Race: a huge blunder of science

IF you accept Darwinism you think we evolved from apes and that civilisations are a recent development. Even then, the Bible, which accepts creationism instead of evolution, narrates that humans have only inhabitated the planet for no more than 4, 5 or 6 thousand years. Either way due to geographical separation we have a scenario where many species were isolated on continents in some penultimate period.

Modern events have seen all of that change, where migration and domination of introduced species has led to loss of diversification, a supposed 'sin of mankind', the result of European colonisation and globalisation. Sadly most if not all of this has happened under the banner of religion, either Christianity or to a lesser extent Islam.

Yet there is another train of thought, that of the Vedas - where Ice Ages have periodically interrupted millions of years of humanity by forcing retreat and dieback on a massive scale. The last period of maximum glaciation ended roughly ten thousand years ago, and since then the melting ice caps and glaciers have changed the topography of the planet vastly. The Vedic thought is that their culture has survived through all of this for millions of years by retreating to areas protected by the Himalayas.

The problem with science, the substitute "Almighty" of atheists, is that it is relative and imperfect (unlike the Absolute, Divine Creator, Supreme Being, Big Dude In The Sky or whatever you identify with) and can make monumental mistakes.

Take classifying humanity into different races, for example; a huge blunder in science. [Quaintly put, the original conceptual division of anthropology was simple - Caucasoid, Negroid, Mongoloid, Australoid. This ran into problems when other "races" were identified, such as the indigenous Ainu of Japan for example, or lumping Polynesian, Melanesian and other Pacific Ocean islanders all together]. Simply put, races don't exist - in reality they are an artificial academic construct, a result of geographical separation over long periods of time. Eventually there will be so much "interbreeding" that it will be impossible to distinguish one "race" from another. The 'modern scientific' assumption of apparent racial distinction is simply a result of the geographical separation of civilisations. One day there'll be kangaroos in Europe just like our colonial rabbits here in Oz. Maybe even Polar bears in Antarctica and penguins at the North Pole. We've already got feral camels and buffalo in the outback and California loves its Eucalyptus gum trees. I say diversity is a good thing and in the future there will be no such thing as an 'introduced species'. It's all just a matter of time.

Sure, there are genetic differences in the DNA of so-called "races". But that occurs even within families. The fact that humans can mate and produce viable offspring proves that we are all one species and that race is a nonsense concept.

So how did all this come about? Even if you accept Darwin's proposition (which I don't) that we evolved from apes (well I'll be a monkey's uncle!), that doesn't explain the sudden recent emergence of civilisation. That evolving ape thing is supposed to be millions of years ago (emphasis on supposed) yet suddenly society springs up 5,000 years ago?

This geographical separation phenomenon has given us a skewed vision of history. Before the technological advancement of sailing boats, continents like Australia and the Americas remained largely inaccessible to the outside world apart from from migration on foot which is what happened. Without genetic diversity, species became "indigenous" purely because they were isolated, no migration. In the future all of this will change. Trying to preserve an outmoded paradigm defies common sense, is useless sentimentality, and flies in the face of progress and evolution.

What happened in the past is what people erroneously call an Ice Age. The fact is we are still in one, as evidenced by the polar caps. There have been at least five ice ages in Earth's billions of years history, and between each one the frozen caps disappear (Galcial/Interglacial Periods). What people really mean by "the last Ice Age" is the last stadial within the Glacial Period, which peaked about 20,000 years ago. Between each Glacial Maximum is an interstadial period of warmness. What alarmists label as global warming is actually a periodic cyclic event, the interstadial we are currently experiencing, somewhat like seasons but happening on a much longer time period of tens of thousands of years.

So picture the Earth before the last glacial period, which lasted about 130,000 years (interstadials vary from 10 to 50 thousand years; stadials, or glacial periods are much longer - generally 100 to 500 thousand years) and ended 20,000 years ago. When everything froze over, all life had to retreat to the few remaining areas of warmth that could sustain them. And where was that?

