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The Lab Leak Hypothesis

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Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#21

Post by MilnerRoute »

I'd like to ask everyone commenting on this article: who wrote it?

Seriously -- what do you know about the author of these words? (There's no "author's bio" anywhere on the page, or even if you click on his name.) So what do any of us know about him?

If you look him up on Wikipedia, it lists his occupation as novelist and fiction writer, as well as an "essayist." ("His fiction generally de-emphasizes narrative in favor of careful description and characterization....")

"Out of a total of ten fiction books, he also wrote three erotic novels."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholson_Baker

His nonfiction works include a book about his more-famous fiction-writer friend John Updike, and a book about public libraries.

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#22

Post by MilnerRoute »

MilnerRoute wrote: post #21

I'd like to ask everyone commenting on this article: who wrote it? Seriously -- what do you know about the author of these words? (There's no "author's bio" anywhere on the page, or even if you click on his name.) So what do any of us know about him? If you look him up on Wikipedia, it lists his occupation as novelist and fiction writer, as well as an "essayist." ("His fiction generally de-emphasizes narrative in fav…

My favorite part of the article is where he says "there is no direct evidence for an experimental mishap..."

Followed a few words later by the word "Nevertheless..."

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#23

Post by chroem- »

MilnerRoute wrote: post #19

Peter Daszak, the president of the EcoHealth Alliance researching the origins of pandemics, pointed out in April that nearly 3% of the population in China's rural farming regions near wild animals already had antibodies to coronaviruses similar to SARS. "We're finding 1 to 7 million people exposed to these viruses every year in Southeast Asia; that's the pathway. It's just so obvious to all of us working in the field…

Weren't there antibody studies of people in the US around that same time frame that claimed 30%+ (somewhere in that range if I recall) of the American public already had covid-19? There was some sort of issue with cross-reactivity that later came out. Did the above link take that into account?

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#24

Post by andi999 »

cma wrote: post #20
fasteddie31003 wrote: post #9

I think the closest natural virus was 95% similar. 5% seems pretty far for mutations. Is there a historical track record for finding the natural virus to a 99.9% similarity?

We see around one base pair mutation per host transmission, so that would likely already put us outside 99.9% similarity even among humans with coronavirus wouldn't it? Rough estimate: (29,000 base pairs, just assuming 3.5 days between generations, 395 days since first affected person (probably it was a bit more), would be 112 mutations = 99.6% similarity) And I think we'd expect more changes to be selected for in th…

Your first sentence is missing the number, did you mean 'one bas pair'?

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#25

Post by sukilot »

coolspot wrote: post #3
api wrote: post #2

I'm not convinced either way, but posting because this is an articulate well written non-sensational discussion of the idea. If it is true, it was almost certainly an accident. Nobody really benefited from this (even if China really has eradicated it, it's damaged their export-heavy economy badly), and if it was terrorists they would have claimed responsibility since that's the point of terrorism. Biological warfare…

However, the state-sponsored gain-of-function research towards particular properties is not an accident. The Wuhan Institute of Virology has published papers on how they were able to modify a bat virus to achieve more dangerous properties [77][88]. [77] - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4797993/ [88] - https://www.nature.com/news/engineered-bat-virus-stirs-debat...

Nature.com says:

> Editors’ note, March 2020: We are aware that this story is being used as the basis for unverified theories that the novel coronavirus causing COVID-19 was engineered. There is no evidence that this is true; scientists believe that an animal is the most likely source of the coronavirus.

which seems to be unscientific editorializing. There is some evidence, as presented in the OP for example, and there is "no evidence" for any other origin theory either. And the Chinese government in Wuhan showed from the start with Li Wenliang's experience, that any evidence that pointed to imperfect competence in Wuhan would be destroyed by the totalitarian government.

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#26

Post by MilnerRoute »

CoffeeDregs wrote: post #13

This is a good, balanced article. I've been of a similar mind for over a year now. The chances of the CCP releasing a self-harming bioweapon in order to harm the US seems silly. But an accident involving a well-intentioned gain-of-function experiment seems quite possible and was something that the US was concerned about with its own gain-of-function research. In any case, this, like so much of this other nonsense aro…

The "likely vector" would be the millions of peasants living near bat caves in rural China (who actually have already been shown to have antibodies to bat viruses). And some of whom traveled to the market.

