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Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

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Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#51

Post by gfodor »

marcosdumay wrote: post #44
gfodor wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occam's Razor doesn't really apply to this one, because each side has different priors on which theory is actually the "simplest." Given that, as far as I know, we don't have a single human case documented before those in Wuhan - something which a) should have been likely and b) China would be highly incentivized to root out since it would disprove the lab hypothesis, it implies patient zero was probably in Wuhan. If…

> we don't have a single human case documented before those in Wuhan The disease spread all over the world before people discovered the first cases, so it's not very surprising if previous cases on a less developed area than Wuhan were ignored.

Well, sure, but my point is that now that people are suspecting it was the lab, we ought to expect China to be digging furiously for evidence of an earlier case. At least so far, I haven't heard of any such evidence.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#52

Post by VBprogrammer »

HPsquared wrote: post #19
VBprogrammer wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When someone's reasons for saying it are simply because it aligns with their own prejudices, shouting it down is reasonable.

How do you determine a person's reasons for saying something, and how can you tell what a person's prejudices are?

Presenting the idea of laboratory escape as a remote but possible scenario is perfectly reasonable. Presenting it as a fact, without backing it up with evidence or subtly is a good indication that they are speaking from a place of prejudice.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#53

Post by s__s »

endisneigh wrote: post #42

Every time this comes I ask - "so what?" So again, I ask - even if it's true, so what? It's impossible to conclusively prove, and even if proven what exactly is proven? That an accident occurred? OK, so what? The article attempts to answer this: > The vitriol also obscures a broader imperative, Relman says, which is that uncovering the virus’s origins is crucial to stopping the next pandemic. Threats from both lab ac…

Consequences for gross negligence.

Updated international laws.

Possible banning of gain of function research.

Stronger safety procedures.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#54

Post by endisneigh »

s__s wrote: post #53
endisneigh wrote: post #42

Every time this comes I ask - "so what?" So again, I ask - even if it's true, so what? It's impossible to conclusively prove, and even if proven what exactly is proven? That an accident occurred? OK, so what? The article attempts to answer this: > The vitriol also obscures a broader imperative, Relman says, which is that uncovering the virus’s origins is crucial to stopping the next pandemic. Threats from both lab ac…

Consequences for gross negligence. Updated international laws. Possible banning of gain of function research. Stronger safety procedures.

How would you know if it's gross negligence or an accident? What consequences are you thinking of that we haven't already done?

Hilarious that we want to punish China but we won't punish our own politicians.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#55

Post by eightysixfour »

loveistheanswer wrote: post #23

Judging by the comments in this thread, it seems a lot of people are still unaware that: 1. Gain of function research primarily uses samples collected from nature, and seeks to stimulate their evolution in as natural a way as possible to learn how viruses evolve in nature. If such viruses were to escape the lab, they would appear "natural" 2. It's not xenophobic for people from the US to suggest the possibility of a…

I feel like people are doing a poor job distinguishing between "engineered" and "leaked."

There is, from my understanding, reasonable evidence to conclude the virus was not engineered from the perspective of "we took genes from one virus and moved them to this virus," but there's no evidence disproving the idea that it was the result of gain of function research.

My personal feeling is that these statements are true:

* The virus is unlikely to have been engineered (in the way I described above) and leaked.

* There is circumstantial evidence the virus was the result of gain of function research and it leaked.

* There is circumstantial evidence the virus was a natural research sample and it leaked.

* There is circumstantial evidence the virus was introduced by an animal/person who traveled to the wet market.

Some of these are more likely than others, and an individual's own calibration for what is likely or unlikely will probably come into play more than evidence in the short term and possibly long term as well. I can say the vast majority of us are not qualified to answer the question either way though.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#56

Post by tacitusarc »

endisneigh wrote: post #42

Every time this comes I ask - "so what?" So again, I ask - even if it's true, so what? It's impossible to conclusively prove, and even if proven what exactly is proven? That an accident occurred? OK, so what? The article attempts to answer this: > The vitriol also obscures a broader imperative, Relman says, which is that uncovering the virus’s origins is crucial to stopping the next pandemic. Threats from both lab ac…

The gain of function research was at least in part US funded. We probably shouldn't fund gain of function research in Chinese labs if the resulting viruses are going to cause a global pandemic, for a start.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#57

Post by gfodor »

jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #24
gfodor wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occam's Razor doesn't really apply to this one, because each side has different priors on which theory is actually the "simplest." Given that, as far as I know, we don't have a single human case documented before those in Wuhan - something which a) should have been likely and b) China would be highly incentivized to root out since it would disprove the lab hypothesis, it implies patient zero was probably in Wuhan. If…

Wuhan is a gigantic city, bigger than NYC. You'll be able to find an example of nearly anything in any category there. But it's also completely unsurprising they were researching the coronavirus category: the 2003 SARS outbreak was a coronavirus too, and obviously motivated an incredible amount of research across the world, but particularly in China.

You're flipping the condition on the probability here.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#58

Post by engineer_22 »

endisneigh wrote: post #42

Every time this comes I ask - "so what?" So again, I ask - even if it's true, so what? It's impossible to conclusively prove, and even if proven what exactly is proven? That an accident occurred? OK, so what? The article attempts to answer this: > The vitriol also obscures a broader imperative, Relman says, which is that uncovering the virus’s origins is crucial to stopping the next pandemic. Threats from both lab ac…

The conflict over the investigation is justifiable. It's necessary to understand how the virus got started. If it's lab-grown we will want to be very careful to scrutinize each other's labs. If it's natural we will want to be very careful to scrutinize wild game. The implications of any scenario are broad and complex, but clearly we don't want a repeat of 2020 if we can avoid it.

Another point: just because there's some uncomfortable conflict over the investigation doesn't mean we should abandon and investigation, in fact it probably means we should investigate more vigorously.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#59

Post by gfodor »

learnstats2 wrote: post #17
gfodor wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occam's Razor doesn't really apply to this one, because each side has different priors on which theory is actually the "simplest." Given that, as far as I know, we don't have a single human case documented before those in Wuhan - something which a) should have been likely and b) China would be highly incentivized to root out since it would disprove the lab hypothesis, it implies patient zero was probably in Wuhan. If…

> a) should have been likely Given that coronavirus would not be observable until there is a cluster of symptomatic cases in a city (and a doctor with relevant experience who can observe multiple cases - here 李文亮), I find it highly unlikely that we could observe earlier cases, if they spread less rapidly or outside a city - or even within another city with less institutional knowledge. > b) China would be highly ince…

The point is that even if we didn't observe such cases originally, given the incentives now, I would have expected China to investigate and surface evidence of such cases, even if circumstantial. So your second point is not a real point: the incentives don't determine the likelihood of it occurring, but they do dictate the likelihood of an investigation to determine if it did occur.

Re: Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out

#60

Post by SubiculumCode »

metalliqaz wrote: post #37

it's not xenophobic, but xenophobic people really love to talk about it. that's the problem with the discourse. of course the irony is that it doesn't even matter. We already know China (1) tried to cover it up, screwing the rest of the world, and (2) has poor wet market sanitation practices that seem designed to cultivate these kinds of diseases. Those issues are already bad enough.

The opposition to the idea comes down to one thing 1)Donald Trump et al supported this hypothesis, and thus disagreeing with the hypothesis becomes reflexive for many.
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