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WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

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Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#61

Post by tootie »

causi wrote: post #26

I'm not skilled enough in the biomedical background to evaluate the various genetics-based articles written for or against natural-origin and lab-origin hypotheses. As a layman, however, I find the degree to which the Chinese government has stomped all over foreign-led investigations into the origin of SARS-Cov-2 to be highly, highly suspicious.

The best writeup I've seen is actually this twitter thread from the WNYC science reporter, Nsikan Akpan (himself a phd in biology). The gist being that while lab leak is still possible, it's very unlikely and it's also likely we'll never find a smoking gun for any hypothesis.

https://twitter.com/MoNscience/status/1396240581651742724

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#62

Post by nickff »

newacct583 wrote: post #60
nickff wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Why must people be in on a secret coverup?" I hadn't considered this before, but you're right that most of the people dismissing the 'lab leak' theory seem to believe that their intellectual opponents are proposing that a 'premeditated conspiracy' took place. In any case, if I were a PRoC official, I would try to reduce the chance of any (direct or circumstantial) evidence of a lab leak came to light. That said, e…

To be fair, a lot of you nuts are absolutely alleging "premeditated conspiracy", or even loopier notions like bioweapon engineering. It's extremely hard to figure out who we're talking to. If you want to argue for some weak form of the conspiracy, then maybe give it another name or something. But note that the weak form you seem to be thinking about (that it was benign research on natural viruses and just a routine m…

>"To be fair, a lot of you nuts are absolutely alleging "premeditated conspiracy", or even loopier notions like bioweapon engineering. "

Why are you insulting me? I honestly don't know where this virus came from, and am more interested in what the polarized discourse says about our current state of affairs.

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#63

Post by cm2187 »

causi wrote: post #26

I'm not skilled enough in the biomedical background to evaluate the various genetics-based articles written for or against natural-origin and lab-origin hypotheses. As a layman, however, I find the degree to which the Chinese government has stomped all over foreign-led investigations into the origin of SARS-Cov-2 to be highly, highly suspicious.

To be honest the only way we will ever know is if the chinese would share the genomes of the viruses they stored in their lab, but who would trust them to do that? The express drive-by the WHO did in china served absolutely no purpose. I am ready to bet that all samples have been destroyed and the staff briefed (warned). I would even suspect the samples have not even been analysed by the Chinese themselves as it is better to not know than running the risk of some technician leaking such damaging information (and who would trust the Chinese authorities whatever they say anyway). So my money is on “we will never know”.

But like others, I have strong suspicions. It starts by an improbable coincidence (pandemic starting at the doorstep of a lab). The Chinese have acted guilty from the outset, by lying about the virus, arresting doctors, not allowing any investigation, and pushing crazy alternative theories.

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#64

Post by hammock »

newacct583 wrote: post #35
causi wrote: post #26

I'm not skilled enough in the biomedical background to evaluate the various genetics-based articles written for or against natural-origin and lab-origin hypotheses. As a layman, however, I find the degree to which the Chinese government has stomped all over foreign-led investigations into the origin of SARS-Cov-2 to be highly, highly suspicious.

I guess, but that imparts a level of uniform direction that isn't really known. It could very well be that the PRC government does not know themselves whether or not covid was a lab leak, because who the fuck knows what those beaker heads were doing. They just want to be sure that if it was a lab leak, that no one ever knows. Basically: totalitarian governments suppress everything. It's what they do. It's not like th…

>Imagine it was a leak. Dozens or hundreds of people -- researchers with PhDs and international cred and travel ability -- would have had to be knowledgeable about the research and in on the coverup

Maybe. And? Dozens or hundreds of internationally-relevant people would have been knowledgeable about the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's specific involvement in 9/11, but that didn't stop it from being covered up for almost a decade.

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#65

Post by vanattab »

cm2187 wrote: post #63
causi wrote: post #26

I'm not skilled enough in the biomedical background to evaluate the various genetics-based articles written for or against natural-origin and lab-origin hypotheses. As a layman, however, I find the degree to which the Chinese government has stomped all over foreign-led investigations into the origin of SARS-Cov-2 to be highly, highly suspicious.

To be honest the only way we will ever know is if the chinese would share the genomes of the viruses they stored in their lab, but who would trust them to do that? The express drive-by the WHO did in china served absolutely no purpose. I am ready to bet that all samples have been destroyed and the staff briefed (warned). I would even suspect the samples have not even been analysed by the Chinese themselves as it is b…

>The express drive-by the WHO did in china served absolutely no purpose.

I served it's purpose perfectly! It allowed China to pretend that an investigation was done.

