill the patient.  

Greetings:

We do not live on a benign planet!  Everything  is  trying to kill us.  We are social creatures, 6.6 billion of us.  We cannot go backwards in time.  A ongoing disruption in our economy will end up killing more people than the virus.  99% of folks who get the virus will recover. For this we have given up all our Civil Liberties, for some false sense of safety.  I'm going to be 80 in a couple of weeks.  As a American Citizen and a veteran,  I want to die as a free man.

Crankster78