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'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

abcnews.go.com

31–40 of 40 posts

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree there was no tangible evidence, but there was circumstantial evidence, the lab's proximity to Wuhan and also scientists from China making the claims. The problem is large chunk of the media didn't say, as you are saying, that there was no evidence, which would be fine to argue. They just said it didn't come from lab, period, full stop. There is a difference from saying there is no proof and that something did…

> I don't think any evidence that it spread from an animal to humans discounts the lab leak The thing is there is no evidence that the virus spread from animals to humans. Of all the animals tested in the market zero tested positive for the virus. And none of the environmental samples showed any signs that an infected animals was present, all the environmental samples were deposited by humans. Since these animals hab…

> The thing is there is no evidence that the virus spread from animals to humans...none of the environmental samples showed any signs that an infected animals was present, all the environmental samples were deposited by humans...With SARS2 we have not found ANYTHING! No environmental samples different than the human derived samples. No market animal in China or anywhere else with a variant circulating unique to their species.

These guys would disagree with you. There was never any direct link found pointing to an origin at the market, but there was plenty of evidence including evidence for spillover.

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/371/6525/120.summary

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp8337

https://zenodo.org/record/6291628/files/Pekar_Zoonosis.pdf?d...

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#32
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The evidence for not being a lab leak was just as weak as being a lab leak. Not at all, because the evidence for a lab leak was non-existent and the people and sources spreading the conspiracy theory often admitted as much. Tom Cotton, one of the first republicans to push the theory, said himself: "Now, we don’t have evidence that this disease originated there, but because of China’s duplicity and dishonesty from t…

Nonsense. Given labs obviously keep a library of natural viruses for research purposes, how does "actual science like genome analysis" prove it wasn't a lab leak? This argument is just bs put forward by scientists highly motivated to discredit the lab leak hypothesis. Using the same level of analysis there was zero evidence for the wet market transmission either (other than the massive levels of obsfucation, misdirec…

> Given labs obviously keep a library of natural viruses for research purposes

That isn't obvious at all. Culturing sarbecoviruses is very difficult. They have libraries of samples but they're dead and they just sequence the genomic material which is in the samples. Recovering viable virus is hard, culturing it is even more difficult.

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#33
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nonsense. Given labs obviously keep a library of natural viruses for research purposes, how does "actual science like genome analysis" prove it wasn't a lab leak? This argument is just bs put forward by scientists highly motivated to discredit the lab leak hypothesis. Using the same level of analysis there was zero evidence for the wet market transmission either (other than the massive levels of obsfucation, misdirec…

> how does "actual science like genome analysis" prove it wasn't a lab leak? You're right, it doesn't, I was just using your own phrasing. What the science did do was provide verifiable evidence which supported the theory that the virus could have came from animals. Having actual research that can be repeated and verified will always win out over vague accusations or suspicions made without evidence, such as your cla…

In the context of an issue of such global significance, given the degree of pressure a nation-state like China is going to apply, I think you are being incredibly naive to accept a single scientific paper on face value. Here's a critique of the very same paper:-

https://zenodo.org/record/7169296#.Y0RCpkPP02y

https://changingtimes.media/2022/10/12/investigators-challen...

So which is right? You don't know, I don't know...so maybe we need to also consider other scenarios too.

And contemplating the possibility of a lab leak, when a coronavirus outbreak randomly appears just down the road from a laboratory that studies coronaviruses (of all places in the world) is about as far from "wild speculation" as you can get. It's just simple commonsense, unless you have an agenda.

Here's some other examples where "wild speculation" must have been involved:-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_laboratory_biosecurity...

And I havent mentioned all the other kinds of intelligence data used to analyse such an event, like satellite photos of the Wuhan lab carpark, or peaks in mobile phone activity in the area, or there are some indications that 3 scientists at the Wuhan lab came down with an "unknown" respiratory disease a month before the first appearance of Covid.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/intelligence-on-sick-staff-at-w...

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#34
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nonsense. Given labs obviously keep a library of natural viruses for research purposes, how does "actual science like genome analysis" prove it wasn't a lab leak? This argument is just bs put forward by scientists highly motivated to discredit the lab leak hypothesis. Using the same level of analysis there was zero evidence for the wet market transmission either (other than the massive levels of obsfucation, misdirec…

> Given labs obviously keep a library of natural viruses for research purposes That isn't obvious at all. Culturing sarbecoviruses is very difficult. They have libraries of samples but they're dead and they just sequence the genomic material which is in the samples. Recovering viable virus is hard, culturing it is even more difficult.

Semantics...unless you are suggesting that all natural viruses brought into the lab were inert before they passed through the doors to the lab.

