Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
-
- Posts: 235
- Joined: December 11th, 2014, 7:29 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
But as Henry I have done a remarkable job. The girl could pass for pedigree anywhere, and her story eclipses Eliza’s. A New York City Black ghetto is a lot grittier than a Cockney working-class neighborhood.
Around me, she still discharges “Me and my friends” as a subject. I’ll give her that look and she’ll superciliously bat her eyes and enunciate, “My friends and *I*.”
-
- Posts: 10339
- Joined: June 15th, 2011, 5:53 pm
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
I presume you googled it and saw that in the summary.I’m no family guy.
Neither is the character of Glenn Quagmire.
-
- Posts: 235
- Joined: December 11th, 2014, 7:29 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
- LuckyR
- Moderator
- Posts: 7981
- Joined: January 18th, 2015, 1:16 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
Sounds like you predict she knows enough to know she doesn't know everything.Haicoway wrote: ↑November 6th, 2019, 8:41 am Yes, without thinking much, I was focusing on people holding emotional matters of opinion, such as that Trump is wrong for the Presidency. I am currently mentoring a young African American girl who was raised in a ghetto with no exposure to café society, but she graduated from college with the highest honors. She asked me if I would teach her genteel manners to accompany her academic achievements toward a professional career. I was happy to because she is extraordinarily pretty and I’m a lecher of sorts.
She told me at dinner a couple of evenings ago that she believed that pharmaceutical companies had drugs to cure cancer but were keeping them under wraps so they could continue to sell less effective drugs for massive profit.
I told her that it wasn’t sophisticated to believe untrue conspiracy theories, and especially to express them. So I arranged a dinner with a PhD pharmacologist who has spent his entire career as an executive in pharmaceutical research to explain the reality to the girl with authority. And her mind shall be changed.
-
- Posts: 235
- Joined: December 11th, 2014, 7:29 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
We’re having that dinner with the pharmaceutical executive tonight, and I am very interested to see if she can totally get off of it.
- LuckyR
- Moderator
- Posts: 7981
- Joined: January 18th, 2015, 1:16 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
Post back with your findings. I would parse her relative strengths and weaknesses thusly: computationally intelligent, street smart at least competent (based on her success within her initial environment) and wisdom challenged, based on your concerns per the odd theories.Haicoway wrote: ↑November 7th, 2019, 4:32 pm Yes, I don’t understand why she would believe such a thing. I have read that people who feel powerless tend to believe conspiracies so that they feel they are in more control, in that nobody’s going to put anything over on them. But my ward, although she comes from a ghetto, feels like Wonder Woman, because of her academic acumen and very good looks. She knows she’s going to be a success, and she is constantly being complimented.
We’re having that dinner with the pharmaceutical executive tonight, and I am very interested to see if she can totally get off of it.
-
- Posts: 235
- Joined: December 11th, 2014, 7:29 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
Something that big could never be kept under wraps, because of all the different kinds of institutions working on any clinical study. And if any company did come up with “the cure,” it would be a huge money making blockbuster. And just about every family sees cancer, so if there was a cure, the pharma people would need it, too. And, again, you couldn’t get hundreds of sociopath researchers together to keep it quiet. The Doctor added that employees migrate from one company to another more than in many industries, and there are hundreds of biopharmaceutical young companies working on cancer research, who are watching for any helpful information.
Yet, I think the girl still believes in the conspiracy theory. I am going to go out on a marginalizing, non-PC limb and say I think that type of blinder is more prevalent with Black people, even the smartest among them, because they were in fact subjected to horrible clinical trial abuse and real conspiracies. It’s similar to third-generation family members of those who suffered in the Holocaust, which my other girl is. She recognizes that the Jewish stereotype is justified in that she, like many other Jewish people she knows, relentlessly saves money and is concerned with money, because in her blood she never knows when she will have to flee oppressors.
- LuckyR
- Moderator
- Posts: 7981
- Joined: January 18th, 2015, 1:16 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
Well, stereotypes are based on actual observations (that is: data points), their problem is not inaccuracy, per se', but the misuse of group observations to label individuals.Haicoway wrote: ↑November 8th, 2019, 1:38 pm Lucky, you are more perceptive about the girl than I am, and you’re not with her. The Pharmaceutical Exec (his wife joined the dinner, a registered nurse, familiar with clinical research) couldn’t be more qualified to render the correct state of affairs on the subject. He owned one and was CEO of another clinical contract research company. He had literally worked with hundreds of pharmaceutical companies, their research, and their principals.
Something that big could never be kept under wraps, because of all the different kinds of institutions working on any clinical study. And if any company did come up with “the cure,” it would be a huge money making blockbuster. And just about every family sees cancer, so if there was a cure, the pharma people would need it, too. And, again, you couldn’t get hundreds of sociopath researchers together to keep it quiet. The Doctor added that employees migrate from one company to another more than in many industries, and there are hundreds of biopharmaceutical young companies working on cancer research, who are watching for any helpful information.