Time for a quick lesson in geography. Nearly all of the Earth's major mountain chains run North-South. The Rocky Mountains of USA, the Scandinavias, the Andes of South America, the Great Dividing Range of Australia, the Atlas Mountains of Africa - all offer little to no protection in halting the advancing Ice Age as it crept towards the Equator from both polar regions.

The exception to this are the East-West Himalayas of India, the Swiss Alps of Europe and the Caucasus and Zagras of Turkey and the Middle East. These are the only places of refuge between the North Pole and the Equator (there is no Southern Hemisphere equivalent) and it is no accident that this is where the world's oldest civilisations come from. South of these ranges, on the Plains between the mountain peaks and the Equator there were no glaciers. They stopped at the mountains. This is why all the Earth's oldest civilisations come from Equatorial regions.

Modern historians mark recorded history from the time humans started writing stuff down. That doesn't mean there was no history before then - again, about 5,000 years ago - just that it wasn't recorded, passed instead by oral tradition, as people had better memories before Kali Yuga started in 3012 BC.

Consider the possibility that many civilisations died out during the Glacial Period (approx. 130,000 - 10,000 BC), or became isolated, lived in caves or underground, eventually dumbed-down through separation and lost their knowledge. Perhaps this is why we are 'taught' (given pictures) of stupid Neanderthal Man groping with clumsy tools as being our ancestors. Yet there are cultures that claim to go so far back in time that their origin is impossible to pinpoint.

Vedic civilisation is one such culture and claims to be millions of years old. Some other surviving cultures are the Chinese, the Australian Aborigines, and of course the African Negroid - a term now not encouraged because it is racist.

Which brings us back to the original context of this whole story. The idea of dividing humanity up into separate races is in itself inherently racist and an invented, artificial construct. It is purely geographical separation over time (as a result of the "Ice Age") that caused the lack of genetic diversity contributing to a limited range of physical features - hence, a supposedly distinct "race".

It is the nature of survival that if a culture's needs are met there is no reason for peoples to migrate, let alone travel long distances seeking adventure. In previous Ages society was more  cultivated and concentrated on spiritual and religious endeavour. All this changed 5,000 years ago with the coming of Kali Yuga, the lowest of all ages culture wise (there are four and they rotate in succession). Losing their spirituality, civilisations became enamoured with lust for sense gratification resulting in capitalism, colonisation and conquering of foreign lands. That's where the ships come in - really high tech stuff in those days.

We tend to look back and judge everything as being really primitive in the old days but it's all relative. We take books for granted but before the invention of the Gutenberg press everything was copied via handwriting. Sometimes books were limited to a few dozen issues. Mass publication was such a boon that it even changed Christianity! No longer were citizens dependent on the Church for scripture; each home could have a Holy Bible and practice worship without having to be dependent on priests and cow-tow to the Roman Catholic Church. They no longer had a monopoly. This is how all the different denominations took hold and the origin of the "Bible Society" began.

Nowadays we look upon books as old-fashioned, outdated technology. Yet like the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Vedas, Egyptian hieroglyphics and the Tibetan Book of the Dead and so many other scriptures, books do not require electricity and are available for use all the time regardless of circumstances unless you don't have a candle!

With no recorded history academics have a hard time proving anything before the invention of writing. Academics discard oral history as mere anecdotal 'mythology'. History starts at the point stuff was written down. Before that it's prehistoric ha ha. Not that long ago, forget about dinosaurs!

Take for instance the Guru-Disciple relationship, formally known as shishya. Say you want to learn how to play the mridanga, an Indian hand-drum. You approach a teacher and promise to serve them, and in return they impart their knowledge verbally and with demonstration and instruction.

It is an oral tradition. Each way of tapping or hitting the drum has a name (bol), and one recites the bol name as each stroke is played. The first lesson is te-re-ke-ta. This simultaneous speaking and playing sets up a dynamic that will enable the student to later sing and play the rhythm once learnt. Sure, it can be written down but it is not necessary. I learnt to play mridanga  primarily from written down stuff (the internet) but it was absolutely vital to hear actual playing (YouTube) to confirm that I'd got it down right. It's like learning a poem or a riddle or a funny joke. Once learnt properly the student then becomes master and can faithfully teach the same knowledge to a new student.

