7 ms·

>Musk has said his critics “cannot cite a single name of someone who died” and “If there were, it would be worldwide headline news!” When confronted with the na

>Musk has said his critics “cannot cite a single name of someone who died” and “If there were, it would be worldwide headline news!” When confronted with the names – including those of children who died because of the cuts – Musk called a journalist “an utter piece of shit and a liar” and “utterly evil”. Musk has claimed, without evidence, that US tax dollars went to arming militants and “corrupt politicians”. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jul/07/elon-musk-doge-cuts-usaid-ebola https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jul/07/elon-musk... https://hsph.harvard.edu/news/usaid-shutdown-has-led-to-hundreds-of-thousands-of-deaths/ https://hsph.harvard.edu/news/usaid-shutdown-has-led-to-hund...

dekhn 9d ago
those are estimates, not data. I am asking about actual data. For example, mortality reports, piles of bodies, etc. I understand feeling emotional about this, I really do. But the important bit is that if you make a big claim "millions of people died", you have to back that with actual evidence, not models.
- ryandrake 9d ago
  You are sealioning[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning
  - dekhn 9d ago
    Nope. And I hate that entire comic for poisoninh the very idea that asking for the evidence is wrong. I'm operating in good faith asking people to show data. There is no reliable data supporting the claim that millions of people died because usaid was canceled. That's all.
- disgruntledphd2 8d ago
  > those are estimates, not data. I am asking about actual data. For example, mortality reports, piles of bodies, etc. I think that this is an unrealistic ask, right now. Over the next 5-10 years enough time will have passed such that we can get more accurate numbers, but right now, all we have are estimates with wide confidence bounds (but narrower than they were last year).

dekhn 9d ago

those are estimates, not data. I am asking about actual data. For example, mortality reports, piles of bodies, etc. I understand feeling emotional about this, I really do. But the important bit is that if you make a big claim "millions of people died", you have to back that with actual evidence, not models.

ryandrake 9d ago
You are sealioning[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning
- dekhn 9d ago
  Nope. And I hate that entire comic for poisoninh the very idea that asking for the evidence is wrong. I'm operating in good faith asking people to show data. There is no reliable data supporting the claim that millions of people died because usaid was canceled. That's all.
disgruntledphd2 8d ago
> those are estimates, not data. I am asking about actual data. For example, mortality reports, piles of bodies, etc. I think that this is an unrealistic ask, right now. Over the next 5-10 years enough time will have passed such that we can get more accurate numbers, but right now, all we have are estimates with wide confidence bounds (but narrower than they were last year).