Read This First, Heuristics (1), Glossary (A-H), Mini Lessons (3)
1. Purity, 1.1. Morals don’t Matter, 1.2. African Bioethics, 2. Climate Justice, 2.1. Climate Collapse, 2.2. Shut Parks, 2.3. Devil Medicine, 3. Iatrogenic Air, 4. Statistical Morals, 4.1. Uncertainty, 5. Quack Funding, <ADDED >1. Job vs Death, >2. Swine Fever, >3. Post Trump Speculation, >4. Win Vote or Death. 190106-VCP.
Other Topics: BioTrumpism, BioPolitics, Vaccine, Biosphere, Disaster, Humor, Climate Change, Anthropocene, Anthropogenic, Communication, One Health, Environmental Change, Human Factors, Social Dimensions, Narratives, Corruption, Air Pollution, Food Security, Baysian Statistics, Fake and Misinterpreted Science, Morals
-1. ⊓* Italy's 5 Star Shows Ruthless Streak, Expels Four Parliamentarians. Despite the headline that is obviously designed to be attention getting (this is not the first time 5 Star has expelled members), this would not appear related to PDWN interests. However; in fact this article is directly related to parademic, but the relevance isn’t clear as the article content does not have a direct connection. Part of the 5 Star’s electoral appeal is using moral panic 181230-VCP-Italy, to include anti corruption. To maintain this public image -2- expelling members for not meeting the standards is a risky, but effective, means to maintain the hard core of support. Expulsion is also an easy means to maintain control of a movement by those not in elected positions, operating behind the scenes. The overall theme is Purity. In PDWN this claim to purity theme (which implies other politicians are impure) by the 5 Star is normally noted as antivax 181223-VCP-Italy, and anti immigrants <ADDED 181209-181125-VCP-Italy>4, or Italy First. Humans are not usually prone to self examination, especially when they are so clearly right, so unlikely that negative consequences are not noticed until they result in a cascading failure. This is one reason why political movements that depend on moral panic, unexamined assumptions, populism, emotional appeals, tend to be anti free press and science 181209-VCP-Italy. Facts tend to be pesky distractions that don’t matter. *⊓’s are used with a stub item that is directly related to PDWN interests, but that relation isn’t clear. Why Are So Many Italians Against Vaccines. 190106-VCP-Global. Metacognitive Failure as a Feature of Those Holding Radical Beliefs. Impact of an Organization Wide Knowledge Translation Strategy to Support Evidence Informed Public Health Decision Making.
-1.1. Biotrumpism has used similar narratives about foreign contamination and moral panic, but has taken an additional step that the source or moral action doesn’t need to be moral itself, possibly changing the meaning of moral which implied purity. Why Evangelicals Support President Trump, Despite His Immorality. Trump Retreats from US Moral Leadership Stance. White Evangelicals Turned out for the GOP in Big Numbers Again. -4.1↓.
-1.2. African Bioethics: Methodological Doubts and Insights. A trend called African bioethics -2- is growing on the continent due to perceptions of existing bioethics, especially guidelines for international collaborative research, as ethical imperialism. As a potential alternative to Western Principlism*, African bioethics is supposed to be indigenous to Africa and reflective of African identity. However, despite many positive insights in the on going discussions, it is feared that the growth of bioethics in Africa lacks a clear direction. Some of the views threaten to distort the essence of bioethics and its development on the continent. PDWN doubts that there can ever be a single bioethics that is inclusive of all of Africa, even of subdivisions of Sahara, sub Sahara Africa, West, East, South.... there are simply too many diverse cultures. However; there is a unity about foreign interference and exploitation, a sentiment that can be hijacked and manipulated against Pan African interests. *Principlism: Autonomy of free will, 2. Beneficence to o good, Non malfeasance to do no harm, and Justice with social distribution of benefits and burdens. Bioethics.
