Health considerations finally prevailed over the tobacco industry, the Surgeon Generals warning appeared on all tobacco products, and ads like these disappeared overnight.
There were literally hundreds of ads like these.
Today the campaign against optimal health is orders of magnitude more profitable, insidious, and institutionalized. It was no accident that tobacco ads featured doctors. The tobacco industry knew their product was health destructive for two decades before the Surgeon Generals warning was issued. The best possible counter was the words of the trusted family doctor.
What are the corollaries today? Chemical companies that design and make the many pesticides, fungicides, and herbicides added to our foods. Foods designed by processed food conglomerates to fritz our instinctual circuitry and cause addiction to toxic "food like" substances. Factory farming of animals. Distribution channels for toxic "foods", including grocery chains and the fast food restaurant industry.
OK, so these megalithic industries have made zillions of dollars making us sick...now what?
Turn on the television and see that every other ad is for the latest and greatest pharmaceutical. We're not feeling too good and see one we think we might "need", and we make an appointment with our doctor (who has extensive training in administering pharmaceutical product). The multi faceted disease management industry (that goes by a misnomer as the health care industry) generates ungodly profits administrating solutions that are on average ineffective at best.
All of these industries put profit first, and have about as much concern for our health as the tobacco industry did: chemical, pharmacological, mono crop agriculture, factory farming of animals, food "science" conglomerates, grocery stores, restaurants, medical, "health care" insurance.
When cancer begins to become epidemic in children what do we do? Build pediatric cancer hospitals.
It's a complex picture that only begins to become clear when we add up the total profits made on production, consumption, and treatment of toxic food choices. The sum of those profits is probably the single largest source of revenues in history. And there is no "one bullet solution" as there was with the tobacco industry (with one bulletin from the Surgeon General). One wonders how it is we are collectively so unconscious and destructive to have generated a socio-cultural mess of this historic scale. Is it as simple as "following the profit"?
I think it should be said at the outset we don't get to see this alternate POV on conventional media sources. And we might also want to notice and keep in mind conventional media has been a little bit hysterical, and sometimes more than a little. When the alternate POV breaks through as it did with the Great Barrington Declaration, and if one is really familiar with what these virologists, epidemiologists, and public health scientists are saying, it quickly becomes obvious this POV is misrepresented.
As just one example, they do not say not to wear masks. They are not devoid of common sense...if the disease is respiratory we would obviously rather filter the air we breathe.
What they are saying is collective damage to human health from the virus is greatly exacerbated by lockdown. And they are insistent this POV is completely apolitical. It occurs to me if the pandemic had come at the beginning of a presidential term, with a president who was him or herself a calming influence, we would not have seen near the levels of hysteria about the pandemic. The virus doesn't care who the president is. We've conflated political hysteria, which was present before the pandemic, with a medical emergency, resulting in off the chart levels of "social hysteria disorder" (if I may coin a term).
Let's remember that "herd immunity" is not some kind of dirty word (as media would have us believe), it is simply the biological mechanism by which all epidemics and pandemics are eventually terminated. It can happen organically as people are exposed to the virus, and it can happen via the "viral mimics" in vaccines, and some combination of the two. We are led to believe the only mechanism by which pandemics are halted is via vaccines. If that were true it's very unlikely our species "sapiens" would have survived the 100,000 years of our time on the planet leading to the discovery of vaccine technology 200 years ago.
Let's also remember that cases can go up while pandemic mortality goes down. And as I write cases are going up, we have to continue to be careful and use good common sense: wear a mask in doors and close quarter out of doors, wash your hands frequently, and keep a social distance from others.
Here's a conversation between an emergency room doctor who was in the thick of it, and Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, one of the three authors of the Great Barrington Declaration. Since it is literally impossible to find a fair and balanced consideration of these views in conventional media we may want to hear what at least one of the experts holding this point of view has to say.
