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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

#551

Post by jeduehr »

tootie wrote: post #214
eightysixfour wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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:…

Even the WHO report didn't rule out the possibility of a leak. They just said the evidence is weak and the evidence of animal to human transmission is stronger.

Yes! And that is how most virologists (myself included) feel about this whole thing.

Zoonosis is just a lot more likely.

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

#552

Post by NoImmatureAdHom »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #542
Robotbeat wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assign non-negligible probability to each of them. I don't know. But I hate the stupid racism and hate around it. COVID-19 attacked every country. With the exception of, like, New Zealand (but it affected them as well... had to shut down their borders, etc). These viruses are a threat to all humanity. I just want us to fight them better and help everyone. I think it's super important that we both simultaneously hol…

> These viruses are a threat to all humanity. I just want us to fight them better and help everyone. It would be more accurate to say: these viruses are a threat to the current socioeconomic and sociopolitical status quo. Take air travel for instance. It was key to spreading this and other pandemic viruses. Yet no one is questioning air travel. Note: I'm not suggesting it should be shut down, only that the idea of in…

Nitpick, but important: saying "wealth redistribution (from the bottom to the top)" implies there's a fixed amount of wealth, like a pie, and the "top" are getting a bigger and bigger slice. A lot of people actually think like this, and it's incorrect.

It's more correct to think of e.g. Carlos or Elon as leading efforts to bake lots and lots more pie, and then keeping a lot of the pie for themselves. The dominant theme is that they're creating value that didn't exist before, not taking a larger proportion of already-existing value.

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

#553

Post by jeduehr »

phyalow wrote: post #508
moritonal wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pointing out spelling mistakes is a fallacy in the sense of attacking the person rather than the argument (as in, you know what they meant to say, but wanted to make them look silly), and they did post a literal megathread of evidence which (because it wasn't summarised for you) you decided to discount.

I am sure you are familiar with the concept involved with Dunning-Kruger, misspelling it when trying to make a point, makes said point somewhat hard to take seriously. I have pursued most of what OP posted on reddit, I am not qualified to judge the finer points, but it doesn't mesh up with what I have seen presented by other independent expert sources or common sense. So I discounted it for that reason not the one yo…

Here are a lot of other experts (and surveys of experts) who agree the lab leak is less likely: https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/gk6y95/covid19_did...

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

#554

Post by NoImmatureAdHom »

fighterpilot wrote: post #471
tripletao wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If SARS-CoV-2 emerged due to the WIV's research activities, then it was potentially with the knowledge and funding of the American government, via the EcoHealth Alliance. Racism is always stupid, but in this case it's particularly so. This absolutely shouldn't be China vs. USA, and it's deeply unfortunate that the Trump administration's early, characteristically unsupported rhetoric made it so. The WIV's safety was p…

Anti-Chinese racism is stupid and toxic, yes, but you're missing the point. People here generally aren't blaming China because that's where COVID-19 originated. That would be stupid. No, they're blaming the CCP for covering it up in the early days, which allowed it to spread and become the global pandemic which it became. Big difference. It's not China's fault that COVID originated there (lab leak or otherwise). It i…

We should also blame the CCP for screwing up containment. Chinese culture is still deeply corrupt in ways that prevent honest and open discussion of safety issues. Honest and open discussion of safety issues should be table stakes for facilities like that in Wuhan. The rest of the world should be pressuring China to not operate these sorts of high-risk enterprises.

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

#555

Post by mensetmanusman »

FindMySocks wrote: post #539
mensetmanusman wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite support data is that you can literally shine a laser at the retro reflector they put on the moon to measure distance.

Surely that can be easily waved away in the minds of an ignorant by saying it's just a shiny rock, crashed satellite, ice patch or some other silly nonsense.

Explain to them how the bright traffic signs work. If they were just mirrors, they would be invisible at night.

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

#556

Post by NoImmatureAdHom »

zdkl wrote: post #477
katbyte wrote: post #474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... so if an open investigation and free access would look better then a cover up then by your logic they would allow it leading to the conclusion reality looks worse?

No, the point is there is almost no way the party would sanction an external investigation, regardless of the actual situation.

I find this very surprising, but I suppose it could be true. Can you put some meat on the bones somehow? An anecdote or something?

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

#557

Post by jeduehr »

dboreham wrote: post #453
jeduehr wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, I actually provided several links filled with sources above. here is the main one you're referencing again: https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/gk6y95/covid19_did... Thanks

I live in a rural place in the middle of the USA, but we have a large number of international travelers pass through. I am aware of several local cases that seem very COVID-like that predate January 2020. Two of these I knew about before anyone heard of the outbreak in Hubei. I remember discussing at the time how it was weird to hear of someone in their early 50s to be hospitalized with pneumonia from 'flu'. Anyway I…

Honestly it's really really hard to say for sure.

It's not super likely, because we don't have the epidemiological data (increased deaths from non-influenza pneumonia at a large scale) to support that, to my knowledge.

It's certainly possible. And it is true that our methods of detection of viruses are ill-equipped so you can assume we're almost always behind the curve a bit.

