Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 4:59:16 AM

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For buzz... you are not alone:

https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/360520/#respond

vxbush 3/6/2020 6:21:07 AM

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In #1 Occasional Reader said: For buzz... you are not alone:

This is more of that new math, isn't it? 

Morning, campers. 

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 6:46:24 AM

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In #1 Occasional Reader said: For buzz... you are not alone:

I'll never live that down.  Fortunately, in Internet years, "never" is about a week and a half.

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 6:49:16 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 3:

My four and a half year-old son is now starting to correct my math (at times).  

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 6:54:20 AM

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In #4 Occasional Reader said: My four and a half year-old son is now starting to correct my math (at times).  

He's got your numbers...

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 6:54:40 AM

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buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 6:57:09 AM

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Reply to Occasional Reader in 4:

Given that I, with my lousy math skills, can out-figure most younger-generation cashiers---they being helpless without their electronic gizmos---by the time Little OR achieves majority he will bestride the earth like a colossus, or at least like one of those explorers in old movies who gets the primitive native tribe to revere him as a god by bringing forth fire with his cigarette lighter.

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 7:09:43 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 7:

He does double-digit multiplication in his head, quickly and (usually) correctly.

At the same time, he needs help putting his socks on correctly... 

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 7:11:54 AM

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In #5 buzzsawmonkey said: He's got your numbers...

Given that he's my spawn, we're clearly living out t the Biblical injunction, "be fruitful and multiply"; it's just the he and I are dividing that job up (pun intended). 

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 7:19:47 AM

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In #7 buzzsawmonkey said: he will bestride the earth like a colossus

I recall a minor plot point in Arthur C. Clarke's novel Imperial Earth, which takes place in 2276, being that the protagonist and his family had made a point of retaining the ability to do math in their heads, which dazzled most people.   (The novel also had about the closest approximation to a smartphone/PDA prediction I personally know of from the 70s or earlier... except even he didn't imagine they'd be wirelessly connected to a global computer network and database, rather that they'd be standalone devices.) 

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 7:23:28 AM

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In #10 Occasional Reader said: Arthur C. Clarke's novel Imperial Earth

And I can vividly recall sitting in the lobby of the Barbizon Plaza Hotel in Manhattan, December 1975, absolutely absorbed in that novel, as my dad waited in line to check us in for our Christmas NYC visit. 

Syrah 3/6/2020 8:06:14 AM

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doppelganglander 3/6/2020 8:08:10 AM

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Reply to Occasional Reader in 8:

That's astonishing. At least the sock problem proves he's a normal four-year-old and not some sort of lab-created humanoid secret weapon.

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 8:11:14 AM

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Hooray for big, evil, capitalist corporations.

I just dropped by the CVS near my workplace.  They have a big display table right in front, loaded with Lysol and Clorox wipes (and similar), along with disinfectant spray.  Not only that... it's on sale, buy one get 50% off the second. 

I feel like this sends a message both of a) be prepared, and b) calm down, we have plenty of this stuff, no need to hoard ridiculous amounts.

Syrah 3/6/2020 8:13:50 AM

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Reply to Occasional Reader in 1:

if we use the MSNBC math calculator, we really can wipe out all of the unpaid college loans, implement Medicare for all and be able to live scott free on rock candy mountain for the rest of our lives!

JCM 3/6/2020 8:17:55 AM

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The jobs report is okay but Corona is going to wreck the economy.

The problem is not Corona but Coronaphobia.

Coronaphobia - the media generated irrational fear of Corona to drag down the economy and damage Trump's re-election bid.

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 8:20:31 AM

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In #16 JCM said: Coronaphobia.

No virus is illegal! 

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 8:22:37 AM

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In #13 doppelganglander said: That's astonishing.

Upon rethinking, let me modify it a bit.

One-digit times one digit multiplication... "easy peezy lemon-squeezy", as he says in his own words, he nails it every time, it's no longer even a challenge.

One times two-digit multiplication, he does very well, and understands how to do it.

Two digit time two digit, he does well, gets it right the majority of the time. 

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 8:24:29 AM

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In #15 Syrah said: live scott free on rock candy mountain

"Big Rock Candy Mountains" by Harry McClintock

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 8:27:14 AM

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While I'm on the subject:

"Fifty Years From Now" by Harry McClintock

Syrah 3/6/2020 8:30:10 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 19:

that song even covers Andrew Yang’s $1,000 a month of free Money. 