Yet, I think the girl still believes in the conspiracy theory. I am going to go out on a marginalizing, non-PC limb and say I think that type of blinder is more prevalent with Black people, even the smartest among them, because they were in fact subjected to horrible clinical trial abuse and real conspiracies. It’s similar to third-generation family members of those who suffered in the Holocaust, which my other girl is. She recognizes that the Jewish stereotype is justified in that she, like many other Jewish people she knows, relentlessly saves money and is concerned with money, because in her blood she never knows when she will have to flee oppressors.
-
- Posts: 235
- Joined: December 11th, 2014, 7:29 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
So I am guilty, because I don't know where the girl got the propensity to abandon reason in the specific area of pharma. It might have nothing to do with her Black ghetto upbringing.
- LuckyR
- Moderator
- Posts: 7981
- Joined: January 18th, 2015, 1:16 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
I agree with you that her upbringing was not the source, though IMO it was a major (if not the major) contributor to the mindset that would entertain such an otherwise illogical proposition. Especially in an individual who otherwise might be more logical than average.Haicoway wrote: ↑November 8th, 2019, 4:06 pm I totally agree that a stereotype should not be applied to anyone in advance of observing that the person might fit the stereotype, and even then the behavior might be caused by some factor not connected with the person being a member of the stereotyped group that includes the observed behavior. So a stereotype should not be applied to any individual, except under situations such as the Jewish person telling me that her behavior was linked to the Holocaust.
So I am guilty, because I don't know where the girl got the propensity to abandon reason in the specific area of pharma. It might have nothing to do with her Black ghetto upbringing.
- Felix
- Posts: 3117
- Joined: February 9th, 2009, 5:45 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
Um, have you asked her? Just to play devil's advocate about that conspiracy theory....Haicoway: Yes, I don’t understand why she would believe such a thing.
Drug companies are in business to (1) make money, and (2) find cures for diseases, usually in that order. So if the CEO of a publicly traded stock drug company had the choice between developing and marketing a cancer fighting drug that was (a) 90% effective but had little or no profit potential (difficult to patent, very expensive to produce, etc.), or (b) 60% effective but has a fantastic profit potential; which one do you think they would choose?
I mean, the American Cancer Society has been in business for over 100 years, and they have an annual income over over $800 million dollars a year, how anxious do you think they are to put their cash cow out to pasture?
- LuckyR
- Moderator
- Posts: 7981
- Joined: January 18th, 2015, 1:16 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
You don't think a Pharmaceutical company couldn't find a way to charge a lot of money for a "breakthrough" drug? Don't you think it is inherently more difficult to charge a lot of money for a product that doesn't work that great?Felix wrote: ↑November 8th, 2019, 6:56 pmUm, have you asked her? Just to play devil's advocate about that conspiracy theory....Haicoway: Yes, I don’t understand why she would believe such a thing.
Drug companies are in business to (1) make money, and (2) find cures for diseases, usually in that order. So if the CEO of a publicly traded stock drug company had the choice between developing and marketing a cancer fighting drug that was (a) 90% effective but had little or no profit potential (difficult to patent, very expensive to produce, etc.), or (b) 60% effective but has a fantastic profit potential; which one do you think they would choose?
I mean, the American Cancer Society has been in business for over 100 years, and they have an annual income over over $800 million dollars a year, how anxious do you think they are to put their cash cow out to pasture?
Part of the misunderstanding is the idea that "cancer" is a single problem with a single cure. If breast cancer was cured tomorrow, there'd be plenty of work left to do in the cancer field.
- Felix
- Posts: 3117
- Joined: February 9th, 2009, 5:45 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
It doesn't have to work great, just better than your competitors products. All I'm saying is that it's easy to see how focusing on financial rewards can corrupt the practice of medicine, and why someone might be cynical about the motives of drug companies. Conspiracy theories always start with cynicism - combined with ignorance.LuckyR: Don't you think it is inherently more difficult to charge a lot of money for a product that doesn't work that great?
-
- Posts: 235
- Joined: December 11th, 2014, 7:29 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
So when a drug works, the independent doctor; his or her coordinator, who does all the administrative work and testing documentation connected with the process; the patient; and the patient’s family know. These people would have no reason to cover up the important and exciting development.
It is only people who do not understand how drug development operates that could think a proven cure for any type of cancer could or would be kept secret.
- Felix
- Posts: 3117
- Joined: February 9th, 2009, 5:45 am
Re: Have you ever changed someone's mind about a controversial issue?
.FDA regulations require that the investigators have no stake in the profits of any drug with which they are involved, so that their findings can be trusted
However, the company that financed the research often does, the FDA approval process can be and has been compromised:
https://bit.ly/2pWaUxN
2023/2024 Philosophy Books of the Month
Mark Victor Hansen, Relentless: Wisdom Behind the Incomparable Chicken Soup for the Soul
by Mitzi Perdue
February 2023
Rediscovering the Wisdom of Human Nature: How Civilization Destroys Happiness
by Chet Shupe
March 2023