Coronavirus

[Count Boso]

Good article here about the risk posed by people who show no symptoms whatsoever, and in many cases never get ill themselves, but who are nevertheless infected and apparently spreading the virus. Hence the need to test everyone (not just those who are already ill), track, trace, quarantine.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52840763

[muzzer]

Good article here about the risk posed by people who show no symptoms whatsoever, and in many cases never get ill themselves, but who are nevertheless infected and apparently spreading the virus. Hence the need to test everyone (not just those who are already ill), track, trace, quarantine.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52840763

Yes, I saw that too. The asymptomatic issue seems to have been forgotten and yet is surely a massive part of this. But testing is not part of the government’s “strategy”, so perhaps no surprise out of sight, literally, out of mind. I can’t bear this permanent lie that is political life at the moment. When I read Victor Klemperer’s diaries a few years ago little did I think such a febrile world would come to us so soon. Which is not in any way to seek to draw a false equivalence, it’s the point that people persist in believing things will be fine when they won’t, because they already aren’t.

[MrGongGong]

Hence the need to test everyone (not just those who are already ill), track, trace, quarantine.

If people are infected, show no symptoms and never get ill then the whole "track, trace, quarantine" will have no effect at all.
Furthermore the "tracking app" isn't going to be adopted by anyone with the intelligence to realise that it will effectively give away all your contacts and data to the likes of DC and his mates. So, I would probably conclude that those who are technologically savvy are possibly the people who are likely to travel and mingle with others the most. They aren't going to download the app, nor are they likely to consent to be "hunted down".....even if it were possible....

BUT on the more positive side ... i've just started reading this https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/humankind-9781408898932/

(and, of course, Singapore is a very different type of society to the UK )

[Count Boso]

If people are infected, show no symptoms and never get ill then the whole "track, trace, quarantine" will have no effect at all.

Are you correct? I'm making no comment about the apps currently being made available, and whether or not they are/will be effective.

Testing everyone (as far as possible) will identify those who are positive, and they should remove themselves from society (Singaporean or British - makes no difference) because the evidence is that in a way which hasn't been fully understood, people who test positive can transmit the virus, regardless of whether they ever develop obvious symptoms.

[MrGongGong]

Are you correct? I'm making no comment about the apps currently being made available, and whether or not they are/will be effective.

Testing everyone (as far as possible) will identify those who are positive, and they should remove themselves from society (Singaporean or British - makes no difference) because the evidence is that in a way which hasn't been fully understood, people who test positive can transmit the virus, regardless of whether they ever develop obvious symptoms.

I don't know if i'm correct (I should have added IMV)

Testing everyone won't happen
we don't have the kind of society that makes that possible (IMV)

Many people are going to be forced to go to work regardless of whether it is wise or not. "Removing" yourself from society is only possible if you are supported (or rich enough) to do so.


BJ & DC have scuppered any chance of a significant % of the population complying with anything they say now.


(but that might have been the plan all along ?)

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I’d like to make a bargain with HM Government.

I’ll download the track and trace app as soon as they remove Cummings (permanently).

[Count Boso]

I’d like to make a bargain with HM Government.

I’ll download the track and trace app as soon as they remove Cummings (permanently).

Good wheeze. I suggest we all do this. All we need is a central place to publicly indicate our rebellion. Yesterday was the anniversary of the Peasants' Revolt, by the way.

[MrGongGong]

I’d like to make a bargain with HM Government.

I’ll download the track and trace app as soon as they remove Cummings (permanently).

That's only stage one for me
I want several other things before I even consider it

[Count Boso]

Raab says "We're transitioning from level four to level three, so we remain at level four." Does that mean that as we're transitioning out of the EU we remain in the EU?

[muzzer]

Okey cokey

[Serial_Apologist]

.