-2. Climate Change Action Cannot Ignore Social Issues. Despite a series of troubling new reports and studies, the world has yet to respond adequately to the threat posed by global warming. One reason is that policymakers have not made the connection between climate action and the social and political challenges their countries face. How is it possible that the slow motion threat of climate devastation has not yet been halted. | Insights from the social sciences can help answer this question. The only way to tackle the threat posed by climate change is by simultaneously addressing social and political challenges. When ignored, social issues can trigger political turmoil, which can undermine the political will to fight climate change. In the US and Brazil, Brazil’s New Leader Quick to Please Farmers, Cap Natives’ Lands, voters angry over socioeconomic issues elected leaders who are hostile to climate action. In France, protesters have taken to the streets to oppose a fuel tax hike, not because they are against climate action per se, but because they are anxious about the high cost of living and frustrated with the elite’s perceived indifference. Environmentally centered, technocratic push for climate action is destined to fail. Addressing anxiety about the future of work is both necessary and feasible. Taking action against climate change cannot be separated from social issues. In fact, simultaneously fighting climate change and promoting social justice makes it harder to ignore either one. [Cartoon, Cartoon]. Farmers Know Climate Change is Real. Will the Feds Help Them Adapt. This is the food security conundrum of being hungry but not eating seeds to avoid starvation later. Difference is now people are not willing to go hungry or give up their eating habits, and they are not sure there is a future too save for. <ADDED 181230-181216-4>1. As Loans and Aid Dry Up, U.S. Farmers Face Fresh Challenge from Shutdown, exacerbating problems from climate change, and loss of cheap labor. Major Changes Coming for Farmers: National Climate Assessment. | One of the social issue ignored here is that denial of fact is also a social issue, More Fake Climate Science.
-‡. Professor: Full Story on Climate Change Requires the Long View, Visualizing the Interconnections among Climate Risks. Despite Climate Change, There Will Be Enough Food for 10 Billion in 2050, food security is not the problem, but nutrition security could be. You Can't Separate Health and Wellness from Climate Change. How the Partial Government Shutdown Is Hampering Climate Efforts. Climate Change Is A Political Issue That Cannot Be Avoided. Intellectual Humility: The Importance of Knowing You Might Be Wrong. Toll on Science and Research Mounts as Government Shutdown Continues. Millions Could Face Severe Cuts to Food Stamps Due to Government Shutdown. | United States Federal Government Shutdown of 2013.
-2.1. One of the indicators that climate change is being more widely accepted is that the concept is being applied to historical events. How Climate Change Caused the World’s First Ever Empire to Collapse. The collapse was followed by mass migration from north to south which was met with resistance by the local populations. A 180km wall – the Repeller of the Amorites$ – was even built between the Tigris and Euphrates in an effort to control immigration, not unlike some strategies proposed today. Climate Change Forces Central American Farmers to Migrate. What Historians Can Teach Us About Climate Change, 181223-2. | Another indicator, as several previous stubs point out <ADDED 181216-181209-2>3A, 181118-3.1, there are also linguistic changes. For example elite$ -2- -3- -4- -5- -6- -7- -8-, and political tipping point -2- -3- -4- -5-. [Cartoon]. Does it Matter That Trump Has Only Spent 6 Percent of the Wall Money$. -180819-7.1↓. What America Can Learn from the Fall of the Roman Republic, <ADDED 181021-180513-1.1>9. 180121-1. I Live in the Midwest & Northern Great Plains - Does Climate Change Matter to Me Video.
-2.2. This particular government shutdown is providing hard data on health harm caused by such action. Human Waste, Trash Overwhelm Some National Parks in Shutdown, Meet the Toilet Paper Angels Who Tackle the Dirty Job of Cleaning Up National Parks During the Shutdown, Zinke: Park Visitors Should Grab a Trash Bag, [Cartoon], Three People Have Died in National Parks since Start of Government Shutdown. National Parks Taking Unprecedented Move to Support Operations During Shutdown with Entrance Fees, House Panel to 'Demand Answers' on Interior's Move to Use Visitor Fees to Keep Parks Open, is the equivalent of having to pay to cross a bridge or use a road, see a politician, go into a hospital, when it is paid for by taxes.
