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Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

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Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#951

Post by bgandrew »

Uberphallus wrote: post #886
bgandrew wrote: post #803

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what I'm saying is that until the closest relative to SARS-CoV-2 is known to be exactly the same virus that was researched in Wuhan institute of virology, it's obvious that lab leak should be number 1 hypothesis. That wouldn't be so, if covid started in Beijing or Nanjing. Or if Wuhan wouldn't be home to one of the two BSL–4 labs in China. And the only lab to my mind that investigated SARS-CoV-2 closest known relativ…

SARS-CoV-2 was first detected in Wuhan, but it's not that clear that it's where it originated. The genetic divergence between RaTG13 and SARS-CoV-2 is explained with about 20 years of natural evolution, which puts the common ancestor somewhere in late 2000s, and given that bats migrate, the ancestor occurred potentially anywhere in Eurasia or even Africa. Post-hoc analysis of waste water and patient samples in Europe…

"Post-hoc analysis of waste water and patient samples in Europe shows that it was circulating in Europe by mid-late 2019, way before the patient 0 in Wuhan."

now this is what's called a conspiracy theory.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#952

Post by Pyramus »

Fomite wrote: post #732
Pyramus wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not disagreeing with your general point that SARS-CoV-2 is an interesting mix of infectiousness and low mortality. From what I've read Ebola has killed many healthcare professionals because they infected themselves when disposing off PPE. As a result a disproportionally large portion of deaths were healthcare workers. > With COVID, a worker could get infected, hide the exposure out of fear/shame, never show any sympt…

I've described SARS-CoV-2 as an RPG character who shows up to a session with a stat block you'd describe as "Okay", and then in the first encounter, you realize everything lines up well for a scary rules interaction. It's not exceptional in many of the ways viruses can be. It's not as deadly as Ebola. Or as durable as Norovirus. Or as transmissible as Measles. It's just...really good at its job. The lack of fomite tr…

I will violate HN guidelines for once and state that user name checks out ;)

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#953

Post by darkerside »

docmars wrote: post #712
darkerside wrote: post #579

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think that's a pretty loose assumption that _all people_ are using it with ill intent. Some people drop the N-bomb without ill intent either. There's plenty of precedent for agreeing that certain words and phrases just can't be used anymore in good faith.

Are you suggesting that those in the Black community using the N-word isn't in good faith? I don't think generalizations like these are useful or productive because they contradict themselves when you apply any other context to them. It's double-think in its most overt form.

No. In fact, I just said that people use it WITHOUT ill intent. And a white person could use it to refer to another white person (in a joking way) with no ill intent to any specific or general party. But society (generally speaking) has deemed that inappropriate in proper company.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#954

Post by mrfusion »

yosito wrote: post #820
mrfusion wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CNN sold us on asymptomatic spread but it’s actually highly unlikely: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w

I've seen this study shared around anti-vaxer groups trying to claim that asymptomatic spread is unlikely. But this study does not prove that at all. They screened 10 million people with no symptoms, and found 300 asymptomatic cases. Then they re-screened 1200 contacts of those cases and didn't find any more cases that they missed. This doesn't prove that asymptomatic spread is unlikely. It proves that the incidence…

I can’t quite follow the line of reasoning here. Can you simplify or rephrase?

(Also nice touch to question the credibility by associating it with anti vaxxers)

That’s by no means the only study though. Here’s a meta-analysis of 54 studies (link to paper is in article)

https://alachuachronicle.com/university-of-florida-researche...

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#955

Post by saas_sam »

dang wrote: post #754
saas_sam wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the US intelligence service isn't credible... but the CCP is? I think I understand where you are coming from now, thank you.

This breaks the site guidelines. Please review them and stick to the rules when posting here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I don't see any guidelines I violated.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#956

Post by Jeema101 »

Raaasmus wrote: post #804
handmodel wrote: post #671

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it Occam's razor? The Bayesian probability suggests the odds that it would evolve by chance AND first become an issue right next to one of the top three bat virus research centers in the world are pretty slim. It would be like a new mosquito disease first being an issue in human population next the CDC headquarters in Atlanta instead of somewhere in Africa of South America. Sure - there are mosquitos everywhere -…

To me another simple explanation is that the disease was first identified near the labs because it is a lab that deals with viruses. I may be mistaken, but I recall it as one of the top ones in the world that virologists from around the world go to. Also waste water samples from Spain and Italy show COVID-19 much earlier than reported in Wuhan. Spain, March 2019, 1 sample https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-cor…

Exactly - people may very well be mixing up cause and effect.

It could be that a precursor was already spreading prior to the major outbreak but only detected when it hit Wuhan because so many coronavirus experts were concentrated in that area.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#957

Post by soperj »

pageandrew wrote: post #942
soperj wrote: post #930

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No surges right now in NZ or Australia. Interesting that the place that it actually originated in has no current surge either.

What do the three countries that you mentioned have in common? Total authoritarian lockdowns. Authoritarian lockdowns are effective at suppressing Covid. I won’t deny that. They’re also a complete non-starter in most countries in the world.

hahahaha. New Zealand has locked down for very little time. Weeks total. They've been open for concerts and everything else in between. The lockdowns would be over if countries had actually done them properly.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#958

Post by tripletao »

coder4life wrote: post #618
8note wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The open question is: are there cases even before those, and outside Wuhan?

We already knew by summer there were cases going back to October 19 in Italy, from saved sewage samples Recently (3 days ago) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/03/210318185328.h...

Note that when the WHO team asked for similar wastewater samples from China, they were told the samples had been discarded:

> They had sought wastewater samples from central China to check if the virus could be detected in sewage from late 2019, but were told those had been discarded, per standard policy, after a month, said Dr. Koopmans.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-refuses-to-give-who-raw-d...

So while it's very likely that SARS-CoV-2 was circulating in Italy back in October, it's entirely possible (and likely, I believe) that it was circulating yet earlier in Wuhan; but the evidence to confirm or refute was destroyed.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#959

Post by InitialLastName »

Mat342 wrote: post #872
p1necone wrote: post #646

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but when when people consistently bring up the mostly unfalsifiable theory that is most associated with conspiracy theories it's basically impossible to separate the conspiracy theorists from everyone else, and sadly much more productive to just not engage.

Wait people can't debunk dumdum conspiracy theories? sad

There's an evolutionary theory of conspiracy theories (that I just made up) that they self-select for plausible unfalsifiability. If a theory has a weakness can be proven incorrect, people will eventually patch it with an ephemeral insinuation that "you know what happened here" and move on.
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