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| Troll Lambert waving what he thinks is the Australian flag |
It's now been a week since I threw down the gauntlet on my blog site and at Right Wing News to five avian flu alarmist bloggers who had attacked my Weekly Standard article, "The Chicken Littles Were Wrong: The Bird Flu Threat Flew the Coop." Since one had predicted a "50%/50%" [sic] chance of a bird flu pandemic among humans within the next year I gave him 10 to 1 odds there wouldn't be, noting that 2 to 1 odds would be even so that anything above that should be tempting. I then offered the same odds to the other four. As I expected, none of them took me up on it. Daily Kos simply ignored it; but after all they're Daily Kos so they can do whatever they like, right? A blogger who goes by "Revere" and posted "Fumento's Bird Flu Follies" at Effect Measure also ignored it. But then, his blog actually had little to do with avian flu; rather it was mostly one long ad hominem attack on me. He even referred to my article as "sleaze," a rather strange term to describe a science article. Three bloggers outright refused the bet.
One was Mr. "50%/50%," an anonymous fellow who runs "Avian Flu Diary." Obviously if your blog is about nothing but avian flu, you have an interest in promoting panic. (There are actually a number of such dedicated sites, primarily FluWiki, which refuses to post my material but has no problem posting opinion pieces like A Severe Pandemic Is Likely and running ads from pharmaceutical companies that make flu drugs.) But our diarist friend had no interest in the bet. "Possible Interstate [sic] gambling law violations aside, this is far too serious a subject to debase by making side bets on whether millions of people will die," he whimpered. Personal bets violate no gambling laws, nor do serious subjects prevent bets. Translation: "Bawk! Bawk! Bawk!" He does not have the courage of his convictions, beyond the conviction to keep his blog alive.
Another was "Mad Mike the Biologist," who posts over at "Science Blogs." From other posters and posts I've seen there it should be called "Superstition Blogs." In the event, despite the written record on his own blog site he denied having even challenged the basis of my article. Never mind that the blog post in question, which in the title called me a "disingenuous ideologue," began: "Revere, over at Effect Measure, has a solid critique of Michael Fumento's opinion piece about avian flu. What the piece shows is just how ignorant of public health Fumento really is." That's not a challenge? Translation: "Bawk! Bawk! Bawk!"
Finally we have Tim Lambert, whose original post criticizing my article is here. Lambert is one of the most obnoxious trolls on the Internet. He produces nothing; he exists to tear down other people to make up for some perceived deficiency on his part. Perhaps it's a deficiency that can be measured with a three-inch ruler; I don't know. Some people buy a flashy sports car in his case, but Troll Lambert uses all his spare time to write fraudulent Wikipedia biographies about people who get more attention than he does (approximately 6.3 billion) and to try to poke fun of them on his blog. In his desperation he often makes an utter fool of himself and this was no exception. Aside from refusing the bet, Troll Lambert claimed that my giving 10 to 1 odds meant I believed there was a ten percent chance of pandemic flu over the next ten years. Right, Troll. And my saying "The sky is sunny" means that I believe Al Qaeda will set off a dirty bomb in Wichita, Kansas. I picked the 10 to 1 figure for the rather obvious reason that people like round numbers and we have a base 10 system. Now, Lambert is an Aussie and maybe Australia doesn't use the decimal system - but I'm pretty sure it does. I know they have chickens over there; Troll Lambert is proof.
And they're we have it; five flu alarmists offered the chance to make a chunk of change and all five refused it. What does this tell us? They'll spew and spew and spew, but they know that what they say just isn't true.
What the heck is that picture?
A.L.
This post is half interesting, half a bunch of sound and fury... you can fill in the blanks.
It's quite odd to criticise someone for ad hominem attacks while resorting to such attacks yourself. I really would like to think that I can expect more from Winds of Change contributors.
When a curious mind reviews the literature (not the blogs), one arrives at the inevitable conclusion that H5N1 is on a track to wreak major havoc. Anyone who denies this, after an objective review of the scientific literature, is ignorant, in total denial, or both.
