Live data from Hacker News

Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

wsj.com

601–610 of 1001 posts

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#601

The lab leak hypothesis makes the most sense. The lab in Wuhan which researches coronaviruses conducts experiences on animals, including bats. Like other labs, there are dedicated personnel for hydrating and feeding the experimental animals. Notably, there are "wet markets" in Wuhan where live animals are sold, including bats, which harbor coronaviruses. Someone who is working in the facility in charge of maintenance…

I don't understand the mental gymnastics to discredit the lab leak hypothesis. The fact that the lab and epicenter of the virus are in the same geographic area make it the likely scenario and warrants the most investigation. The efforts to look past this seem artificial.

> I don't understand the mental gymnastics to discredit the lab leak hypothesis.

I’m not sure I beleive in Dead Internet Theory so much as I believe in some form of unknowing indoctrination theory.

That if you take the people with these hardline defensive of authority opinions away from the internet for a bit, explain a new event to them, when they get back on the internet, none of the people they normally deal with have the same opinion of what they learned about “offline” at first.

I think we unintentionally have created a mind control device.

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#602

Earlier quoted context omitted.

no one is going to care if the deaths were "intentional" or negligent.

not Americans. They always need someone to blame. Remember when they went to war with Iraq on fabricated evidence? Remember when they wen to war with Afghanistan after 9/11, but Afghanistan had no responsibility whatsoever (again!) and 10 years later they handed the country back to Talibans? Can we consider 9/11 an accident? Would it be the same to you? You know when really nobody talks about it? When it's the US kil…

It's talked about in many circles in the United States, mind. Not one year has gone by without a rant in my sphere about stupid boutique or ulteriorally motived wars, and a pining for the day the U.S. focuses more on solving domestic problems than foreign.

It just happens that for some stupid reason, neither the Republican or Democratic parties have a great track record of producing candidates that can manage to walk the line of foreign policy that minimally entangles us with very poorly advised foreign intervention.

Which is made all the more difficult when allies don't do their utmost in terms of defense spending. The U.S. doesn't need to always be the first bunch of people everyone looks to when some autocratic idiot starts rattling the saber again. This may even be made easier if we don't export advanced manufacturing business to places that value human life and time at approximately zero because it makes the quarterly reports look better.

After all, it's way harder to be an autocrat when no one will do enough business with you to keep the military sufficiently in your pocket. Or teach you how to make the machines that make arms or advanced weaponry. Or sell you said arms.

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#603

It seems more likely to me that it was intentionally released and not an accidental leak.

It's definitely an effective way to tackle China's emerging age pyramid problems. However, it's hard/impossible to prove that. I think it's easier to argue that the Chinese government is guilty of interfering with investigations, destroying evidence, and have a too lax security policy for their virology institutes.

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#604

Time once again to post Jon Stewart: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSfejgwbDQ8 I still don't understand how in 2020 people were branded as racist sinophobes for saying that the coronavirus that originated in Wuhan, probably originated from the coronavirus research lab in Wuhan . I know suspicion isn't fact, but that should have always been the leading theory to be disproved. Instead, IIRC Twitter and FB were flaggi…

Absent of other information, why is this the most probably explanation? It’s possible sure, but the best we could’ve said, especially back then is we don’t know. Viruses from animals jump to humans all the time, and have caused other outbreaks before many times, why is this one special?

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#605

There has been SO much lost faith in media and authorities because of the coverage, laws and regulations re this, it's so so bad... People not vaccinating their young children with vaccines we know to work and have no side effects for 30+ years. Locking young children inside for years and stumping their social growth. Or teenagers and adults too, leading to unmeasurable mental health problems.

Agree, now try and reason that there are a TON of people that have been through the last three years and haven’t come out even a tiny bit more skeptical of governments, media, and authorities.

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is an interesting admission though, because by definition that means that the "evolved in nature and came from wet markets" view is also a crappy theory.

What it means is that we lack the ability to prove either of those theories, not necessarily that either theory is bad.

This entirely depends on the total amount of theories. It also assumes the known theories cover all possible origins.

Saying COVID evolved from nature is sort of a catch all. It's like saying all possible theories in aggregate except for the lab leak theory.

For example: What are the chances of anyone but you winning the lottery? Quite high.

So when they say low confidence of the lab leak theory it most likely means it's a crap theory.

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#607
There are two theories: - the covid19 was created naturally and just happen to happen near the only place on Earth (or one out of two or three places?) that study covid19-style viruses; - the covid19 was created in the lab and leaked outside because of negligence and/ or sloppy procedures.

Your choice which theory you believe. But a lot of powers in this world have vested interests to make you believe in “nothing to see here theory”.

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#608
post #524
post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deleted

In my opinion, the simplest explanation of this is: a worker at the Wuhan facility was accidentally infected (mistakes happen) and it was able to spread. It was not intentional.

An intentional leak would be an attack. I don’t recall that being on the table during the early part of the pandemic. I’m sure there was a least one person suggesting it but I recall the lab leak theory being the most ridiculed was some kind of accident or mistake at the lab resulting in an infected worker. …probably asymptomatic to boot.

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#609
post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious solution for this conundrum is that they did study it, but didn't publish it because the screw-up happened and all evidence was promptly destroyed. In a totalitarian state, the secrecy is the default mode. You can get exceptions and publish stuff, sure, but only once you asked and received permission. If you didn't - or in the period between you asking and permission being issued something happened - no e…

The effort required to culture virus like this is fairly large, and it requires them to keep it secret in 2019 before there was any need to keep it secret. Nobody talked about it to collaborators, no sequences were leaked out, etc. They somehow had tighter controls than Apple developing a new iPhone, before they had any reason to.

there are millions of people who want to know what Apple is doing

Re: Lab leak most likely origin of Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. agency now says

#610

[flagged]

Agreed, there is one issue of release. That we can never prove. China, not China. Intentional, not. GoF funded with US dollars or not.

There is imo a bigger issue with response. And if ANYONE thinks the response was even remotely correct or good then they need to put their screen down for a good long while.

Post reply on HN