Episode 1575 Scott Adams: Today I Will Trigger Some of You Into Cognitive Dissonance. Sorry
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Content:
A new COVID variant, Omicron
Provocative tweets and cognitive dissonance
Tells for cognitive dissonance
Vaccinated versus unvaccinated
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Good morning everybody and welcome to the best thing that's ever happened.
Coffee was Scott Adams and it never disappoints.
Never. Never.
Especially today. So, before we get into the fun stuff, I'd like to take a moment to remind you I don't care if you get vaccinated.
We'll get into some things later.
Now, again, I'm not going to talk about whether you should get vaccinated.
We're going to do a little experiment to see how many people I can trigger into cognitive dissonance in a live setting.
I'll tell you what to look for, and then you're going to watch it happen in real time.
Okay? So it's going to be fun.
But again, I don't care if you get vaccinated.
I'm not trying to influence you one way or another.
But watch what happens when we just talk about it.
It's going to be interesting, I think.
But first, how would you like to take it up another notch?
Yeah, you're that kind of person.
Would you settle for less when you could have more?
No, of course not.
And so you want more, you want the simultaneous sip, and all you need is a cup or a mug or a glass of tank or a chelsea stein, a canteen jug or a flask, a vessel of any kind.
Fill it with your favorite liquid.
I like coffee. And join me now.
For the unparalleled pleasure.
The dopamine hit of the day, the thing that makes everything better.
Accept your booster shot.
It's called the simultaneous sip and it happens now.
Go. Yeah.
It's going to be good. It's going to be good.
Now, I would like all of you to help me express fake shock.
Do any current events change what I've written in LoserThink?
I don't know. So I'd like you all to participate in this at home.
I'm going to read you a news headline, and I want you to pretend to be shocked.
Okay? Here's the headline.
Just when we thought the pandemic could be winding down...
It seems there's a new variant.
What? What?
What? Are you kidding me?
I did not see that coming.
Did anybody see that coming?
I'm shocked! I'm shocked!
Literally, the most fucking predictable thing that could ever happen in the world.
Now, Remember I told you that follow the money works even when it shouldn't?
Even when money seems to be not part of the decision, it always predicts.
Always. Because what would be the most profitable thing for the pharma companies?
Another variant, of course.
Of course.
And wouldn't you imagine...
That it's likely that the vaccines will work against the variant to give you a little extra push?
Or maybe somebody will come up with a new pill that only works against the variant.
Well, now you say to yourself, but Scott, the pharma companies might like to sell more vaccines.
Of course. But that has nothing to do with the fact that other scientists have discovered this variant.
You know, the variant is either there or it isn't, right?
The variant is just a fact.
It's either true or it's false.
It has nothing to do with follow the money.
Except that follow the money always predicts right.
Why? So you knew this was common.
And I'll say again...
The odds that some novel virus, such as coronavirus, which we highly suspect may have been engineered, if it were engineered in a way that would trigger a lot of deadly variants, wouldn't we have a lot more of them?
The deadliest ones?
Really, just one or two?
I feel as though you would have dozens or hundreds, or maybe zero.
But exactly the right number to support the vaccine program, right?
That of all the possibilities, from one to infinity, of how many deadly variants there could be, there's just three.
You know, the original, Delta, and then this one.
And they happen to happen at just the right time.
Okay, I'm a little suspicious of all of this, as all of us should be.
Let me give you a persuasion lesson in one tweet.
I tweeted something obnoxious, and the purpose of the tweet was attention, of course.
So the first part of persuasion is attention.
So here's the tweet, and I'll tell you what the technique is in it.
I said that political influence is the product of persuasion skill...
Times reach.
For example, if I had 10 million Twitter followers, I would be in charge of America.
Now, is that true?
Is that true?
Doesn't matter. Well, it got your attention, right?
But here's the first part.
So I started with saying that political influence is the product of persuasion skill times reach.
How many of you would agree with that claim?
That if you were persuasively skilled, that wouldn't help you at all if nobody knew about it.
But if you had a giant platform, you know, 10 million users, you'd have more...
basic, right? So the first part of the influence is that I say something you'll agree with.
That's good persuasion.
The first thing I say is something you'll agree with.
That's what salespeople do.
Works with tweets. Works with everything.
So first you start by pacing and or.
This isn't exactly pacing.
It's more like saying something that sounds smart that you agree with.
What happens when I say something that sounds smart?
Forget about whether it is.
If I say something that sounds smart and you agree with it, what have I done?
I just made you feel smart.
And you and I just formed a bond.
Yeah, we're the smart ones.
I know what you said, and I get it, right?
So it's a little bonding thing, and it primes people for what comes.
And then I gave the example.
I said, if I had 10 million Twitter followers, I'd be in charge of America.
Someone pointed out, accurately, that I had once said something along the lines, if I had one million Twitter followers, that I would be the most influential person, or something like that.
