What is a scientific reason to believe in AIDS?

If I browse through the peer-reviewed literature on the topic of HIV and AIDS I come to the conclusion that HIV is the cause of AIDS, AIDS is a distinct phenomenon. More so, I find the literature to be overwhelming.

How do you suggest to counterbalance the conclusions drawn from this literature, often government funded (not just one government, governments of many different counties), often privately funded.

I cannot see how to reach another conclusion than the one i did based on a review of the literature.

 

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A moderator has expressed concern at the tenor of this post.

This was in response to Metakron's observation: -
James, we need to make our own decisions without the government's help.

Now, I have acknowledged the validity of Metakron's observation, or, at least agreed with him upon the point of making decisions independent of government.
I have then honoured his position by acting upon his recommendation and reaching a decision of my own. This decision has three components:

a) Metakron is dangerous
b) Metakron is a moron
c) Metakron should remove himself from the forum

I shall deal with point b) first. I do not have independent data on Metakron's intellectual capacity. It should be clear, however, that were he truly a moron he would be incapable of making the contributions, such as they are, to sciforums. Therefore, it should be self evident that the description of him as a moron is figurative and metaphorical. It is also, in those senses, demonstrably accurate: the wealth of data supporting the existence of AIDS and its association with HIV can only be ignored by someone motivated by some combination of emotion, paranoia and blind ignorance.

If this were a discussion on the existence, or non-existence of UFOs, then his myopi would be amusing. It is, however, about an illness that is wreaking havoc in Africa and Russia and many nations and communities around the world. Promoting the idea, against the evidence, that AIDS does not exist and is not linked to HIV is irresponsible and fully merits describing Metakron as dangerous.

When an individual persistently acts against the massive weight of evidence in an inappropriate and dangerous fashion it is right, indeed mandatory, to request that they piss off: never darken my hand towels again.

I could have repeated and rehashed the arguments that show Metakron to be mistaken. I could have demonstrated that such a mistake could only arise in an individual suffering from severe mental problems. And then I could have requested he take stock of his own position, do the right thing, and cease and desist from his nonsense.

On the whole it seemed much simpler, more direct and much more honest to say "I've decided you are a dangerous moron, now piss off."


Poachers turned gamekeeper are generally very good at gamekeeping, but if your interest remains poaching they can be a definite pain in the ass.

 

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We need to frame this and hang it up in the moderator's sauna.
Having so many new mods is going to make this an interesting place in the next few months... hopefully not too many will fuck up much (I've already had one incident, fortunately fixable

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).

 

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I would like to express my thanks to Ophiolite for his explanation of his short comment.

I actually never realized what he meant by dangerous exactly until now.

Indeed, there is danger to let scientific research be subservient to blind emotion. Imagine that the notion that HIV is unrelated to AIDS, or that AIDS does not exist gets a large following based on an effective propaganda machine. AIDS research will suffer, AIDS treatment will suffer. The world will suffer.

One could very much bring up a topic now that will activate Godwin's Law.

Mod Hat (tiassa ™)

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Hello, this is your friendly Biology & Genetics moderator,

I do believe in active moderation, however, not in active negative moderation. I will merely try to steer people, confront them with their deepest inner thoughts and morality, stimulate discussion, until the very moment I realize it is taking to much of my time and I resort back to passive moderation.

As you can see the explanation that was furthered by ophiolite did nothing to explain his ideas to himself, however they did give other sciforumers insight into the thinking behind his short and sweet comment.

I hope people will realize that more thoughtful posts are actually more interesting. Needless to say I will have to put more effort into this myself.

And obviously sometimes things are more clear with a one-liner. I would hate to think that friends of biology & genetics feel pressured into abandoning the one-liner.

 

I think most people have missed the point, i think what hes really asking is why should we believe anything soley on the basis of authorative consensus, we believe in aids - or rather what its proported to be soley on the assumption that the people who tell us what it is know what theyre talking about!
Of course this goes for just about anything else as well so its not particularly relevant to biology or disease, in fact id say it was a philosophical matter if anything.

 

Scientists publish the results of repeatable experiments. Anyone too lazy or lacking the means or skills to repeat these experiments, at the very least, owes the scientific community the benefit of the doubt.

 

The beauty of it is that you do not have to believe in it. You can visit a library that carries scientific journals and look up all the research yourself. No need to take a text book for granted. No need to take anyones word for it.

What's more worrisome is actually that people take conspiracy theories for granted. Such as this one. They read something on the internet and immediately believe in it. Just something someone wrote.

However, they could just go to the library and look up the original research. Read it. And form their own opinion.

But it is easier to believe in conspiracies because it just requires belief. No reasoning required. No effort required. No logic required.