Maybe no one took the bet because it is a sucker bet. If you're right you get paid, if they're right they get paid (but with money that will have lost any value).
Sort of like, I bet you any amount at 1 million to 1 odds that I don't die today. If I do, try and collect.
There are no ads at fluwiki. Score zero for your credibility.
Yes, Avian flu has become the boy who cried wolf... there was this big fear that this would be the human killer... and so far we're ok. The same thing happened with SARS, and like the boy, I think this racheting up the warnings of a specific germ is making people grow a tolerance to the fact that the global society we live in could also grow a global pandemic in a very short time span.
There is drug resistant teburculosis, now drug resistant staff infections. We have african infections like ebola that spring up, kill hundreds, and then dissapear with a moments notice. And we are not ready to deal with a pandemic in this country.
So yes, overhyping avian flu may be a mistake. But pretending that no danger exists may be even deadlier.
HIGHLY entertaining... no question there will be another flu epidemic, it is arguable whether H5N1 will be responsible. Also there is no doubt there are a bunch of people on the web that base their arguments on very questionable data.
I think it is funny that folks wont put there money where their hysterical "we are all gonna die!" mouths are.
Hey they might all be dead soon, so here is a chance to make an easy 1000% on their money. Live for today, for tomorrow we die!
I guess now is the time to take out that 30 year mortgage, and laugh all the way to the grave?
Michael Fumento, I learned from your excellent AIDS book, and will start worrying about avian flu only when good epidemiologists tell me I should. And that ends my interest in avian flu.
You've picked a strange way to get famous - telling people that beat-up panics are just beat-ups. I thank you for our work anyway.
Fumento's arguments on this are self-evidently absurd. A flu pandemic is something that has a low probability of occurrence during any one year, a high probability of occurrence over the long-run, and heavy consequences once it does occur. It is precisely for these kinds of risks that insurance was invented for. The chances of me getting into a major auto accident in the next year are certainly less than 50/50, and probably far less than 90/10, yet that doesn't mean I don't carry insurance.
To insure against a flu pandemic now is just common sense. No one I know has argued that we have to do this because the pandemic will strike this year; certainly none of the people who Fumento attacks have claimed that, yet that is precisely what his silly bet is based on. It's nothing but a pathetic straw-man, as intellectually dishonest as it gets. Which makes it par for the course for Fumento.
Funny, I only see one person devolving into hysterics here...
I mean, how can you not notice Mike's post, for example, directly stating that he doesn't think avian flu is that big a threat? (Exact words from Feb 06: "Personally, I think a pandemic is a low probability event". From Jan 07: "Well, I'm not putting odds down because I've never said that a pandemic is likely." How exactly is he contradicting himself here?)
Oh, I know how. Because you didn't even read it. Not even enough to get his blog's title, which is "Mike the Mad Biologist" and not "Mad Mike the Biologist" (two viruses enter, one virus leaves?).
Anyway, a much more reasonable explanation for not taking you up on your bet is that doing so would prove nothing. Unlike you, these people traffic in facts and data, not bravado and bloviation, so this sort of grand standing has no use to them.
It is interesting that your critique of Lambert consists of only ad hominem remarks and utterly fails to address his critique with anything resembling intelligence. But then, that's pretty par for the course with Fumento, isn't it?
There are no ads at fluwiki. Score zero for your credibility.
http://www.fluwikie.com/pmwiki.php?n=Consequences.PPE
That page looks to be pimping ViralDefender masks.
Michael -in the post above, you've got some takers. I'd love to see your response...
A.L.
Yeah he's one evil Michelin-Man is Lambert.
Don't judge Australians by him will you Michael?
Not all of us are bizzare leftist DDT-Holocaust-deniers and climate-alarmist bullshit-artists.
Its amazing just how many non-arguments that Lambert can squeeze into the one blog.