I binge-read Robert Anton Wilson's Cosmic Trigger series recently, and he had childhood polio ... he was healed by the Kenny Method, which was considered "pseudoscience" at the time.
I'll have to check that one out. After I wrote this I read Disolving Illusions which talks about the Sister Kenny (sp?) treatment which was physical therapy and she had great results but teh doctors of the day thought braces, splits, etc. were nessesary.
The worst part, for me, is that Poliomyelitis still exists, we just can't call it Polio unless it's caused by a specific virus. We just renamed it and it vanished....
As one of the many kids who got the first version of the Salk vaccine -- the one that was not foolproof and resulted in some new polio cases -- I consider myself very lucky. Very lucky to have not been one of those unfortunate kids who got a milder version of polio, but to be one of the first kids in the world to be pretty much assured of not acquiring the scourge of one of the most heinous diseases known to man. Although I was only four years old in the early '50s (my mom lied to get me in...you had to be five yo), it was the only time in my life I saw both of my parents cry.
Idiotic Americans who won't get their kids vaccinated because of their faulty, unscientific and uncritical thinking of what vaccines can do are now the scourge of America. Not only are they sentencing their kids to diseases that have been supposedly eradicated, they are enabling other children to catch these diseases as well.
Just like the Middle Ages population of Europe seemingly forgot everything the Greeks and Romans and other learned societies had gleaned centuries before (it was more like the Church denying knowledge to the masses to keep the public under their control), so too are we moving backward in time as real time unerringly moves forward.
Hey everybody -- you are on your own. Don't believe anyone until you critically think through the problems and do your own research. However, this doesn't apply to vaccinations -- you don't have the blessing of time to make up your mind. And, if I run into anyone who has decided not to vaccinate their kids, please expect a gut-check. Not figuratively, but actually.
Thanks Michael...yep, I read it late last year. The 1950's were quite a watershed for vaccines. Kids my age HAD to get chickenpox, measles and the mumps to acquire immunity. Thankfully, most of us lived -- and that was primarily because so few kids were obese and the strains of those diseases hadn't really "evolved" like the strains of Covid and other epidemic- or pandemic-related diseases of today. These things we just lived with.
Another Mungerism! This week, it's "perverse incentives."
Michael, the good news is that you may well live to be 99. The bad news is that you may begin to resemble a turtle. The gooder news is that you'll be a billionaire, but the bad news is that you'll also be a curmudgeon.
Perverse incentives are incredible. Whenever I see a behavior I don't like, I always look for the reward mechanism that drives it. I learned this by doing a lot of process optimization.
I binge-read Robert Anton Wilson's Cosmic Trigger series recently, and he had childhood polio ... he was healed by the Kenny Method, which was considered "pseudoscience" at the time.
I'll have to check that one out. After I wrote this I read Disolving Illusions which talks about the Sister Kenny (sp?) treatment which was physical therapy and she had great results but teh doctors of the day thought braces, splits, etc. were nessesary.
The worst part, for me, is that Poliomyelitis still exists, we just can't call it Polio unless it's caused by a specific virus. We just renamed it and it vanished....
His books aren't about polio, the series is a three-part memoir and he talks about having polio in them a little bit. Mostly about psychedelics!
As one of the many kids who got the first version of the Salk vaccine -- the one that was not foolproof and resulted in some new polio cases -- I consider myself very lucky. Very lucky to have not been one of those unfortunate kids who got a milder version of polio, but to be one of the first kids in the world to be pretty much assured of not acquiring the scourge of one of the most heinous diseases known to man. Although I was only four years old in the early '50s (my mom lied to get me in...you had to be five yo), it was the only time in my life I saw both of my parents cry.
Idiotic Americans who won't get their kids vaccinated because of their faulty, unscientific and uncritical thinking of what vaccines can do are now the scourge of America. Not only are they sentencing their kids to diseases that have been supposedly eradicated, they are enabling other children to catch these diseases as well.
Just like the Middle Ages population of Europe seemingly forgot everything the Greeks and Romans and other learned societies had gleaned centuries before (it was more like the Church denying knowledge to the masses to keep the public under their control), so too are we moving backward in time as real time unerringly moves forward.
Hey everybody -- you are on your own. Don't believe anyone until you critically think through the problems and do your own research. However, this doesn't apply to vaccinations -- you don't have the blessing of time to make up your mind. And, if I run into anyone who has decided not to vaccinate their kids, please expect a gut-check. Not figuratively, but actually.
Interesting. I think, based on your profile, your really enjoy this book on the topic of disease, hygiene, medical advancements and more.
https://amzn.to/42RNB7P
Thanks Michael...yep, I read it late last year. The 1950's were quite a watershed for vaccines. Kids my age HAD to get chickenpox, measles and the mumps to acquire immunity. Thankfully, most of us lived -- and that was primarily because so few kids were obese and the strains of those diseases hadn't really "evolved" like the strains of Covid and other epidemic- or pandemic-related diseases of today. These things we just lived with.
Another Mungerism! This week, it's "perverse incentives."
Michael, the good news is that you may well live to be 99. The bad news is that you may begin to resemble a turtle. The gooder news is that you'll be a billionaire, but the bad news is that you'll also be a curmudgeon.
Really miss uncle Charlie.
Perverse incentives are incredible. Whenever I see a behavior I don't like, I always look for the reward mechanism that drives it. I learned this by doing a lot of process optimization.
Hanlon's Razor really helps!
100% That's what I keep finding over and over again.
and: laughing is healthier than gritting your teeth