Matthew Paris is Right. BBC's Belief in Lockdown is Superstition

 

A commentary on Matthew Paris' article in 'The Times':
The BBC isn't Telling Us the Full Story on Covid

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/bbc-isnt-telling-us-the-full-story-on-covid-h2xm35pmh

Examples of an unfalsifiable hypotheses include:
Druids can turn water into a healing elixir, and it is a spiritual, non material change.
I have fairies at the bottom of my garden that only I can see.
A rain dance causes rain if performed enough times and in the right way.

In each case there is no test that can be independently replicated that, if the hypothesis is false, could demonstrate that it is actually false. If we cannot know if it is false or not, how can we know if it is true? We can't. We could believe it to be true, but belief is not knowledge. Belief without evidence is faith, superstition even.

Paris highlights that, after lockdown measures,  
1. if there is a reduction in infections, BBC will mainly broadcast claims that the lockdown measures were effective,
2. if there is an increase in infections, BBC will mainly broadcast calls for a harder lockdown until a reduction is seen.
This makes the claim that 'lockdown is an effective strategy' an unfalsifiable hypothesis. No outcome can demonstrate that it is false, and we cannot know by this faulty reasoning that the hypothesis - 'lockdown is an effective strategy' - is in fact true.

This is to say that 'lockdown is an effective strategy' has been adopted by the BBC not because it is a scientific theory based in reason and logic but as a faith based superstitious kind of belief that an action has an effect.

Experts disagree, as is necessary in the scientific pursuit of objective truth. But Paris highlights that the BBC gives little voice to scientists and experts who are critics of government strategy or any part of it, even though such scrutiny may be applied by scientists that are highly cited in the scientific literature, or even Nobel prize winning experts expressing mainstream interpretations and insights in their field. 

The effect of this is a portrayal of critics - including those who rigorously apply reason and cite papers in reputable science journals - as a tiny minority of unorthodox, irrational 'irritants' to be opposed.

Here is the irony. When ministers say "following the science" you ought to read "following the will of SAGE", which is a government body that is a closed group and whose interpretations are guided by unchallenged group think, compromised by internal competitive incentives and corrupted by external conflicting interests. And those those who uncritically accept the pronouncements of SAGE by resting on the claim that they are "following the science" (or even "religiously following the science", as a government minister once put it) are stepping outside the framework of reason and not being entirely rational. 

Science is not a religion. Professors Whitty, Vallance and SAGE do not have a monopoly on truth, but,  judging by Paris' observations, it seems the BBC could be leading you to believe that they do.