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/04/23/8417296...

So I would upgrade that quite a bit from "moderate-low." (One of the researchers in this NPR article seems to rate it as an obvious suspect, so I'd call that "high likelihood.")

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#27

Post by mabbo »

> There is no direct evidence for these zoonotic possibilities, just as there is no direct evidence for an experimental mishap

But there is so much more opportunity for the zoonotic possibilities. In fact, this is the seventh time we've seen Betacoronavirus cross from bats, through another animal, and then into humans. SARS came via palm civets. MERS came via camels. Four more types cause a mild cold only and so they don't get sexy names or a deep investigation as to how humans became hosts.

So why would Covid-19 even need to come from a lab? We (humans) had wet markets filled with animals, including the very bats that carry the base virus. It's the perfect breeding ground to create a pandemic-level virus and probably a few thousand more viruses of lesser impact.

> A lab accident — a dropped flask, a needle prick, a mouse bite, an illegibly labeled bottle — is apolitical.

Oh, I disagree. If the root cause is Big Government meddling where they ought not to, that tells us one story. If the root cause is unregulated wet markets with viruses crossing species freely, that tells a very different story.

Smaller government solves one problem, and more regulations solves the other. There are a lot of people who want each story to be the truth.

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#28

Post by sukilot »

anonymousiam wrote: post #17
api wrote: post #2

I'm not convinced either way, but posting because this is an articulate well written non-sensational discussion of the idea. If it is true, it was almost certainly an accident. Nobody really benefited from this (even if China really has eradicated it, it's damaged their export-heavy economy badly), and if it was terrorists they would have claimed responsibility since that's the point of terrorism. Biological warfare…

The interesting thing for me is the contrast in the behavior of the Chinese government between the previous viral leaks from China. I'm citing a few references from before 2020: https://www.the-scientist.com/news-analysis/sars-escaped-bei... https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/3/20/18260669/deadly... The previous behavior was to acknowledge the leaks and try to contain them. The current behavior is to arrest peop…

Your China article is from 2004. China's regime's ability to control media and its residents is stronger now than then, and the people in charge are more insecure and defensive. That may be enough to explain the change in PR strategy.

Alternatively, past leaks simply weren't bad enough to embarrass the State and could be blamed on local officials. This one got so big so fast that a more defensive posture was required.

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#29

Post by [deleted] »

CoffeeDregs wrote: post #13

This is a good, balanced article. I've been of a similar mind for over a year now. The chances of the CCP releasing a self-harming bioweapon in order to harm the US seems silly. But an accident involving a well-intentioned gain-of-function experiment seems quite possible and was something that the US was concerned about with its own gain-of-function research. In any case, this, like so much of this other nonsense aro…

[deleted]

Re: The Lab Leak Hypothesis

#30

Post by Cactus2018 »

CoffeeDregs wrote: post #13

This is a good, balanced article. I've been of a similar mind for over a year now. The chances of the CCP releasing a self-harming bioweapon in order to harm the US seems silly. But an accident involving a well-intentioned gain-of-function experiment seems quite possible and was something that the US was concerned about with its own gain-of-function research. In any case, this, like so much of this other nonsense aro…

> The chances of the CCP releasing a self-harming bioweapon in order to harm the US seems silly.

But to harm someone else?

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/04/health/coronavirus-neande...

]] Dr. Paabo said the DNA segment may account in part for why people of Bangladeshi descent are dying at a high rate of Covid-19 in the United Kingdom.

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-09/oios-tan0930...

]] IMAGE: THESE GENETIC VARIANTS ARE ALMOST COMPLETELY ABSENT IN AFRICA AND OCCUR IN THE HIGHEST FREQUENCY IN BANGLADESH.

https://media.eurekalert.org/multimedia_prod/pub/web/244496_...

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