ViperMan

*If* your standard is 100% prevention of COVID, then yeah, you're right. Here is a study that quite convincingly demonstrates that masks diminish the amount and distance COVID will spread. https://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0015044 Will you get it hanging out in a room with a COVID+ person for a couple hours face-to-face? Probably. The point isn't that it's a silver bullet. The point is that it reduces the probability that you catch the bug. So in that sense, yes it slows the spread. *Also* there will never be any 100% definitive proof, because we don't have two separate universes that we're testing masks vs no masks in an open planet. You either believe the common sense argument that it reduces the energy of your breath thereby reducing how far COVID can go, or you don't. Which it does, because it's hard to breath through. Note: I'm in the camp that thinks masking up is ridiculous at this point. That said, I can still admit that masks have some positive effect. BL: Get the vaccine or don't. Take your own chances. Everyone at this point has had the opportunity to get it if they so choose. I'm vaxxed and am going back to normal now.

I agree that masks slow the spread, but comparing death rates across these countries is fraught with difficulty. For starters, Japan's obesity rate is ~4%. In the US, not one state has less than 20% obesity. Stated differently, our skinniest folks are 5x fatter than Japan - some states approach or exceed 10x! So what amount of the difference is due to their mask adherence vs. them just being much, much healthier in general? I don't know, but I think I'd rather have a BMI < 30 and not wear a mask than rely on a cloth mask to save me. https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/prevalence-maps.html

To be totally clear, I don't think it was an intentional release, though I am firmly in the camp that it was an accidental leak. Thaaaaaat said, there are plenty of viable, and reasonable answers to all these questions. Ruling it out is premature. I think the most important thing to look at is how China maneuvers in a post-COVID world. How does the world become re-aligned, or how do things take shape in their favor (or against ours) in the near term future. Those questions will be far more illuminating than ever hoping for some smoking gun to be reported in the NYT or WSJ. 1. How about deniability? Worst case, is now "ooops, sorry everyone". 2. To create chaos and throw the world into turmoil. How about it doesn't need to be Captain Tripps/End of days. It just needs to fuck everything up economically. War by other means, and such...

So now Pizzagate, Qanon, and microchipped vaccines are akin to wanting a secure border? Or wanting the people who are here to be American, want them to be American, and be actual participants in our system...not just here for a handout from the greatest civilization on Earth? Do you seriously not think there are legitimate problems being identified by the right in this country? Or is everything racist? GTFOH.

We're currently pushing it to the CAF...

Really? You're about to lose sleep? Here, grab ahold of these:

Military: Established that you need to take vaccines. Experimental vaccines, open question. Civilian: Doesn't matter if it's a sugar pill. Can't make anyone take it for any reason whatsoever.

What he means is that you don't automatically give up every right you have. He leaves room, though, for some rights to have been "given up."

I'm with you in theory, but there is established precedent for vaccination being required for people in the military. Anyone in the military today knows this. That said, "experimental" vaccines are probably an open question - in my legal opinion (which isn't worth shit, btw). J&J ok. Phizer/Moderna, you may have a case.

Without resorting to bible thumping, do you not recognize or understand that a pregnant woman is two separate (albeit connected) beings with different DNA? A person can be charged with double murder if they kill a pregnant woman. At the very least, we can at least agree that our laws are schizophrenic on the issue (at best). Conflating these two issues is a stretch. And throwing the "bible" poop at the wall in an attempt to relegate the view to a simple-minded, and/or limited to religious objection is side-stepping the actual issue. My gut tells me that abortion is wrong - at the very least becomes more wrong the further into a pregnancy a woman gets. I don't need to appeal to any book or religion to arrive at that conclusion. Yours is the same argument anti-gun nuts make when they "ok" gun use for hunting or sporting. Which, sorry to say, is not what the 2nd amendment is about.

Uhhhhhggggg. Reading the last few pages of this thread is a bunch of tiresome strawmen and red herring. A bunch of people trying to convince others' that they have the correct version of "because X". News flash: the ground truth, fundamental point is that you have rights in this country. One of those is the right to bodily autonomy. Notwithstanding military exceptions, if you don't want to take the vaccine for a valid or invalid reason or no reason at all (spite), that is your RIGHT. You don't need a because. No one gets to fucking tell you different around these United States. It's that simple.