Now, suppose I could get you to debate whether it would take me one million users, or ten million, to run the country.
It's thinking past the sale, right?
If you're debating how many users I need before I'm in charge of the country, I've made you accept that I would be in charge of the country as some number, which is a little bit absurd and yet true at the same time.
I mean, it feels absurd, even to me, but it's a little bit true.
Somebody with my persuasion skills.
Trump has them. There are lots of other people who have the skills.
But they don't necessarily have the huge platform.
And when Trump did, look what he did.
When he had the huge platform and the persuasion skills.
President of the United States.
So... And then I also used the phrase, I would be in charge of America.
Did you catch that? I didn't say I'd be president.
And I didn't say I wanted the influence, because those things would make you afraid, right?
Like, oh, this guy's trying to become president.
I'm definitely not trying to become president.
And so I said I'd be in charge of America like it would be a duty.
Instead of saying I want it, which I'm not sure I do, it would feel like a responsibility.
It would just feel like a duty. So I put that out there, and it was very unpopular as a tweet, because I think it made people uncomfortable, but that was part of the point.
But I would argue that at 10 million Twitter followers, I would effectively run the country.
Now, let me put some caveats on that.
I believe that the real way to see who is in charge of everything is that there is a battle of competing Illuminatis for every topic.
Now, I've been behind the curtain enough in the last several years to know that that's actually the best way to see things.
You know, the cartoonish views we have are You know, somebody's going to say, Jews control the world.
You know, somebody's going to say that.
Somebody's going to say, it's the elite.
Or there's an Illuminati.
Or it's the deep state.
There's always some shadowy group that you're afraid is running everything.
The actual best way to see everything is that for every topic...
There's at least one Illuminati, in other words, one group of people behind the curtain who have something they're trying to influence, but probably competing with others.
So it's like small groups of shadowy figures and you don't know their names, but by the time you see it, it's coming through a politician's mouth.
And by then, all the influence has been laundered out.
You just think it's the politician.
It's usually not.
There's usually a battle behind the curtain, and then the politician just tells you who won for their vote, anyway.
So that's the best way to see the world.
And certainly somebody who had my persuasion skills, and again, it's not because I'm genetically gifted or something.
I'm just saying that I've learned...
I had to persuade that the techniques are learnable, and if you have learned them, if you had 10 million followers, you could pick a topic and probably have a big influence on it.
How many topics do you think I've influenced already?
Like, in the actual national level, tell me what things you think...
Like, give me some examples.
What things do you think I've directly influenced with, you know, half a million to, I guess, 600 and almost 70,000 followers?
I'm seeing Trump.
I'm seeing China. Nuclear policy.
Telemedicine. The simulation.
Fentanyl awareness.
Coffee. Telemedicine, yeah.
The fine people hoax.
Yeah. So there are enough examples...
That it makes the point, doesn't it?
You know, if I tried to influence everything, it would dilute my influence and I wouldn't be able to get anything done.
But if you've got X number of followers and you know how to influence, you can pick a topic and you can really make a dent.
Look at Greta.
Greta Thunberg makes a dent because she's picked one topic.
If you do that, you can make a big difference.
All right. So apparently this new virus, the Omicron, as it's being called, the big story is that they skipped a few Greek letters to get to Omicron.
And one of the ones they skipped was the letter XI. I don't know how you pronounce the Greek letter XI. But if it were a Chinese name, which it also is, it would be Xi.
I'm saying pronunciation would be Kai.
So if you pronounce it the way the Greek letter would be, it would be chi?
Is that right? Okay.
All right. And somebody says Jack Posobiec pointed out that Omicron is an enneagram for moronic.
Is it? Oh, my God, it is.
Okay. But if you're saying to yourself, oh, the World Health Organization skipped the letter CHI because it looks like XI, then people would say, oh, that's Xi, President Xi of China.
And I'm not sure that's the reason, though, because I think China, there's already a Xi virus.
It's called fentanyl. It kills about 60,000 Americans per year, and that comes from China.
Through the cartels into the United States.
So there's already a Xi virus.
It's just called fentanyl.
From fentanyl, China.
I provocatively tweeted this, which got people all mad.
Which I suppose I expected.
I said, is it my imagination or are the unvaccinated secretly hoping the vaccinated die in large numbers to prove a point?
Now, people, of course, jumped in and said, oh, it's the other way around.
I think those vaccinated people want the unvaccinated to die.
Now, probably some of that.
Probably some of that.
And the reason I ask the question is that I felt this pull myself.
In other words, there's always a pull to be right, right?
And unfortunately, some people predict things will go well in the world.
Some people predict things will go poorly.
But we both want to be right.
Even if you don't want things to go poorly, you still kind of do, because you want to be right.
Right? If I asked you, do you want people to die so you can be right, most people would say, no, no, I don't want people to die just so I can be proven right.