-2.3. Dealing with Devil Has Long Been a Part of Medicine. It has been speculated that social disruptions have lead to an increase in reports of demonic possessions. In 1566 Amsterdam, that would have been the Dutch becoming a republic, religious persecution of Protestant vs Catholic and Calvinists vs Anabaptists, the start of the 80 years war/ Dutch Revolt, being a center of world trade. PDWN has also noted increased reporting of supernatural creatures during biocalamities, that tend to correlated with social disruption, ass seen in the US at this time Demand for Exorcisms on the Rise, Says One American Priest Who Conducts Them, Trump’s Policies ‘Come from the Darkness,’ Says Gillibrand. This however is not a cause and effect, antecedent and behavior relation. It is not of a correlation that if one is found it is like the other will also be found. Students Who Take Latin Have Better Chance of Summoning Demon Later in Life. Magic Can Increase Belief in Pseudoscience. The 2018 List of the Worst in Anti Science.
-3. China's War on Particulate Air Pollution Is Causing More Severe Ozone Pollution. The rapid reduction of the pollutant PM 2.5 dramatically altered the chemistry of the atmosphere, leading to an increase in harmful ground level ozone pollution, especially in large cities. We run into iatrogenic constantly in parademic. Attempts to help either health or the environment without understanding the consequences of the change that causes, resulting in unintended harm. Unfortunately it is not always to possible to wait to study what may happen, and sometimes there is no way of knowing than to try. The trick is to do such unavoidable experiments in ways that can be reversed if they go wrong, or start small when possible. ¶ Toxic Smog Shrouds Indian Capital as Pollution Soars, Govt Measures Fail. Environmental Groups Threaten Lawsuit over Air Quality in Arizona, Utah.
-4. People Make the Same Bayesian Judgment They Criticize in Others. When two individuals from different social groups exhibit identical behavior, egalitarian codes of conduct call for equal judgments of both individuals. However, this moral imperative is at odds with the statistical imperative to consider priors based on group membership. Insofar as these priors differ, Bayesian rationality calls for unequal judgments of both individuals. We show that participants criticized the morality and intellect of someone else who made a Bayesian judgment, shared less money with this person, and incurred financial costs to punish this person. However, participants made unequal judgments as a Bayesian statistician would, thereby rendering the same judgment that they found repugnant when offered by someone else. This inconsistency, which can be reconciled by differences in which base rate is attended to, suggests that participants use group membership in a way that reflects the savvy of a Bayesian and the disrepute of someone they consider to be a bigot. Our Social Judgments Reveal a Tension Between Morals and Statistics. <ADDED 181202-181118-3.2>4.
-4.1. It has been noted that what is fact is no longer certain. Biotrumpism has also made what is moral and/or ethical uncertain 1.1↑. Trump Cabinet Bible Study Teaches About The 'False Religion of Radical Environmentalism', Evangelicals Who Don’t Support Trump May Be 'Immoral,' Jerry Falwell Jr. Says. The Ugly Nihilism of Jerry Falwell Jr.’s Comments About Why It Doesn’t Matter if Trump Is Immoral. Pope Suggests Trump Is Not Christian 2016. Nancy Pelosi: Border Wall Is Immoral, Expensive, Unwise. Trump Says He Could Declare National Emergency to Build Wall, Warns of Yearslong Shutdown, Fact Check: What's a National Emergency, and Can Trump Declare One to Get His Wall. | Fake News, Fake Science: Reflections of Teaching Introduction to Biological Anthropology in the Era of Trump. Now that fake news articles are being shared on social media by Russian hackers and alt right media, navigating what is true science and what is not can be difficult. Social media functions as a way to share content quickly so that the readership of an article increases exponentially as it is continuously shared. However, this issue of fake news is not only a problem on social media platforms. It can take many different forms. Predatory journal editors solicit manuscripts from junior faculty and young scholars in order to publish their research for a fee in fraudulent journals. Academics can quickly brush off poorly designed research and fake news when it surfaces on the Internet or in journals, but eager students who want to learn and impress their professor may not find such sources so simple to dismiss. Anthropologists who specialize in biological anthropology borrow methodologies and theories from the subdisciplines of anthropology and other academic disciplines to augment their interpretation of their data. The line between what is considered acceptable research and what is considered biased science or even modern eugenics is very thin, and scientific ideas can be used inappropriately to produce inaccurate or extreme conclusions. Scientist Legislators Are No Cure for Bad Science Policy.
