Subtle Coronavirus Statistics

221,480 – The number of detected coronavirus cases in the US (8 Dec, 2020).

86,661 – The number of detected coronavirus cases in China (total).

74,222,484 – The number of dumbfuck Republicans incapable of understanding the first two numbers.

 

10 Replies to “Subtle Coronavirus Statistics”

  1. I assume the hypothesis is that incompetent handling of the situation exacerbated the poor outcomes in the US vs China.

    The alternative hypothesis (based on nature from nature vs nurture type arguments), taking all data at face value, is that Chinese, a sort of homogenous group, had more inherent resistance to the virus, perhaps because they are so often, historically, exposed to the various flu viruses it is claimed originate in East Asia. This is possibly testable if US residents of Chinese background have better outcomes than the population in general.

    Left as an exercise is creating alternative hypotheses based on nurture, geography, fooled by randomness (from Nassim Taleb), demographics, political organization, weather, religion, … Super extra points for creating a model that incorporates all of the hypotheses.

    1. GGG, for now let’s ignore the first number and some flippant inaccuracy in my post. Are you seriously suggestion that the second and third numbers, individually and definitely together, require explanation other that American society as a whole is out of its fucking mind?

      1. “American society as a whole is out of its fucking mind?”
        American society is more than Republicans. BTW, I’m not arguing that the US in not out of it’s #$%^ mind, just that it is more than Republicans.

        1. I agree. That’s the “flippant inaccuracy” to which I was referring, and also the reason for my reference to “American society as a whole”. Republicans are a death cult, but the whole place is crazy.

          But what are you actually suggesting in your first comment? That there’s some mystery about Americans screwing up their response to the plague? I have a lot of time for Taleb, but bowing to Taleb here is meaningless.

          To repeat my question, are you seriously suggestion that the second and third numbers, individually and definitely together, require explanation other that American society as a whole is out of its fucking mind?

    2. How about this:

      H0: freedom of movement and unwillingness to wear face coverings has no effect on the rate of infection.

      H1: restricting movement and wearing a face covering lowers the rate of infection.

      I haven’t crunched the numbers, but I suspect H0 can be rejected at the 0.05 level pretty easily.

      1. Yeah, but a close one. Could go either way. Maybe let’s wait until America kills another hundred thousand or so, and then check again.

      2. Chinese do not have freedom of movement? The have high speed rail and a maglev. It is not clear that Americans actually travel more than Chinese.

        1. Not my argument.

          Wuhan essentially closed down when the pandemic hit and citizens severely limited their movement. Entire factories closed for weeks.

          America, by contrast, didn’t seem to limit movement of citizens at all.

          The virus doesn’t move. People move.

  2. Marti,

    Luckily there were also over 81M Americans who didn’t vote for the GOP & MAGA 45 according to the Link above.

    BREXIT and Trump’s surprise 2016 victory make populism a worrying trend in some western democracies. It causes division but doesn’t provide a solution IMO

    Steve R

    1. Yeah, but that’s the point. The country has a psychopathic president in the middle of a grossly mishandled unhandled pandemic, and *still* it takes a decent dose of luck for the asshole to lose.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

The maximum upload file size: 128 MB. You can upload: image, audio, video, document, spreadsheet, interactive, text, archive, code, other. Links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other services inserted in the comment text will be automatically embedded. Drop file here