“Where the handouts grow on bushes.”

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 8:31:15 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 19:

The Burl Ives variation on "Big Rock Candy Mountain"

Syrah 3/6/2020 8:46:04 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 22:

The McClintock version has more energy. It makes the Burl Ives version seem sleepy. 

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 8:54:09 AM

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Reply to Syrah in 23:

Agreed.  I always prefer originals myself, and McClintock's is the original.  

The Ives version, from the "Folk Revival" era, is an interesting contrast, in that one can see/hear how the initial verve was commercialized/dumbed down.  Pete Seeger used to rail against the evils of "Tin Pan Alley," i.e., the commercial music industry which gave us the American standards---but he and the other "folkies" of the 50s/60s "folk revival" era were themselves creatures of "Tin Pan Alley."

By the way---semi-on-topic---here's a pro-American "Tin Pan Alley" song which I've always felt is far too unknown.  It's written, and sung, by Harold Arlen, the author of the iconic "Stormy Weather" and its followup, "Ill Wind," among others. The closing lines, "We've got no Mussolini, got no Mosley/We've got Popeye and Gypsy Rose Lee" have always amused me:  "God's Country" by Harold Arlen

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 9:03:36 AM

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In #24 buzzsawmonkey said: I always prefer originals myself,

I do often, but not always.

See, e.g., "Blinded by the Light".  The Manfred Mann version beats the Springsteen one. 

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 9:04:13 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 24:

By the way, the raucous horns that begin and end the Arlen song "God's Country" are a nod to another, earlier song, "I'm Wild About Horns on Automobiles [that go Ta-Ta-Ta-Ta]"---in other words, an oblique salute to America's auto industry and the changes it wrought.  Two versions of "I'm Wild About Horns on Automobiles":

Fred Rich and His Orchestra (it has the verse lead-in) and 

Harry Reser and His Orchestra (Reser was a banjo virtuoso, so a different arrangement)

vxbush 3/6/2020 9:10:01 AM

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In #16 JCM said: The problem is not Corona but Coronaphobia.

Well, I would say it's more an issue with knowing what we should do (complete quarantine) and not wanting to do it correctly. I've heard numerous stories of the CDC quarantining one family member while not quarantining another family member who lives in the same house. That's completely ridiculous, based on the transmission rate of this bug. 

I totally understand why there aren't enough test kits. The virus was only isolated in December. Having test kits at this point--any kits at all--is absolutely amazing. 

However, I've only heard of the Chinese mentioning the fact that there are two strains of the virus, and I've heard no reports about whether both strains are in the US. 

doppelganglander 3/6/2020 9:29:32 AM

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Reply to Occasional Reader in 18:

Still pretty amazing at his age. I can't multiply two digits by two digits in my head without serious concentration. I actually do what they teach in Common Core - multiply tens, multiply ones, then add them up. That may be what he's doing too. 

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 9:33:07 AM

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In #28 doppelganglander said: I actually do what they teach in Common Core - multiply tens, multiply ones, then add them up. That may be what he's doing too. 

That’s exactly what he’s doing, and I taught him that, not common core. I seem to recall they taught us that even back in the day.

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 9:37:41 AM

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JCM 3/6/2020 9:40:45 AM

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Reply to vxbush in 27:

What I observe from reports is it likely that the virus has been in the US at least a month longer than first suspected case.

Which means it has been passed around much more broadly than person to person contact, hence the "community acquired" cases.

Since it appears the virus is much more wide spread than known cases it also gives us more clues.

The actual infection rate remains unknown. If it is been around as that long either it has a low infection to exposure rate, how many people have the virus but don't show any symptoms vs. those who do.

Also unknown if it has been around a month longer, how many people got a "flu" chalked it up to seasonal flu, suffered through a few days of flu and continued on about their business. How many people go to a doc with the flu? A small percentage, unless symptoms are severe.

From those bits and pieces it looks like Corona has a low infection rate. However it is more virulent, when some gets sick, they get sicker. Especially those with compromised immune systems. Hence the high mortality rate in the local nursing home, 75% of fatalities so far are from one nursing home. And the others had underlying medical issues.