Historians have no interest in any of this because there is no evidence, no "written account of history". That doesn't mean knowledge wasn't imparted or exchanged or that nothing happened, just that it isn't recorded.

So effectively all history amounts to the stuff that was recorded (in those days written down) as if people were too dumb to recall and recite it later! Historians date the Vedas as being no older than a few thousand years. But the fact is that's just the time they were written down. Before that they were passed down for millions of years by oral tradition just like all cultural traditions are these days. There is no telling how old any of them are.

There is debate about when Australian Aborigines migrated. Some say there were two or more waves, 40, 60, maybe 120 thousand years ago. Chinese dynasties can only be dated from the time they wrote shit down. Same thing with the Egyptians and papyrus. Funny enough it all traces back to 5,000 years ago... the start of Kali Yuga (again!) when memories deteriorated and they had to start writing everything down.

'Cos that's when history "began".

Back then everyone was a joke teller.

Western Astronomy vs Puranic Cosmology

As an astrologer I am familiar with western astronomy and to a lesser extent Jyotish astrology and the Vedic Cosmology model. Jyotish is based on the 'modern' Siddhantic model which closely aligns with astronomy whereas Vedic Cosmology is based on the ancient Puranic model.

The thing I am trying to address here is the potential humiliation of the TOVP if they try to build a model based on the spiritual, non-scientific (some would say 'mythological') Puranic model of ancient times – so old that it is literally pre-historic. Modern Jyotish is based largely on the Surya Siddhanta (of which Śrīla Bhaktisiddhanta wrote a commentary) and differs vastly from the Puranic model, aligning more closely with Western astronomy, the difference being that western is geocentric and uses the tropical zodiac and Jyotish uses instead the sidereal zodiac and is heliocentric - a difference in point of view rather than mathematic abstractions. Nevertheless, Siddhantic Cosmology uses basically the same formulae for calculations as Western astronomy, so it makes little difference when it comes to transits, eclipses, etc which system you use.  

This is all semantics regarding NASA vs Rahu and Ketu. The Moon's North Node is the same as Rahu. The Moon's South Node is Ketu. The Moon's North and South Nodes mark the points where the Sun/Earth/Moon orbital planes intersect. If a lunation (new or full) occurs near the nodes an eclipse occurs. That is the geometry. It is not necessary for NASA to acknowledge Rahu and Ketu as planets for their calculations to be made. The Nodes are invisible points and the calculation of the timing of eclipses is exactly the same no matter what they are called in either astronomy or Jyotish. You can argue that their knowledge is deficient but it doesn't change the geometry. 

Back to Puranic Cosmology. On the subject of geometry, the Moon cannot always be further away than the Sun otherwise it can never form a (dark unlit) New Moon. As it approaches a conjunction with the Sun (a Lunation but not an eclipse) if it was on the other side it would appear almost full, not the crescent we see as a result of the geometry of its proximity. The argument that the brilliance of the Sun hides the Moon's illumination does not account for the crescent we see. (A full moon occurs when we, Earth, are between the Sun and Moon. A new moon is when the Moon is between Earth and the Sun. If it was on the other side it would be Full. Do you understand the geometry? If not I shall draw a diagram.) New Moons can only occur when it is inside the Earth/Sun or it. There is no their way. There is no other way. There is no other way.   

Therefore SB must be describing the Cosmos in some other time or circumstance, eg on another plane or dimension, as in viewed from the Heavenly Planets or a different cycle of Yugas where our current situation is not the normal cosmology that generally prevails. We know for a fact that the orbits of all bodies change over millennia, even the Fixed Stars. To say that Vedic Cosmology is static and always applies is a questionable proposition.

Therefore, what the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam describes (Puranic cosmology) and what we see (modern astronomy) don't have to concur for both to be valid. Different time and circumstance. For the TOVP to build a Puranic model and say "this is reality, NASA has got it all wrong", and expect to be well received – well, they're stark raving mad.

