Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

He has fringe people on his show to drive engagement. Fauci is not going to pay the bills.



Spoken like somebody who hasn't even bothered to scroll through the list of episodes for even a cursory few seconds (which seems to be the norm among JRE critics). Do Snoop Dogg, Jewel, or Jim Gaffigan strike you as "fringe people"? Oliver Stone? Chuck Palhaniuk? Joe has stated ad nauseum that he invites guests that he finds to be interesting people. Why folks continue to try and reduce the breadth of guests to the 10% fringe is beyond me. Some combination of ideology and laziness, if I had to guess.

>Fauci is not going to pay the bills.

Is that why Disney just released a feature film documentary about him? Complete with red carpet gala and a monster Disney+ promotion?


Sure, but:

1. Lots of correct scientific ideas were considered outright heretical (not just merely fringe), prior to mainstream acceptance. If you exclude 'fringe' ideas, you exclude the bad ones and the good ones.

2. People who get duped will simply stop listening. Example: This week I was duped by a youtuber, and will never rely on that source again [1].

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30137025


Regarding 1, science makes zero progress on an entertainment show. The correct way to scientific redress is through publication of peer-reviewed literature. That's how you get mainstream acceptance in science. Science is not the consensus of opinions in the general public. Quite the contrary.

Come back to me when Nature censors something for ideological reasons.


> Come back to me when Nature censors something for ideological reasons.

I would be genuinely surprised to find this hasn't already happened.


> science makes zero progress on an entertainment show

Someone better tell Bill Nye and Niel.


I watched a little Bill Nye as a kid but it didn't teach me anything at all about the scientific method or falsification.

That may have been my own fault - I don't remember enough to know.

Just saying.


Science and consensus being wrong sometimes doesn't mean we have to actively promote widely debunked crap. Or that we cannot boycott and complain about it.

I'd say we can even call for it to no longer be published. And if it can be shown to actively cause significant harm the legal system can respond.


> doesn't mean we have to actively promote widely debunked crap

If it's so widely debunked then why do you care? Should be easy to shoot down on a debate. Oh and you don't have to listen.


Nor most I support publishers profiting from such crap. Or even stay silent when it is given credence by popular hosts.


Yes exactly! Censorship is how we move science forward!


You jest but elevating reproducible evidence and refuting sloppy 'evidence'/analysis is how science advances.


And neither of those are censorship.

To refute sloppy analysis, the sloppy analysis must be published and available.


Science journals do not publish bunk papers because there is no value in publishing facially wrong things


Right but JRE isn't a science journal, and neither is Spotify?


Shutting down psuedoscience prevents science from moving backward.


Citation? I assume you have some scientific evidence to support such an assertion.


I must assume you're being serious in my response, but this really does not feel like a genuine effort was put in when forming this take.

Science follows the scientific method. Pseudoscience, definitionally, is anything that identifies as science but does not follow the scientific method. A study is not needed to demonstrate that not following the scientific method lessens the usage of the scientific method. No one would bother peer reviewing or publishing trivial work. It is a waste of time.


> A study is not needed to demonstrate that not following the scientific method lessens the usage of the scientific method

Again, you're treating this as a given when it is anything but. Sure, pseudoscience means you're not doing science, but people promoting pseudoscience weren't necessarily going to being doing science instead / the people listening to them wouldn't necessarily be listening to science instead. In other words, science and pseudoscience are not a zero-sum game. In fact, the existence / publication of pseudoscience could actually galvanize "real" scientists to do more work than they otherwise would've to prove things scientifically. Not saying this is the case, but again, your assertion is far from a given.

Also, although we like to pretend that "science" is some concrete ideal, it is really not. For example, I mainly consider things to be scientific in line with Karl Popper's thinking re: falsifiability, which would cause me to lump a lot of "science" done today in the "not super sciency" category alongside some of the more clearly bunk pseudoscience.


yes but 99.99% of antivaxxer logic is easy to disprove with known science. I'm going with statistics on something as trivial as a podcast. Also I think people that don't like JR experience have two really good options, unsubscribe or simply don't listen to him. Why is everyone so negative? Lots of -good- people are on spotify, why concentrate on the negative? I just don't get why to the cancel culture types everything has to be cancelled or their world is completely out of balance and existence is awful.


