Progress Requires Curiosity, Skepticism, and Cooperation: How we will beat covid-19
By Gary Larson
There is an ancient parable about six blind men who encounter an elephant for the first time and attempt to define it. They each approach the beast from different angles. The one feeling the trunk believes it to be a large snake. The one feeling its side thinks it is a wall. The one touching the leg thinks it is a tree, etc. There are several versions of the parable. One has them believing that the others are lying, or just plain ignorant. Their attempts to convince each other as to the truth ends disastrously. Some tales have the men resorting to bad-mouthing each other in public. Some lead to them ceasing all communication. Finally, there are versions where they resort to physical violence. In each case, the result is that they will never know what an elephant really is.
Happier versions involve communication and cooperation between the perplexed individuals. In each version, the people slowly come to a consensus that the elephant has different parts; they were each initially partially correct and incorrect at the same time. They may never know all of the details about the pachyderm, such as its color. There may come a time when a person with vision can inform them exactly what the elephant looks like, as in some versions of the story.
As far as science goes, this parable is a gem. The pursuit of knowledge involves small bits of information observed (sometimes accurate, sometimes not) by individuals or small groups. The data is usually only useful as a call to other scientists for further research. Each observer may have their own perspective and set of skills that will enable the discovery of new information not previously considered by others. Along the way, as the picture comes into focus, it is vital to maintain all communication, unique perspectives, and sharing of data. Oftentimes doubt may arise. In time the doubt may turn into disbelief. If the disbelief is based on concrete, reproducible experiments, it should become a general consensus. On the other hand, if new ideas are dismissed, censored, or mocked without foundation, scientific progress can cease. In the end, Science relies upon both skepticism and individual thought in the backdrop of cooperation.
In the 1840s, Ignaz Semmelweis was driven to madness because he suggested hand-washing before surgery saved lives. He was right; his detractors were DEAD WRONG. Instead of accepting his theory (which Semmelweis had proven experimentally), they impugned his reputation and mocked him. He died in a public insane asylum five years later, at the age of 47. It took several more decades before handwashing became the norm before surgery. As a result, countless people died who otherwise could have lived if Semmelweiss was taken seriously.
Shutting down scientific inquiry prevents progress. Scientific knowledge is often wrong, and further investigations lead to clarification. Sometimes theories are debunked, and sometimes they are proven. That is how science works.
Recently, as I have done in the past, I reached out for help understanding some data I was looking at. The dataset had to do with the CDC US mortality numbers for 2019 through 2020. It contained all of the individual conditions that cause death, including death by natural causes. It also included a count of all deaths compiled by the CDC. The data was arranged by month and spanned 2019 and 2020. When I started to look at the data, things just did not add up. The total death count the CDC gives cannot be accounted for by adding up their individual causes.
I reached out to Genevieve Briand, the Assistant Director for MS in Applied Economics program at Johns Hopkins. As an economist, she is an expert in data inspection. She had also recently done an informal examination of the exact CDC database that I was studying. She responded immediately, even though it was the holiday weekend, and I am very grateful. I also contacted the owner of the database at the CDC to ask how to interpret the data. They answered me quickly as well, and I am grateful to them too. I was told the following by both of them:
Death by natural causes is defined as death other than by an accident, murder, and suicide. I did not know that, causing my manual total individual death count to be much higher than the number the CDC reported. I ended up removing it from my calculations.
The CDC added:
If I tried to add up all of their individual causes, the total would differ from the actual number of deaths they report. The CDC has a separate column for the real number of deaths that occur each month. Deaths can be represented by more than one individual cause. The data is meant to find correlations, NOT FOR DIRECT COMPARISON. In essence, the CDC told me their data won’t “add up.”
The informal discussion Genevieve gave in a video conference to students was covered in an article in the school newspaper and then taken down as “misleading.” She spoke about the relationship between deaths from Covid-19 and deaths from heart attacks. She was criticized for the comparison, and the article was taken down as a precaution due to concerns that her talk might lead to disbelief that the pandemic is not as bad as it is. Luckily Genevieve sent me the links to her talk and the article in her email.
I have read the article the school paper published, watched the video of her talk, and read the newspaper retraction statement, as well as read the piece done by Factcheck.org. My personal opinion is that Genevieve was not trying to mislead anyone. She was demonstrating a particular way to interpret the data and suggested more inquiry into the subject. She did not seem remotely dogmatic about her convictions. Genevieve freely admitted her lack of medical knowledge and suggested that others pick up where her knowledge leaves off. She was doing what most scholars do; uncovering information and asking for help clarifying its significance.
On the other hand, Factcheck.org took an authoritative stance, in my opinion. Before getting into the Johns Hopkins article, they mention an entirely different article while debunking the school newspaper piece, calling the headline false, and accusing the publisher of being “alt-right,” which is meant as an aspersion. They then charge this other article as spreading misinformation without clarifying any points made in it or why they are incorrect.
I have seen this tactic before. They set up a “straw man” in place of Ms. Briand and expected the reader to draw direct comparisons. They then introduce their expert Steven Woolf. He has an impressive title, which is meant to elevate his stance and diminish Genevieve’s. I could not find where Dr. Woolf has any conflict of interest as a fact-checker, but a recent New York Post article was dismissed by a group that had definite conflicts of interest with the article they fact-checked. You the details here. Dr. Woolf mentions “multiple studies” without giving any citations to back up his claims. When they get back to talking about the Johns Hopkins article, they employ words like “unsophisticated” and “crude.”
Factcheck does raise several valid points about her presentation that I agree with when they are not using yellow journalism. They do a disservice by pushing a narrative that tends towards a dismissive attitude. I believe that further analysis and discussion could be fruitful. We will never know if we don’t look into it further. Alas, it seems the result is that the conversation has potentially died, or at least lost momentum.
I do not want readers to think that they should not follow every reasonable precaution available to avoid the spread of Covid-19. Most of the posts I have done on the subject of Covid-19 have included EXTRA precautions to consider, such as plenty of sleep and optimal vitamin D levels.
Scientific knowledge is continuously evolving. The only thing we know for sure is that science is never a settled issue for the most part. There will always be new insights that change the way we view scientific phenomena. The quest for knowledge requires steps forward. Sometimes the step is in the wrong direction, and a course correction is needed. Sometimes the step is in a new direction that opens up a whole new branch of understanding.
Darwin’s theory of evolution is a perfect example. He was ridiculed for suggesting that we evolved from apes. Many people thought his suggestion was preposterous. Thankfully he was not dismissed and driven mad like Ignaz Semmelweiss.
When he came up with his theory, he did not know about DNA and genes. Watson and Crick’s discovery of the structure of DNA ultimately led to sequencing the human genome. They thought we would unravel how all of the biological processes in the body happen once the sequencing was accomplished. This did not turn out to be the case, and the field of epigenetics was born. The mRNA Covid-19 vaccination is the latest example of how far we have come since Darwin’s time.