kjz

Karma: 194

kjz 18 Jan 2022 19:34 UTC
3 points
in reply to: Liam Donovan’s comment on: Polymarket Covid-19 1/17/2022
I’m not a lawyer, but their newest Terms of Service imply otherwise:
USE OF A VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORK (“VPN”) TO CIRCUMVENT THE RESTRICTIONS SET FORTH HEREIN IS PROHIBITED.
Not sure how willing and able they would be to enforce such a regulation, but that’s a different question. (Not legal advice!)

kjz 17 Jan 2022 23:09 UTC
3 points
on: Polymarket Covid-19 1/17/2022
Any thoughts on if/when Polymarket might be available again in the US? I found their Compliance Update which says they are still looking to build a US product, but given the recent CFTC settlement it’s hard to tell how likely this is to happen.
Of course, one pleasingly meta way to get at this question would be to create a new prediction market asking “Will Polymarket be available in the US on [date]”, but I wonder if Polymarket would be willing to put up a market like this, since the regulators they are dealing with might not find it amusing.

kjz 5 Jan 2022 17:55 UTC
2 points
in reply to: NormanPerlmutter’s comment on: Omicron Post #12
I agree that attending large events is a type of risk compensation, and we may be referring to similar behavior patterns using different words here. But I’m trying to distinguish between these two types of infection:
1. Infections resulting from people going about their daily activities (e.g. getting exposed at work, in a store or restaurant, other small gatherings, etc.) Here, individuals might indeed change their behavior based on their own vaccination status and risk tolerance. But since Omicron is so widespread at this point, the probability that an infected person was vaccinated should be close to the base rate of vaccination among the overall population (although somewhat lower, since the vaccines still prevent some transmission of Omicron). In other words, P(vaccinated | type-1 infection) is a little less than P(vaccinated).
2. Infections resulting directly from attending large superspreader events where proof of vaccination was required. In this case, while P(vaccinated | type-2 infection) won’t be exactly 1 due to the possibility of fake vaccine ID cards or weak enforcement of the policy at the event, I think it would still be quite close to 1.
If type-2 infections are a high enough percentage of overall infections, this could make it look like vaccinated people are more likely to get infected (which would be true at the population level!) even though getting vaccinated makes it less likely for any individual to get infected (assuming their behavior after vaccination remains the same).
Apologies if much of this is obvious or redundant—I’m still trying to understand the gears behind this dynamic better myself. I agree there is likely a component coming from “vaccinated people take on more risk in general”, but I hadn’t considered that policies which only allow vaccinated people (to a first approximation) to attend large potentially-superspreading events could lead to increased transmission among the vaccinated relative to the unvaccinated, which could lead to negative perceived vaccine effectiveness, until seeing Peter’s post.

kjz 5 Jan 2022 3:26 UTC
1 point
in reply to: CraigMichael’s comment on: Omicron Post #12
That may contribute as well, but I think Peter was implying that if enough cases overall take place during superspreader events where ~all of the attendees were vaccinated, vaccinated people may be more likely to test positive just because they were substantially more likely to be attending those superspreader events than unvaccinated people.

kjz 27 Feb 2021 17:40 UTC
4 points
in reply to: AspiringRationalist’s comment on: RadVac Commercial Antibody Test Results
I also strongly upvoted for the same reasons. Very much looking forward to the results of the ELISA mucus test!

kjz 24 Feb 2021 2:38 UTC
4 points
on: Judging Our April 2020 Covid-19 Predictions
Bitcoin can only go as low as $0. Bitcoin could, in theory, go up not only to $100k but to $1 million or more.
I’m confused. In theory, $50k currently invested in VTI could also go to any of those values. Is there something I’m missing about the relative likelihood of different outcomes that would make Bitcoin the more attractive investment? I feel like there’s some Econ 101 lesson I’m forgetting here.
There’s no trade, since (as many people reminded me) Metaculus is not a prediction market and you can’t trade on its values, but there’s still a big contradiction with market prices here.
In this case, isn’t the trade to just use the info Metaculus provides to inform your trades elsewhere? In a way, that’s an advantage of having Metaculus in addition to money-based prediction markets—predictors at money-based vs. points-based prediction markets have different motivations for predicting, so they’re likely to be self-selected from different populations and may generate different, complementary predictions. Granted, for any individual question it would be easier to be able to trade directly in the money-based market, but I think there’s an overall benefit in having both types available.

