We the people can't explain squat!

SATURDAY, MARCH 11, 2023

Concerning the value of masks, the later Wittgenstein scores: All kidding aside, how about it?

If you wore a mask during the recent pandemic, did that reduce the likelihood that you would come down with Covid?

Roughly one month ago, "a respected scientific nonprofit" issued a barely coherent study concerning some such question. That respected scientific nonprofit's barely coherent study resulted in a wide range of claims of this general type:

Masks don't work.

Tucker Carlson even broadcast that claim. And we all know how careful he is!

In this morning's New York Times, Zeynep Tufekci has penned a guest essay regarding the barely coherent study in question. In our view, Tufekci's essay isn't gigantically coherent itself, but it does start to resolve the widespread confusion about the findings of the barely coherent study—in part, because the respected scientific nonprofit has now publicly stated that its original work was, just as a matter of fact,  incoherent and pretty much wrong.

Tufekci's essay appears beneath the headline shown below. The headline offers the general drift of what her essay says:

Here’s Why the Science Is Clear That Masks Work

Masks do work, Tufekci reports (though they can't provide perfect protection). 

Masks do work! After a month of widespread confusion, it's important to get clear on that basic point. But the most important learning here involves the inability of high-end elites to explain / articulate just about anything, no matter how important.

Tufekci starts her essay at a key point. The respected scientific nonprofit in question has now acknowledged that its recent, widely-cited report was incoherent and pretty much wrong. 

Here's how Tufekci starts:

TUFEKCI (3/11/23): The debate over masks’ effectiveness in fighting the spread of the coronavirus intensified recently when a respected scientific nonprofit said its review of studies assessing measures to impede the spread of viral illnesses found it was “uncertain whether wearing masks or N95/P2 respirators helps to slow the spread of respiratory viruses.”

Now the organization, Cochrane, says that the way it summarized the review was unclear and imprecise, and that the way some people interpreted it was wrong.

“Many commentators have claimed that a recently updated Cochrane review shows that ‘masks don’t work,’ which is an inaccurate and misleading interpretation,” Karla Soares-Weiser, the editor in chief of the Cochrane Library, said in a statement.

The respected scientific nonprofit in question goes by the simple name, Cochrane. Or maybe it's called the Cochrane Library—three paragraphs in, we aren't sure.

At any rate, a Cochrane official has now said that Cochrane's recent review doesn't show that "masks don't work." 

That's "an inaccurate and misleading interpretation" of Cochrane's review of studies, the Cochrane official has at long last said. 

More strikingly, that same official has also said that Cochrane played a leading role in these misinterpretations. 

Why did people misinterpret the Cochrane review? According to Tufekci, people misinterpreted the review because "the way [Cochrane] summarized [its own] review was unclear and imprecise!" 

Cochrane mischaracterized its own review! And that isn't simply Tufekci's opinion. As Tufekci's essay continues, she quotes the Cochrane spokesperson saying that same thing, and worse:

TUFEKCI (continuing directly): She said that “this wording was open to misinterpretation, for which we apologize,” and that Cochrane would revise the summary.

Soares-Weiser also said, though, that one of the lead authors of the review even more seriously misinterpreted its finding on masks by saying in an interview that it proved “there is just no evidence that they make any difference.” In fact, Soares-Weiser said, “that statement is not an accurate representation of what the review found.”

Sad! The Cochrane spokesperson apologized for the way Cochrane had worded its own review. Cochrane's wording "was open to misinterpretation," the agency's spokesperson said.

Even worse, one of the lead authors of Cochrane's review didn't seem to understand what the review had determined! According to the Cochrane spokesperson, that lead author had issued a (widely-cited) statement which "is not an accurate representation of what the review found.”

For the most part, we're going to leave it right there today, though with a note on the basic anthropology. In our view, the anthropological takeaway here is this:

We the humans are vastly unskilled in many areas of rationality. Even at the highest levels, we can't explain a freaking thing—and when we offer incoherent or inaccurate work, few others are likely to notice.

On the level of high academic culture, this major anthropological finding is a confirmation of the later Wittgenstein's work—work which was itself extremely hard to summarize or follow.

On the level of the here and now, this remarkable episode instructs us in a basic fact—you can't assume the accuracy or the basic competence of anything you read, even when the work in question comes from respected upper-end sources.

For us, the background here went like this:

We began to read about the Cochrane review on February 13, in this piece at The Atlantic. The piece struck us as incoherent. It left us with no clear idea of what the Cochrane review had supposedly found.

The problem stemmed from the cavalier use of an unexplained technical term—"at the population level." The Atlantic's author never quite seemed to realize that she wasn't giving a clear explanation of what the Cochrane review had supposedly found, and her editor—if some such person exists—had waved her essay into print without requiring clarification.

After that, we read Bret Stephens' treatment of this matter in the New York Times. He too didn't seem to be up to the task of explaining what he was talking about—and when Kevin Drum critiqued the Stephens piece, the confusion wasn't addressed.

It seems to us that Tufekci herself struggles with clarity in today's essay. As best we can tell, the confusion lurking in this mishegoss revolves around the difference between masks and mask mandates:

On the one hand, masks did and do "work," though to an imperfect extent, for such people who wear them. Such people were and are less likely to become infected with Covid, or to spread Covid to others.

On the other hand, mask mandates may not reduce the spread of Covid through a large population. Many people will ignore the mandate, permitting Covid to spread.

Masks do work; mask mandates may not. We've read one report or essay after another in which high end journalists were unable to draw this fairly simple distinction. 

For the record, we can't fully guarantee that this is the key distinction. For our money, Tufekci is also rather fuzzy today, though she benefits from the statement of apology from the highly respected Cochrane org itself.

Key point:

The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but we humans are extremely limited in our basic "rationality" skills. We aren't real good at explaining things, and when we traffic vast confusion, others aren't likely to notice.

As the later Wittgenstein confusingly noted, this is true at the highest academic and cultural levels. Sadly, we're forced to tell you this:

This is a basic part of the hapless way our self-impressed blue tribe works!