Biology is seemingly infinitely complex. Here's a definition of the biological sciences: "Biological sciences encompasses all the divisions of natural sciences examining various aspects of vital processes. The concept includes anatomy, physiology, cell biology, biochemistry and biophysics, and covers all organisms from microorganisms, animals to plants."
We've been on a quest to discover and understand all of the interactive mechanisms that play individual and coordinated roles in life function, and an almost unimaginable amount of data has been compiled. Just think of the data that has been compiled in the process of discovery and mapping of the human genome alone.
Why do we do this? Well part of the answer is simple - we are a species possessed of insatiable curiosity. But why? And the answer to that question is the topic of this blog - we want to achieve higher and higher levels of functioning.
To see examples of "the genetics solution", take a quick glance at this NIH (National Institute of Health) site for the National Human Genome Research Institute:
- Genetics and genomics both play roles in health and disease.
- Why are genetics and genomics important to my health?
After many years of discovery and research we've mapped the human genome with the overarching purpose of understanding and controlling disease processes. And not a moment too soon, health in the developed world has been getting worse for quite some time. So we've mounted great effort and resources to understand exactly, down to microscopic minutiae level, how to control our health for the better. Underlying all this effort was the belief that the answers lay in what is not yet known.
Newer and better drugs will be developed to that end. They will be expensive, probably very expensive, but no doubt worth every penny.
You may have noticed my tongue in cheek just there. There are subcultures among us that regularly achieve very high levels of health from birth to death, and longer happier lives in the process, with relative ease and at almost no cost. How is this possible? The answer is they have focused almost exclusively on the cause of health. Or, one might say, the energy input-output question.
I've been writing in this blog about this since discovering the importance of this question, which was finally made completely clear to me by my primary health educator Dr. Doug Graham. It's basically quite simple, but there are some puzzle pieces that have to come together for understanding. And there is a general thrust in this direction by other health educators and other similar schools of thought. Integrative medicine is one such, and the paleo movement is another.
I've looked carefully at the variations and have found the school of thought that goes under the broader name of "no oil whole food plant based" to be of the highest quality to the "input" side of the equation, and so the more efficient approach. The word vegan doesn't describe this approach sufficiently, but a particular approach to veganism can.
You may have guessed by now what the energy input-output question is referring to. It is simply this: the quality of the inputs (to the body) equals energy out. The computing phrase "garbage in garbage out" works. It is basically that simple.
The psycho-cultural problem we run into is that it is very difficult bringing ourselves to see the "normal" ways we've been eating and living our lives is garbage in garbage out. There are complexities here but the primary problem is the things we've learned in the formative years are very "sticky"... in other words we have come to unconsciously associate these things with our very survival. And survival is of course the prerequisite to health. So, ironically, we have come to unconsciously associate "garbage in" as health producing. And we've come to think of all sorts of toxic substances as "healthy" to "protect" these unconscious associations. But the problem of course is these toxic inputs are killing us en masse way too early. It is, as they say, one hell of a hoary conundrum.
Paleo and integrative medicine take steps toward resolving this conundrum by retaining as much of the old way as possible, while being considerably better than the old way. We get to keep our "anchor" comfort foods while improving the foods around the anchors, and improving lifestyle habits also.
But there is a revolution going on in the young that I believe will eventually overtake the less efficient ways, it is the vegan revolution. I don't consider this an idealistic fantasy, I'm well aware there will always be those who know full well that "smoking is bad for you" and smoke anyway. There is a curious relationship between what we may perceive as near term pleasure and long term pain. But that is a different issue for another time perhaps.
The scientific evidence for the more energy efficient inputs is being established as we speak, and in fact many consider "the weight of the evidence" to have already landed, and I agree with that view. But cultural change can happen slowly.
Meanwhile, we don't have to wait. But we first need convincing. The book that really convinced me in the early stage of my health education was a fast easy read about the foundational work in reversing heart disease by Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn. This work resulted in published studies, and was followed by "Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease", the popular book referred to above.