Yeah, I certainly don't either. But it does concern me that I see similar narratives being talked about in other outlets. It concerns me more that these come from so-called serious outlets. Fox may be biased towards the right, but I don't see actual, overt racism passing on that network. The example cited is particularly egregious, but it's not unique. I came across a CNN article (which I begrudgingly admit is a source I frequent) that glorified the act of quitting. I thought the take was ridiculous, and (of course) so did other conservative news outlets. That clip was the central subject of one of those articles which rightfully identified it as racist. Let's hope you're right.

Exquisite logic. Unfortunately it's because that approach doesn't have the unstated, but desired, effect of stigmatizing the unvaccinated.

I'm triggered by our societal reaction to her act, as embodied by the liberal media, not the act in and of itself. As others have made clear, it's her body, her choice. No one should ever be forced to participate in something they feel is against their best interest. That said, the media is using the story as a mechanism to continue to centralize topics they want to talk about, in a light they wish to cast them. For instance, MSNBC's Nicole Wallace called out "doughy, white, right-leaning, losers" in order to talk about how "f'd up" our country is. That's the story's actual utility for the media, and is the actual reason it's being talked about. That's what I'm frustrated by. It's being abused to continue harping on the race trope. Sadly, the host in the clip below is unironically racist herself. It would be funny if it were satire; unfortunately, she's being completely serious. See for yourself how a racist statement it just tossed out by someone who is taken as credible. Imagine, if you will, had the statement been along the lines of "malnourished, Chinese, bat-eating, weasels." Would anyone tolerate that for a second had it been an utterance by Trump? Should it be tolerated as 'ok' by one of our major (so-called) serious media outlets?

Nor does it mean worse. There is information that matters, and there is information that doesn't matter. Models that contain information that doesn't matter, learn things that don't matter (i.e. are false). All things equal, models that contain a greater amount of "mattering" information vs. models that contain "non-mattering" information are better. Hence my comment that the model as presented contains information that matters, and is also able to be collected uniformly. I just don't think there's much else in the way that matters to be collected re: pilot candidates - and a model that says you can get to a 94% predictive value agrees. RE: invisible factors: What would appear, however, are large, unexplained - and inexplicable - deviations from the model. Those deviations (outliers) would lead whoever is using the model to question what the hell is going on - no such deviation is present in the model indicated, as it is able to predict with 94% accuracy who would graduate. Models that don't account for latent (hidden) variables - what you're addressing - don't approach 94% accuracy.

I agree it'd be great to have more pilots, and if we could get to a 94% graduation rate, that'd be awesome for us and the taxpayers. But already we're at ~85%. The question I would ask is why is there a need to change the approach to selecting those who attend UPT? The only reason I can think of is because it's not currently working - which it clearly is by any actual metric. So it must be something else. The average US high school graduation rate is about the same (~88%). The average 4-yr college graduation rate is ~33%, and gets up to ~60% after 6 years. Was there a pilot shortage in the 60s, 70s, and 80s? I don't remember and didn't look it up. The bottom line, IMO, is if the USAF really wants more pilots, they need to get serious and open up another UPT base.

I'm intentionally being mildly derisive. I honestly don't really care that she took a knee, as it at least appears to be justified. What I'd rather point at is how such an act would be viewed by the PTB if Michael Jordan did it in game 6 after a poor quarter. Or if Pat Mahomes had done it after throwing an interception in the first quarter of the super bowl. Does anyone honestly think there would be a mass movement coalescing around those individual's decision to "take care of themselves" and throw in the towel? Of course not. Neither of those athletes (and most others at their level) would be given that benefit of the doubt. The would be blasted on ESPN the next day, perhaps rightfully, for not staying on the field of battle. Sports is certainly physical, but playing at any level requires a certain level of mental fortitude - overcoming that is what makes someone great - not quitting. So I just view it as one more example of coddling that is going on. We should be instilling fortitude and an attitude of "never quit." Yeah, this.

