"Anti-vaccination" has now fully replaced "creationism" as the go-to example of a position that is contrary to scientific consensus. I understand how it happened, but it's not a good shift, since the two positions, while inaccurate, emerge from very different cognitive errors.
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The spectrum of positions potentially described by anti-vaccination is also very different from the spectrum that can be described as creationist. It would take more than a Twitter thread to explain why we need to be clear about all this, but IMO it really is a big problem.
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Replying to @AlanLevinovitz
What difference does it make if the anti-vaxx and creationism arise from different errors? They're equally far outside the scientific consensus. Anti-vaxx tries to portray itself as reasonable concern just as creationists try to portray themselves as scientifically respectable.
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Replying to @beyerstein @AlanLevinovitz
Exactly, and I would counter with an argument that the errors are not really as different as Alan is portraying them.
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Replying to @gorskon @beyerstein
Well, like I said, too much for a Twitter thread! And as you both know I'm a fan of highlighting similarities between different forms of faulty thinking. It's just...the errors really are quite different. For one, visceral fear of physical harm isn't part of creationism.
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I recall the kind of rhetoric and humor that surrounded the Scopes trial. If committed to the identity of privileged ontological status between the animal/physical and the spiritual/angelic—as I was literally taught—is not descent from apes both spiritual and physical "harm"?
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Excellent point. Similarly, there is a belief that the human body is "pure," be it created by God, as creationists believe, (which means it can't have descended from apes) or be it facing the threat of "contamination" by vaccines.
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Sure—these are parallels I've talked about myself. But there's a large number of people who are just scared of being injured by vaccines because they've heard stories about people getting hurt, full stop. Error of risk assessment, not purity/impurity.
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That sounds more like what we call the “vaccine-averse,” not antivaxxers. Being antivax goes beyond merely being afraid of vaccines.
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