I found this Twitter debate about the Icelandic study that COVID re-infection rates increase with the number of vaccine doses a patient receives interesting in the context of our polarized acceptance of data. In this debate, a right leaning person highlights the study's hypothesis regarding COVID reinfection rates. The left leaning person accuses the right leaning person of purposely misinterpreting the results.

It appears they are both correct. The study does illustrate the reinfection rate and there is a disclaimer at the end. Does the disclaimer mean we should not take the study seriously? Does the hypothesis mean we should ignore the disclaimer?

No, and no, if we are a truly intelligent and curious species.

Lets take this to another topic, climate change. The world is panicked about the supposed existential crisis of man-made climate change and the world ending if we don't take dramatic steps to correct it before 2030. Yet the data the climate alarmist use to come to this conclusion comes with its own disclaimer, these scenarios represent a low probability. Climate alarmists ignore this disclaimer. Climate deniers point to this disclaimer. Is that a selective analysis by both, based on confirmation bias? Or, is it just the nature of scientific study to present the data completely?

Manipulation of numbers and science is not a new technique. What is new, is the wholesale support of the effort by political leaders, government leaders and the worldwide media establishment. One would expect those groups to be more mature and thorough in their analysis of data. But, sadly, they are not.

I suspect, though I do not know, that the person in this debate who wants to use the disclaimer to discredit the COVID reinfection rate hypothesis in the Icelandic study, is also a climate change alarmist person who ignores similar disclaimers in the climate change scientific studies.

We both can and should do better.