Errata bounty: $1,000 per error in Turtles and $200 in Fauci books

Help stop misinformation. To date, nobody has found any factual errors in the Turtles or Fauci books. So I'm going to increase the reward to make it clear that there are no errors.

How it works

I really don’t want to spread misinformation, but it’s hard to read books like The Real Anthony Fauci and Turtles All the Way Down: Vaccine Science and Myth and not be persuaded by them.

Are they true? Or are they misinformation?

Let’s put a bounty on errors. If there are no takers, we’ll raise the bounties over time.

At a minimum, we’ll incentivize a lot of people who think we are misinformation spreaders to read these books and show the world that we are wrong.

To qualify

An error means you found something that is a material error of fact in what was presented. So if the book says “they never tested vaccine XX against a placebo” and you find a document proving it was tested against a placebo, you win the current reward for that book. It’s that easy.

So the book must state a material fact and that fact must be shown to be untrue to claim the reward.

Only the first person to discover the error will be paid.

The Turtles team wants to focus ONLY on Chapter 1, so only errata in Chapter 1 are eligible. Chapter 1 is a quick read. For RFK’s The Real Anthony Fauci, all 250,000 words are eligible.

The offer ends on June 27, 2023.

Existing errors (winners table)

See this spreadsheet of winning entries.

To enter your submission

1. Send 1 Solana (SOL) token to this address: 9BBhGEfAMSHg8Mxyb4x67VKMhyomJ3MAPa9mqXtaP8xZ

2. Make your submission to the Contact me page explaining what you found. Include the following:

   1. The SOL transaction ID from Step #1

   2. A description of the bug

   3. Whether I can publish your identity to give you credit for success

   4. The SOL address to send the reward if you win

   5. There are no anonymous submissions so that everyone can verify this is legit.

The Solana fee is a de minimis entry fee (it’s about $30) and does four important things:

1. It establishes that you are serious about your submission. We simply cannot afford the time to look at entries which are not serious.

2. It makes a public record of your entry

3. It creates a timestamp of your entry in the event of disputes

4. It insulates me from having to pay PayPal a $2,500 per payment penalty which they wanted to assess on anyone who in their sole opinion violates their terms of service.

Note:

1. Pretty much anyone who does crypto can help you make the transfer if you are not crypto literate. If you are using Ledger Live to send the Solana, you can populate a “memo” field with your name, book, and page # which then creates a public record of your entry, e.g., “Steve Kirsch, Fauci, 234.”

2. You can see the entries on the blockchain here. Here was the first entry from a teacher in Sydney, Australia:

   

3. Someone could front run your entry fee by looking for blockchain transactions and then front running you on the Contact me form. This is unlikely since there will be a “double claim” in my database and it will be easy to assess who sent the funds. So this means there is no incentive to game the system.

The entry fee is non-refundable and covers our costs of reviewing your submission.

Modifications

If the system is abused, I reserve the right to increase the entry fee at any time.

Similarly, I reserve the right to change these terms at any time. So the timestamp of your entry as proven on the blockchain is public proof of the terms in existence at the time of the submission.

Judging your submission

1. I will send your submission to 2 or more experts of my choosing to evaluate.

2. If the experts believe you are correct, you win the reward amount which will be sent to you at a crypto address of your choosing. Otherwise, you forfeit the fee.

3. I will have 30 days to evaluate your submission. If you don’t hear back from me in 30 days, it should be considered a “I disagree” response.

Disputes

1. You can dispute my decision by requesting JAMS arbitration.

2. Both sides are allowed to dismiss up to 2 judges from an ordered list presented by JAMS (or other mutually agreeable ADR service). So the first mutually agreeable judge will judge the case.

3. The parties split the arbitration fee.

4. The loser agrees to reimburse the winner for the arbitration expenses.

5. The arbitrator could decide it is a draw in which case both sides split the cost.

This creates an incentive to settle and ensures that only serious cases would go to arbitration. It provides a neutral way to settle disputes that favors the person with the stronger case.

Duplicate submissions

If someone has already submitted the same erratum ahead of you, I’ll fully refund your entry fee. You can avoid this by checking the current submissions list at the end of this article.

Modifications to these terms

1. I tried to keep this as simple as possible, but I’m open to negotiating these terms.

Reward amounts

As of Nov 7, 1:48 PM PST:

The Real Anthony Fauci: $200 per erratum anywhere in the book.

Turtles All the Way Down: $1,000 per erratum. Only the first chapter is eligible.

Current submissions

The first submission came in just hours after I posted the reward.

Here is a list of paid entries (Book, page number):

Fauci book winning submissions

Page 194
On page 194, RFK Jr states incorrectly that "Belgian health officials acknowledged that the current vaccines cannot stop COVID, nor protect Belgium’s citizens." I followed the citation and what it actually said there was "As RTBF acknowledges, in the face of the Delta variant, current vaccination is far from sufficient to protect the population." So I can see how this could have been misunderstood by RFK Jr's team. I then followed the citation there to verify my hunch, and indeed, the original source is quoting RBTF as saying that the current vaccination *rate* is too low to protect the population but that the vaccine is highly effective at preventing deaths. So basically RFK's take is completely wrong here. The original article can be read behind the paywall here.

Page 525
340% should be 240% (the RR was 3.36). It took us about 5 minutes to review. Proof of payment