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Complex Numbers #1084950 added March 7, 2025 at 8:44am
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Story Time
Articles like this one from The Guardian give this old pessimist some hope.
Strength of character, you see, isn't about clinging stubbornly to one's beliefs. It's about being open to changing one's mind due to overwhelming evidence, especially when going against the collective will of your tribe. Admitting you were wrong demonstrates good character, as well.
Researchers believe personal stories are more persuasive than facts alone in addressing vaccine skepticism
This doesn't surprise me. This shouldn't surprise anyone who writes, be it fiction, nonfiction, or anything in between (tabloid journalism or political speeches, e.g.) And that goes for almost any subject. If you're told that eleven million people died as the result of actions taken by Nazi Germany, you might register that as a fairly large number; if you read the Diary of Anne Frank and learn its associated stories, the horror might actually hit home.
There's a quote attributed to Stalin related to this: "A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic." There's no evidence that Stalin ever actually said or wrote that, and plenty of evidence of similar sentiments from earlier in history.
Stalin or not, there is a darkness lurking within the persuasive power of anecdotal storytelling. As with almost everything, its power can be used for good or evil, much as a hammer can be used to create or destroy. I'll get to that shortly, after I look at the article a bit more.
When Nikki Hill Johnson’s first daughter was born in 2012, Johnson didn’t hesitate to take her to the doctor for routine infant immunizations.
And so the anecdote begins.
Soon after the birth, South Carolina-based Johnson, now 42, joined a fitness- and nutrition-oriented multilevel marketing company (MLM).
Speaking of Stalin, wow, that's one big giant red flag.
There, she encountered a colleague who made her question the safety of vaccines.
This does not surprise me, either. Once you hold one set of beliefs without evidence (in this case, that MLMs benefit anyone but the founders thereof), you invite other sets of beliefs without evidence into your mind (in this case, that vaccines aren't safe).
I'll take that even farther. Not only are these beliefs without evidence, but they are beliefs with overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This isn't like religion, where it's not possible for realists to prove that the supernatural doesn't exist (only that it doesn't have to exist); this is willful blindness to overwhelming evidence.
“I remember someone in the community talking about their child who had been ‘vaccine injured’,” Johnson recalls. “It sparked a fear in me.”
Here we come to the dark side of anecdotes: they can be used to sow doubt and fear just as much as they can be used to elicit compassion. Hearing a story like that, believing it to be true, taps right in to our worst nightmares. It's like those attempts to keep kids from doing drugs: "John tried heroin once. Once. Then his arm fell off, his eyes exploded, and he died in agony." Except those are well-meaning, whereas vaccine rejection (I will not call it skepticism, because skepticism isn't about blindly rejecting a premise, but about looking at it rationally) actually does kill.
There also needs to be a better understanding of the difference between correlation and causation. "Jane ventured into the park and died. Don't go into the park." Except that it wasn't anything in the park that killed her; it was a heart attack. So it must have been exercise that actually killed her. See? Exercise can kill.
The science of vaccinations and immunization schedules also seemed impenetrable. “I was very conflicted, and felt like: ‘I don’t know any of this stuff, I didn’t go to school for this,’” she says.
And I have to admit: That, I understand. Science in general is beyond the grasp of most people. They don't understand it any more than I understand what dolphins are saying to each other. Just to be clear, I'm not ragging on that. I can't understand all of it, either. No one can, not even other scientists. Those who aren't lawyers can't comprehend the nuances of law. Those who aren't archaeologists might think Indiana Jones is true to life (spoiler: it is not).
The answer, however, is not to "do your own research" by finding and believing those anecdotes that either speak to your existing biases, or claim to be able to calm your fears.
Johnson joined “crunchy” Facebook groups full of moms concerned about potentially harmful substances affecting their children, and started taking advice from a trusted anti-vax family member who seemed particularly credible because she was a nurse.
And, of course, there's that minefield.
Anyway, there's a lot more to the article. It may or may not help. But at least it's on the right path. |
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