BUT on the more positive side ... i've just started reading this https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/humankind-9781408898932/

The Bregman line is not new - it was most clearly presented by Alan Watts in Psychotherapy East and West 60 years ago, and I've been plugging it on this forum for quite some time now. Watts drew comparatively on Zen and Taoist sages of old and a number of latter-day post-Freudian thinkers - Bateson, Fromm & co - arguing that Freud's idea of the Unconscious and unconscious motive was itself unconsciously impregnated with unexamined post-Christian guilt, bequesthing us a sceptical science-based world view, one without heaven or hell, but also without God's mercy. But, argued Watts, why not go the whole hog and trust in the basic goodness of "human nature"? The only alternative is to distrust ones mistrust if the very basis of judgement in such matters must itself be faulty! In the end there's no choice BUT to trust in ones self. So, what is it that holds societies back, we have to ask ourselves collectively, and find practicable answers? We mostly seem to have forgotten a strong argument around in the 1960s that it is capitalist culture and the pressures capitalism imposes on all to be self-absorbed, self-comparing with others by standards artificially imposed in line with current socioeconomic politics designed to keep the rich in charge and control. We are made to feel image or identity-selfconscious and ensure we continue to be unsustainable consumers to keep the socieconomic status quo going, and when all fails then religion can provide back-up by "reminding" [sic] us we're all at root subject to Original Sin and in need of redemption... but we have to wait until the "next world" to be redeemed, since basic human frailty makes realising a better world than the one we're in impossible in this one. Such reasoning flies in the face of what we have long known about an interdependent world, of which our intelligence, intelligently applied it goes without saying, is a functioning manifestation. But yet, the old discredited "reasoning" goes on round and round, apparently forever, and those at the top, the Cummingses, Johnsons, Trumps, Netanyahus, laugh their way to the bank.

A starting point is questioning all such misleading ideology and outing its sources. If we have to talk about "our own kind" let's stop being mean about and to ourselves and think how if life opportunities were more evenly shared the resulting inclusiveness would reveal all manner of presently wasted useful potential. The relationship of forces may presently be inimical to positive change, but at least we go to our graves knowing all along we weren't wrong.

[MrGongGong]

The Bregman line is not new - it was most clearly presented by Alan Watts in Psychotherapy East and West 60 years ago, and I've been plugging it on this forum for quite some time now. Watts drew comparatively on Zen and Taoist sages of old and a number of latter-day post-Freudian thinkers - Bateson, Fromm & co - arguing that Freud's idea of the Unconscious and unconscious motive was itself unconsciously impregnated with unexamined post-Christian guilt, bequesthing us a sceptical science-based world view, one without heaven or hell, but also without God's mercy. But, argued Watts, why not go the whole hog and trust in the basic goodness of "human nature"? The only alternative is to distrust ones mistrust if the very basis of judgement in such matters must itself be faulty! In the end there's no choice BUT to trust in ones self. So, what is it that holds societies back, we have to ask ourselves collectively, and find practicable answers? We mostly seem to have forgotten a strong argument around in the 1960s that it is capitalist culture and the pressures capitalism imposes on all to be self-absorbed, self-comparing with others by standards artificially imposed in line with current socioeconomic politics designed to keep the rich in charge and control. We are made to feel image or identity-selfconscious and ensure we continue to be unsustainable consumers to keep the socieconomic status quo going, and when all fails then religion can provide back-up by "reminding" [sic] us we're all at root subject to Original Sin and in need of redemption... but we have to wait until the "next world" to be redeemed, since basic human frailty makes realising a better world than the one we're in impossible in this one. Such reasoning flies in the face of what we have long known about an interdependent world, of which our intelligence, intelligently applied it goes without saying, is a functioning manifestation. But yet, the old discredited "reasoning" goes on round and round, apparently forever, and those at the top, the Cummingses, Johnsons, Trumps, Netanyahus, laugh their way to the bank.

A starting point is questioning all such misleading ideology and outing its sources. If we have to talk about "our own kind" let's stop being mean about and to ourselves and think how if life opportunities were more evenly shared the resulting inclusiveness would reveal all manner of presently wasted useful potential. The relationship of forces may presently be inimical to positive change, but at least we go to our graves knowing all along we weren't wrong.