Hence I disagree with your statement that the original topic is represented by your idea of not taking authority for granted. Conspiracy theories are based on this. Not science. Nothing is more satisfying for a scientists than to blow up the scientific dogma and replace it with your own.

 

In the absence of knowledge to deduce for yourself the validity of scientific claims im not sure its atall wise to put absolute faith in the competence of others.
Alittle faith is no bad thing though dont get me wrong, no problem atall in hedging your bets here and there.
Its the wider attitude of accepting the authoritive consensus no matter what the issue or circumstance that i have a problem with.

 

Of course! when you have the time to go that far there is certainly nothing stopping you from from looking into these things yourself.
The problem is no one humanbeing has the means or time to look into the validity of every theory or claim out there. A porportion of what we 'know' is based apon the assumption that the people whos job it is to know such things know what it is theyre talking about.

Fair point.

True, science is ripe for contradicting/refuting where possible, the problem is the lack of time/inclination for the vast majority of people to go that far. Therefore faith becomes a kind of necessary evil for most of us.

 

>> Stating AIDS is not caused by HIV is comparable to stating evolution does not exist.

well there goes AIDS ---->

Maybe AIDS as such is not caused by a virus, but rather the patient must have a predisposing clinical/biochemical condition, and the trigger that precipitates the catastrophic loss of immunity for the patient is maybe a virus, maybe a number of viruses.

Something is certainly transmissible between certain people.
This criteria fulfills one of Koch's postulates, but it seems not all criteria are met.

So AIDS is a modern illness... and I suspect the bio-metal state of the patient is the key, as it is with all modern illnesses

There are many opportunistic bugs out there that by themselves cause little harm, but degrade the population by restricting food, shelter etc...poison them outta their clean biochemical state, and I am sure LIFE will remove the aberrant cells.

I do not think a healthy, well nourished person can contract any illness/disease.... it is only compromised people who are susceptible, IMO

 

Not exactly. That's a different question from the one at the top of this topic, but it is related.

People are talking here like the HIV hypothesis of AIDS is proven by the definition. Too many people do this and too many go along with it. It is the basic logical fallacy, the twist in the story that screws it up at the very beginning. It creates a Mobius loop of logic. Some of us can step outside of that loop and analyze it from that vantage point. Apparently some people can't. They even take pride in being part of it. They're part of something, all right. Trouble is, they don't understand what.

We're following a stinking meme.

Who would take hold of this and dissect it?

Scientific definitions have to make sense. They have to follow rules of logic. In this case the definition of an "Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome," needs to contain its logic, its referents, and its justification within those four words. Acquired means that you get it from somewhere. The accepted definition of "Immune" is anything to do with the body's ability to fight disease. "Deficiency" is pretty much self-explanatory.

Syndrome: "In medicine and psychology, the term syndrome is the association of several clinically recognizable features, signs, symptoms, phenomena or characteristics which often occur together, so that the presence of one feature alerts the physician to the presence of the others. In recent decades the term has been used outside of medicine to refer to a combination of phenomena seen in association."

When considering the hypothesis of HIV-caused immune deficiency, and applying the label of AIDS to this one thing, only one of those words does not change its meaning. Maybe the term "deficiency" also changes its meaning, come to think of it.

"Acquired" has been altered to mean one accepted cause. "Immune system" is redefined as the actions of the select set of immune system cells that are allegedly affected by the virus. "Deficiency" follows that narrow path. "Syndrome" became totally undefinable.

Outside the loop, it's hard to get in. Inside, it's hard to get out. A person has to be able to jump a track to get from one to the other. A law of gravitation makes the inside seem more attractive, but it also anchors a person to a set of ideas that he or she is not allowed to question. This forces the person to be less than he was and less than he could be. That's the kind of trouble we're in.

 

If you want to argue semantics, then fine. AIDS really isn't the proper term. There are other ways that immune deficiencies can occur. Hiv-caused AIDS has taken over the term and driven all the other types of AIDS out the window.

But, this is a fact of life. AIDS has taken on a specific meaning. It refers to a specific type of immune deficiency.
The immune deficiency caused by the hiv virus.

The scientific reasons to 'believe' in AIDS exists in spades. The literature is full of them.

You may choose not to believe scientific literature. You may choose to not even bother to review the data in order to choose not to believe.
However, if you do so, then you're not basing your choice on science. You're basing your choice on your intuition.

 

I know exactly where youre comming from, i just dont think many people will be able to follow you in taking that vantage point without getting offended and assuming youre attacking the entire scientific paradigm.
Alot of people on here (if not the majority) are what Howard Bloom might describe as 'conformity enforcers'.

 

If the scientific paradigm is worthy, it can withstand any attack.

 

The semantics are very important. IF HIV causes immune deficiency, then AIDS caused by HIV Should be a subcategory. It should not be placed at the top of the hierarchy in such a way that we speak of AIDS as if immune deficiency can only be caused by HIV.

