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PaperclipPerfector  4d ago (text post)   21425 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 4, 2024

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He's proven to be intelligent and has a reputation to protect.

Being wrong about this would have zero impact on his reputation. Haters would put another hop in their gish gallop against him. Fanboys would ignore it or find some plausible deniability ("all he did was post a screenshot of a news article!").

Did Andreessen lose credibility when, despite having published "It's Time to Build", he hypocritically implored the city council not to build more housing? No. It is, as they say, already priced in.

So a level of 1.5 is still well below the EPA limit. This could be a crisis on the level of lead paint and leaded gasoline.

Only 0.6% of the population is on a water system with 1.5ppm or more of fluoride. Lead paint this is not.

Imagine if we were putting lead in the water to prevent cavities, and then just assuming that the amount delivered to the consumer was the perfect amount to prevent cavities without causing negative effects.

And water systems with such high levels of fluoride have it not due to fluoridation but due to groundwater with high concentrations of fluoride.

Did Andreessen lose credibility when, despite having published "It's Time to Build", he hypocritically implored the city council not to build more housing? No. It is, as they say, already priced in.

He seems to have lost credibility with you.

Not really. I still think that "It's Time to Build" was largely correct, and I've generally enjoyed listening to his appearances on CWT. If by "lost credibility" you mean I don't take his word about fluoridation, well, he never had it to begin with - that's not what he's for.

If 1.5ppm reduces IQ's by 2-5 points, what is the reduction in IQ's from the recommended level of 0.7? Keep in mind that the recommended level was 1.2 until recently.

Sure the 18 "high quality" studies might be wrong. I don't have a lot of faith in this area of science. But certainly the burden of proof needs to fall on those who would seek to add a chemical to the drinking water.

In any case, it's one thing to have a normalcy bias. I get it, normalcy bias usually points to correct outcomes. But to arrive at correct outcomes we also have to consider things outside the norm. Markets of ideas can't work if everyone just buys an index fund. Aren't you at all curious about this?

If 1.5ppm reduces IQ's by 2-5 points, what is the reduction in IQ's from the recommended level of 0.7? Keep in mind that the recommended level was 1.2 until recently.

The number is between zero and 2-5, assuming no hormesis. Based on Cremieux's arguments here, I lean towards closer to zero.

Markets of ideas can't work if everyone just buys an index fund. Aren't you at all curious about this?

Far be it from me to compel people to buy index funds. Let a thousand flowers bloom. For my part, I'm not convinced that there is a there there at all, and I don't see anyone making any argument that would suggest that the scale of the problem is anywhere near spewing lead from every tailpipe.

There also has to be someone buying puts for the market to function, after all.

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