[deleted]
Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
161–170 of 372 posts
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
Atrazine causing feminization in frogs is an undisputed fact, but the statement as given ("they put chemicals in the water TO turn frogs gay") is absolutely not. Atrazine is used because it's a cheap and effective herbicide, frog feminization is a side effect which doesn't factor into decisions about its use.
The Alex Jones quote is "I don't like them putting chemicals in the water that turn the friggin frogs gay". Where'd you get your quote? or did you make it up?
It's a direct quote from the comment I replied to. They've since edited their post.
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
Atrazine causing feminization in frogs is an undisputed fact, but the statement as given ("they put chemicals in the water TO turn frogs gay") is absolutely not. Atrazine is used because it's a cheap and effective herbicide, frog feminization is a side effect which doesn't factor into decisions about its use.
The Alex Jones quote is "I don't like them putting chemicals in the water that turn the friggin frogs gay". Where'd you get your quote? or did you make it up?
This is my favorite hn handle to date.
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not a biologist, this is not a biological question per se - all viruses and bacteria mutate over time during replication. It's a question of statistics rather... When you have 100 infected individuals and a virus that mutates in 1% of infected people (note: this is a random number, no idea what the actual mutation rate of coronavirus is), you'll end up with one mutated version. When you have 100k of infected people,…
But how did one new strain suddenly amass 17 previously unseen mutations? Normally we should have sampled a number of strains with fewer of the same mutations, shouldn't we?
Not an expert here, but there probably are many other strains out there with fewer mutations (and some with more). Most of them residual because they don't provide a clear advantage. The reason we know about this 17-mutation one is that this specific one turned out to have such an advantageous infectivity that it's displacing all other strains and becoming the dominant one.
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#165Whenever this topic comes up, the discussion seems to consist largely of _extremely_ strong opinions against the perfectly plausible hypothesis (don't forget, the evidence of zoonotic origin is equally thin on the ground). My question is, why? What does it matter whether the virus originated from a lab or from a wet market - it isn't any more dangerous if it came from a lab, nor does knowing the origin really help de…
Because it would make China liable, and for the majority of individuals, their stance on China as a good actor in global matters is now linked to their American political allegiance. It is hard for many folks to reconcile both.
Not really, the Wuhan lab received funding for the studies into gain of function for bat coronaviruses from the NIH (via EcoHealth Alliance). The incentive to bury the origin (if this was the origin) would be high for the US and China both.
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#166Unfortunately, I do not have the chops to debate against this, but the political ramifications would be immense. The bet ( https://www.rootclaim.com/rootclaim_challenge ) requires that (a) you have $100k (b) are able to successfully debate it. I won't put $100k against this, but I'll put $10k against it, because "the truth" is worth it. I'll pool $10k into a $100k stake behind a debate team that can debate this (and…
Please clarify your date format. Is that 1st of March or the day before 4th of January? According to my European sentiment it's the 3rd of January, is that correct?
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#167For those interested, the specific breakdown is on this page [1]. I don’t know what good will come of this discussion, unless all countries are willing to discontinue gain-of-function research if this claim is found to be true. However that’s a lot of “ifs” and there is too much opportunity to simply place blame, which won’t help anyone. [1] https://www.rootclaim.com/analysis/what-is-the-source-of-cov...
It used to be banned here. The ban ended in 2017 https://id.elsevier.com/ACW/?return=https%3A%2F%2Fsecure.jbs...
Archived link: https://archive.is/ftHs0/image
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
Atrazine causing feminization in frogs is an undisputed fact, but the statement as given ("they put chemicals in the water TO turn frogs gay") is absolutely not. Atrazine is used because it's a cheap and effective herbicide, frog feminization is a side effect which doesn't factor into decisions about its use.
The Alex Jones quote is "I don't like them putting chemicals in the water that turn the friggin frogs gay". Where'd you get your quote? or did you make it up?
Here's the actual quote for those curious
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
One can conclude you believe it purely coincidental that the Wuhan Institute of Virolgy specialized in research on bat coronaviruses? A paper in the lancet early in the year reported that the Wuhan Seafood market not only did not sell bats, but that many of the early patients reported never visiting the market. At this point, it may be too late to ever discover the true origin of the virus.
The Wuhan lab being specialized in bat viruses means very little. For one thing, this is a classic example of correlation != causation. Let’s say you had a shark attack on some beach and there was a team researching shark attack located right in that area. Would you then conclude that the team engineered the shark attack? The simple reality is that the most likely reason the team studying shark attacks is located in…
This works for sharks because they are a pre-existing condition. However if the bay with a shark bio lab was an origin of shark mutants, I'd assume the lab engineered them.
Re: Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
Looking at the report, most of the likelihood is from a single "prior". The whole likelihood basically hinges on the fact that the outbreak occurred in Wuhan and that the Wuhan Institute of Virology has been working for decades on enhancing coronavirus strains. That's quite strongly circumstantial but it's not evidence. Possible chimerization and furin-cleavage insertion seem a lot more interesting imo but are weight…
In addition to that, one of their other priors supporting lab escape appears to be plainly wrong: >Furin cleavage sites are not common in other related coronaviruses. However, this claim appears to have been investigated and debunked [1] >Furin cleavage sites occurred independently for multiple times in the evolution of the coronavirus family, supporting the natural occurring hypothesis of SARS-CoV-2. [1] https://www…
This is key since the entire analysis hinges really on 2 or 3 key assumptions and furin cleavage is one of them.