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#66

Post by TMWNN »

908B64B197 wrote: post #12

Remember when the previous administration suggested looking into the Lab Leak theory and was laughed at? Remember how you would get banned from Facebook for suggesting that the lab leak theory was a possibility? Then major social networks and the medias reversed their positions. What changed in the meantime, other than the president?

>Then major social networks and the medias reversed their positions. What changed in the meantime, other than the president?

Further, the above (reasonably) implies that, had the president not changed, the reversing of positions would not have occurred.

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#67

Post by TMWNN »

handmodel wrote: post #23
tlowrimore wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is important to consider the context within which these suggestions were initially put forth. We had a president that claimed to have Coronavirus under control, that it was no worse than the flu and who openly and frequently cast doubt upon the only expert in the room. Perhaps had his behavior been a bit more tempered, he would have been taken more seriously.

I posted an article on HN at the time from a Chinese-born Harvard Public Health PHd who was writing in winter of 2020 he thought it could have come from the lab. It actually wasn't downvoted too much - plenty of people here found it plausible - but the amount of people saying I was stupid and gullible has really stuck with me. I was told I had no idea how viruses work (this is true enough - I don't have a degree in b…

>I was told I had no idea how viruses work (this is true enough - I don't have a degree in biology) but still felt extremely gaslit.

Similarly, on New Year's Eve 2015 I saw mention of the Cologne mass attacks on women by refugees as they were occurring on, yes, 4chan/pol/, and checked /r/worldnews and /r/europe to find out more. I didn't see anything, and assumed that it was another /pol/ "it's happening" dank maymayism. I only later realized that German media and those subreddits' mods had all worked to suppress news of the attacks until they could no longer be ignored.

(Cue "/pol/ was right" couplet)

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#68

Post by fouric »

newacct583 wrote: post #60
nickff wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Why must people be in on a secret coverup?" I hadn't considered this before, but you're right that most of the people dismissing the 'lab leak' theory seem to believe that their intellectual opponents are proposing that a 'premeditated conspiracy' took place. In any case, if I were a PRoC official, I would try to reduce the chance of any (direct or circumstantial) evidence of a lab leak came to light. That said, e…

To be fair, a lot of you nuts are absolutely alleging "premeditated conspiracy", or even loopier notions like bioweapon engineering. It's extremely hard to figure out who we're talking to. If you want to argue for some weak form of the conspiracy, then maybe give it another name or something. But note that the weak form you seem to be thinking about (that it was benign research on natural viruses and just a routine m…

> To be fair, a lot of you nuts

Please don't resort to personal insults on HN. It's a violation of the guidelines[1] and makes for poor and uninteresting discussion.

Instead...

> It's extremely hard to figure out who we're talking to.

...don't resort to personal attacks, and assess the argument that the individual is making, without setting up a straw-man argument. If you're unclear what their assumptions are, then ask.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#69

Post by 908B64B197 »

handmodel wrote: post #23
tlowrimore wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is important to consider the context within which these suggestions were initially put forth. We had a president that claimed to have Coronavirus under control, that it was no worse than the flu and who openly and frequently cast doubt upon the only expert in the room. Perhaps had his behavior been a bit more tempered, he would have been taken more seriously.

I posted an article on HN at the time from a Chinese-born Harvard Public Health PHd who was writing in winter of 2020 he thought it could have come from the lab. It actually wasn't downvoted too much - plenty of people here found it plausible - but the amount of people saying I was stupid and gullible has really stuck with me. I was told I had no idea how viruses work (this is true enough - I don't have a degree in b…

> I was told I had no idea how viruses work (this is true enough - I don't have a degree in biology) but still felt extremely gaslit.

You don't need a degree to understand how a virus works.

Re: WHO inquiry chief 'had concerns' about lab close to first Covid cases

#70

Post by wadeparzival »

908B64B197 wrote: post #12

Remember when the previous administration suggested looking into the Lab Leak theory and was laughed at? Remember how you would get banned from Facebook for suggesting that the lab leak theory was a possibility? Then major social networks and the medias reversed their positions. What changed in the meantime, other than the president?

I remember when the previous President said he had evidence of a lab leak, but did not share it or have any corroboration from anyone else in the administration. It was obvious at the time that it was a political tool to drive a nationalist sentiment.

The issue is not that people wanted to investigate a lab leak, the issue was that people presented their lab leak theory as a fact. Believing in a theory without any evidence to support it falls pretty squarely in the conspiracy theory bucket.

Honestly, I haven't seen anything change in substance in the meantime. It still is a suspicious coincidence, but we don't have any clear indication of what actually happened. What has changed in the reporting is that people are expressing concerns about the lab (clearly theories, not fact), which is completely natural. We should investigate it so we can better prevent, detect, and respond to future outbreaks. But let's not make premature judgements from a coincidence.

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