ML2 @mathlover@social.cleverlibre.org

@joey_zozo
I agree. The issue is that Florida in particular is at ridiculous levels and reopening schools there is not safe.
@valleyforge

@joey_zozo
@valleyforge

The fact that we are thinking that putting teachers (and kids to some extent) at risk of getting permanent lung damage because "kids need to be in a physical school" more than lungs need to be healthy is in my opinion absurd.

@valleyforge
They aren't as uncommon as you would think. In grade school here it was about 10% of teachers. Also while young kids might not get sick as much, young adults have comparable morbidity (though lower mortality) to people 65 and over.

I think schools can open in some places but my father says it's beyond premature to do so in Florida with transmission being so high.

@valleyforge
The children aren't the only people at the school. Also, children may not die as often, but older children can still get quite sick.
This is a terrible idea on Florida's part

What the fuck is Florida thinking?!?!
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/florida-lawyers-offering-free-living-wills-teachers-returning-school-during-n1234872

@lordalveric Biden has stated he is against defunding police. He also isn't on board with the far left on identity politics, and at the federal level I don't see the far-left getting drastic changes past more moderate members. Additionally, Democrats might still be held in check by a GOP-led senate, and if they are not, the Supreme Court will remain conservative and able to strike down anything truly egregious.

More urgent than Democratic legislative control is Biden's ability to reverse Trump's executive policy (which have been disastrous for the nation as a whole and would be even worse for the nation if Trump remained in office.)

@lordalveric From what I have heard from my father (medical doctor) the brain part is more affected by the variations within populations (and even more so by environmental factors) than by racial differences, and the effects of the latter two are so large that racial differences in neurology are negligible.

You are correct about the matter of what "race" is.

@freemo If you flip a coin 100 times, the sequence of heads and tales that results will be one of around 2*10^30 possible such sequences, so the odds will be one in 2*10^30. But you *will* get such an individually improbable sequence simply by flipping the coin 100 times.

Incidentally, this is one reason why arguing for intelligent design by way of the supposed improbability of a human genome doesn't work.

@lordalveric
My thoughts:
1. Race is to human population variation what "hot", "warm" and "cold" are to termperature: vague labels with undefined boundaries describing an inherently continuous phenomenon.
2. Racial differences are highly superficial, with skin color, minor anatomical differences, and having one set of genetic diseases scattered amidst the population rather than some other set being more or less the extent of these differences.

@lordalveric My mother (a medical doctor who majored in psychology in college) has suggested Biden's issues may be neurological sequelae from a head injury, which while observable, could easily be minor overall and not at all indicative of dementia. From what she has seen of Biden, she judges that he speaks on a vastly better level than Trump.

@lordalveric If it weren't for the fact that my part of the US is generally sane and I have a loving supportive family I would not want to leave behind, I'd probably be halfway to two-thirds convinced to leave by this point.

@lordalveric You certainly aren't the only person I know of who left for those reasons, and I'd be lying if I said that I haven't been slightly tempted to come to the same conclusion a few times every year since 2016.

@lordalveric Biden apologized for that stupid remark, but true.

Biden has gaffes and several policy positions I strongly dislike (opposition to Section 230 and support for assault weapon bans among them); Trump has even more gaffes, has even more policy positions I despise, has an actual policy and enforcement record I despise, and is currently causing the country to go down the tubes as-is. Biden is also more likely to fill positions with competent people (which is arguably the single most important part of a presidency) while Trump has been quite content leaving positions empty and having people fill them in an acting capacity, or even having cronies or family *unofficially* fill them.

To be honest a lot depends on who Biden's VP pick is as well, as whoever she is, she will probably play a significant role in Biden's administration.