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

301–310 of 578 posts

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

#301

Post by darkerside »

XorNot wrote: post #250
darkerside wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a false dichotomy between natural and manmade. What about a virus that naturally occurred in a bat cave, was studied in a lab, and escaped from the lab later? What if that virus mutated unintentionally while in the lab? And what if its mutation was encouraged by researchers in the lab? Occam's Razor, to me, suggests that it's more likely the virus came from the nearby infectious disease lab than from the wet mar…

Why couldn't it have been transported into the city on trucks and vehicles coming from sampling sites? Or hitchhiked in bat guano on a worker's boot who visited the wet market? You've generated 2 possible outcomes and gone "yes these are the only possibilities". But why? There was a whole train of transportation bringing things into the city for the lab. Of course, if it was from that timeline, then the whole "lab es…

It could have. There's irony in the tone of your response to a post that started with calling out a false dichotomy. There are many more possibilities and that was my point.

On your latter point, I'll just say that the virus likely needed some time to mutate into a human infectious form, and most of what we're talking about is, where and how did that happen?

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

#302

Post by rainbowzootsuit »

ximeng wrote: post #122
novaRom wrote: post #66

There is an interesting peer reviewed paper published last month with analysis of existing facts about the origin of covid-19. A part from their conclusion: More than a year after the initial documented cases in Wuhan, the source of SARS-CoV-2 has yet to be identified, and the search for a direct or intermediate host in nature has been so far unsuccessful. The low binding affinity of SARS-CoV-2 to bat ACE2 studied to…

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S187350612... Here is a paper that states that the furin cleavage site appears naturally in a number of viruses. I looked into these lab origin theories for the furin cleavage site last year. The problem with it being a laboratory insertion was that although performing an insertion is relatively easy once you know what to insert, generally it’s beyond current science…

Maybe this URL makes it seem more legit than it is, but the linked article below has a "2.5" version of events that proposed that samples taken from a group with who'd been infected by a coronavirus from bats may have been released accidentally. In other words that the lab was the point of release, but that they didn't construct or alter the virus as it already had adapted to humans in an earlier time.

I've done some separate reading that this is a legitimate way that viruses can adapt to a new species, but I don't have any background to evaluate the argument much beyond face value.

Some of the adjacent comments shed some doubt there as it sounds like bats aren't a plausible source because of the spike protein genetics.

https://www.independentsciencenews.org/commentaries/a-propos...

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

#303

Post by notriskfree »

didericis wrote: post #246
onethought wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arresting Drs talking about a possible repeat of SARS is something China clearly wouldn’t want out unless it absolutely had to. The effects on markets, general panic etc are not nothing issues. Later discovering they really did have a problem and it was even worse than SARS going to a full lockdown at the main crossroads city right before Chinese New Year (the largest human migration event). The motivation feels very…

If this did come from a lab, it was an accident. I think it’s unreasonable to consider the spread in China intentional, as there’s no reasonable motivation to do so. The main difference from SARS is we know there is a virology lab in Wuhan researching coronaviruses right across from the wet market considered the epicenter. I don’t know enough about the reaction to SARS to know how similar it was, but my understanding…

Setting the actual tragic pandemic to one side.

It is not true that there are never going to be reasonable motivations to deploy a virus:-

It could be viewed as a tool to alter population demographics in an ageing society.

It might be deployed against an adversary.

It might be used to reduce the human population to avoid a predicted ecological disaster.

There are probably dozens of very reasonable motivations.

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

#304

Post by bouncycastle »

Jeema101 wrote: post #275
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,…

It could be that you're confusing cause and effect, though. How do we know that the virus (or a precursor) wasn't already circulating in China, and was simply detected in Wuhan because of the fact that there are experts in coronaviruses who reside there? (Also I'm not entirely sure your statement about the gain of function research is correct. A Google search doesn't seem to provide any evidence one way or another.)

