I think the clearest article on topic is from Zeynep Tufekci https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/25/opinion/coronavirus-lab.h... who says , repeatedly what we do not know and what is disturbing.
If only it wasn't behind a paywall :(
Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
271–280 of 833 posts
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#272Earlier quoted context omitted.
Facts are facts. The fact is in 2019 there were 39,397 wet markets in China. How many virology labs were there in China handling Corona-viruses? TWO. One of which was TWO BLOCKS from where the wet market from where the original Covid-19 virus which started the pandemic has been traced to. One might be forgiven for being curious as to the likelihood of the virus emerging from this particular wet market as opposed to a…
Additionally the closest cave containing any viruses resembling SARS-Cov-2 are 1500 km away from Wuhan.
The closest cave containing any viruses resembling SARS-CoV-1 are about the same distance away from Guangzhou where the outbreak was in 2003.
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#273Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#274Dear HNers, please consult the post history of OPs account. It is a newish account which has been used daily to post controversial ideological and political flame baits, mostly related to COVID conspiracies, pandemic denialism and low-key misinformation.
welcome to the bottom of the page! You're in good company though, we have tea and snacks.
Unfortunately HN users are not somehow special and immune to flame bait. This type of content would dominate the front page if it weren't manually down-weighed.
Meanwhile, truly technically interesting projects like clip guided diffusion and GLIDE have zero coverage or discussion here. It's a shame but the larger the community the more topics tend toward the mean.
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#275I think the clearest article on topic is from Zeynep Tufekci https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/25/opinion/coronavirus-lab.h... who says , repeatedly what we do not know and what is disturbing.
If only it wasn't behind a paywall :(
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#276I feel like it was impossible to really deal with this debate responsibly, what with the current state of society and social media where everyone has figured out how to weaponize false information, before we as a society have figured out how to really deal with it.
Even now it seems like everyone wants to elide the massive differences between "accidental lab leak" and "deliberate lab leak". Even now the common phrase is "lab leak" which can be taken either way. But if you ask anyone on twitter or facebook what "lab leak" means, but especially at the beginning of the pandemic, they would have immediately jumped to a deliberate bioterror attack scenario and there would have been no way to stop it. And we already had a surge of asian hate with what we dealt with.
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#277I feel like it was impossible to really deal with this debate responsibly, what with the current state of society and social media where everyone has figured out how to weaponize false information, before we as a society have figured out how to really deal with it. Even now it seems like everyone wants to elide the massive differences between "accidental lab leak" and "deliberate lab leak". Even now the common phrase…
> I feel like it was impossible to really deal with this debate responsibly, what with the current state of society and social media where everyone has figured out how to weaponize false information
So, the solution to this is lying. Right. That will make everything better. Oh and also make fact checkers tell people the truth is false information. FACT checkers. Yes. That will increase trust. Sure.
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#278Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you honestly dispute that there are options in foreign affairs between "do absolutely nothing" and "full scale military invasion," then our worldviews are so far apart that I don't think fighting about it on the Internet will be a good use of time for either of us.
You seem to be grossly misinterpreting my comment. I’ve said nothing at all to suggest there are no options in foreign affairs between "do absolutely nothing" and "full scale military invasion”. Where are you even getting that message? I asked what you thought those options are since you seem to have some opinions. Or at least a few of them. Specifically. I don’t see how I said anything that indicates I’m trying to f…
> I’ve said nothing at all to suggest there are no options
Great. So you agree that there are other options in between do nothing, and an invasion.
Both you, and everyone else, agrees on that idea. So that means that you personally can think of some in between those two extremes.
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#279Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Trust the science" hasn't made people more rational, it has made "science" more dogmatic. I wonder what governments and the media will latch onto once they have eroded the trust in science, because there aren't many other trustworthy institutions left.
I agree, but I still consider it a step up to what we had before. There's always been institutions whom people are told to trust. For a thousand years it was the church. I think for most people to trust credentialed scientists from government institutions is a vast step up, even if they have sorely disappointed during this pandemic.
You mean the people who told us not to wear masks? I trust science, but that doesn't mean I trust every scientist.
Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt
#280I think the clearest article on topic is from Zeynep Tufekci https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/25/opinion/coronavirus-lab.h... who says , repeatedly what we do not know and what is disturbing.