No longer do I feel discumbobulated with the clash of paradigms. We use modern methods to observe and calibrate the current real world we live in. We use the Puranas to marvel at the incomprehensible timeless qualities of the Supreme Personality of Godhead and to wonder at the vastness of all His creation.

Weblog trivia

Unfortunately, most web users (and abusers) aren't familiar with nature. Recent geographical isolation does not necessarily equate with imbalance. Nor does it harken rectification. Please hear me out.

There are natural laws, and they don't necessarily coincide with human-based definitions. In fact, humans are quite out of step with what nature dictates. There is a wise saying, expectations merely provide a hook to hang your disappointment on.

According to the laws of nature, no species can reproduce let alone survive in an inhospitable environment. This is why we don't have penguins at the North Pole (or polar bears at its southern opposite).

Us humans just don't seem to get Mother Nature. She allows rabbits to infest Victoria, cane toads to do the same in Queensland, yet in their assumed "superior wisdom" fucktards declare that "this is unnatural". Well what the fuck then is your definition of natural? Something separate from nature? I dismiss at the outset any misanthropic philosophy. For those unfamiliar with the term, it means man-hating, as in hating all of mankind. Or manhurt. Either way it's pretty divisive and not conducive to finding a solution. It's pretty much a devoid atheistic approach, based on a pessimistic non-outcome of the failure of human civilisation. Not exactly in accordance with God's plan. But then if you're a damned atheist to begin with, it's highly unlikely that you're figuring in any kind of redemption.

Tadpoles don't survive at the poles because it's unnatural. They freeze in icy conditions. Meanwhile camels, oxen, boars and many other "introduced species" prolifically reproduce in the Australian wildlife like rabbits.

Btw, it's called "wildlife" for a reason. It means without human interference, letting nature take its course. Ponder that for a moment before you environmentalists go off half-cocked. It's nature, stupid.

Wankerpedia, quote: "Unfortunately, Laughing Kookaburras are also well established in south-west Western Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand after being artificially introduced, possibly because of its reputation for killing snakes."

https://www.natureaustralia.org.au/explore/australian-animals/are-kookaburras-laughing-or-screaming-/

We need to get beyond, yay transcend, the narrow definition of what is natural. Botano-fascists reckon that non-indigenous specie don't belong. I disagree. I say they just haven't taken up their place yet. Increasingly in the future there is going to be unprecedented globalisation. It is unavoidable. Specie will intermix, even interbreed, breaking all the rules. Did you know that the dingo was introduced into Australia as little as six thousand years ago? (based on fossil evidence - or more exactly, the complete lack of any dingo fossils/skeletons older than five thousand years). Some argue that there were two separate waves of aboriginal migration, 120,000 years ago and 40,000 y.a as well. The problem as I see it is with academics, intellectuals, professors, etc cosily nestling in their ivory towers in established universities while the rest of the world is changing around them. They are oblivious to it because it challenges their long-held dichotomous thinking, not allowing or entertaining anything outside their sphere of reference.

Such is the Eurocentric Darwinian White Supremacist/Caucasian materialistic concept of the world. Well I'll be a monkey's uncle! (by the way, apparently Jesus was an Arab) Take that, racists!

Typos in Śrīla Prabhupāda's books

Hare Kṛṣṇa Prabhus,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Śrīla Prabhupāda!

We have all heard the expression "Too many cooks spoil the broth". There was more than one editor who worked on Bhagavad-Gītā As It Is, Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and similar works with Devanagari, romanised Sanskrit, transliterations, translations, etc and I think it is safe to say that they have made mistakes, as we are all human. This is separate from any confusion caused by chronological differences.

At the risk of appearing impertinent, please may I quote from a previous blog of mine on editors' typos in Śrīla Prabhupāda's books:

"Oh My God Kṛṣṇa! The 5th Canto is a minefield of typos!

Personally I have no objection to the numerous typos in Śrīla Prabhupāda's books - and I am certainly not criticising Him. Not only do I not mind them, I value them - as they provide a valuable function! These typos serve to identify His Divine Grace's original books because they have since been removed from the edited, so-called 'corrected' and changed modern BBTi versions.