> because of the fact that there are experts in coronaviruses who reside there

In the beginning, they arresting doctors in Wuhan who spoke about it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Wenliang

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

#305

Post by __s »

swader999 wrote: post #93
misja111 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. There was an outbreak in a deserted mine in South China in the early 2000's, 6 cleaning workers got seriously ill with symptoms similar to current Corona. See e.g. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2020.5815... The leader of the Wuhan team went there with a team to collect samples and animals. In the early days of Covid, those samples were re-examined and it turned out that the genome of the…

Also,this sars cov-2 virus will not infect bats. That really hurts the 'it came from the bats' theory.

Similarly, humans can't impregnate chimpanzees. That really hurts the "humans evolved from apes" theory

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

#306

Post by drpgq »

yread wrote: post #179
_trampeltier wrote: post #170

For me it felt allways a bit strange how fast china acted. The virus was very fresh, nothing was known, just a few cases and china totaly locked down millions if people. Two, three months later, when we already had high numbers if cases in the west, lockdowns started in the west also. But everybody said, "we know nothing about this new virus". For me it allways like, china knew much more about the virus early on.

They did have the experience with SARS1. And if you look at other countries that had experience with SARS1 they also acted very swiftly and did fairly well - Taiwan, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam. What I found absolutely baffling is that we in west saw what China was doing and haven't got our shit together until months later (with exceptions). Instead the discourse was about how much the Chinese eat unsavory things an…

As a Canadian, we had experience with SARS1 and I wouldn't say we acted swiftly or did fairly well.

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

#307

Post by MagnumOpus »

astrange wrote: post #137
octoberfranklin wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe the lab escape was even remotely deliberate; however: > the virus has no characteristics that would make for a good weapon of any kind. Quite the contrary. The virus clearly favors authoritarian societies whose citizens will let their government weld them into their apartments. Just look at the death rate in China compared to the US and Europe. The only free societies that have come out unscathed are…

I mean, the best way to survive SARS-CoV-2 appears to be "be South Korean". Africa and random Eastern European countries have also been doing okay.

> Africa and random Eastern European countries have also been doing okay

Eastern European countries are topping the death-per-capita charts (and the ones that don't are still topping excess-death charts).

African countries are doing "okay" because their ratio of people above age 65 is 2-3% rather than the 20% in Europe, and case numbers are low because they don't have the money to mass test.

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

#308

Post by zby »

evrydayhustling wrote: post #248
zby wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The natural origin hypothesis is also pushed for ideological reasons - at this level of meta analysis we are at a stalemate. The article was good at revealing that there is not just ideology - but also material interests involved and that the two prestigious letters that were so categorical in dismissing the lab escape hypothesis were quite a bit tainted by conflicts of interests.

If we abstract away the specific actors/motivations, this reminds me a bit of the Oumuamua debate. "Man made" and "natural" are both very broad theories that admit many details and are thus hard to falsify. But I wonder to what degree we agree about: (1) Which category (if either) has an advantage by Occam's razor? (2) Which category (if either) is more easily falsifiable? (Meaning easier to determine improbable, sin…

Just one nitpick - it does not need to be 'man made' to make a 'lab escape'.

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

#309

Post by DSingularity »

christocracy wrote: post #81
FpUser wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if the article tells the truth? Why would author's racial preferences matter? You might be surprised how much of modern tech was developed by racists and other bad apples. If you are from the US try reading how your rocket / space industry had been developed for example.

>You might be surprised how much of modern tech was developed by racists and other bad apples William Shockley, co-inventor of the transistor. See section “Views on Race and Eugenics”. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shockley

Yeah, and for that reason we should forever regard him with disdain. Even if he invented everything we use today. We should always bring it up and highlight his racist views.

My problem with this isn’t that a racist position exists. It’s that racism thrives and grows when you don’t point it out in a manner which leaves a stain on the racist. Those who are secretly racist will be emboldened by a publicly accept racist and it will give them some path to expressing or acting on their racist views which they have otherwise suppressed.

So should we read the article? Maybe. But should we share it while saying “hey look what this known racist is saying”? I don’t think so.

Post reply on HN