But you kind of do.
Right? Right? Meaning that the influence to be right is so powerful that it does kind of push you slightly uncomfortably in the direction of being a little bit happy if people died and made you right by dying, which is a horrible thing.
And by the way, I totally feel it in myself.
So I would have been amazed if nobody else had the same feeling.
Now, again, I don't want people to die to prove me right, but, you know, you feel the force of it.
And one of the comments that I got, and here's where I'm going to start pushing you into cognitive dissonance.
And by the way, let me tell you what the tells will be.
So you can see it in yourself, and you can see it in the comments.
Here are some tells for cognitive dissonance.
Number one, attacking the messenger.
And it would look like, Scott, you've lost it.
With nothing else. Or, well, you've really jumped the shark now.
With no other comment. That's usually cognitive dissonance.
So if you attack the messenger, probably cognitive dissonance.
If you imagine I'm saying something different so that you can prove me wrong on some point I'm not talking about, that's probably cognitive dissonance.
If you can't handle the points I'm making, you will imagine I'm making a different one and argue that one.
So watch for that, and I'll point it out when I see it.
And another one is mind reading.
Now, there might be other triggers as they come by.
But the... And the writing in all caps, I don't know what that means.
That's just crazy shit.
But the other one is mind-reading.
For example, this morning, I heard somebody say on Twitter, Scott, why does it seem like you're regretting your vaccination decision?
That would be like mind-reading, right?
Because I don't.
I certainly questioned whether it was right, but regretting it's a whole different thing, right?
I mean, nobody can be 100% sure you made the right vaccination decision for yourself.
Can you? All right, so I would say that anybody who says they're 100% certain probably has a mental competence problem.
Not mental illness, but a competence problem.
Because if you're 100% sure that you made the right vaccination decision, there's just something wrong with your brain.
Now, if you said 98% sure, eh, okay.
At least you're allowing that you could be wrong, right?
So I'm vaccinated, but if you ask me, are you 100% sure that was the right decision?
How could I be? How could I possibly be right?
I mean, I don't have data that I trust, do you?
Do you have some secret data you trust?
Because I haven't seen any I trust.
So, full certainty is the other way to know somebody's got something going on that isn't good thinking, alright?
So, here's where I'm going to trigger you into cognitive dissonance, some of you, and watch for it in the comments.
The number one comment I got from the unvaccinated is, all we want is to be left alone.
That's all we want.
And it's not the same the other way.
Because the vaccination people want to do something to us.
They want to actively make us do something.
They won't leave us alone. Would you agree?
Just leave us alone.
Alright, here's where the cognitive distance is going to get triggered.
You're both not leaving each other alone.
Oh, here's our first cognitive dissonance.
Somebody paid $20 to do it.
So Chad says, why do you accept and reinforce the divisive frame of vaccinated versus unvaccinated?
I'm not doing that.
So here's cognitive dissonance.
Somebody's imagining that I'm increasing the vaccinated versus unvaccinated frame.
I'm doing exactly the opposite.
Because I tell you I don't care if you're vaccinated.
I do care about your opinion.
So this is about your opinion, not mine.
So if you think this is my clever way to, you know, divide people or to cause you to do something, none of that's happening.
That would all be mind-reading on your part.
So here's my point.
It is definitely true that the vaccinated, on average, are trying to get the unvaccinated people to do something, get vaccinated, all right?
But it is also true that the unvaccinated are having a huge impact on the vaccinated.
Right? Because the vaccinated would say, and again, this would be their opinion.
I'm representing a general opinion.
This is not necessarily my own opinion.
The vaccinated would say, we could have opened up by now.
Everything would be normal by now.
And the vaccinated would say, you have completely fucked up my life by not getting vaccinated.
That's what they would say.
Again, I'm not saying that.
I want to be really clear.
This is not my argument.
I'm just saying that we live in a world where everybody's choice affects everybody else, and in a big way in the pandemic.
So not getting vaccinated is a choice.
That's an active choice.
To imagine that you're the one who just wanted to be left alone is, I think, selfish beyond anything I could imagine.
Now, both sides are selfish, but only one side seems to know it.
So maybe that's unfair.
Let's just say this.
The unvaccinated are having a gigantic impact on every part of the vaccinated people's lives, or so the vaccinated people would say.
Again, I'm representing a general opinion.
This is not necessarily coming out of my head.
So how many of you would accept that neither of you are leaving the others alone?
Not even close.
In fact, leaving the other side alone is so opposite of what's happening right now.
So now I think we would get into...
Watch. This would be another trigger or indicator for cognitive dissonance.
We'll probably get into word thinking now.
Now, word thinking is where you just try to win by defining things.
So somebody's going to define away the way the impact goes both directions.
Let's see. Let's see.
Forgetting the people who have no choice.
Well, no, the people who have no choice are a separate thing.
All right? So 83% of adults are vaxxed.