If the virus is as pervasive as I suspect from above, generally healthy people don't seem to be all that susceptible.

As to the novel part of the virus, people recover therefore it is not so totally news to the human immune system that it can't fight off the virus.

The "normal" flu this season has made 32 million Americans ill and been fatal for 15,000 or so... and that is a "normal" year. In the same time frame at the beginning of the flu season, the regular thing spread faster and killed more than Corona.

The report of the kit short is media BS (IMAO)... Seattle / King Co alone has the capability online now to test 1400 a day.

Again my opinion the media frenzy is why out of proportion to the evidence I see of the threat.

Then when I see the media saying, "Nice job report, but wait till next month when you see the Corona job report, that will be the REAL Trump economy." When the March jobs report comes out in April with 50k new jobs... the media will scream recession and start a new panic. And push and push on that until business do slow down thinking, what if there is something to it? Just in time for election season.

Color me a cynical grumpy SOB.

But the evidence I can find, and the reporting do not align.

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 9:42:31 AM

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Reply to Occasional Reader in 29:

It's certainly the way I was taught---although memorizing the times tables helped, too.

I will say, once again, that the current "Common Core" is irksome because it is a prime example of the Left hermit-crabbing a valid term.  The "Common Core" was invented under Robert Maynard Hutchins, when he became president of the University of Chicago in the 1930s.  Hutchins is, BTW, the guy who ended the University of Chicago's formerly-champion football team, as he did not believe that the immense amount of resources spent on college football was conducive to the "life of the mind" university he wanted to create.  That is why there was room under the bleachers at the unused Stagg Field for Fermi to create the first atomic pile.

In any event, Hutchins also decreed that entering undergrads at the U of C would have to take two years of "Common Core" courses---in English, Western Civilization, math, science---before they would be permitted to go on to choose a major.  He believed that everyone had to have a basic grounding in Aristotle and Shakespeare and things of that sort before one could call one's self "educated"---and that only once one had an educated grounding in these basics could you have the capacity to choose an area of specialization, and that any area of specialization would benefit by having people in it who were so grounded.

The current "Common Core" uses the umbrella term, and also seeks to standardize pedagogy---but it has, by all accounts, discarded the Western civilization/great thinkers foundation on which the original, genuine Common Core was based.

doppelganglander 3/6/2020 9:43:22 AM

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Reply to Occasional Reader in 29:

Possibly. I don't remember much about how I was taught math. As I've mentioned,  I missed out on a couple of years of key concepts and had a times table thrown at me in 4th grade. I may have fallen victim to one of the many teaching fads of the day. My brother got caught up in something called ITA and almost didn't learn to read at all.

vxbush 3/6/2020 12:03:47 PM

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What I observe from reports is it likely that the virus has been in the US at least a month longer than first suspected case.

No disagreement there. We have no way of knowing who the first case was in the US. 

Which means it has been passed around much more broadly than person to person contact, hence the "community acquired" cases.

Well, we knew that after the first person returning from China passed it on to another person. What we don't know is if the milder version was passed around and interpreted as flu and how long it has been going.

Since it appears the virus is much more wide spread than known cases it also gives us more clues.

The actual infection rate remains unknown. If it is been around as that long either it has a low infection to exposure rate, how many people have the virus but don't show any symptoms vs. those who do.

Okay, time to put my math hat on: 

(places stylish hat covered with beautiful math symbols on head)

There's no way that we can know the actual infection rate. It is simply unknowable, period. The best we can do is estimate it, based on known cases. Yes, we've missed a number of cases at the beginning, I'll grant you that. But just based on what we do know, we can come to some reasoned estimates.

At this point, based on my favorite stats site for Coronavirus, the infection rate (Ro) has been estimated to a broad range of values: 

WHO's estimated (on Jan. 23) Ro to be between 1.4 and 2.5. [13]
Other studies have estimated a Ro between 3.6 and 4.0, and between 2.24 to 3.58. [23]. 
Preliminary studies had estimated Ro to be between 1.5 and 3.5. [5][6][7]
An outbreak with a reproductive number of below 1 will gradually disappear.
For comparison, the Ro for the common flu is 1.3 and for SARS it was 2.0.