Besides, most of the typos are so glaringly obvious as mistakes that they generally don't cloud any meaning. Forr eximple, you moste probably hav no trouble undastanding wot this sentence meenz. Similarly with figures, when different numbers describe the same phenomena (such as 10,000 yojanas and 1,000,000 yojanas for the same distance) we can do the sums in our head and work out, with simple arithmetic, which one is correct.

Distances between planets in 5th Canto, Book Two, Chart Three differ not only from the texts - the texts differ from the purports. Even the heavenly bodies change names in some places!

It is no wonder Vedic Cosmology has devotees confused the world over. It definitely seems to have confused the editors, proof-readers and typsetters! I could not find a single Sanskrit reference to the distance between the Earth and the Sun anywhere in the texts (either in the Devanagari script, the Sanskrit, the transliterations, or nor the English translation of the Sanskrit). It appears in Chart Three as 100,000 yojanas; elsewhere in the purports as 93 million miles; yet not a single mention in the actual Sanskrit texts - at least not in the 5th canto which deals with our position in the material universe in detail. If it exists somewhere else in Sanskrit I would be very grateful if someone can show me where in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam it is (not in the English in the purports which is NASA's figure of 93 million miles).

I used the search tools built into Vedabase, Gitabase and Vanipedia, with the words 'Sun', 'Earth', 'distance', 'above' - even including the Boolean term AND between them to narrow down the results - and didn't find ANYTHING in the actual Sanskrit-to-English text. There are plenty of references everywhere else but they all use figures based on western astronomy, not Vedic. I guess this is why Śrīla Prabhupāda uses the 93,000,000 figure. As far as I could fathom the actual figure of 100,000 yojanas (or 800,000 miles) comes from the Viṣṇu Purana, not the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.. but that still doesn't explain how 100,000 yojanas found its way into Chart Three mistakenly as double that figure.

So we have these unusual entries:

#SB 5.22.8, the is Moon listed as 100,000 yj above the Sun; whereas

#Chart Three it is drawn as 200,000 yj; and elsewhere

#SB 5.22.11, the bold Text says that the 28 Stars are 1,600,000 miles above the Moon; yet in the purport it reads "above the Sun";

#Not only that but the calculation for the distance of the 28 Stars above the Earth at 4 million miles only adds up using the distance of the Moon being 800,000 miles above the Sun instead of 1,600,000 suggesting again that the Text is correct and that Chart Three is wrong; and

#93,000,000 miles for Earth/Sun distance; oddly, always in miles, not yojanas - as used by NASA the mile is an imperial measurement, not Vedic). Nowhere in the body of the text EXCEPT THE PURPORTS is the height of the Sun above the Earth given;

#SB 5.24 chapter introduction states that below Rahu "by another 1,000,000 yojanas" whereas text 4 says 10,000 yj re: Siddhaloka etc.;

#Chapter 24 goes on to say that the seven Subterranean planets, each the same size as Earth, are 10,000 yj apart yet Chart Three shows them as not starting until 70,000 yj beneath the Earth which is about 1,000 diameter. How anyone can interpret subterranean as meaning 'inside hollow Earth' is obviously taking its meaning literally and disregarding the arithmetic. They can't all be the same size and yet fit inside it! Yes, 'subterranean' means 'below the earth's crust' as in underground - but certainly not 'below the Earth's plane! Perhaps an overzealous editor substituted or suggested the word not knowing the correct context.

These are just few typos that I found by double-checking a few chapters of just one book. My point is, the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam is wonderful, but regarding these minor discrepancies, anyone who takes EVERYTHING they read literally, especially the multitude of contradictions in the 5th Canto, is sure to be getting the wrong picture. Perhaps they spent a little too much time experimenting in Haight-Ashbury during the 60s? Maybe that explains how some people can accommodate both a Flat Earth and a Hollow Earth at the same time.