Trouble is, I do believe scientific literature. Your projection to the contrary is invalid. I draw my objections to the HIV hypothesis from scientific literature. You, Invert, might say that it is not part of the canon of scientific literature if it produces evidence that is contrary to the HIV hypothesis. If you say this, and I've seen a lot of people say it, and I've seen a lot of people say it and say that they didn't say it, then you are allowing the hypothesis to control the scientific findings that should be free to affirm or deny that hypothesis according to the evidence that is actually found.

The things that AIDS dissidents have been excoriated for include actually researching the scientific literature, actually analyzing statistics, reading the literature about the medications and telling people what it says, and in any way shape or form doubting the HIV paradigm. At the same time, we are talking about a paradigm that was badly constructed from the beginning. It is constructed to obfuscate investigations. If investigators are not free to reconstruct the hypothesis so that it makes a properly verifiable statement, then something is going on that shouldn't be.

 

I beg to differ. "conformity enforcers" are not concerned with truth or accuracy. Many people here are rationalists and scientists. You need to understand the difference between three things

- blind acceptance
- blind denial
- rational skepticism

If you have hard evidence that AIDS is not caused by HIV, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary, then show it. What reason could you possibly have to not accept the vast majority of scientists conclusions regarding this? Are you an experienced virologist? Molecular physiologist? No?

Gut feelings usually mean that you ate a bad hotdog. Nothing more.

 

I think rationalists and proffesional scientists are actually pretty thin on the ground round here. What we mostly have here is people holding up the pillars of science, so that the genuine movers and shakers of scientific enquiry can get on with their work safe in the knowledge that their paradigm is being held firmly in place by its devouted flock.

Im talking about the absence of knowledge not knowledge of contradictory evidence.

Thats entirely the point; im not a virologist or a molecular physiologist im almost entirely ignorant to those specific scientific fields.
In the absence of a foundation of the critical tools to decern for myself do i simply accept the concensus as fact by default?
If i do then im taking the concensus as fact purely on nothing more than the belief that the majority 'probably arent wrong' and simply hedging my bets.
Am i guilty of doing this myself? very much so, although id rather state such things as 'probable fact' than actual fact.
And in doing so also make sure to remind myself of the importance of seperating the stuff that i know from the stuff i think i know. Otherwise the foundation of my personal knowledge becomes tenuous to say the least.

 

Most of us who have no expertise in these areas don't go on crusades (metakron) with the conviction that they're right and the mass of scientific evidence is wrong. I think I know a lot. If i whittled it down to what I actually know from direct observation and experience, my knowledge base becomes pretty thin.

When I say "I know that the object at the heart of the crab nebula is a pulsar" I feel pretty confident in that despite not being a professional astronomer or alien pulsar explorer.

 

Wrong question. You can't readily prove a negative. What is the hard evidence that HIV causes immune deficiency?

There is a lot of hard evidence that the HIV idea is poorly constructed and depends much more on belief than evidence. I have read a lot about how the HIV ideology came to be accepted, and the evidence, or more accurately, the lack of evidence that HIV causes any sort of negative condition at all.

What "everyone knows", even trained scientists, is not necessarily accurate. The scientists have huge stakes in staying with what they perceive to be the mainstream on this, like their jobs, their income, and their reputations. Even in a place like this, people jump all over a dissident and impugn his intelligence, accuse him of overreaching himself, and use gratuitous insulting behavior. Not so many of them actually address the evidence.

www.virusmyth.net

When I say that the definition of AIDS is semantically incorrect, I present a body of evidence for that statement. This evidence can be found right or wrong based on the evidence, without regards to my profession, my expertise, my hair color, or whether I voted Republican.

Also, proving that a theory is poorly constructed is just as good as proving that there is no evidence to support it.

 

Your usual argument isn't semantic. Your main AIDS rant is that hiv doesn't cause the symptoms experienced in AIDS. That, instead, these symptoms are caused by the medications used to treat the farcical condition. This has been refuted logically by showing that the symptoms existed before the 'syndrome' was identified and/or defined. And before hiv was ever discovered.

The illness predates the treatment for said illness.


When I spoke earlier of semantics, I was speaking strictly about how it can be said that AIDS may not be the best choice for a label for the condition as there are other types of immune deficiencies with different causes than hiv.
However, these other types of immune deficiencies likely don't express themselves in precisely the same manner and symptomology as hiv induced AIDS.

And, regardless of the aptness of the label, it is the agreed upon label.

AIDS is now used to represent hiv induced AIDS.
This is simply the language and to argue it is to argue against language.
Might as well say that 'the' is a stupid word. (I mean look it. "The." What the fuck does it mean anyway, right?)