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#35
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Given labs obviously keep a library of natural viruses for research purposes That isn't obvious at all. Culturing sarbecoviruses is very difficult. They have libraries of samples but they're dead and they just sequence the genomic material which is in the samples. Recovering viable virus is hard, culturing it is even more difficult.

Semantics...unless you are suggesting that all natural viruses brought into the lab were inert before they passed through the doors to the lab.

Yes, most of the samples were. You don't need live virus in order to sequence.

Which was the problem with all the studies early in 2020 finding SARS-CoV-2 mRNA on surfaces after X hours.

Also the problem with high cycle count rtPCR results long after symptoms have abated.

You can study genomes without ever having to deal with infectious virus, which is vastly simpler.

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#36
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how does "actual science like genome analysis" prove it wasn't a lab leak? You're right, it doesn't, I was just using your own phrasing. What the science did do was provide verifiable evidence which supported the theory that the virus could have came from animals. Having actual research that can be repeated and verified will always win out over vague accusations or suspicions made without evidence, such as your cla…

In the context of an issue of such global significance, given the degree of pressure a nation-state like China is going to apply, I think you are being incredibly naive to accept a single scientific paper on face value. Here's a critique of the very same paper:- https://zenodo.org/record/7169296#.Y0RCpkPP02y https://changingtimes.media/2022/10/12/investigators-challen... So which is right? You don't know, I don't kno…

> I think you are being incredibly naive to accept a single scientific paper on face value.

No one accepted that one paper at face value, it's just one of several examples of papers and research where actual evidence was presented and explored.

The fact that biolabs exist and leaks have happened in the past are not actual evidence. That lab still exists today and leaks have still happened in the past, does that mean a virus is leaking right now? It's just wild speculation. Wet markets also exist and have been linked to outbreaks of disease in the past. These are reasons for investigations, not for accusations and conspiracy theories.

Gradually, real evidence for the lab leak theory started to emerge. Your parking lot picture and the sick lab researchers are good examples of evidence, even though they're only circumstantial, but none of that evidence existed when people started spreading lab leak conspiracy theories. Those conspiracy theories had no evidence at all.

Even still, investigations were carried out to see if the the virus really was a bioweapon, to determine if it came from the lab, and to see if it came from the market. As evidence that it came from the market grew, the people spouting lab leak conspiracy theories ignored all the evidence for everything else and continued to spread their conspiracies even though the evidence for a natural origin was much stronger.

Any time actual evidence that supported the lab leak theory emerged the media reported on it, and when enough evidence existed to justify the lab leak theory the media took it seriously.

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#37
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the context of an issue of such global significance, given the degree of pressure a nation-state like China is going to apply, I think you are being incredibly naive to accept a single scientific paper on face value. Here's a critique of the very same paper:- https://zenodo.org/record/7169296#.Y0RCpkPP02y https://changingtimes.media/2022/10/12/investigators-challen... So which is right? You don't know, I don't kno…

> I think you are being incredibly naive to accept a single scientific paper on face value. No one accepted that one paper at face value, it's just one of several examples of papers and research where actual evidence was presented and explored. The fact that biolabs exist and leaks have happened in the past are not actual evidence. That lab still exists today and leaks have still happened in the past, does that mean…

You addressed none of the criticisms in the paper I mentioned. Yet the original paper seems to be the entire basis for your argument.

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#38
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Semantics...unless you are suggesting that all natural viruses brought into the lab were inert before they passed through the doors to the lab.

Yes, most of the samples were. You don't need live virus in order to sequence. Which was the problem with all the studies early in 2020 finding SARS-CoV-2 mRNA on surfaces after X hours. Also the problem with high cycle count rtPCR results long after symptoms have abated. You can study genomes without ever having to deal with infectious virus, which is vastly simpler.

Whats the point of the extraordinary high levels of bio-security restrictions in these labs then? Wuhan is BSL-4?

https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2017.21487

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#39
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, most of the samples were. You don't need live virus in order to sequence. Which was the problem with all the studies early in 2020 finding SARS-CoV-2 mRNA on surfaces after X hours. Also the problem with high cycle count rtPCR results long after symptoms have abated. You can study genomes without ever having to deal with infectious virus, which is vastly simpler.

Whats the point of the extraordinary high levels of bio-security restrictions in these labs then? Wuhan is BSL-4? https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2017.21487

The fact that they studied infectious virus in the lab doesn't mean that every sample they studied was infectious virus.

Re: 'Potential lab incident': FBI director Wray speaks publicly on Covid origin

#40
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whats the point of the extraordinary high levels of bio-security restrictions in these labs then? Wuhan is BSL-4? https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2017.21487

The fact that they studied infectious virus in the lab doesn't mean that every sample they studied was infectious virus.

Nobody said that.
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