But there also isn't much more than anecdote to support this. Lots of people get influenza-based pneumonia in the winter. Could you consider the possibility that your recollection is now tainted? And that you are primed to notice those events more? It was also already a very bad flu season. See here:

-https://time.com/5758953/flu-season-2019-2020/

-https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/924728

Another kind of issue is that early reports of "SARS-2 positive serum!" were overblown, which colored a lot of news reports on this. They basically made the tests too "promiscuous" so they also detected antibodies against common cold coronaviruses. That was a big problem. If you're curious about how tests like this work, you can check out this other post I wrote on that! Antibody tests are actually my specialty!

https://www.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/g1ty3g/are_immuni...

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

#558

Post by jeduehr »

trevelyan wrote: post #533
jeduehr wrote: post #448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi I actually discussed the GOF several times in my post and subsequent comments. You can find them here: - http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/gk6y95/covid-19_did... - http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/gk6y95/covid-19_did... I also address the statistical models you describe, here: - https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/gk6y95/covid19_did... I go into detail about petri dish vs lab animals vs accele…

Everyone knows that mutations that increase transmissability generally hurt morbidity. Is there some reason you think this supports zoonotic hypothesis? It is public knowledge RaTG13 was collected from a mine shaft where a similar virus killed 50% of infected workers and where WIV was doing significant sampling work. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2020.5815... Your comments on mutation rates confi…

>Everyone knows that mutations that increase transmissability generally hurt morbidity. Is there some reason you think this supports zoonotic hypothesis? It is public knowledge RaTG13 was collected from a mine shaft where a similar virus killed 50% of infected workers and where WIV was doing significant sampling work.

Why would this support either hypothesis? The cleavage site clearly has nothing to do with RATG-13 and it is probably one of the main drivers of SARS-CoV-2 pathogenesis. See here:

-https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03237-4

-https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7457603/

But before you say "See! Gotcha! That means that the cleavage site is the smoking gun!"

It also looks, from a molecular perspective, like a natural recombination event. See here:

-https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fgene.2020.0078...

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

#559

Post by iforgotpassword »

FindMySocks wrote: post #538
fighterpilot wrote: post #482

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed that it's a separate question. I just don't think the anti-CCP sentiment is unjustified, though. Whether it was a lab leak is important but a misdirection. Their cover-up of the true scale of the problem (lab leak or not) made it hard for politicians in other countries to lock down quickly. It helped it spread intentionally to multiple countries and by then it was too late. If they were blasting their sirens e…

> Their cover-up of the true scale of the problem (lab leak or not) made it hard for politicians in other countries to lock down quickly. It helped it spread intentionally to multiple countries and by then it was too late. I disagree. The actions from a lot of countries were absolutely lacking, even when they could see how bad it was given both China's data, and Italy, Israel's initial incidents. China locked down su…

Well said. China botched it at the beginning. They could have prevented a worldwide pandemic, but they started acting to late. However, what I know now is that pretty much any western country couldn't have prevented a pandemic, if the origin of the virus would have been them.

I'm in Germany and the whole situation is a joke. Incompetence in any way possible, everywhere. Half heated "soft lockdowns" whenever things get worse, reopen everything as soon as it gets a little better, then be all surprised that incidents are on a rise again, rinse and repeat. Obviously every state does this without any coordination with neighboring ones.

And it's not surprising. Do you think any politician is even remotely qualified for the position they have? Usually you get your position as minister of health, or defense, or whatever, but because everything in Germany just goes its way and nothing is wrong, you do your four years, pass a few meaningless bills, and that's it. Now that we have a pandemic at our hands and the minister of health would have to actually do something for the first time in several decades, the whole spiel falls apart.

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

#560

Post by pmiller2 »

eightysixfour wrote: post #55
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:…

I agree that the virus is unlikely to have been engineered in the manner you describe. But, I'm wondering: where is this circumstantial evidence for the leak scenario, be it a natural sample or one that had some help evolving? (I also doubt the wet market scenario, but that one isn't nearly so contentious.)

Here's the thing: in my mind, anyone who wants to claim the virus escaped the lab as a result of an accident needs to show how someone could have gotten infected with it while working with it in a lab using BSL-3 precautions. We're all just walking around wearing plain old surgical masks, and sometimes not even that level of protection, but literally a piece of cloth is enough to reduce transmission of this virus significantly. Now, tell me how someone wearing full body PPE gets infected with it.

Even at BSL-2, any procedures that would create aerosols are done inside a containment vessel, so, I can't honestly see it happening there, either. And, it certainly wouldn't have been at BSL-1, as that's reserved for known non-pathogenic organisms. Basically, the criterion for a BSL-1 lab is "we grow bugs here, on purpose." Clearly, any of the bat coronaviruses they would handle at WIV would greatly exceed that level of precaution.

With that in mind, IMO, the real interesting bit this article had to offer was to suggest the possibility that the virus snuck into the lab. Given the virus's relative inability to spread via surface contact and necessity of aerosolized droplet spread, you still have to answer the question of how it got out, but, it's at least an intriguing origin story.

So, in summary, yes, the only correct answer we can really say for sure is "we don't know exactly where it came from, if it leaked out of a lab, and what might have been done with it while it was in the lab." But, I'm having a really hard time believing a virus that gets largely stopped by a simple mask could sneak out of a BSL-2+ lab.

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