That's not terribly helpful, but at least it gives us a starting point. And that estimate gives us a way to determine how aggressive we should be in responding to the illness. It seems pretty clear it is more transmissible than SARS (this is my own guess, based on my memory of how not widespread SARS was as compared to Corona), so I would say it's at least over 2. If you go with the maximum estimate of 4, I would say we have reason to question the poor quarantines that the CDC has established.  

The easier figure to estimate at this point is what percentage of those who get coronavirus end up dead. That is still low at 6% and probably lower based on the given of more people actually infected than reported in, and lower still for normally healthy people. 

From those bits and pieces it looks like Corona has a low infection rate. However it is more virulent, when some gets sick, they get sicker. 

I am hearing something else--some folks who have had coronavirus and been released because they were deemed recovered have ended up dying days later. However, right now that only applies to China, where they have all sorts of reasons to push people out of makeshift hospitals. But the meme is starting to go around that this is a far more aggressive virus and folks are going to panic even more. University of Washington is now closed. Again, we're in a position where folks are damned if they don't close and it turns out that this is horribly more dangerous than we have realized, and damned if they do for overreacting. 

If the virus is as pervasive as I suspect from above, generally healthy people don't seem to be all that susceptible.

I think that may depend on which version of the virus the person gets. (Note that no one is suggested to inoculate people with the weaker virus; that makes me wonder how related the two versions are but they really may not know yet.)

The "normal" flu this season has made 32 million Americans ill and been fatal for 15,000 or so... and that is a "normal" year. In the same time frame at the beginning of the flu season, the regular thing spread faster and killed more than Corona.

Yeah, I've seen this argument made numerous times, but the problem is people are looking at it only from the flu side. That indicates a flu death rate of 0.04687%. Let me rework that analogy: If 32 million Americans got COVID based on a 6% death rate (our best estimate so far), then you're looking at 1,920,000 deaths from Corona. The difference boils down to the infection rate *and* the death rate. The common flu Ro is at 1.3; it seems that COVID is above 2. 

There's a reason why the CDC is performing quarantines and lots of companies are stopping travel. I'm not going crazy here; I'm just working the current estimates. And that's all they are right now; estimates based on current statistics. 

I completely agree that the media is trying to use COVID to bash Trump and prevent him from winning reelection. That is indisputable. And while I appreciate the CDC is trying to prevent panic (to which the media isn't helping), I do have to wonder if they are instituting stringent enough protocols. Again, it depends on which strain is progressing here. 

vxbush 3/6/2020 12:13:33 PM

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In #34 vxbush said: Yeah, I've seen this argument made numerous times, but the problem is people are looking at it only from the flu side. That indicates a flu death rate of 0.04687%. Let me rework that analogy: If 32 million Americans got COVID based on a 6% death rate (our best estimate so far), then you're looking at 1,920,000 deaths from Corona. The difference boils down to the infection rate *and* the death rate. The common flu Ro is at 1.3; it seems that COVID is above 2. 

Note I'm including China here.....this is total worldwide. 

vxbush 3/6/2020 12:17:36 PM

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In #35 vxbush said: In #34 vxbush said: Yeah, I've seen this argument made numerous times, but the problem is people are looking at it only from the flu side. That indicates a flu death rate of 0.04687%. Let me rework that analogy: If 32 million Americans got COVID based on a 6% death rate (our best estimate so far), then you're looking at 1,920,000 deaths from Corona. The difference boils down to the infection rate *and* the death rate. The common flu Ro is at 1.3; it seems that COVID is above 2. 

If you assume a 3% death rate, the number goes from 1,920,000 deaths down to 960,000 deaths. 

At what point do you decide that you need to institute stronger quarantine measures? 

Occasional Reader 3/6/2020 12:50:54 PM

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Reply to vxbush in 35:

Also note, apparently the death rate in China outside of Wuhan is about 0.7%.   This per NPR (yeah, I know) yesterday. And there are good reasons to believe that's a more representative rate, given the likelihood that a) there was more confusion at Wuhan at the start of the thing, combined with less knowledge of how to treat; and b) there was likely a strong phenomenon at the start of having the seeming mortality rate skewed upward because initially, only the people experiencing more severe symptoms would be seeking any sort of medical intervention, the rest assuming they just had a cold or regular flu which they got over. 

