Hurricane Katia – Day 3

by Bryan

4 comments

1 Badtux { 08.31.11 at 12:20 pm }

Sources? Yes, I followed your link. It’s to some right-wing doctor making claims that certain births aren’t counted as births in other countries — but never providing any sources to validate said claims. The OECD is pretty good about putting little asterisks and stuff at the bottom of their data tables whenever data isn’t exactly comparable, and doing adjustments to the data to make them comparable, so where’s the URL to an OECD page on infant mortality with these little asterisks or with the adjustments? Uhm, sorry. Not happening, ’cause truth doesn’t matter, only ideology, if you’re a right winger. Right wingers pulling **** out of their *** is just right-wingers pulling **** out of their ***, in the end.

2 Bryan { 08.31.11 at 5:09 pm }

Most of Europe has had fairly consistent vital statistic reporting since the mid-19th century, while the US didn’t really get organized in that area until the 20th century.

Infant mortality covers the period from birth to the first birthday, so it really tells us the number of children who made it to their first birthday. If a birth isn’t registered, it isn’t counted in the statistic, regardless of outcome.

You can’t simply say the data is wrong, you need proof that it is wrong. The process is called the scientific method. The absence of proof being provided means your ‘source’ is an opinion and nothing more.

3 Badtux { 09.01.11 at 2:06 am }

Heh, yeah, I think I’ve mentioned my grandfather here before, who didn’t even have a birth certificate until he needed one to sign up for WW1. He’d been delivered by a midwife in rural Louisiana and they did not usually file birth reports in those days (the 1890’s).

Data that contradicts their cherished religious beliefs simply get ignored or dismissed as lies by religious zealots, even if well sourced. They never bother concocting actual contradictory data, they simply proclaim “that data is wrong!” and that’s that, whether it’s the data supporting evolution, the data supporting global warming, or the data regarding infant mortality in this case. Dealing with delusional people who refuse to live in objective reality or even admit that there is such a thing as objective reality reminds me of the time when I worked a psych unit, except there the patients had a reason for their delusional behavior — by and large they had something chemically wrong in their brains. My suspicion, however, is that the Duffer and his ilk have nothing chemically wrong in their brains, they’re simply following an older primate instinct where the alpha male leads, and they follow — and have chosen alpha males to follow that have an agenda that requires convincing their followers that up is down and the sky is a fine shade of purple.

Next up: Watch as The Duffer throws feces, as primates tend to do when they see members of opposing bands of primates :).

– Badtux the Scientific Penguin

4 Badtux { 09.02.11 at 11:18 am }

And another feces-throwing primate heard from ;).

– Badtux the Accurate-prediction Penguin