-5. Clever way for quacks to spread the blame. Crowdfunding Drives Funds and Attention Toward Questionable Medical Treatments. Many Americans turn to crowd funding to pay for medical care. But sometimes the money covers unproven treatments. Should crowd funding companies be held accountable for spreading false hopes. The combination of desperation from as yet incurable diseases, expense for treatment, lack of insurance, “right to try” legislation, allows this to be possible. If a biocalamity accelerated at the same time as a government shutdown there would lead to even more problems, The CDC and the Shutdown: Potentially a Big Deal 2013, How the Shutdown Might Affect Your Health 2018.
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-181223-1>1. Upton Sinclair on Why People Don't Deal with Climate Change. It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it. 181028-5, 180826-1. The relationship between geography and employment has appeared several times in PDWN. If anyone is interested in more references from PDWN let the curator know through comments. How Your Brain Stops You from Taking Climate Change Seriously. Not so far discussed about geography and employment is where those who profit from an industry work and live. The assumption is that they profit from the income, but are not at risk by being in proximity, but is that true. In addition where do those who advocate getting rid of toxic industries live and do they profit by an industry dying, or its geographic area becoming available as people are forced to leave (migrate) to find employment and affordable places to live.
-181118-VCP-China>2, <ADDED 181125>8, This has continued to spread since last noted in PDWN, but nothing new in terms of intersection with social sphere, that is until, African Swine Fever Hits Huge, Foreign Invested Chinese Farm owned by a Danish investment fund, showing the spread of the virus to modern industrial farms expected to have the best levels of disease prevention. China Warns Pig Trade Against African Swine Fever Cover Ups as Taiwan Concerns Grow.
-180819-7.1>3, <ADDED 180826>2. Sci Fi Writers Are Grappling with a Post Trump Reality. -2.1↑. In 2018 fantasy author N.K. Jemisin became the first person to ever win three consecutive Hugo awards for Best Novel. She is the guest editor of #Book The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2018 [Cover]. Many of the stories have a clear political message that will make readers think hard about current political realities. One in which humanity declines to aid extraterrestrial refugees grapples with the issue of morally compromised bystanders, of not taking action and being complicit with evil. A truth about rivers: There’s so much gone now. Not just our dead but all that we held. The fish and the plants – the life. What remains is only dry earth and memories, and maybe there will come a day when not even those are Left. This Guy Is Devoting His Life to Spreading Climate Change Fiction.
-180513-1.1>4. In the Aftermath of Elections, Access to Internet and Social Networks Cut. Cutting communication is a desperate behavior to remain in power, and during a disease outbreak it also means that channels of communication are also cut, as well as sources of information. These are crucial in identifying new patients and their locations, contact tracing, information sharing, debunking what misinformation is in circulation, updates on getting medical and health care for non Ebola conditions, location of legitimate treatment for Ebola and what scams are exploiting the situation. General Slowdown of Response Activities Due to Security Situation. Beni: Health Structures Threaten to Close after Fires in Health Centers. Ramping Up the Response to Ebola. Congolese Flee to Uganda after Vote, Raising Ebola Fears. Congo’s Catholic Church Says Data Show Clear Election Winner, Election Violence in Congo Hinders Ebola Response, Beni: Electoral Tensions Have Not Affected the Response to Ebola. DRC: Is it Impossible to Speak of a Political Ebola. US Deploying Troops to Congo Ahead of Possible Violent Demonstrations Following Election, US Deploys Troops to Gabon amid Fears of Unrest in DRC, probably more about the Benghazi narrative than for Ebola medical personnel providing support. Ebola Total Tops 600; Vaccination Team Attacked. Outliving Death: Ebola, Zombies, and the Politics of Saving Lives. Swedish Hospital Isolates Patient amid Ebola Suspicion, Sweden: No Ebola Virus Detected in Hospital Patient. Free Healthcare Is Doing Well in Different Health Facilities in Butembo. Pregnant Women and the Ebola Crisis. Ebola Response Activities Cautiously Resume in Beni. Congo Delays Announcing Results of Presidential Election, Congo Election Results Delayed past Sunday Deadline. It seems absurd to risk an epidemic to win an election, but there are many examples of this world wide, see 181223-VCP and previous weeks. ¶ In the Shadow of Tomorrow Ebola vaccine research in Liberia; WHO’s Tedros: Experimental Ebola Vaccine in the DRC Has Saved Countless Lives, 190106-VCP-III, DRC.
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