Syrah 3/6/2020 1:06:08 PM

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Reply to vxbush in xx:

Reply to JCM in xx:

re: Corona 

I think that a big part of the Corona panic is that what we were seeing in the visuals coming out of Wuhan were by western experience, bizarre, extreme and frightening. 

It looked like the Chinese government was either panic, or fighting an “end times” plague. 

China is not like the US in many ways and a straight one to one comparison based on the images we were exposed to can be and almost certainly were very misleading. 

Wuhan, in what we would call city and county, has a population of about 41m. The metro core alone is about 19m.

For comparison, King County, which includes the cities of Seattle, Bellevue, Redmond, Renton, Kirkland, Burian and a number of others, has a total population of 2.2m.  Seattle has a population of about 800thousand. 

When we saw China build factory sized field hospitals, hosing down streets, buildings and even office spaces with people still in them which disinfectants with foggier machines, we saw something that looked like terror stricken panic on the part of the Chinese government.

Wuhan’s metro core is over 19 times the population of the city of Seattle. People are stacked on top of each other there in a way that people on the American west coast do not live in. With people living in such close proximity to each other, exposure is going to be very high. None of the cities in King county ar no where near as dense as is Wuhan. Our exposure rates will be less.

Also, China has an old population. The US is young by comparison. (I don’t have the numbers) When someone in China catches this disease, they are much more likely to be elderly. The High Risk group in China is a much larger percentage of the population than it is in the US.

What we saw happening in China does not cross compare that well.

I think It is less likely to be as bad here than it is in China.

I can’t explain away the things we are seeing coming out of Iran. I wonder if their medical care is just that bad.

vxbush 3/6/2020 1:09:30 PM

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In #37 Occasional Reader said: Also note, apparently the death rate in China outside of Wuhan is about 0.7%.   This per NPR (yeah, I know) yesterday. And there are good reasons to believe that's a more representative rate, given the likelihood that a) there was more confusion at Wuhan at the start of the thing, combined with less knowledge of how to treat; and b) there was likely a strong phenomenon at the start of having the seeming mortality rate skewed upward because initially, only the people experiencing more severe symptoms would be seeking any sort of medical intervention, the rest assuming they just had a cold or regular flu which they got over. 

The WHO's infection estimate is 3%, which I got from a coworker; I can't find that figure on their website, though. Everything I see that is at their website dates from before March 1. 

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 1:15:48 PM

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In #39 vxbush said: The WHO's infection estimate is 3%, which I got from a coworker; I can't find that figure on their website, though. Everything I see that is at their website dates from before March 1. 

What does Dr. Seuss say about all the WHOs down in WHOville?

vxbush 3/6/2020 1:21:02 PM

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In #40 buzzsawmonkey said: What does Dr. Seuss say about all the WHOs down in WHOville?

Oh how I wish I had time right now to come up with a Seussian rhyme about Whovids with COVIDs.....

Syrah 3/6/2020 1:31:35 PM

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I don’t know what the right term is.

What is the term for how fast a disease spreads in a community?

That rate, whatever it is called, would be affected by the population density of the community.

Time is an important factor. 

PaladinPhil 3/6/2020 1:34:07 PM

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Reply to Occasional Reader in 10:

Best example of cloud computing was Niven and Pournelle's "The Mote in God's Eye". Also tablet computers. One plot point was a couple was in the males cabin and she needed to check on some video footage. Grabbed his tablet and logged in to share what she had recorded.

vxbush 3/6/2020 1:35:23 PM

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In #42 Syrah said: I don’t know what the right term is. What is the term for how fast a disease spreads in a community? That rate, whatever it is called, would be affected by the population density of the community. Time is an important factor. 

I believe that is the infection rate, but I don't usually hear about any change in that value based on population density. It doesn't seem like there are any illnesses where if you simply walk by someone you pick up the illness. But I freely admit, I'm interested in the numbers more than that stuff. 

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 1:52:50 PM

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In #41 vxbush said: Oh how I wish I had time right now to come up with a Seussian rhyme about Whovids with COVIDs.....

It'll keep a day or two, if it needs to. Looking forward to it!

JCM 3/6/2020 1:55:26 PM

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Reply to Syrah in 38:

Population density is a big factor. As is hygiene which is not up to our standards.

buzzsawmonkey 3/6/2020 2:00:43 PM

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