I was familiar with Watts from the obvious relation to Zen / Cage etc but thanks for reminding me
The Bregman book is interesting and very timely IMV

So many people (as i've banged on too much) are insistent on the idea that without heavy control "civilisation" will end.
One of my children went to school with the daughter of someone who appeared on a TV programme about parking control. He expressed the view (he is in charge of car parks in am English city) that without all the rule "anarchy" would arrive and we can't have that..... it said more about him than the way that people in the world really behave.
When the traffic lights fail people don't crash into each other, they look out for each other. Which is NOT to say that traffic lights are a "bad" idea, more that when given the chance (and the current situation we are in demonstrates this over and over again) most people will take care and look after each other.
The real problem IMV is that we reward those (BJ, DC et al) who demonstrate the opposite.

[Serial_Apologist]

I was familiar with Watts from the obvious relation to Zen / Cage etc but thanks for reminding me
The Bregman book is interesting and very timely IMV

So many people (as i've banged on too much) are insistent on the idea that without heavy control "civilisation" will end.
One of my children went to school with the daughter of someone who appeared on a TV programme about parking control. He expressed the view (he is in charge of car parks in am English city) that without all the rule "anarchy" would arrive and we can't have that..... it said more about him than the way that people in the world really behave.
When the traffic lights fail people don't crash into each other, they look out for each other. Which is NOT to say that traffic lights are a "bad" idea, more that when given the chance (and the current situation we are in demonstrates this over and over again) most people will take care and look after each other.
The real problem IMV is that we reward those (BJ, DC et al) who demonstrate the opposite.

I can foresee one of the arguments coming up from those who think otherwise - namely that manifestations or acts of unselfishness or co-operation are all very well if only applied in the short term, i.e. emergency or war situations, because of their novelty value appeal. It was this that had Johnson's behaviourist psychologists advising him not to overextend lockdown and delay its introduction - people weaned into having to keep up with constant innovation (which usually isn't really) will quickly tire of restrictions and disobey the rules. The point is that the practice is never allowed time to bed in, due to the short term character of capitalist-determined "interests". Get it now or the supply will run out, take the chance while it lasts, etc etc. - and this competitive scrapping for scarcities - jobs, tickets to see U2, a place for the sprog at your favourite uni - undermines encouraging mutually beneficial patterns of behaviour and ways of living. It shouldn't be hard to understand why the reality that the secure job and chances of improving working conditions only last as long as booms allow, but not for the rich, is deeply embedded in working class culture. Yet people think it is in their own power to provide for their own future security, and therefore their own fault for grabbing more that is affordable damaging future prospects, while demand is constantly stimulated by advertising and its images of promise and escape.

All this does is f*cks with people's heads. No wonder there's so much religion and skunk weed among the poorest sectors of society. "The left" really needs to get its vision in line with its act, or preparing for such, if we are to build on Greta Thunberg's finger-wagging at the rich and powerful, telling them they ought to care, useful rallying cry though this proved in the absence of anything better: the problems are first of all systemic.

PS - this all ties in with Accelationism, linked upthread.

[Dave2002]

That's only stage one for me
I want several other things before I even consider it

Indeed. Don’t want to end like Wat Tyler with a head on a pole.

[Dave2002]

Now we hear that the chances of meeting someone with CV-19 if we go out is about 1/400 compared with 1/40 when the disease was more active. This is still significant in some contexts. For example, if we were to travel on a large aircraft, the chances would be maybe 1/2 that someone on the plane would be carrying the virus. That potential exposure would also be modified by the interactions in airports before boarding, and also on exiting an aircraft. Similar considerations would apply to trains.
Of course most plane and train transport is at a low level, currently, as “packing densities” are I hope much smaller than they were a few moths ago.

However, in small communities, where most interactions are within the community, and perhaps not in such a confined space as an aircraft or train, the risks might now be considered acceptable, if not minimal.