kjz 20 Feb 2021 13:47 UTC
19 points
in reply to: joetessier’s comment on: Making Vaccine
Welcome, and thanks for making your first comment!
As a fellow scientist with decades of experience in the industry, I disagree with several of your claims.
First, you will never know if it really works until you run blinded clinical trials against a placebo. This is the only way to tell and that is why it’s required for any new drug/vaccine to be launched on the market.
Clinical trials are helpful for understanding whether a drug/vaccine works on the population level. But on the individual level, clinical trials are not the only way to tell. For example, you can just take an antibody test and see if it works.
You can’t just take a antibody test and see if it works.
Of course you can.
Even if there were the right antibody tests for these peptides
Anna Czarnota posted an initial protocol here. I haven’t tried it, but it seems reasonable and likely to provide useful information about one’s level of protection.
but without using rigorous scientific method, there could be many other factors why you could see a response. Like you were exposed already to the virus and didn’t know it.
The “rigorous scientific method” is not the only way to generate knowledge that allows individuals to update their priors. But setting that aside, the question of whether one’s immune response came from the vaccine or from previous exposure to the virus is not very relevant to one’s future decision making. Either way, the antibody test provides information about one’s current level of immunity, which one can use to update their risk tolerance and behaviors.
It feels like your comments are aimed at the question, “What is the best vaccine (or vaccines) to approve and mass produce for the general population?” which is a perfectly valid and important question. As things currently stand, this relies on the standard clinical trials/FDA approval process. But this process takes a long time and is prone to all sorts of delays and inefficiencies due to politics and organizational maze behaviors, during which the pandemic continues to spread. Realizing that, the radvac developers and many commenters here have been asking a different question: “What can individuals do now (or in a future pandemic) to mitigate their personal risk of being infected?”
Both questions are important, but the large organizations responsible for developing/approving new vaccines have very different incentives than individuals looking for ways to minimize their own risk of infection.

kjz 14 Feb 2021 17:42 UTC
1 point
on: What does the FDA actually do between getting the trial results and having their meeting?
I think it’s just that a few weeks is the going rate for avoiding blame, as Zvi outlined in his posts Asymmetric Justice and Motive Ambiguity.
A politician can choose between two messages that affirm their loyalty: Advocating a beneficial policy, or advocating a useless and wasteful policy. They choose useless, because the motive behind advocating a beneficial policy is ambiguous. Maybe they wanted people to benefit!

kjz 13 Feb 2021 21:19 UTC
3 points
in reply to: remizidae’s comment on: How Should We Respond to Cade Metz?
Good question. I hadn’t defined it in any more detail in my mind. But my basic thought is that someone should be able to build an online presence under a pseudonym (from the beginning, without having revealed their real name publicly like Scott had) as long as they comply with the rules of the communities they choose to join, without legal obligation to declare their real name. I would imagine some exceptions would have to apply (for example, in the case of a legally enforceable warrant) but others, including journalists, would refer to the pseudonym if they wanted to report on such a person.
But of course there could be unintended consequences of this sort of rule that I haven’t considered.

kjz 13 Feb 2021 17:49 UTC
4 points
in reply to: Dentin’s comment on: How Should We Respond to Cade Metz?
Strongly agree with your analysis.
I also think a lesson to take away here is that, assuming we agree pseudonymity is generally considered a desirable option to have available, it falls on us to assert the right to it.

kjz 13 Feb 2021 17:40 UTC
2 points
on: How Should We Respond to Cade Metz?
I agree this is an important topic for discussion, and I hope others will continue to weigh in with their thoughts. I’m sure this won’t be the last time a journalist writes/is interested in writing an article about this community, and it would be good to coordinate around some norms here.
- Scott was told that the way to get ahead of damaging journalism is to reveal everything they might want to find out. For those of us writing under a pseudonym, should we all just be revealing our real names, and letting friends, family members, and colleagues (where appropriate) know about our connection with SSC and this community?
I’m personally not ready to do that yet. I also feel that revealing it too early would risk some of the positive things I’m trying to do within my community, and I don’t want to take that chance.

kjz 13 Feb 2021 1:23 UTC
1 point
in reply to: Anna Czarnota’s comment on: Making Vaccine
Agree with John, thank you so much!

kjz 13 Feb 2021 1:19 UTC
1 point
in reply to: Zvi’s comment on: Covid 2/11: As Expected
Yes, I think we are all in agreement on the topic. On my first reading, seeing the isolated quote between the other two examples of poor vaccine responses made me think this was another example of a poor response, and the quote itself can be interpreted that way if read alone (i.e. We think only vaccinating 75-year-olds is the correct policy, and it’s hard but necessary work to enforce it).

