01-25-2022, 07:44 PM
Guess what he died of!
Olavo Luiz Pimentel de Carvalho GCRB (29 April 1947 – 24 January 2022)[1][2][3] was a Brazilian polemicist, self-promoted philosopher,[4][5][6] political pundit, former astrologer, journalist, and far-right conspiracy theorist.[7][8] From 2005 till his death, he lived in Richmond, Virginia, US.[9][10][11][12]
While publishing about politics, literature and philosophy since the 1980s, he made himself known to wider Brazilian audiences from the 1990s onwards, mainly writing columns for some of Brazil's major media outlets, such as the newspaper O Globo. In the 2000s, he began to use personal blogs and social media to convey his conservative and anti-communist ideas.[13][14][15] In the late 2010s, he rose to prominence in the Brazilian public debate, being dubbed the "intellectual father of the new right"[16] and the ideologue of Jair Bolsonaro,[17] a label that he came to reject.[18]
As a polemicist, Carvalho was praised for not complying with political correctness and criticized for often resorting to obscene ad hominem attacks.[19] His books and articles have spread conspiracy theories and false information,[20][21][22][23][24] and he has been accused of fomenting hate speech[25] and anti-intellectualism.[26] He positioned himself as a critic of modernity. His interests included historical philosophy, the history of revolutionary movements, the Traditionalist School[27][28] and comparative religion.[29] His views were generally rejected by philosophers.[30][31][32]
Carvalho was widely known as a polemic figure in Brazil for supporting several controversial views.
Carvalho propagated controversial information about prominent ideas and figures of modern science.[59][60] He contested ideas of physicists Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein, and mathematician Georg Cantor. He said Newton introduced a self-contradictory thesis and spread the virus of "formidable stupidity".[61] Olavo also said Einstein's theory of general relativity was plagiarized.[62] Carvalho criticized Georg Cantor's work on transfinite numbers, accusing him of confusing "numbers with their mere signs", seeing his work as a "play with words" and a "false logic".[63]
He also said that there are no proofs of heliocentrism[64] and that geocentrism was as valid as heliocentrism "since you can use different points of reference."[65] In 2018, on Facebook, he stated that he had no "definitive answer" to many "questions", such as whether the Earth is spherical or flat.[66]
Carvalho also spread the hoax of Pepsi using cells from aborted fetuses to sweeten soft drinks.[67][68]
Carvalho claimed that global warming is a hoax produced by a global conspiracy. He based his claims on the Climategate episode in which hackers, on the eve of the Copenhagen Conference, disseminated thousands of e-mails from University of East Anglia climatologists in order to undermine the credibility of the conference. Carvalho claimed Climategate to be the work of a conspiracy led by the Rockefeller family, the Council of Foreign Relations, the Bilderberg Club, and the New World Order, indicating them also as leaders of the "global abortion and gay [...] campaigns of the new bionic global religion, and of the Obama administration's proposal for universal control of the movement of capital."[69]
In a 2016 Twitter post, Carvalho stated, citing Dr. Carlos Armando de Moura Ribeiro, that "vaccines either kill you or drive you crazy. Never vaccinate your children."[70]
He falsely declared that AIDS does not pose a risk to heterosexuals, basing his arguments on journalist Michael Fumento's book The Myth of Heterosexual Aids.[71][69]
On 22 March 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, a disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, he stated during a livestream in YouTube that there was no confirmed case of death from the virus in the world and that the pandemic would be "an invention" and "the most extensive manipulation of public opinion that has ever happened in human history".[72][73] At that date, according to the World Health Organization, there were more than 294,000 cases of the disease and 12,784 deaths from it.[74]
Carvalho spread the debunked conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was not born in the United States.[75] Furthermore, he claimed that Foro de São Paulo "is the largest political organization that has ever existed in Latin America and undoubtedly one of the largest in the world."[76] He also made up the fake information that a book written by Fernando Haddad, the opponent of Jair Bolsonaro during the 2018 Brazilian general election, promoted incest.[77]
