Rogan and RFK Jr. Have Already Lost the Debate
Once, probably a couple of decades ago, an investment firm (I don't remember precisely when or which firm and I am too lazy to go look it up for the sake of an anecdote) ran a series of commercials designed to make you think that they did deep research before spending your money. The commercials went through a series of industries and described how they researched some aspect of a company and discovered something unique about it and THEN decided to invest (I don't remember the commercials every being "and so we decided they were incompetent fools and didn't invest", but I think that would have worked even better). Fairly effective -- until they got to an industry I knew something about.
One commercial focused on a data center company (remember those? They were wehere the internet lived before AWS.). The ad made a big deal out of the use of a chemical fire suppression system in the server rooms as a reason to invest. Friends, those suppression systems were bog-standard in every server room I had ever been in, even at the smallest of companies. Hell, I even had a desk in a room connected to one of those systems once -- no one tell OSHA. They were in no way a reason to invest in one data center over another. The commercials became a lot less impressive after that.
What has that to do with Joe Rogan and RFK Jr. trying to bully a doctor into debating vaccines and possibly putting his safety at risk? Debates on these kinds of issues are a lot like those commercials -- you can sound a lot more impressive to people without a deep background in the subject if you are able to control the presentation. I didn't know much about sheep farms or shipping companies or whatever else the investment firm's commercials was talking about, so the commercials seemed reasonably impressive. That is the intention of a public debate on a complicated subject controlled by one of the partisans (and make no mistake, Rogan is an anti-vaxxer): setup the conditions to make it easy for misinformation to appear at least as credible as actual information. But the debate has already been had, and Rogan has already lost it.
We live in a society where people make their mark by overturning the accepted wisdom. We reward people for proving that something is wrong or not as we thought in science regularly. The idea that some massive flaws in the COVID vaccines could exist without some significant scientific pushback is ludicrous. I recently linked to a story about an economist who suggested price controls as a means of fighting inflation. She was attacked mercilessly in deeply personal terms by the orthodox economists. What happened to her? Well, other economists looked at her work, went, "huh, this actually makes sense" and some of it was used to help fight inflation Europe. Some of the more honest economists apologized for their behavior and her career has not suffered. Even economics, a branch of science that resembles nothing so much as Calvin and Hobbes' "No Girls Allowed" club, except for heterodox ideas, with a few slide rules thrown in for effect, was susceptible to having one of its most cherished ideas refuted.
Yes, I understand that the pharmaceutical companies are run by people who appear to have the morals of a serial killer in a slasher movie. And yes, I am well aware of the history of companies like the tobacco companies pushing out bad science to make themselves look good. But there is no evidence for that kind of manipulation here. Scientists in and out of the industry of all proven the efficacy of vaccines in general and the COVID ones in particular. The research has been done, and the evidence is clear. If it wasn't, you would see pushback from a significant number of scientists. Rogan and RFK jr. have already lost this debate, which is why they need to turn it into a performance. If they can use the limited time and space of a "debate" under their control to present false information, misleading facts, and talk over their opponents, they can make their positions look sounder than it is. Only then can they hope to overcome the factual, logical, and commonsense deficiencies in their positions.
Maneuvering through these kinds of issues can be difficult. Science often is warped by companies for their own ends. The issues are often highly technical and require at least some degree of specialized knowledge. But there are always scientists willing to explain things in a way that the public can understand. Heck, sometimes if you ask nicely, they might even respond directly to good faith questions asked correctly (I just recently had two prominent historians answer a fairly dumb question for a historical novel I am trying to write. People are generous and want to share their knowledge if you are polite and respectful of their time). You can, with a touch of work, generally come to understand where the current best understanding resides. It might not stay the best understanding, but that is life. We grow as we learn more.
Believing the science does not mean putting aside healthy skepticism. But industry does not control science to the point that their word is the only word available. The tobacco companies put out bad science, yes, for example. But there was always a significant pushback from scientists and researchers outside the industry. When you see that, when you see a debate or significant pushback from a significant number of reputable sources, then you can know that there is something to the debate. Absent that, like with vaccines in general and the COVID vaccine specifically, any "debate" is just performative bullshit.