Not fully vaxxed, though.
It's closer to high 50%.
Wow, the comments are so long, it's hard to see them.
So I've got a clarification question.
So this is to me.
So the unvaccinated are being selfish because the vaccinated insist that the unvaccinated must be vaccinated before letting things open.
Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying.
Yeah, I'm saying that in a civilized society...
Everybody expects everybody else to do their part, wouldn't you say?
Like, I expect you not to litter so that I can enjoy walking on the street.
I expect you not to commit a crime so that I can feel safe.
I'm putting expectations on you all the time, as you are on me.
So to imagine that this pandemic is the one case where one group can just be left alone, No.
They could be left alone if there were six of them and they didn't affect anybody else.
But you're talking about tens of millions of people who have a gigantic effect on every part of the other people's lives.
Of course, nobody can be left alone.
So here's my bottom line.
The idea that you could leave either side alone is purely imaginary.
And you'd have to sort of word-think it to turn it into being left alone.
We can't. Everything that we do affects everybody else.
In big, big ways, right?
Now, take another situation, and this is not an analogy, just sort of clarifies thinking.
Take cigarette smoking.
Wouldn't cigarette smokers say, why don't you just leave me alone?
How about you just leave me alone?
To which I say, you know, I'm sensitive to that argument.
I do think we should leave him alone.
But you're sitting next to me in the restaurant.
If you're sitting next to me in the restaurant, is that the same as leaving you alone?
Because you're not leaving me alone.
So my point is...
Both sides are always influencing both sides.
And there's no way to untangle that.
So it's a ridiculous argument to say, I just want to be left alone, because that's what the other side wants to.
You forgot non-vague reasons, just analogies.
Yeah. Yeah, if your only reason that you have is an analogy, then you don't have a reason.
Because you wouldn't need the analogy if you had an argument.
An analogy is good if you've made your point, but maybe you want to inform a little extra or something like that.
Now, the other thing that I saw, and it's...
Well, so here's a question I asked on Twitter, and this is, again...
This is not intended to show you my opinion, okay?
I need everybody to feel that first, or you won't be able to hear the rest of it.
So this is not about my opinion.
It's about yours. So I was asking your opinion because I'm interested.
I'm genuinely interested in your opinion on this.
So I came up with this totally artificial question to get people hopping mad.
And I said this. It was a poll question on Twitter.
I said, if you are unvaccinated by choice, And let's say there's no health reason, you just didn't trust the vaccine.
So if you're unvaccinated by choice, and there's only one bed left in the ICU, and of course that's never the case because they can expand and stuff, but I'm just trying to get to sort of a clarifying of your opinion question, right?
That's all we're trying to do here.
It's not a realistic situation.
But if there were only one ICU bed left, And there was a vaccinated person and an unvaccinated person.
They both had COVID. Do you think that the unvaccinated person has the same moral right to the one bed?
What do you say? I'll let you answer this question.
Do you think the vaccinated and the unvaccinated have the same moral right to be treated?
Mostly yeses. I got, what, 80% yeses?
86% yeses.
And I agree with the majority.
So if what you're looking at is the moral standard, yeah, you can't treat people differently.
Right? As soon as you go down that road, it's all lost.
The single most important thing we do as human beings and certainly in America the thing that makes America, in my opinion, its strongest thing is that we don't ever do this.
We don't treat some people as morally less valuable.
Even to the point of a fetus for tens of millions of people.
So we don't do this.
It doesn't matter if you've made a bad decision, a good decision.
It doesn't matter if you're a criminal, old or young.
You are morally exactly equal.
However, but, it would also be a triage decision, wouldn't it?
Which is different than a moral decision.
How would the triage go?
So now it's a separate decision.
Take morality out of it.
You're trying to save the most life.
It's just the greatest amount of life.
Now what do you do? What's the triage decision?
Let's assume same age, same everything.
It's twins.
It's literally twins.
One is vaccinated and one isn't.
Just to make it easy, it's identical twins.
Same weight, same everything.
How do you triage them? Well, I'll tell you what a doctor just said.
So a doctor on Twitter responded and said that he would treat the vaccinated person first.
Why? Can anybody tell me why?
Why would you triage?
Everything else is equal.
So don't do a Kobayashi Maru on me.
Everything else is equal.
Why would you treat the vaccinated person first?
It has nothing to do with morality.
Nothing to do with that.
Safer for the doctor?
No, that's interesting, but not what he said.
Here's why. Then this is his reason, not mine again, right?
None of this is my opinion.
I'm just walking you through it.
The doctor said that the vaccinated person has such a higher chance of quickly recovering compared to the unvaccinated that the vaccinated person would open up a bed sooner.
What do you think? The vaccinated person is more likely to have a quick rebound and therefore open up another ICU so you can save two people.
So if you save the vaccinated, you save two.
