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The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

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Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#311

Post by sradman »

yters wrote: post #216

I ran a blast query against the cov2 glycoprotein that binds to human ACE2, and it just pops out of nowhere in 2020. There is a difference of like 30 amino acids from anything that came before, which is much too great to be explained by the coronavirus wild mutation rate of 1 nucleotide every thousand years. So, possibilities are it is a strain that has evaded researchers till now, some natural phenomenon vastly acce…

> some natural phenomenon vastly accelerated its mutation

Natural recombination [1] vs gain-of-function lab work. Some of the lab work leverages natural recombination by artificially co-infecting lab animals with multiple viruses and studying the resulting chimeras.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recombinant_virus#Natural_re...

Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#312

Post by calpaterson »

mieses wrote: post #278
ezVoodoo wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brazil https://www.scmp.com/news/world/americas/article/3091757/ear... Spain https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-spain-... Italy https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53106444

November 17 in China? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/13/first-covid-19... Possibly in October.. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/china/coronavirus-... as early as September? https://www.newsweek.com/coronavirus-outbreak-september-not-... I'm getting tired of Googling fake news

Thanks for doing it though.

Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#314

Post by gfaure »

ezVoodoo wrote: post #261
gfaure wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that the virus was detected in wastewater samples in Italy earlier doesn't by itself rule out an origin from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, or from China.

It does not rule out the origin from Italy, USA, Spain, UK or any other countries on the earth either.

True, but what you wrote suggested that the fact it was detected elsewhere exonerates China. It does not.

Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#315

Post by makeramen »

sudosysgen wrote: post #282
chrisco255 wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't there often a trade-off between virulence and infectiousness in viral transmission? See "A transmission-virulence evolutionary trade-off explains attenuation of HIV-1 in Uganda" https://elifesciences.org/articles/20492

That trade off is made by evolution. I don't see why scientists in a lab would make that trade off in a gain of function analysis - you can just make it more infectious and keep (likely increase) the level of virulence. Since evolution isn't involved in the proposed mechanism, I see no reason why such a trade-off would occur.

Perhaps depends on your goals. Virulent enough to cause global panic and show how a totalitarian state can respond better to a pandemic than democratic stated. But not virulent enough to actually kill everyone.

Similarly SARS and MERS were perhaps too virulent and could thus easily be controlled by screening for symptoms, while the new coronavirus can spread without symptoms, which could possibly be attributed to the lower virulence.

Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#316

Post by biolurker1 »

sandworm101 wrote: post #138
jkhdigital wrote: post #127

Here's the Cliff Notes version of the argument in this paper: 1. SARS-CoV-2 has a number of unique and unusual genetic features, when compared to close relatives, many of which explain its high virulence and infectivity among humans. 2. A series of research papers published by a group of virologists, dating back a little over a decade, demonstrate (1) a progressively increasing understanding of viral features which m…

Or, and this is a really crazy theory, they were studying it in China because it was a local virus that they were worried might one day infect humans. Maybe they were studying which changes would make it most dangerous because they wanted to be ready if those changes happened naturally. Honest hard work can sometimes look like evil plans, and not every coincidence is the result of conspiracy.

This is not the scientific method you are applying but a hopeful emotional reaction.

Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#317

Post by trevelyan »

hazeii wrote: post #305
jkhdigital wrote: post #127

Here's the Cliff Notes version of the argument in this paper: 1. SARS-CoV-2 has a number of unique and unusual genetic features, when compared to close relatives, many of which explain its high virulence and infectivity among humans. 2. A series of research papers published by a group of virologists, dating back a little over a decade, demonstrate (1) a progressively increasing understanding of viral features which m…

As noted downthread, these points don't particularly point to it being engineered (point 1 applies in spades to SARS and MERS, for example). Most scientists believe the evidence [0] indicates it's of natural origin. [0] https://www.sciencealert.com/the-new-coronavirus-could-have-...

> SARS-CoV-2 spike proteins were so effective at binding to human cells, they had to be caused by natural selection.

Read the article you are citing. There is convincing evidence that the virus developed via evolutionary mechanisms. That in no way refutes lab-origin and is entirely consistent with how most labs promote infectiousness (particularly airborn infectiousness) through gain-of-function research.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4693520/

Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#318

Post by cryptica »

nothal wrote: post #99
robbiep wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the same logic, was the H1N1 spanish flu designed to perfectly flourish and kill possibly 10% of hosts? You say it in your second paragraph. You're no biologist. But you find it strange. Very few biologists find it strange. They have in fact been warning of a ticking time bomb [0 for brevity, 1 for article]. May I respectfully suggest that you stick to your lane regarding the science? WHO ups and downs and politic…

I understand your impetus to tell others to 'stick to your lane' but I respectfully disagree and cite their post and your response as why. OP had what you deem a misapprehension and they deem a valid point. By voicing their point as they believes it, you were able to retort with evidence you feel should convincingly disprove it. To me, this is reasoned, diverse discourse correcting for unintuitive misapprehensions, a…

As I understand it, the general rule of nature is that biological specimens don't thrive as well in environments that they are not evolutionary adapted to. This is why humans can't swim very fast and fish can't walk on land. The fact is that COVID-19 made its first jump to humans (new environment) only a few months ago and yet it spreads better than most pre-existing known coronaviruses that have been affecting humans for centuries before that seems odd.

So when scientific papers match my layman intuition (though I do know something about evolution in general, just not microbiology) and I also see the so-called 'real experts' lying about the facts, and some other experts are writing papers which seem to confirm with my intuition, then my intuition has a lot more weight.

Re: The evidence which suggests that Covid-19 is not a naturally evolved virus [pdf]

#320

Post by [deleted] »

casefields wrote: post #283
bwi4 wrote: post #114

So what would evidence, rather than speculation, look like in this case? A SARS-CoV 2 genome sequence dated before December 2019? Somehow identifying patient zero and corresponding records of their exposure at the lab? I’m skeptical that any hard evidence will be found. It seems to me the origin is likely to remain speculative indefinitely.

NSA/CIA intelligence catching them red handed discussing how it happened. Of course, with the Iraq fiasco still in our collective memory, who knows if the public would believe it.

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