Francis Collins is a national treasure. But I don't understand his thoughts on "faith".
Collins: "I am concerned that people of faith have been particularly vulnerable to misinformation and disinformation". He seems surprised by this. This has been a problem for a long time in both healthcare, politics, etc.
Why? (1) There is 0 scientific evidence for a supreme being (god); and, (2) if a person can believe in such a mythological being, you can then get them to believe in anything.
I read one of his previous books about 10-15 years ago when I was trying to understand how it was possible for some people to reconcile their belief in the logic of science (fact) with their parallel belief in the truth of religion (faith). His life, and his life's work, are a shining example of this dichotomy.
What a thoughtful, caring man! This, to me, was a powerful take-home point: “And I wish Eric, I had said more often what I'm telling you today is the best that the assembled experts can come up with, but the data we have to look at is woefully inadequate. And so, it very well could be that what I'm telling you is wrong, when we get more data, I will come back to you as soon as we have something better and we'll let you know, but don't be surprised if it's different and that will not mean that we are jerking you around or we don't know what we're talking about. It's like this is how science works.”
Interesting interview and wholly agree that pandemic communication was poor, e.g., failure to explain what novel means. Even today, peoples' frame of reference allows them to think they are "good to go" once covid symptoms are gone. I would ask Dr Collins to not use the phrase "screaming left" who generally are the folks that would support his Hep C initiative. FWIW my brother on Medicare Advantage has Hep C and treatment is $10k. Failure to fund treatment for all is a policy decision based on ideology not money. Much thanks for writing the book & will order it.
Francis Collins is a national treasure. But I don't understand his thoughts on "faith".
Collins: "I am concerned that people of faith have been particularly vulnerable to misinformation and disinformation". He seems surprised by this. This has been a problem for a long time in both healthcare, politics, etc.
Why? (1) There is 0 scientific evidence for a supreme being (god); and, (2) if a person can believe in such a mythological being, you can then get them to believe in anything.
I read one of his previous books about 10-15 years ago when I was trying to understand how it was possible for some people to reconcile their belief in the logic of science (fact) with their parallel belief in the truth of religion (faith). His life, and his life's work, are a shining example of this dichotomy.
What a thoughtful, caring man! This, to me, was a powerful take-home point: “And I wish Eric, I had said more often what I'm telling you today is the best that the assembled experts can come up with, but the data we have to look at is woefully inadequate. And so, it very well could be that what I'm telling you is wrong, when we get more data, I will come back to you as soon as we have something better and we'll let you know, but don't be surprised if it's different and that will not mean that we are jerking you around or we don't know what we're talking about. It's like this is how science works.”
Interesting interview and wholly agree that pandemic communication was poor, e.g., failure to explain what novel means. Even today, peoples' frame of reference allows them to think they are "good to go" once covid symptoms are gone. I would ask Dr Collins to not use the phrase "screaming left" who generally are the folks that would support his Hep C initiative. FWIW my brother on Medicare Advantage has Hep C and treatment is $10k. Failure to fund treatment for all is a policy decision based on ideology not money. Much thanks for writing the book & will order it.