If you go for the unvaccinated person first, there's a much greater chance you'll lose that person and lose the person that didn't get the ICU. Why is this?
Why would you assume...
You've got a lot of questions coming in.
Now, I see not true.
I'm not the one who could argue this point, by the way.
I'm telling you what one doctor said.
Maybe other doctors would have different opinions.
Now, how many of you think that the shots...
Increase your rate of myocarditis.
In the comments, how many of you believe that the shots, the vaccinations, increase your chance of myocarditis?
I'm just looking at you.
I'm saying yes, yes, yes.
Not sure. Don't know.
It is claimed. It is claimed.
Sure. Probably.
Probably. So I'm seeing not-sures and yeses.
All right, here's my second question.
Compared to what? What did you compare it to?
More myocarditis.
Myocarditis, yeah. Most of you said yes.
So if they have more of it, more compared to what?
Compared to people who didn't get the vaccine?
Is that the right comparison?
You know what I'm doing to you right now, right?
Are you making the right comparison?
Is it logical to compare the myocarditis of the people who got vaccinated to the people who did not?
Is that logical? Seems logical, right?
It would seem like the most logical thing in the world, wouldn't it?
Except... We're moving into endemic territory, which means you're going to get COVID. You're going to get it.
So, the real comparison should be not vaccinated compared to unvaccinated.
That is not logical. In the specific context of knowing we're all going to get it, or likely.
You should compare myocarditis for the vaccinated to myocarditis To the unvaccinated, both of them having the infection.
Right? So if you get infected, you get more myocarditis.
Did you know that? Let me ask you this.
How many of you knew that the infection itself can give you myocarditis as well as other things?
How many of you knew that?
Right? So if you know you're going to get the...
You get the virus.
Are you with me?
Do you buy just the logic of it?
That comparing it to people who don't have a virus and didn't get vaccinated is the wrong comparison.
You have to compare it to people with the virus.
Now, my understanding is, and again, all data is not to be trusted.
Would you agree? Can we agree that all the data is not to be trusted?
But if the data we have that's, let's say, public and generally agreed by the experts, if that data were correct, and that's a gigantic if, it would be safer to get vaccinated if you believed you were going to get the virus anyway.
All right? Does anybody disagree with that?
I see one disagree, but I don't see a reason.
Can we not compare to the time before COVID? No.
That would be an irrational comparison.
I mean, you could, but it would be irrational.
Let's say, with clear incidence of myocarditis coming from vax getting into the bloodstream rather than the muscles, this argument is missing context.
No, it isn't. No, it isn't.
You either got myocarditis or you didn't.
It doesn't matter how it got in there.
What about excess deaths?
Probably just bad data.
I'm not sure we can tell anything about excess deaths.
Well, Gohan, you are spending a lot of money for these comments.
But I appreciate the money.
Thanks for that. Intellectually dishonest.
Who is? About what? This guy is nuts.
There we go. So I got the, there's your first cognitive dissonance trigger.
Somebody said, this guy is nuts.
That's cognitive dissonance.
So something I said didn't agree with them, but they could recognize it as correct anyway.
James Bond says, Scott is pushing the vaccine again.
So that's cognitive dissonance.
If you were here in the beginning, that's cognitive dissonance.
Because I really don't care if you get vaccinated.
I really don't. And I'm willing to accept the greater restrictions so that you can have that right.
Are you okay with that?
No, I believe that the unvaccinated have an enormous effect on me.
Because they do. I think the lockdowns, the masking and all that would all go away if we were 100% vaccinated.
But I'm not telling you to get vaccinated.
And I'm completely willing to put up with the inconvenience so that you can maintain that right.
Are you okay with that?
Are you okay that I willingly take an enormous, enormous load for the unvaccinated, but I do it willingly?
Because I'd rather that you have that freedom.
Is everybody comfortable with that?
I mean, is that a fair opinion?
That I am willing to suffer tremendously...
For you to keep that right.
Because if it were the other way around, I'd ask you to do the same.
I would, right?
But do the shoe and the other foot trick, right?
If it were the other way around, I would ask you to sacrifice a lot for me to keep my freedom, to not put stuff in my body I don't want to put in there.
I would ask you to put up with a lot for me to have that freedom.
And I'm willing to do that for you.
I'll put up with a lot.
And I am. I think.
Now, if you're saying to me, but Scott, you can't be sure if everyone got vaccinated, we'd really be better off.
Right. Correct.
I cannot be sure.
If you're sure about anything, you're lost.
All right. Apparently there's a precedent that I'd forgotten about, but I need a fact check on this.
Give me a fact check on this.
Is it true that alcoholics don't get liver transplants because they're alcoholics?
Can somebody confirm that?
I'm seeing some yeses, but I don't know if that's...
There's probably enough doctors on here who can tell me if that's true.
Oh, if you're six months sober...
Maybe it varies by location, right?
Compared to getting an unknown number of shots and boosters.