It's about this point that I remember something a little birdy told me that I'd forgotten (the 'something', not the person). She (who I won't name to respect her privacy) joined the movement as a teenager in the early 70s. I met her during 1988/89, soon after she'd come back to Australia to resume karmi life after a decade and a half in the movement, much of it overseas. Her former husband was responsible for outing one of the fallen ZAS "gurus".

Two things she said -

1/ whenever someone starts a spiel by saying "Prabhupada says.." ignore verbal quotes, ask to see it in writing, it could be made up (Iskcon was doing a lot then to cover up its tracks); and

2/ even in writing - the astronomy figures in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 5th Canto were fudged (by who?) on purpose (why?) - there can be a lot of confusion from conflicting passages.

Either way I never paid a great deal of attention to what the little birdy said and didn't understand the relevance as I was more interested in other things at the time.

Now.... whether or not any or all of that is true...

From what I have read, besides Giriraj who was very qualified and did most of the editing and proofing before anything was sent to the printers, others at various times may have 'helped' eg typed, copied manuscripts, doted the i's and crossed the t's etcetera to get the purports ready. We take it as a given that the Devanagari script, Sanskrit romanisation, word-for-word transliteration, and all the text translations were all done by highly qualified and experienced people. You will be hard-pressed to find any mistakes there. It is in the purports that we invariably find all the discrepancies, not just typographical errors, for in some places the information is partially scrambled or completely incorrect, rendering it confusing to the reader. This is where I suspect certain editors made human mistakes.

On the whole Śrīla Prabhupāda's "Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam" is a masterpiece. As I have said before, the typos that it does contain help identify it as the original because subsequent (edited and altered) editions don't contain many of them. Therefore they serve a valuable purpose rather than detract from the great body of work."

[end of quote]

No-one can deny that human error has crept into the editing of SP's books. The typos are proof of that.

Hare Kṛṣṇa
हरे कृष्ण

Herd immunity - science or myth?

To begin with, I'm a strict vegetarian for religious reasons and steadfastly refuse to use vaccines that are grown in animal tissue.

Yet, I can't seem to win here. If herd immunity works, then surely I don't need shots, being one of the small percentage of the public that abstains from getting jabbed. But if 'herd immunity' validly exists and I use that to skip a jab seeing as "I'm protected by others", then I'm labelled a parasite for bludging off society. If it's a myth then there's no protection whether you're vaccinated or not. If enough of the population has had flu shots, why should I worry? The strain is supposed to die out without enough hosts for it to multiply. Therefore I can skip the jab and avoid the risk of getting flu from it ha ha!

Don't get me wrong - I'm not an Anti-vaxxer - I'm pro-choice. Actually, I'm all for immunisation (eg tetanus antibodies booster); pretty much ok with inoculation such as variolation; sitting on the fence with inactivated vaccines but quite alarmed and somewhat wary about attenuated "live" vaccines such as flu shots - which can give you a bout of influenza that you may have otherwise avoided. Mind you, Australian flu vaccines are supposed to be different to overseas ones and don't have attenuated "live" microbes. They're supposedly thoroughly killed off and there's no chance of getting flu from them. Still, the vaccine is incubated in chicken eggs and then inactivated. This year's jab is 47%  effective. Last year it was 36%. At those rates I'd sooner take my chances and stay chicken egg free. Though I might still get the flu regardless.

You didn't know there is a difference between vaccination, immunisation and inoculation? Thought they were all the same? That's because these three terms are wrongfully used interchangeably in a slipshod manner (hardly anyone even knows what variolation is so I didn’t count that one). They are all completely separate procedures that use different mechanisms to artificially induce immunity or even better, a response from your immune system.

As for "herd immunity", the term comes from observation of natural resistance that some animals have in a community. It isn't the same as vaccine-induced 'protection' because natural immunity is life-long and far more effective. Most adults don't realise that their childhood jabs are no longer protecting them, whereas kids that have had measles or chicken pox will never ever have to deal with them again. There's every chance that elderly citizens can succumb to diseases they've been vaccinated for because most wear off - like pneumonia, shingles, diptheria, tetanus, hepatitis A & B. And influenza - because it constantly mutates and past jabs won't protect from future strains.

