Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

thebulletin.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

261–270 of 578 posts

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#261

Post by rlpb »

uvesten wrote: post #251

I think most people are confused because of CCP’s successful disinformation campaign, and also out of fear of being seen as prejudiced. The fact is that an epidemic with a corona virus (never before or since seen in the wild) with a peculiarly efficient ability to infect humans started in the _only city in the world with a lab where gain-of-function experiments on corona viruses_ is located. Just apply occam’s razor,…

> The fact is that an epidemic with a corona virus (never before or since seen in the wild) with a peculiarly efficient ability to infect humans started in the _only city in the world with a lab where gain-of-function experiments on corona viruses_ is located. Just apply occam’s razor, and then you are done.

What's the reason the lab is located in that city? Is there an underlying causal connection?

For example, is Wuhan prone to novel coronoviruses because of the local bat population, and so that was the logical place to site a coronavirus research lab?

If so, Occam's Razor would suggest that common connection as the more simple explanation.

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#262

Post by throwaway8581 »

blackoil wrote: post #160
strogonoff wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue with COVID is the precedent of attempts of trying to identify the origin of this new disease being sabotaged for seemingly political reasons (and with no obvious repercussions). It seems intuitive that knowing the origin of the virus (sample escaping a lab or pure nature) could help prevent similar cases in the future or deal with them more efficiently. Is my intuition wrong here?

It may be true, but isn't very surprising. It came when US-China tensions were already at peak and it was from onset was politicised as 'China virus', followed by political attacks by Trump and racial attacks against Chinese/Asians.

It’s almost all black people beating up Asians. I don’t think they’re listening to Trump.

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#263

Post by AzzieElbab »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #256

“ It later turned out that the Lancet letter had been organized and drafted by Peter Daszak, president of the EcoHealth Alliance of New York. Daszak’s organization funded coronavirus research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. If the SARS2 virus had indeed escaped from research he funded, Daszak would be potentially culpable. This acute conflict of interest was not declared to the Lancet’s readers. To the contrary,…

I read Josh Rogin earlier articles on the subject. He also recently implicated Fauchi for covertly funding gain of function research, and he is pushing for congressional oversight/investigation https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/cong...

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#264

Post by didericis »

dirtyid wrote: post #233
didericis wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lean towards the lab hypothesis due to China’s behavior early in the pandemic. I have a difficult time understanding why they would have been arresting doctors who were talking about the virus if it were natural. The transition from arresting doctors to locking down cities doesn’t make much sense otherwise. You could argue they had motivation to arrest doctors talking about a natural infection if they thought they…

>I have a difficult time understanding why they would have been arresting doctors who were talking about the virus if it were natural. No doctors were arrested early on. Few got cold tea lectures about spreading rumors that literal SARs returned not novel SARs like virus. Signed boilerplate paperwork and was released back to work. This is generic behavior for "picking quarrels and provoking trouble" tier infractions.…

> No doctors were arrested early on

The following happened to Doctor Li Wenliang:

> On 3 January 2020, police from the Wuhan Public Security Bureau investigating the case interrogated Li, issued a formal written warning and censuring him for "publishing untrue statements about seven confirmed SARS cases at the Huanan Seafood Market." He was made to sign a letter of admonition promising not to do it again. The police warned him that any recalcitrant behavior would result in a prosecution.

Being detained and forced to sign a letter on threat of prosecution is the practical equivalent of being arrested.

> If there was foreknowledge of a lab leak, these doctors would be under surveillance and stashed away in safe house away from family/friends/work for months/years like in other politically sensitive cases.

There is no evidence that doctors like Doctor Li Wenliang had knowledge of the origin, and were targeted for reporting on the virus.

Huang Yan Ling was a researcher at the virology lab in Wuhan that has been missing since right before the outbreak.

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#265

Post by freddie_mercury »

dehrmann wrote: post #80
seymore_12 wrote: post #61

If we apply Occam's razor [1] decision between "Wuhan, however, is home of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a leading world center for research on coronaviruses" and "Wuhan, there is a wet market where under certain conditions virus can jump from bat to monkey to person" is relatively straightforward But then, we should probably also apply Hanlon's razor [2] "never attribute to malice that which is adequately explain…

I assume practically every city in China has wet markets. I wonder how many cities have facilities that do virus research. It might actually be more than you'd assume; I have no idea what sort of research might happen at universities, You also have to weigh this with SARS Classic originating in China.