Oh, that's a good point.
Let me get back to that, about the number of boosters.
Yeah, so somebody's pointing out on YouTube that if you're trying to do your risk analysis, did you do your risk analysis assuming that you would get one shot or infinite shots?
And is it different?
Probably different. Probably.
But I will throw in one sort of rule of thumb, which is if the first two shots didn't kill you, I feel like it's really unlikely the third one would.
Am I wrong about that?
My understanding is that if the vaccinations would cause problems, there's like a 99% chance or something high that you would see it in the first six months.
And so, just giving you more of what you've already had, you've probably already proved you're okay with it.
Richmond the Goth says you're wrong about that.
I could be wrong about that.
I could be wrong about that.
Now, are you comfortable with that?
Are you comfortable with me saying, as a rule of thumb...
Probably most of the problems happened right away, so we'd know about it.
But I'm also allowing that there could be things like God knows what down the road somewhere.
Could be. So I would say that adding shots definitely increases risk.
My guess is not much.
That's my guess.
But if you told me anybody knows that, no, nobody knows that.
Yeah, the first two months is where everything happens, it seems like.
*laughs* At least one person loves my cognitive dissonance shows.
All right. Let's see if we can catch anybody in the comments who's got cognitive dissonance.
Here's how we'll do it. Oh, let me just do one more thing before we do that.
I remember a time, and it was a year ago, when if you gave me a choice between scientific studies, you know, peer-reviewed scientific studies, versus anecdotal reports, I would laugh at you and say, we can't believe these anecdotal reports.
We've got actual science.
Just look at this study, peer-reviewed, Look at that.
It's a thing of beauty.
Why would you listen to these anecdotal stories when you've got science?
That was a year ago.
Today, it's about a tie.
And man, am I unhappy about that.
One of the most basic things I've always believed about the world is that the science was better than the anecdotal observations.
Maybe. Maybe.
I think it depends on the situation.
But I've got a feeling that people are doing just as well with anecdotal observations during the pandemic as they are with the science.
I'm exaggerating a little bit.
I'm still pro-science.
But, man, has science hurt its credibility.
I mean, science has really damaged itself in the last few years.
Which is, I don't know, maybe it's good.
Maybe we have a better understanding of it.
Alright. So here's the question.
I want you to avoid the following things while telling me what you disagree with about anything that I said today.
Alright? So you can't read my mind to imagine I have some intent.
You can't change the topic.
And you can't just say, you know, I suck in words.
So tell me what it is you disagree with.
About something I said about vaccinations or the odds or anything.
Just from today.
Go on.
How much money are you going to spend here?
Yeah, drinking is an excellent example of something that has a big effect on other people.
I bet there's a lot of people who say, just leave me alone.
I just want to drink. Get the government out of here.
I want to drink and drive my car.
I disagree it's the unvaccinated cause in lockdowns, since they don't occur in red states.
Well, you know, I see your point.
It's not one variable, right?
So it's not like...
The only thing that matters is the unvaccinated.
That's not the case. But all things being exactly the way they are, which is blue states are more restrictive than red states, if everyone were vaccinated, I think even the blue states would loosen up.
Maybe not. I mean, that's speculation, but I think so.
Oh, the risk of additional boosters is unknown because of the mix and match.
That's a good point. That's a real good point.
So if, as I said, if you get the same vaccination three times, probably the third one's not much risk at all.
That's my guess. But yeah, if you mix and match, that does introduce an extra risk.
However, let me do a counterpoint to your counterpoint.
Yes or no? And I really need an expert to help me on this one.
Yes or no? Let's say you had one kind of mRNA shot, and then you decided to mix and match with another one.
Could you know that if the first one didn't excite your system to basically attack itself, that the other one wouldn't?
I don't think you could know it, but could you think it's probable?
Because, in other words, is the mechanism that a vaccination would hurt you, is that mechanism the same across all three?
Or at least the two mRNA ones?
Yeah, it's all unknowable.
It's unknowable. Yeah, every time you introduce an unknown, you've got trouble.
All right, has anybody seen any cognitive dissonance go by?
Here we go. James says, experimental vaccine equals FOOL in all capital letters.
Now, that's cognitive dissonance.
One of the examples is using word thinking instead of reasons.
So experimental vaccine is trying to win an argument just by putting words on it.
It doesn't change.
There's no argument there.
It's just a word.
Why don't I call it the extra-safe vaccine?
Is it good now? How about we rename it to the vaccine that kills you?
Is it worse now because he changed the name?
Changing the name isn't anything.
That's just words. So if you have an argument, as in the FDA did not study it as well as the other things, I think...
Let me ask you this.
How long does it take for the FDA to approve a drug?
So after the tests are done and the FDA gets it, how long does it take to approve it?
Anybody know? After the data is there, not before you've done the test, but after the data is done.