On 17 March 2019, Carvalho criticised the presence of military personnel in Bolsonaro's administration, stating: "He didn't choose two hundred generals. Two hundred generals chose him. Those people want to restore the 1964 regime under a democratic aspect. They're ruling and using Bolsonaro as a condom [sic]. I'm not saying that it is the reality, but it is what they want. Mourão said that they would return to power democratically. If it is not a coup, it is a coup mentality."[78]
Sleeping Giants started a campaign to reduce his influence on Brazilian politics and convinced advertisers to remove their media buying from his online newspaper and YouTube channel. Also PayPal decided to cancel their contract and removed their services from his online seminars due to violation of terms of use.[79]
On a January 2021 interview, Carvalho falsely claimed that election fraud took place in the 2020 American presidential election, stating "Everything in this election has been fraudulent.” During the same interview Carvalho falsely asserted that Joe Biden had Parkinson’s disease and that Biden and Kamala Harris were working for the Chinese government.[80]
Carvalho advocated a revisionist view of the Inquisition, claiming it is a myth spread by Protestants.[81][82]
In 2020, Carvalho was ordered to pay 2.8 million Brazilian reais in libel charges after accusing musician Caetano Veloso of sexual crimes against children.[83][84]
Views on science
Olavo strongly criticized several figures who occupy a prominent place in the history of the sciences, such as Isaac Newton, and Giordano Bruno, who according to him "did not make any discoveries... He did not even study modern sciences, physics, astronomy, biology or mathematics, he was not condemned for defending scientific theories, but for practicing witchcraft, which at the time was a crime".[63] The criticism extends to Galileo, of whom he writes:
Olavo's family announced his death on social media, on January 24, 2022, eight days after he tested positive for COVID-19.[3] His family's statement did not specify his cause of death, but his daughter Heloísa said that it was from coronavirus.[1][2] His personal doctor stated officially that his death was caused by respiratory stress associated with emphysema, heart failure, bacterial pneumonia, and a generalised infection, not covid.[57] Olavo de Carvalho was known for his skepticism about vaccination against the virus and often questioned the severity of the pandemic, even reaching the point of spreading misinformation about the virus on his social media.[58]
You guessed it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olavo_de_Carvalho
Olavo Luiz Pimentel de Carvalho GCRB (29 April 1947 – 24 January 2022)[1][2][3] was a Brazilian polemicist, self-promoted philosopher,[4][5][6] political pundit, former astrologer, journalist, and far-right conspiracy theorist.[7][8] From 2005 till his death, he lived in Richmond, Virginia, US.[9][10][11][12]
While publishing about politics, literature and philosophy since the 1980s, he made himself known to wider Brazilian audiences from the 1990s onwards, mainly writing columns for some of Brazil's major media outlets, such as the newspaper O Globo. In the 2000s, he began to use personal blogs and social media to convey his conservative and anti-communist ideas.[13][14][15] In the late 2010s, he rose to prominence in the Brazilian public debate, being dubbed the "intellectual father of the new right"[16] and the ideologue of Jair Bolsonaro,[17] a label that he came to reject.[18]
As a polemicist, Carvalho was praised for not complying with political correctness and criticized for often resorting to obscene ad hominem attacks.[19] His books and articles have spread conspiracy theories and false information,[20][21][22][23][24] and he has been accused of fomenting hate speech[25] and anti-intellectualism.[26] He positioned himself as a critic of modernity. His interests included historical philosophy, the history of revolutionary movements, the Traditionalist School[27][28] and comparative religion.[29] His views were generally rejected by philosophers.[30][31][32]
Carvalho was widely known as a polemic figure in Brazil for supporting several controversial views.