The energy input-output question, properly addressed, fixes way more than heart disease, but heart disease is the leading cause of all death in the developed world, so Esselstyn chose it as the best thing to study.
What percentage of cardiologists still do not recommend this approach as the only known way to reverse heart disease? And instead prescribe comparatively ineffective drugs and surgery? These doctors either reject it out of hand, or "go along to get along" with "the standard of care". To be fair, it's not their job to teach health education, their job is to do the best they can under the circumstances. But it's not good enough, in fact it's not good at all. I question that it even reaches the level of "triage medicine".
But you better believe cardiologists have all heard about Dr. Esselstyn's work by now, it's a threat to their way of practicing medicine. Think about it...a proven way to reverse heart disease. An inconvenient truth for the medical system as it currently exists, and an incredibly convenient truth for the rest of us. It's completely free, easy to understand, and the only side effect is radiant health. Sound too good to be true? It's not. There are 10's of thousands of "anecdotal proofs" walking around now. Folks that would have been long dead following the standard of care. I know this because I'm one of them.
So I will heartily and happily recommend this book as an excellent starting place on a journey toward the highest levels of health. For a quick introduction to Dr. Esselstyn and his work, have a look at this recent talk he delivered to a Sentara Healthcare audience.
Why even pose the question? Logic tells us herd immunity is simply the biological mechanism that ends pandemics, and there is no other. It comes about through exposure to the virus, and/or a "viral mimic" in the form of a vaccine. If one is never exposed to any form of the virus, biologic or artificial, there can be no immunity, individual or herd.
I've read that vaccines are between 40-60% effective. Not sure how we arrive at that number, presumably in isolated studies where no opportunity to be exposed to the biologic form of virus confounds results. If the 40-60% number is correct, consider that exposure to active viruses may be more effective than exposure to artificial viral mimics. Otherwise it's very unlikely our species sapiens would have survived our 120,000 years on the planet preceding vaccines, a concept that is 200 years old.
Have we been blinded by science with the idea only vaccines are effective? Consider also that vaccines take time to develop, and by the time of their arrival herd immunity is already well along it's path.
And yet all credit goes to vaccines. Hubris?
I'm reminded of the Thomas Dolby song "She Blinded Me With Science".
I have no objection to vaccines that are safe and effective, but I have come to be concerned about the corrosive effect of outsized profits on the vetting process.
The obsession with cases also blurs the issue. Epidemiologists focus on mortality because as the virus "consumes it's resources" (the immunologically naive), two things happen: one, it depletes resources, and two, it mutates and virulence decreases. Both factors cause mortality rates to decline as herd immunity increases.
Of course an overall combined benefit is possible to a double exposure to both live virus and viral mimics. But that is mostly beside the point I'm trying to make.
One pandemic we humans are increasingly infected with is hubris, which is correlated to and increases with industrialization and technology. We have asserted a great deal of control over nature, but at the cost of environmental destruction. There is a belief more technology, the original problem vis a vis ecological destruction, will be the answer. But technology is simply not possible without resource consumption. Collectively we humans have a difficult time accepting that proposition. Every new technology is going to be "the answer". It's a hubristic delusion that takes us further into the current rapid decline of biodiversity, the seventh mass extinction.
Certain members of the health science community take a zero tolerance position, where any number of cases and deaths from the virus are unacceptable. This strikes me as naive, hubristic, and ultimately and ironically, more destructive than the focused protection perspective.
Some also have the idea as an indication of the success of lockdowns to this point only 20% of populations have been exposed to the virus. And going to a focused protection approach will result in a massively higher total mortality. This also strikes me as a naive belief that "waiting for the vaccine to save us" is the answer to everything. It's my impression most experts feel the numbers of the exposed is closer to 60% at this point. Let's also remember that most individuals exposed have either no, or minimal, symptoms.