I'm seeing all kinds of numbers from six months to five years.
How long does it take to look at the data that the pharma company packages up and hands to you?
Why does it take six months to look at data that's packaged up in exactly the form you asked for, presumably, and is handed to you?
Now, you're not going to go check the data, are you?
Do they do that? I mean, what does the FDA do...
Other than look at the data and say, okay, do you have more data?
Or, you know, why'd you forget this?
But it seems to me that if you were a major drug company, you would know in advance all of the questions.
And you would give them exactly what they need on day one.
Wouldn't you? I mean, if you didn't, you'd be an idiot.
So, here's what I wonder.
Does it take six months because they're just slow?
Or is there something about the process that really takes a long time?
Because I don't know what that would be.
Remember, I'm talking about all the data is in.
From the point where there's no more data, it's all in, how long does it take to approve it?
I mean, it's months and months, right?
So, now let me change the question.
These current vaccinations were approved quickly, right?
But it wasn't the trial that was quick, was it?
I mean, it didn't run for years and years, but the data they got was real data from a real trial.
So would it be safe to say that the FDA did everything that it normally does, just a little faster, because they needed to, and that they did the same amount of caution, except the only thing they couldn't know is what happens down the road?
Is that fair? Now, I'm speculating, and I'm making some sort of real-world assumptions.
The real-world assumption here is that the reason it takes so long for the FDA to approve something is just incompetence.
It's not because they don't have data.
It's just incompetence.
And the only thing that we miss is the stuff that would be several years down the line, which could be substantial.
But historically, it's a very low risk.
So when you say experimental, I would say the only thing you're saying there, probably, is that the only thing we don't know is what will happen in the long run, and that's the risk you're asked to take.
They have to struggle with good and bad data, but still...
That struggle seems to be something that would take two days, not six months.
The FDA is hiding the Pfizer data.
Is somebody saying that there's some data that hasn't been released?
Could be. Approval process adds six months tops.
Okay. But if the approval process only added six months...
Why do other vaccines take five to seven years?
What are those other vaccines doing wrong?
So there's something about this.
Yeah, the thalidomide case, if I were to talk about that, I'd be way over my head.
But let me ask you this.
Is the thalidomide case something that we would have seen coming today?
In other words, if thalidomide had gone through the same approval process as warp speed, would we have caught it?
The answer is, I don't know.
I don't know if we would have.
Because it really only expressed itself in births, right?
You couldn't tell until there were babies born, I think.
Well, ultrasound, yeah, I guess so.
Yeah, why do we never talk about Regeneron having emergency use?
Isn't that the same? By the way, I bought stock in Regeneron because I think they'll be selling a lot of that stuff.
Yeah, it's the company's own data that takes time, but after that's done.
All right. This is the grift to beat all grifts.
Thalidomide is still in use.
Do you think there could be bias with science?
Of course. Yes, science is, of course...
You know, the whole point of science is to drive out the bias, which means they know there's a lot there to drive out.
Used to treat...
Oh, thalidomide is used to treat cancer today.
So I imagine that they just make sure that you're not likely to get pregnant.
Scott, how often do you misidentify cognitive dissonance?
Simply because most people don't put much effort in their comment because they don't expect you to read their comment.
Yeah, that's a fair point.
Yeah, there are some people who do some, I'll call it reflex comments, where it's literally just the first thought in their mind and they type it.
So yeah, there's some of that.
But most of it's cognitive dissonance.
By the way, if you ever think that I'm speaking in absolutes, you're probably wrong.
If I am, I'll tell you.
But everything else I talk about, you should just assume, I mean, usually, mostly, most of the time.
Just put that in there.
Mentally. Is there any loser think that's not so loser think now?
I'd have to re-read my own book to...
By the way, there's a Spanish-language version of LoserThink, and some Asian-language version, and I can't identify the language.
My publisher sends me the books when they're published in other languages, and I don't know.
It's got the characters, but I don't know if it's Korean or Japanese or Chinese.
I'm guessing South Korean.
So Korean language.
Oh, you bought a Korean copy for your dad, so that's probably what it is.
It was probably the Korean copy.
What is your tremendous suffering because of unvaxxed people?
The fact that I need to be masked and...
You know, I can't go to my gym.
I've got to show my vaccine passport.
There are places I can't travel.
So that sort of thing.
Now, again, the assumption is that if everyone were vaccinated, even the blue states would loosen up.
We don't know that to be true.
But as an assumption, it's a reasonable assumption.
It might not be true.
That's because you live in California, yeah?
Don't rub it in. Well, you know, I didn't want today to be a vax discussion.
It's more of a persuasion discussion.
So, like you said, do what you want to do with your vaccinations.
And those of you who are saying that, you know, I'm affected because I'm in California, and it's really a California problem...
I hear that. I hear that.
We hold people who choose not to be healthy responsible.
There's no practical way to do that.
