481–490 of 792 posts
If something like this did arise from zoonotic sources via a market - this will be the 1st of many such cases that we will endure going forwards. Controlling something like that is nearing impossible.
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Very well put. One thing I’d add, is that this entire debate regarding the lab leak hypothesis is entirely politicized, and I feel few people actually have legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth. Either theory is perfectly viable given the evidence we currently have.
> and I feel few people actually have legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth Not to be glib, but what would be a legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth? That this plausibly could have been of natural origin would seem to override any value in discerning where it actually came from. If it was a lab leak, "Oops." We hastened it occuring naturally by some amount of time. Lots of people…
There is only one reason I would hope it is a lab leak. A lab leak is a mistake that theoretical can be controlled via more stringent systems. It is something that has a limited footprint in terms of initial infection vector. If something like this did arise from zoonotic sources via a market - this will be the 1st of many such cases that we will endure going forwards. Controlling something like that is nearing impos…
Why is preventing or reducing the probability nearing impossible?
I think understanding the origin is important, but I also understand why it wasn't a media fixation during the pandemic itself. 1) Understanding the origin doesn't change the consequences or response to the pandemic 2) Unlike the nuclear analogy in the article, pandemic virus outbreaks happen naturally, and fairly frequently. Combined with the huge increase in global travel, when one does happen it can be around the…
What??? I honestly expect more from HN readers than blatant china-apologists.
OF COURSE it changes the consequences! We tell China to hand over all research and distribute it to scientists around the world so that research doesn’t start from ground 0. If it could have accelerated understanding of the virus by several months, imagine how many lives could have been saved!
Instead China deleted all their files and kept quiet. They literally don’t care about millions of deaths.
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That doesn't mean each are equally likely.. hence the huge section in the article I linked about bayesian priors.
I sort of lost faith in the article's willingness to take lab leak seriously when they threw this map up[0] and inexplicably did not label where the Wuhan Institute of Virology is on it. For reference[1]. [0] https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_... [1] https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Huanan+Seafood+Market,+Fazha... It's not at all far-fetched to think the virus piggybacked 10 miles before find…
Dunno if that point is just offices or whatever though.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Very well put. One thing I’d add, is that this entire debate regarding the lab leak hypothesis is entirely politicized, and I feel few people actually have legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth. Either theory is perfectly viable given the evidence we currently have.
> and I feel few people actually have legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth Not to be glib, but what would be a legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth? That this plausibly could have been of natural origin would seem to override any value in discerning where it actually came from. If it was a lab leak, "Oops." We hastened it occuring naturally by some amount of time. Lots of people…
What would we do differently? We put people like Fauci in prison for funding dangerous research that was specifically prohibited by the Obama admin —- then lying about it. We’d defund and disband the WHO for lying to our face while carrying water for China. Even the name “Covid” was made up to protect the Chinese. The WHO didn’t rename MERS, Zika, Ebola or any number of dangerous diseases with a regional connection. But for Covid? They bent over backwards to obfuscate Chinese responsibility. And Fauci? Lying to the American people and Congress over and over again while knowing good and well he helped fund it. And note the NIH and other US federal agencies aren’t required to disclose royalty payments from scientists in their employ. People making decisions about this virus literally got paid from the very corporations creating the treatments. If any scientist that had any influence got paid a single dollar from a company benefiting from their decisions — that’s a conflict of interest of extraordinary proportions. If an Army general gets paid a royalty from a defense contractor that general would be thrown in prison. Rick Marcinko went to federal prison for allegedly doing when happens all the time in our national health agencies.
The world should be outraged and Fauci should be in prison. What would we do differently? Not fund Chinese research. Demand full and absolute transparency from our public health agencies especially when it comes to research funding and financial ties to those who profited immensely from this.
Rand Paul’s questioning of Fauci was spot on. But people are too blinded by political parties to open their eyes.
For those with a bit more background in the sciences, there's an increasingly massive amount of evidence to support Zoonotic origin. Philipp Markolin has a good rundown: https://protagonistfuture.substack.com/p/natures-neglected-g... Most of the "evidence" for lab leak is just weird insinuation -- it's increasingly hard to pin down what the advocates for that position are even arguing (e.g. whether it's a natural vir…
Most of the "evidence" against lab-leak is just weird insinuation. Speculation about how the virus wasn't created wholly synthetically: nobody is seriously arguing it was, or it wouldn't be SARS-family. Arguments that the spike protein binding domain wasn't synthetically engineered: it didn't have to be. It could have been serial passage in humanized mice, considering that's what Daszak and co had literally proposed…
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This is not true. Ralph Baric developed (and patented) a seamless technique to assemble coronaviruses in 2002 [1]. Baric was a close collaborator of the Coronavirus group at WIV. Since then there has been even more progress. Since 2015 or so it's been possible to "print" DNA of any sequence. In fact as COVID started to spread in China and the sequence was released, a Swiss lab used this technology to print the genome…
> insert a Furin site, swap out an RBD, whatever, you can literally do it with a text editor and copy and paste. Saved a lot of money this year making Covid-19 at home using the SARS viruses I already have. Takes like 2 seconds
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> and I feel few people actually have legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth Not to be glib, but what would be a legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth? That this plausibly could have been of natural origin would seem to override any value in discerning where it actually came from. If it was a lab leak, "Oops." We hastened it occuring naturally by some amount of time. Lots of people…
Perhaps we could hold those responsible accountable? Especially if it came from research Fauci said wasn’t happening but actually was? Specifically gain of function. Look at how BP got hammered for an oil spill. Why wouldn’t China proportional penalties given that if it were a lab leak it lead to a global economic and health disaster. That it was coincidence that the virus happening near a research facility where the…
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Less probable than such a coronavirus originating in Wuhan of all places?
The WIV was in Wuhan due to the proximity of coronaviruses and other bat-borne diseases like rhabdovirusus.. this line of logic is akin to blaming shark research centers in South Africa for nearby attacks.
Nowhere near Wuhan.