The best protection by far is a healthy immune system. You can't find that in a needle or a pill bottle because it is a result of a healthy lifestyle - good diet, exercise, avoiding allergens,  toxins and chemicals - and even having good thoughts and healthy warm emotions! All these promote a good immune system, your first defence against any attacking pathogen.

Childhood diseases are actually good for the individual as long as they don't suffer permanent injury (or worse still, die) because their immune system's response gives them lifelong protection. It is far better to catch a disease as a kid than as a senior because old folk don't bounce back so good. That's why they die of 'ordinary diseases' that would only send a kid to bed for a couple of days or at most a week or two. Catching measles as a veteran is potentially lethal whereas very few of us died as kids from it. Well in fact none of us if you're reading this.

I'd like to note here that as a child I was constantly getting sick on a routine yearly basis - either otitis media (infection of the middle ear), tonsilitis, or hives (I still don't like the smell of caladryl lotion!). As an undiagnosed coeliac, most likely all three, all inflammatory reactions, were a result of wheat, although the hives might've been from the sprays they used in those days. I enjoy them now without any allergic reaction. I was diagnosed just before my 55th birthday, soon after my 16yo daughter received the same news. Strangely my mother was a trained nurse yet missed picking up on it even when I complained that my lunchtime brown bread sandwiches made me feel ill. When I asked to have white bread like all the other kids I was told to stop complaining, "wholemeal bread is good for you". No it wasn't!

Ok, back to 'herd immunity'.

It's not a scientific rule. It's an idea. Herds can still get sick, just that it won't spread like wildfire and they're less likely to succumb when most of the members are resistant to a particular disease. Yet this natural resistance is far, far stronger than any artificially induced vaccination, a point often glossed over in pro-vaxx circles where those who have been jabbed may be unwittingly carrying around supressed microbes of a virus that infect unvaccinated people including anti-vaxxers.

So.... Herd Immunity is an ideological concept, not a scientific fact based on exact numbers. True, different diseases need different percentages of populations to minimise spreading but it doesn't eliminate disease. It prevents epidemics breaking out... in theory, that is. Still the numbers required are approximate because it's guesswork. That's not science. That's politics, guilt-trips, peer pressure, emotional blackmail. I find this whole "for the greater good" compulsory vaccination propaganda an impingement on personal freedom. Every individual in society has the right to choose otherwise we live in a dictatorship. Yet it makes complete sense that because viruses rely on suitable hosts to breed and multiply, limiting the number of available hosts restricts any disease from "going viral" (pun intended).

With myself, basically it comes down to this... If vaxxers really believe they're protected by their vaccinations, how can they blame anti-vaxxers for exposing them to potentially harmful pathogens? I thought your vaccination made you immune. What are you frightened of? How can you blame me or anyone else?

Because I'm a bludger, relying on herd immunity? Well then wtf are you worried about if herd immunity is protecting you!

The problem I find with these sorts of emotionally charged arguments is that it is hard to get unbiased information. Take for example global warming. Both sides of the argument presented data sets, graphs, meteorological and climatological groupthink, predictions and prognostications to backup their respective points of view. It is said, when debate degenerates into character assassination, name-calling, insults, foul language and uncivil antisocial behaviour it is fairly reasonable to assume that the offending party is losing the debate. Those with weak arguments get angry. Those who are quietly confident are patient, calmly presenting their case in an optimistic, gentle manner as they have nothing to fear. Aggression is a sign of a weakly placed Mars in the horoscope of the individual. Those with a strong Mars have no need to attack. They use others' agression by deflecting it back at them where their mistakes in thinking result in further complication. It is impossible to make wise decisions when one is angry, everyone knows this from practical example. No-one ever makes a smart choice by being hot-tempered. Eventually the detractor will self-implode out of sheer frustration. Game over.

"A gentleman tolerates insults silently. Wise men suffer fools gladly. In such circumstances, inaction is the only honorable course of action."