Who cares about gymnastics?

Ok, you really made a strong point and focused heavily about certain types of data being excluded being a problem, though - I didn't get much in the way of descriptive vs. predictive modeling. In any case, descriptive models / analysis don't exclude data from a data set - predictive models / analysis do exclude certain data from the model. In a typical case (not sure what the specific split was in this study), the a data set is split 70/30 into a training and a test data set. The model created using the training data is then used on the test data (not present in the model) to predict a certain variable (outcome) - in this case whether or not someone graduated from UPT. So this study is certainly using predictive modelling techniques. To your point about other factors affecting certain variables limiting their value, if there is data that can indicate a true/false or yes/no or 1/0, then machine learning techniques are flexible enough to account for them. If the data isn't present, in many cases, it'll be a wash in the aggregate. But to answer your point directly, having a degree doesn't make you a good pilot, but having a degree is an indicator that you are more likely to graduate from UPT. And further, the more difficult the degree, the higher the likelihood you'll graduate. Though to be extremely clear, this is not shown by the data available, since every USAF pilot has a degree - it's not variable among pilots - but it is well understood to be generally true.

Yep. What this study really says is this: "Hey Air Force, if you adjust the relative weights of the selection criteria you're already using, you could do about 9% better in choosing your pilot candidates. That's a decent improvement." One thing I noticed, though, is that the model was not published, nor was the data. Both would be very interesting to play with and see. They talk a lot about how they used a decision-tree model (which tend to be more explicable). This makes it easier for the Bob's to know what's going on inside the black box.

Survivorship bias doesn't have anything to do with the criteria being used in an evaluation - it has to do with the "subset" of data points included in the analysis. See the small section about "missing bullet holes" in the wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias. It's an interesting and counter-intuitive discussion about how our intuition works and how easily our "reasoning" can be led astray by invisible and incorrect assumptions. In that situation, the mistake the military made was to only look at bombers that returned from combat - not bombers that didn't make it back (i.e. the ones that were shot down). That led them to draw wildly wrong conclusions about where to armor up the bomber fleet. By way of analogy, this study includes UPT graduates (bombers that "make it back") and UPT washouts (bombers that "don't make it back") - it doesn't include intel school washouts and/or AFIT graduates because that isn't going to tell you anything about graduating from UPT. It didn't make sense to include data where P-38s were or weren't getting shot up because it was a study focused on bombers. It's not survivorship bias, you're advocating for using more dimensions of data - which is fine. A few things. First, any prediction that is going to be made, will by definition, be "backwards looking" since there's no such thing as future data. And while there definitely may potentially be better predictor variables out there, the difficulty will be to capture them in a consistent and reliable way across a large population which is distributed across multiple communities and multiple time spans - not an easy challenge. Maybe if we could somehow capture those students who used to "bullseye womprats back on Tatooine" we could enhance our process...it's challenging to get to that level of fidelity though. Already, the fact that > 85% of UPT candidates make it through provides a high level of confidence that UPT selection criteria are pretty good - squeezing out the last few percent becomes increasingly hard in any endeavor. Any average high school varsity basketball player is in the top 1% of all basketball players on earth. Though we all know there is an enormous difference between that kid and Michael Jordan... And finally, this is not like saying women can't be pilots. No scientific researcher looking at that data and looking at how people were selected for pilot training back in the 80s would ever draw that conclusion. I get your point about the insight gained being limited by the data, but then so is everything else because we don't have perfect measurement for anything. In any case, all the data used in this study included women. Correct. Though I would say the model "includes" the unsuccessful events in order to learn from them. Not emphasizes. So is your suggestion to include people not selected for UPT and then measure how the do in UPT? Or is it to just lump random people into the study who didn't go? I'd pay to see the first executed. If you're suggesting the second, then I think all that study will conclude is that being selected for UPT is the most important data point in determining who graduates from UPT - not exactly a ground-breaking research. The point is that a study like this is not the same as a vaccine trial. You are already selecting from a group that self-selected and there is nothing you can do as the researcher to affect the outcome you want to examine (UPT graduation) from a group of people that doesn't want to be military pilots.