kjz 13 Feb 2021 1:07 UTC
1 point
in reply to: TheMajor’s comment on: Covid 2/11: As Expected
The loss of life and health of innocent people who got suckered into a political issue without considering the ramifications?
By now, everyone has had a year to consider the ramifications of their decisions. People are free to make their own choices about the vaccine and their response to covid in general. If they make their choices based on their political affiliation or in-group signaling, so be it.
But with these numbers (death rate, long term health conditions, effectiveness of vaccines) around are you seriously suggesting trying to help them is not cost-effective?
I am seriously suggesting it is not cost-effective for me to try to influence others to get the vaccine. Most of the people I know have either already decided to get the vaccine at their first opportunity, or decided they will never get it. In November/December, as the vaccines were starting to get approved, I had some discussions with my few friends who I thought might be on the fence, but they weren’t moved much by my arguments. I don’t actually think I know anyone that I could convince at this point.
On a population level, I agree it is worthwhile and most likely cost-effective to continue to encourage people to get vaccinated. But that is almost entirely beyond my ability to influence. And I reject any blame for observing this situation and commenting on it without completely fixing it.

kjz 12 Feb 2021 0:34 UTC
1 point
on: Covid 2/11: As Expected
I believe the quote in the Janelle Nanos tweet (after “Meanwhile, in Boston, priorities are straight:”) was taken out of context here. The full article shows how Dr. Ivers was trying to point out the inefficiency of the state’s rigid system and offer improvements:
For weeks, Dr. Louise Ivers has been advocating for Massachusetts to speed-up the pace of its COVID-19 vaccinations. But it’s not just the slowness of the rollout that is causing the Boston doctor consternation when it comes to the state’s vaccine push.
The executive director of Massachusetts General Hospital Global Health and interim head of MGH’s Division of Infectious Diseases told Boston.com that while she’s been disappointed by the state’s vaccine efforts, she isn’t completely surprised by the sluggish and fragmented rollout based on the response to the virus over the last year.
...
Ivers told Boston.com she believes that if the pace of the vaccine were ramped up with more flexibility to start new phases as others plateau, that some of the issues around equity that the state has seen would “settle a little more carefully.”
“It’s quite complicated — you spend a lot of operational resources and planning and logistics to make sure that you only vaccinate 75-year-olds,” Ivers said. “There’s a lot of time and energy spent on making sure that a 74-year-old doesn’t accidentally get vaccinated.”
Instead, Ivers said the state should be moving more quickly to expand vaccine access to those 65 years old and up, as well as groups with comorbidities.

kjz 11 Feb 2021 23:15 UTC
9 points
on: Covid 2/11: As Expected
I also notice that there is a large part of me that thinks, once it’s easily and widely available, you know what? Straight up, just f*** ’em if they don’t want the vaccine.
This is how I was planning to act at that point, and basically as soon as I’m able to get an official vaccine. Once it’s readily available I’ll feel no guilt about continued cases (assuming no major vaccine escape, that would be a different story). Even once I’ve gotten the official vaccine, I’ll want to propagate the norm that vaccinated people should live their lives as if they were, you know, vaccinated, so I intend to act that way, unless there’s a reason I’m not considering.

kjz 10 Feb 2021 23:15 UTC
2 points
in reply to: Anna Czarnota’s comment on: Making Vaccine
Is this something that can be done at home with readily available and affordable equipment? If so, would you be willing to share more details of how someone might get started? I think a lot of readers would be interested in hearing more about this—it could even be its own post.

kjz 10 Feb 2021 22:48 UTC
8 points
in reply to: fluffyclouds’s comment on: Making Vaccine
Maintaining 4 °C sounds doable with a good fridge and a data logging thermometer. −20 °C is more tricky—maybe use a home freezer (*** is specced at ≤ −18 °C) and add a data logger. If it then turns out that it can’t reach −20 °C, it might be possible to fix that by modding its internal thermostat somehow. Or have access to a lab freezer, or shell out the big bucks (four figures) to buy one.
As someone who has worked in the labs a long time, I wouldn’t worry about having to hit exactly −20 °C; that basically just means “freezer temperature”. Lab freezers don’t work any differently than home freezers as far as I can tell, although they do have certain safety features that a home freezer wouldn’t. But the temperature can still vary a few degrees up or down, and it shouldn’t affect your storage much. The (very) general rule of thumb is a difference of +/- 10 °C makes chemical reactions (such as peptide degradation) go 2x faster/slower. So even having to store in a fridge temporarily would only be ~4x faster than a freezer, still maybe good enough for one’s purposes.
The big difference comes for −20 °C vs −80 °C, since there you have a 2^6 or 64-fold rate difference. So something that can last for a month at −80 °C might degrade in half a day in a freezer. Hence the complex supply chains needed for such vaccines.

kjz 6 Feb 2021 22:32 UTC
1 point
in reply to: MikkW’s comment on: Creating A Kickstarter for Coordinated Action
I didn’t know that! OP, you can also highlight the desired text and click the block quote button. You can also add links that way.

kjz 6 Feb 2021 17:20 UTC
1 point
in reply to: handoflixue’s comment on: Making Vaccine
Totally agree, and this is pretty much what I had in mind as well. The organizer can also host a Zoom call beforehand where they explain the procedure, answer any questions, and let people sign up for times spaced out by 5-10 minutes to self administer.