Durango Steve says, Your cognitive dissonance on this broadcast is astounding.
So that's cognitive dissonance.
Sorry, Durango Steve.
Yeah, so if the best you can do is just blame me for having cognitive dissonance without an example.
Blaming the unvaccinated is misplaced.
The vaccinated are enforcing the rules.
Well, you know, everything that exists has to exist the way it is to get what you want.
So the government has to be bad, you know, the decisions have to be bad, and that's true.
But it's also true that if everyone was vaccinated, all the problems would go away.
Or so the vaccinated believe.
You could question that.
I mean, that's certainly not a given.
Or a natural immunity...
You know, we've sort of reached the point where every comment about natural immunity being better than the regular, don't we all know that now?
I think it's only the government who's not sure.
I think every human being in the country who is not officially in the government would tell you that natural immunity is better.
It's just...
We can't seem to get that answer from the experts.
But I think we all know it.
All right.
Somebody says the government gets more power by pitting the vaxxed against the unvaccinated.
And some said I was doing that, too, pitting the vaxxed against the unvaccinated.
But certainly not my intent.
If you read the superchats, you will make more money.
Well, the superchats are terribly disruptive.
So I don't really encourage them.
And even though I appreciate it, I don't encourage them.
Because your regular comments, I'm just as likely to read, frankly.
But I always like it when you do.
If 100% of us were vexed, It's not going anywhere because animals can spread it.
Yeah. Let's see.
FDA has agreements.
The application review can take six to ten months under normal conditions.
Yeah. But that's got to be based on competence.
That can't be because there's some reason you have to wait.
If they had enough staff, wouldn't it be faster?
Yeah. All right.
Okay, the vaccinated are getting COVID, so why the jab?
All right, I have to answer that question.
So this is from user Famous.
Famous? 333.
The vaccinated are getting COVID, so why get the jab?
I have to ask you, do you have a news source?
Like, that's a serious question.
Yeah, the person who...
And I saw this comment a whole bunch on Twitter.
But do you watch the news?
That's a real question. Because how could you watch the news and not know why you should get vaccinated even if vaccinated people can get COVID? Are there other people who don't know the answer to that question?
But there are a lot of people who are asking that question.
Now, I don't know that that's cognitive dissonance.
That looks like sort of a news bubble problem.
But... Israel and Vermont and Cyprus are near 100% vaccinated and yet have the highest rates.
All of the data about who's vaccinated and what rates they are, that's all misinterpreted.
It's been debunked so widely that it's hard to imagine that you missed it.
If your belief is that the vaccinations, quote, don't work because vaccinated people get COVID, I would have to think you don't have any news sources, like either on the left or the right.
Because both the left and the right say all the time that being vaccinated will make your recovery faster and more likely.
And you'll be far less likely to catch it and far less likely to spread it.
Now, how do you not know that?
Can I ask, is there anybody who's hearing this for the first time?
Is there anybody in the comments, tell me, are you hearing it for the first time that although the vaccinations do not completely stop the spread, they make it way more easily recoverable and less spreadable?
Is anybody hearing this for the first time?
Really? Really?
I actually saw somebody say that they saw it for the first time.
Prove it. Do you really believe that, Scott?
Sounds like fake data.
You are trusting experts.
Well, let me be as clear as possible.
Could it be wrong?
I suppose. I suppose.
It could be wrong. But I'm just telling you the official...
If you're saying you don't understand it, that's different from saying you disagree with it or you think it might be wrong.
But if you've never heard that the vaccination makes you way less likely to die, in fact, it lowers the risk of dying to about zero.
Pretty close to zero.
Has Scott not heard about the efficacy of the vaccines declining over the past year?
Do you think there's somebody who hasn't heard about booster shots?
Anybody? Is there anybody here who hasn't heard about booster shots?
100% of the people know that the vaccines decline in effectiveness.
Everybody knows that.
That could have been cognitive dissonance, to imagine there's somebody who doesn't know that, given that we're talking about boosters every day.
Let's see.
Lisa has a sister who's vaccinated and in the hospital.
Anecdotal information?
My friend thinks the vaccinated are spreading because they don't know they have it.
Well, they are. The vaccinated are spreading it because they don't know they have it.
So is everybody else.
But they don't spread it as long because they clear much faster.
So yes, they spread it, but half as much as the unvaccinated.
Being healthy is also close to zero.
Yes, but a lot of the country is not healthy.
And we're not going to change that right away.
Scott will be unvaxxed soon.
Yeah, if you wait long enough.
All right. There wasn't much in the news today that I thought was worthy of discussing because it's a slow holiday time.
And I think our time is up, as you've noticed.
So I don't know that this might have been my worst live stream of the year.
Because I know you hate this topic.
Chad said, would California loosen up if serology showed 75% antibodies?
Good question. I think you'd only want to know the antibodies of the unvaccinated, wouldn't you?