> I just don't get why to the cancel culture types everything has to be cancelled or their world is completely out of balance and existence is awful.

I don't think I'd put this situation in the same bucket as cancel culture. The spread of Covid misinformation, especially anti-vaccination stuff, has a provable impact on the healthcare system which forces our governments to ask us to endure more restrictions than would be necessary if vaccine hesitancy wasn't a thing.

People like Rogan are sitting there complaining about government overreach while exacerbating the problem by spreading misinformation. As the distributor I think Spotify has an obligation to put a stop to it. I'm not saying he should be cancelled, but they need to tell him to get back to entertaining and to leave the medical advice to the experts in that field.


> has a provable impact on the healthcare system which forces our governments to ask us to endure more restrictions than would be necessary if vaccine hesitancy wasn't a thing

It's exactly this kind of misinformation that leads to people calling for censorship. You honestly think if there was MORE censorship there would be LESS vaccine hesitancy and the government would be implementing LESS mandates? That's dillusional and you have no evidence of it.

Censorship has a provable impact on people's trust. If you censor competing viewpoints then guess what? I'm less likely to believe yours. The only way I believe anything is if competing viewpoints are allowed. If they aren't then I don't believe you can defend your viewpoint. I don't just blindly trust anybody. You have to show evidence and prove yourself.


Joe Rogan would interview Dr. Fauci if he were up for it. He would even let Dr. Fauci talk and defend his position for 3-4 hours if he had that much to say.

I wouldn't call the guests on his show "fringe". In fact blanket calling all the hundreds if not thousands of people he had on his podcast fringe would require whomever said that to be someone who thinks through a groupthink/xenophobic mentality of believing the other side is evil.


>Joe Rogan would interview Dr. Fauci if he were up for it.

In one of this podcasts, JR said he was trying to find someone from the "other side" to debate (I think it was) Dr Malone. He said he couldn't, everyone turned him down. I think this part of the big disconnect in modern discourse; one side wants open discussion and debate, the other wants to censor and deplatform.


I doubt Anthony Fauci would be willing to go on the show, but I could see someone like US Surgeon General Vice Admiral Vivek Murthy willing to go on Rogan's show. I'd like to see it. However I suspect it would go a lot like it did when Sanjay Gupta made an appearance. I don't think it was a good look for Gupta.


If that's the case, I think you hit it spot on.

Their actions speak for themselves.

For myself, they don't need to say anything else.


Both "sides" censor and deplatform. Only one side pretends they don't.


"Two wrongs don't make a right" - did you miss that childhood lesson?


You missed my point completely. It is only conservatives that pretend they do not cancel people. They constantly cancel people. Maybe even more than liberals.


Might I ask what "fringe people" are? I've watched his podcast and he certainly has a whole spectrum of people on. He may have his opinions and biases, but a person is allowed that right? Who are these fringe people, people who have different opinions from you? From the main stream media?


People like Jordan Peterson that deny climate change exists because of "variables." Most of these people are discredited hacks (i.e. Malone).

Sure, get the brightest minds that are contrarian on the program. Malone and Peterson aren't it. Get Richard Ebright on the program.


How does that make any sense? By definition fringe people are going to attract a fringe audience. If he wants more engagement the guests should be more like when he had Elon Musk on smoking weed.


That's not by definition at all. A view that is fringe in a scientific or medical context can still have strong appeal to a non-scientific and non-medical audience. In Joe's case, platforming fringe views in addition to his regular guests creates a compelling sense among his listeners that they are being given a fair and balanced presentation and the freedom to make up their own minds.


Ah gotcha, fringe wrt "experts", not fringe wrt the proles.


Yes - sorry. Subject matter experts and expert communities do exist, and they evaluate issues in a way that laypeople can not.


I think my point stands regardless – if he is just trying to drive engagement there are clearly better guests to have on than people on the fringes of the medical community.




Consider applying for YC's Fall 2025 batch! Applications are open till Aug 4

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: