David Bailey
Member
It seems to me that there is some uncertainty about whether HIV exists, and if it does exist, whether it causes AIDS. The basic concern here is that experts who doubted the official story were shut out of the debate.Hey David, I'm not sure I understand where they answer the questions I was posing. Would you mind elaborating?
In one sense that is true, but don't you suspect the guy who tries not to answer questions, by calling the other guy a 'denialist'?That's a fine question, yes. Though I won't say it's necessarily surprising when someone gets called out for ideas that bump up against scientific consensus. Either way dissent doesn't say anything about whether the claims are true or not in and of itself. As always the problem is that the layperson cannot be expected to become a scientist to understand who is correct, and for every expert claiming "A" we can present another expert that's claiming "not A".
It seems that the HIV tests measures something that isn't very specific - a collection of antibodies that can be due to a whole variety of conditions. According to Bauer, you are more likely to fail an HIV test if you have flu or are pregnant!This is exactly what I'm talking about. What does it even mean to be found HIV positive if it doesn't exist? What exactly is it that does not exist?
It sounds as if it could be a mish-mash (probably a great scientific description!)! This is a scary issue but I do know that Dr Kendrick (a GP in the UK who writes a blog on medical issues) is at least worried about this issue! He wrote about part of this in his book, "Doctoring Data".That's what I meant by my question about whether or not HIV, as it is understood by scientific consensus at least, actually maps to something in reality. Or if it doesn't at all. Is it just a complete global mish mash of people making it up as they go along?
No, I think the hypothesis is that you have a test that can be triggered in a number of rather vague ways that are associated with ill health, and that people who test positive, are then assumed to have HIV/AIDS and get treated with some pretty noxious pharmaceuticals!To be a hyperbolic here, do people sometimes go to the hospital with a headache and the doctor decides he needs to fill the quota for big pharma and tells the patient they have HIV (which doesn't exist, of course), so he can prescribe some treatment? And then those people die of AIDS later by coincidence? I guess we'd have to work out why that would happen. Perhaps the treatment itself is what causes AIDS?
I understand that there are a lot of ideas that don't seem to add up, and I get that Bauer is presenting a case. And I can try my best to understand it despite a lack of scientific background. But it also seems a worthy exercise to consider what the implications are, how this system could even function the way it does, to understand what the flip side of the coin is to see if it all fits together in a meaningful way.
The implications if this is true, are pretty awful - people being treated with really noxious chemicals for a disease that doesn't exist, or which is harmless - no question about it.
I am just one of those people who have become a bit wary of the standard, "these are AIDS denialists - just ignore them!" line! That simply isn't the way to treat alternative hypotheses in science or medicine! Remember, the core 'denialists' aren't armchair theorists, these are people who were acknowledged experts in their field - one with a Nobel Prize!
David
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