A "wet market" is simply a market where you can buy meat, fish, and vegetables.

Every neighbourhood in every city in Asia has a wet market. Well other than Japan and Singapore, I guess. I live in Asia and there are two wet markets within walking distance of my house.

Wet markets are as omnipresent as convenience stores in America.

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#266

Post by curation »

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #3

We don't want to know. That may sound a bit glib but I think it's true. What would be the reaction if we could determine the outbreak was due to an unintentional leak? China cannot reimburse the world for the economic damage covid has caused. It cannot be held accountable for all the lives that have been lost. It cannot compensate the world for the diminished quality of life we've all suffered. But there will be plen…

It is easy to claim the opposite using this binaric logic: The US has lost the covid war to China with the most deaths in the world. The desperate fear of China's economic dominance which seems unstoppable alongside the fact that they do not invade and bomb countries (so if we do that to them we will have a really big propaganda job to convince people). So how do we convince China is really bad? Oh I know. Leak a deadly virus near their lab. Frame them. Keep it in your back pocket in case the cultural genocide framing fails. This is why these polemics lead nowhere. Rather, we have no evidence conclusive either way. The desire to speculate from our side, only feeds anti-Asian attitudes.

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#268

Post by FpUser »

altacc wrote: post #194
FpUser wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"and don't pretend you 'only care about the science'." I don't. The question was did the virus come out as the result of that research or not. The answer is simple yes or no. No need to dance around.

There is no clear yes/no answer here. Without a smoking gun either way there is a scale of probability/certainty and everyone who looks into this falls somewhere on that scale based on their experience, ideology, biases, research, etc... Personally I think lab origin is unlikely as whilst it's possible to describe how it could happen, that's not proof it did actually happen. Too often people mistake theoretical actio…

>"There is no clear yes/no answer here"

There is. We just do not know it. But somebody does.

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#269

Post by newacct583 »

AzzieElbab wrote: post #263
mensetmanusman wrote: post #256

“ It later turned out that the Lancet letter had been organized and drafted by Peter Daszak, president of the EcoHealth Alliance of New York. Daszak’s organization funded coronavirus research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. If the SARS2 virus had indeed escaped from research he funded, Daszak would be potentially culpable. This acute conflict of interest was not declared to the Lancet’s readers. To the contrary,…

I read Josh Rogin earlier articles on the subject. He also recently implicated Fauchi for covertly funding gain of function research, and he is pushing for congressional oversight/investigation https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/cong...

> He also recently implicated Fauchi for covertly funding gain of function research

I'm sorry, that essay (which is an opinion piece, not a work of investigative journalism) says absolutely nothing of the sort. What's your source on that? That's a pretty ridiculous accusation if you don't have evidence.

Re: The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box?

#270

Post by varjag »

rlpb wrote: post #261
uvesten wrote: post #251

I think most people are confused because of CCP’s successful disinformation campaign, and also out of fear of being seen as prejudiced. The fact is that an epidemic with a corona virus (never before or since seen in the wild) with a peculiarly efficient ability to infect humans started in the _only city in the world with a lab where gain-of-function experiments on corona viruses_ is located. Just apply occam’s razor,…

> The fact is that an epidemic with a corona virus (never before or since seen in the wild) with a peculiarly efficient ability to infect humans started in the _only city in the world with a lab where gain-of-function experiments on corona viruses_ is located. Just apply occam’s razor, and then you are done. What's the reason the lab is located in that city? Is there an underlying causal connection? For example, is W…

It's not. The officially suspect bat population was some 800km away from Wuhan.

Similarly, Sverdlovsk lab (the ground zero of 1979 anthrax outbreak) wasn't located there because Sverdlovsk specifically suspect to anthrax. An interesting tidbit, the party blamed the local farmer (wet) market for the outbreak there.

Post reply on HN