Carvalho propagated controversial information about prominent ideas and figures of modern science.[59][60] He contested ideas of physicists Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein, and mathematician Georg Cantor. He said Newton introduced a self-contradictory thesis and spread the virus of "formidable stupidity".[61] Olavo also said Einstein's theory of general relativity was plagiarized.[62] Carvalho criticized Georg Cantor's work on transfinite numbers, accusing him of confusing "numbers with their mere signs", seeing his work as a "play with words" and a "false logic".[63]
He also said that there are no proofs of heliocentrism[64] and that geocentrism was as valid as heliocentrism "since you can use different points of reference."[65] In 2018, on Facebook, he stated that he had no "definitive answer" to many "questions", such as whether the Earth is spherical or flat.[66]
Carvalho also spread the hoax of Pepsi using cells from aborted fetuses to sweeten soft drinks.[67][68]
Carvalho claimed that global warming is a hoax produced by a global conspiracy. He based his claims on the Climategate episode in which hackers, on the eve of the Copenhagen Conference, disseminated thousands of e-mails from University of East Anglia climatologists in order to undermine the credibility of the conference. Carvalho claimed Climategate to be the work of a conspiracy led by the Rockefeller family, the Council of Foreign Relations, the Bilderberg Club, and the New World Order, indicating them also as leaders of the "global abortion and gay [...] campaigns of the new bionic global religion, and of the Obama administration's proposal for universal control of the movement of capital."[69]
In a 2016 Twitter post, Carvalho stated, citing Dr. Carlos Armando de Moura Ribeiro, that "vaccines either kill you or drive you crazy. Never vaccinate your children."[70]
He falsely declared that AIDS does not pose a risk to heterosexuals, basing his arguments on journalist Michael Fumento's book The Myth of Heterosexual Aids.[71][69]
On 22 March 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, a disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, he stated during a livestream in YouTube that there was no confirmed case of death from the virus in the world and that the pandemic would be "an invention" and "the most extensive manipulation of public opinion that has ever happened in human history".[72][73] At that date, according to the World Health Organization, there were more than 294,000 cases of the disease and 12,784 deaths from it.[74]
Carvalho spread the debunked conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was not born in the United States.[75] Furthermore, he claimed that Foro de São Paulo "is the largest political organization that has ever existed in Latin America and undoubtedly one of the largest in the world."[76] He also made up the fake information that a book written by Fernando Haddad, the opponent of Jair Bolsonaro during the 2018 Brazilian general election, promoted incest.[77]
On 17 March 2019, Carvalho criticised the presence of military personnel in Bolsonaro's administration, stating: "He didn't choose two hundred generals. Two hundred generals chose him. Those people want to restore the 1964 regime under a democratic aspect. They're ruling and using Bolsonaro as a condom [sic]. I'm not saying that it is the reality, but it is what they want. Mourão said that they would return to power democratically. If it is not a coup, it is a coup mentality."[78]
Sleeping Giants started a campaign to reduce his influence on Brazilian politics and convinced advertisers to remove their media buying from his online newspaper and YouTube channel. Also PayPal decided to cancel their contract and removed their services from his online seminars due to violation of terms of use.[79]
On a January 2021 interview, Carvalho falsely claimed that election fraud took place in the 2020 American presidential election, stating "Everything in this election has been fraudulent.” During the same interview Carvalho falsely asserted that Joe Biden had Parkinson’s disease and that Biden and Kamala Harris were working for the Chinese government.[80]
Carvalho advocated a revisionist view of the Inquisition, claiming it is a myth spread by Protestants.[81][82]
In 2020, Carvalho was ordered to pay 2.8 million Brazilian reais in libel charges after accusing musician Caetano Veloso of sexual crimes against children.[83][84]
Views on science
Olavo strongly criticized several figures who occupy a prominent place in the history of the sciences, such as Isaac Newton, and Giordano Bruno, who according to him "did not make any discoveries... He did not even study modern sciences, physics, astronomy, biology or mathematics, he was not condemned for defending scientific theories, but for practicing witchcraft, which at the time was a crime".[63] The criticism extends to Galileo, of whom he writes:
Quote:A background of charlatanism appears to have already been introduced into physics by Galileo, when he proclaimed that he had overturned the notions of ancient science, according to which an object not propelled by an external force stands still—an illusion of the senses, he said. In fact, he pontificated, an object in such conditions remains stationary or in uniform and rectilinear motion. But, after having thus overthrown the old physics, he discreetly clarified that rectilinear and uniform movement does not really exist, but is a fiction conceived by the mind to facilitate measurements. Now if the object not moved from without stands still or has a fictitious movement, it means, strictly speaking, that it stands still in every case, just as ancient physics said, and that Galileo, by means of a new system of measurements, could only explain why it stands still. That is to say, Galileo did not dispute ancient physics, he merely invented a better way of proving that it was correct, and that the testimony of the senses, being true enough, does not have in itself proof of its veracity, which was well known since the time of Aristotle. It was this episode that inaugurated the craze of modern scientists to take simple changes of methods as if they were "proofs" of a new constitution of reality.[63]
Olavo's family announced his death on social media, on January 24, 2022, eight days after he tested positive for COVID-19.[3] His family's statement did not specify his cause of death, but his daughter Heloísa said that it was from coronavirus.[1][2] His personal doctor stated officially that his death was caused by respiratory stress associated with emphysema, heart failure, bacterial pneumonia, and a generalised infection, not covid.[57] Olavo de Carvalho was known for his skepticism about vaccination against the virus and often questioned the severity of the pandemic, even reaching the point of spreading misinformation about the virus on his social media.[58]
You guessed it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olavo_de_Carvalho
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.