If that's the case herd immunity to covid is pretty much here already, and the fact global all cause mortality rates have mostly dropped back to normal levels supports that view. This does not mean however care and caution with social distancing is no longer warranted, we first need to see more prolonged all cause mortality rates back to normal levels.
These two perspectives, an overactive belief in science as the answer to everything, versus the less hubristic recognition that nature still runs the show, seems to me to be at the root of the social hysteria we are currently enduring. And if I may note, most of the strife is generated by the overactive belief brigade.
Isn't that usually the case?
We are of the earth and we return to the earth. The human who's biology is not absorbed back into the earth has yet to happen. That would be, I suppose, the first astronaut to slough this mortal coil above the atmosphere, way off into the cosmos somewhere. There must be some innate comfort to death on the earth we don't think of very often. Mother Earth is generous in her birthing of us and grateful in her receiving of us when our time somes. And we are grateful there is life at all in the cosmos, here, on Earth.
If you know anything at all about Jordan Peterson you will probably know he is considered to be quite controversial. I have to admit I don't understand this point of view at all, I find him to be self-evidently grounded, common sensical, and brilliant. Can we also call him an original thinker? I think so, if only in the sense he arrives at eternal truths of what it is to be human more quickly and fluidly than other original thinkers who've come before him.
I think we all know what hubris is, dictionary.com defines hubris as excessive pride or self-confidence; arrogance. The Wikipedia page says hubris describes a personality quality of extreme or foolish pride or dangerous overconfidence. And in ancient Greek hubris referred to actions that violated natural order, or which shamed and humiliated the victim, sometimes for the pleasure or gratification of the abuser.
We shouldn't have to work too hard to think of an excessively hubristic individual that occupies the world stage at the moment. But the point of this post is not the extremes of hubris (one might say intractable, or pathological hubris), but rather more common everyday examples of hubris, and where hubris comes from in general. And yes, I have a personal interest in this as a result of some of my experiences with my own hubris.
The short answer is hubris is an example of something called egocentric bias. And perhaps the most interesting and complex thing about bias is it's typically completely unconscious. And we all have various forms of unconscious bias, it's simply part of being human: where there is an unconscious mind there is also bias.
It seems to me there are fairly widespread misconceptions about the unconscious part of our human mind. And the most basic of these is that the unconscious is accessible. And of course it is to some extent, as in dreams and myths. Perhaps Joseph Campbell, the well known professor famous for his work on mythology, would have said The Power of Myth is in its ability for us to better understand our unconscious human mind.
So perhaps it's accurate to say the unconscious is partially accessible. Accessibility is, after all, the point of psychoanalytic and other therapies that intend to reach into the unconscious mind and find and resolve those "stuck parts" that repeat counterproductive thoughts and behaviors over and over in never ending loops. These therapies pursued with diligence can be successful to varying degree, which itself speaks to the relative inaccessibility of our unconscious mind.
The central idea that came out of the Age of Enlightenment was that the capacity for reasoning bestows on us the power to control our destiny. This is, of course, a very attractive idea that continues to predominate the Western perspective. But more recently brain science is discovering the degree to which Freud was correct in his most basic idea that our behaviors are governed mostly by the unconscious. A wonderful book that delves into the implications of this is "Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than EQ" by Daniel Goleman.
So then where does hubris come from? We can all have it, and probably have to varying degrees and times in our lives. There is a somewhat surprising answer, it is luck, combined with the unconscious.
I came across a great Youtube channel recently named Veritasium (a made up word) where the author covered the degree to which luck plays in success and hubris very nicely. The title of this video: Is Success Luck or Hard Work? It's 12 minutes, and worth every one of them:
For those who would like to learn more about unconscious bias I'd also like to recommend a book on this fascinating topic, Everyday Bias: Identifying and Navigating Unconscious Judgements in Our Daily Lives, by Howard Ross, who is probably as expert on this as anyone.
