Ioannidis vs. the Lockdown

Buzzfeed reporting: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article...irus-lockdowns

Ioannidis has—up until recently—been very highly regarded for the work he and his colleagues have done in a wide range of fields esp. in medicine & epidemiology, typically with the aim of improving the quality of research in those fields. During the pandemic, however, he's been met with sharp criticism for a number of questionable decisions, both wrt methodology as well as wrt his professional judgement. This story doesn't improve matters much. Separating this from the covid thread because I believe this touches on another more general phenomenon—the process whereby superstar science-dudes with a contrarian bent inevitably metamorphose into arrogant kooks and cranks. I don't know how far along Ioannidis & co. are on that journey, but his conduct is both disappointing and alarming.

Ditto for the French dude who promotes hydroxychloroquine. A lot of these "superstars" made a single major discovery decades ago and used their fame to "publish" tons of research that was mostly carried out by their colleagues or co-authors.