No. "Otherwise illegal" is talking about the government, not Facebook. i.e. it is illegal for the government to prohibit speech (generally). It is still illegal when they induce a company to do it on their behalf - that's where the 1st amendment violation comes in. *If* Facebook or Twitter took it upon themselves to censor that speech, without government intervention, they are 100% free to do so. As you say, Facebook is not a public space - problem is, it doesn't have to be for a first amendment violation to take place when the government intervenes. For example, the government can't censor your speech on a public sidewalk, why would they be able to censor it in your private home? Ok, so now expressing skepticism over getting a vaccine is akin to yelling 'fire' in a movie theater? I think the difference is that one of those acts is capable of causing acute, immediate panic which leads to injury or death - I'd be interested to see that case made in court, re: COVID vaccines. I fully grant that herd immunity is of public health interest. In any case, are you familiar with the Thalidomide tragedy? What if people had expressed 'doubt' about taking Thalidomide back in the 50s? How would they have fared in our current environment? Point being, the government or PTB don't always know what is best, and mistakes get made. There is no long-term data on COVID-19 or on the side-effects of the vaccine - none. And I think, generally, people can tell the difference between complete and utter BS, and actual healthy skepticism. For example, I got the vaccine - full believer in modern medical tech. Yet simultaneously, I find it much more credible to consider the lab-leak hypothesis for the origin of the virus than I do the zoonotic origin - yet I would be labelled 'conspiratorial' in many circles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide Well, as a matter of legal fact, it doesn't have to block anything directly. Merely inducing, promoting, or encouraging, is enough to constitute government intervention and a violation of individuals' rights.

Well, I asked specifically "apart from what we think is happening in society right now" to help us get somewhere with this argument - that you stuck to how it applies here feels like a further attempt to side-step the actual issue at hand. I don't think there's anything wrong with lawmakers voicing their opinions! Jeez, that's a fundamental aspect of our system. But your misrepresentation of the issue is a dodge - the problem isn't with "voicing opinions" - the problem is when the government induces, encourages, or promotes action or policy out of a private entity that would be otherwise illegal for them to do. That is happening when congressional committeemen (who can call on the likes of Jack Dorsey and Mark Z to testify at their behest) and presidential administrations publicly state their desire that the company had best comply with their dictates, lest they suddenly find themselves being legislated. I wasn't really paying attention to that, honestly. But to answer your question, I think libel laws are probably ok as they are. But I frankly know nothing about them. BTW, I'm no Trump apologist.

I guess I'll just ask it simply, apart from what we think is actually happening in society right now: do you think that when the government pressures a company to do what it otherwise cannot, there is a potential violation of the constitution? i.e. do you think Norwood v. Harrison was correct? "It is “axiomatic,” the Supreme Court held in Norwood v. Harrison (1973), that the government “may not induce, encourage or promote private persons to accomplish what it is constitutionally forbidden to accomplish.” https://www.wsj.com/articles/save-the-constitution-from-big-tech-11610387105 May not induce, encourage, or promote...what do you think that means? Must there be legislation in your view for there to be a problem? Because if so, that's not in accordance with established legal precedent in our country. That is to say, I'm fine if it's your opinion that you think that case was decided incorrectly, or that the concept itself is wrong. That said, from a legal standpoint, from a constitutional standpoint, there needn't be any legal action or legislation in the works to constitute a violation of the constitution. Which is why the argument you're making is a straw man. It's not necessary for there to be legal action. You're cherry-picking a single example. What about the others? i.e. members of Congress calling for legal action, etc? Nadler, etc? i.e. encouraging and promoting...

https://nypost.com/2021/07/15/white-house-flagging-posts-for-facebook-to-censor-due-to-covid-19-misinformation/ Also, see the removal of the ability to post about the Hunter Biden laptop from Twitter and Facebook. Is legislation necessary in your view? Or are the threats levied against these companies (previously cited) enough? What about the fact that it is actually happening? Like, right now. Again, there is established legal precedent that has found that the government threat of legal action against a book publisher constituted a violation of the first amendment. Now, back to my question. Do you understand the distinction being made?