there are certain types of people who are far more likely to stick to the status quo or mainstream view point even if a mountain of contrary data points exist. The mainstream view is safer and more comfortable in their minds, not to mention less likely to earn them the scorn of their peers. Then again, there are people at the other end of the spectrum that form opinions based on too little evidence, too few data points, and a lack of understanding. Even if what they sometimes say has a nugget of truth, they say things that are so sloppy and over reaching it makes everything they say seem off. For example, I've met people who have, in my opinion, several valid points about COVID but they'll blurt out that the virus doesn't even exist or that the vaccine is going to mutate people's DNA (instead of specifying that it may change the epigenetic expression). It makes me cringe, because I realize that they're making everyone who has reasonable (yet non-mainstream) view points about COVID look bad.
To take the COVID vaccine example - which is on topic this thread.
In medicine almost anything is possible. But very little is actually likely.
It is known that both COVID infection and COVID vaccines and here alter epigenetic markers - and not surprising. It is not known how permanent these alterations are nor whether they have any biological significance.
The judgements about what is signiifcant are not simple ones, and not ones you are or can make with any level of confidence without a 6 months review of the literature and to back that up a lot of background in biology. (Also we need to put aside our hypochondria to do so - everyone is there own worst physician).
So, unless we are arrogant, we need to take other people's judgement. There we are choosing people, not evaluating scientific research.
There are five ways can do this:
(1) I can identify when someone is behaving unprofessionally, or is just so obviously clueless even I can detect they are not expert.
(2) I can note when they do the Rossi thing. An individual comes up with an isolated ground breaking invention - possible. Somone who invents - in completely different areas, many different new technologies far ahead of what now exists, they are deceiving you, and possibly also themselves. For antivaxxers this is when a non-biologist publishes striking new evidence of multiple quite distinct discoveries about vaccines, in unrelated fields, that no-one else credits, and that make it obvious all other scientists are wrong.
(3) I can protect myself from people having biasses by going for the peer-reviewed scientific consensus. It is not immune to bias, but it is the best we have, because anyone can contribute, different ideas get rigorously tested against each other, everyone has a motivation to back something novel (if it has a decent chance of being correct). Alas it is low because (high quality) peer review in good journals takes time: and time again for the authors to respond to criticism and tighten their arguments, remove speculation presented as fact, etc.
(4) I can look at detail from bloggers who meet (1), (2) and (3).
One problem here is that I will not pick up outliers with zany ideas no-one much credits. Those outliers are occasionally right, and usually wrong. If I choose the ones that appeal to me I am simply amplifying my own biasses, conscious or unconscious. And on average it is a very poor strategy.
I can do more than read the pre-digested and politically correct opinions. Reading 3 or 4 different serious scientists who have credible backgrounds, engage with the literature seriously, and are mainstream gives me a variety of different views - the mainstream has a lot of variation when it comes to something new like COVID, and srious differences of opinion as you would expect. Just not cast in the lurid populist and unscientific style used by the antivaxxers.
THH
