What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis? • Hacker News Board

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#511

Post by elil17 » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 12:59 AM UTC

tripletao wrote: post #504

ethbr0 wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

> Or, in other words, what would we do differently if it were a lab leak? If the virus is a laboratory construct (e.g., a recombinant of two novel natural viruses with a human-chosen FCS; we can argue about how likely that was, but no genomic evidence can exclude that), then it would near-certainly never have existed without that laboratory manipulation. The pandemic could near-certainly have been permanently avoided…

I'd argue should be doing more to ensure lab biohazard safety regardless of the origin of COVID-19, which is one reason I don't think knowing the answer has a lot of practical significance.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#512

Post by notriddle » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:02 AM UTC

scarmig wrote: post #426

mikeyouse wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But we've pretty much established that it was a virus of natural origin - all of our molecular techniques leave signs, so an honest discussion would foreclose that possibility. That doesn't eliminate the possibility that it was a natural virus which had been collected and subsequently escaped due to bad lab technique but the former is too attractive a conspiracy theory to let go..

> That doesn't eliminate the possibility that it was a natural virus which had been collected and subsequently escaped due to bad lab technique but the former is too attractive a conspiracy theory to let go.. For some reason most discussions claiming that the lab leak hypothesis is a conspiracy theory focus 90% of their effort arguing against being a bioengineered weapon and little time arguing against the actual str…

A zoonotic jump that happened to occur inside of a wildlife research facility due to bad lab technique is not that scary. If it's proven true, it's pretty likely that the lab operators will fix it. Could you imagine being the guy who caused the COVID-19 pandemic by forgetting to sanitize some tool? I bet whoever did it would be the single most careful and clean research scientist in the entire world after that kind of episode.

The bioweapon theory, however, is politically useful. If you want to start a war, or at least trade sanctions, a villain is a good place to start. Someone violating international law and gene splicing themselves a pandemic in a bottle is exactly the right kind of comic book supervillainy, without being technically impossible.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#513

Post by rzz3 » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:05 AM UTC

ethbr0 wrote: post #410

rzz3 wrote: post #278

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…

>Not to be glib, but what would be a legitimate scientific interest in discovering the truth?

Meaning, someone who didn’t walk in with a bias and look around the room for things that support said bias. This debate is packed with armchair experts who seem to have a larger interest in the politics than the science.

>If it was a lab leak, "Oops." …

Oops?!

>Or, in other words, what would we do differently if it were a lab leak? Increase biocontainment protocols?

If you’re like most of us on HN, at work, when we make big mistakes that cost our companies money and users, we have thorough retrospectives, learn from our mistakes, identify root causes, build for redundancy and high availability, and prevent the same incident from ever happening twice. That’s what I’d expect to see if the lab leak (which you strangely keep calling human origin, as if a naturally occurring virus can’t leak from a lab) were proven.

> Okay, so we've made human-origin less likely. We still have to deal with naturally-occurring in the future.

We have naturally-occurring forest fires, yet as a society, we sure seem to put a lot of effort into stopping “human-origin” fires. This sounds a bit “fuck it, why bother trying to make anything better, something bad will always happen”.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#514

Post by pclmulqdq » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:06 AM UTC

ethbr0 wrote: post #489

briandear wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

And if we did all of that, how much would it decrease our future risk of zoonotic spillover?

It would not, but it would sure as hell reduce the risk of a lab leak. The whole idea of GoF research was to preempt evolution on bad viruses. If instead, the research is causing the evolution of bad viruses, it should be shut down.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#515

Post by 0x20cowboy » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:16 AM UTC

I am all for looking into things, but this all sounds really familiar https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discredited_HIV/AIDS_origins...

I think there is something in human psychology that gains some kind of comfort thinking everything is controlled by humans. Like accepting that we live in a chaotic universe we have no control over is scarier than some imagined Dr. Evil character that we can blame events on.

Not saying it’s not worth looking into, just that a lot of these same people think there is a laser satellite starting forest fires.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#516

Post by ellopoppit » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:20 AM UTC

affgrff wrote: post #139

mathieubordere wrote: post #116

A lab specialized in investigating Coronaviruses in the city where the first outbreak was, is at least suspicious imo. The fact that the Chinese authorities weren't exactly helpful (to my knowledge) in debunking the lab-leak hypothesis is extra suspicious. But then again, if they really would have wanted to cover it up, they might have looked for another city to point to as the source of the outbreak, I don't know ho…

It is a little suspicious, but also not too far fetched: Where would you put a lab researching Coronaviruses? Somewhere near where it exists in the wild.

>Where would you put a lab researching Coronaviruses?

Antarctica perhaps? Not in the middle of a freaking city.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#517

Post by Izkata » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:20 AM UTC

LordDragonfang wrote: post #343

daveevad wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure that is correct. In a subsequently FOIA'd email, Fauci told a colleague on February 5, 2020. > Masks are really for infected people to prevent them from spreading infection to people who are not infected rather than protecting uninfected people from acquiring infection.

That's a well known fact about how masks work in general, yes. They have a large effect on transmission from the wearer and a comparatively small effect in preventing transmission to the wearer. However, when you have a limited supply of masks, it's impossible to give them out to every potentially-infected person, so saving them for high-risk people (like healthcare professionals, who also have the highest risk of be…

Only with droplet spread. Once we're in the realm of aerosol spread, as with SARS-CoV-2, you need N95 filters or better to stop them. The virus just goes around or through the cloth masks everyone was wearing.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#518

Post by ethbr0 » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:22 AM UTC

b112 wrote: post #500

ethbr0 wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if we did all of that, how much would it decrease our future risk of zoonotic spillover?

The comment you are responding to, talks about alleged malfeasance, and morally bankrupt acts. Your response is, oh well? In terms of spillover, there is zero guarantee it would happen naturally. For any virus, it could, it may, and for some it has. But for any specific virus, it is absolutely not guaranteed. And purposefully training for human compatibility in a lab, clearly makes that maybe, a certainty, and if ins…

No, my response was not "Oh well."

It was "And if we did all of that, how much would it decrease our future risk of zoonotic spillover?"

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#519

Post by tripletao » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:22 AM UTC

elil17 wrote: post #511

tripletao wrote: post #504

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or, in other words, what would we do differently if it were a lab leak? If the virus is a laboratory construct (e.g., a recombinant of two novel natural viruses with a human-chosen FCS; we can argue about how likely that was, but no genomic evidence can exclude that), then it would near-certainly never have existed without that laboratory manipulation. The pandemic could near-certainly have been permanently avoided…

I'd argue should be doing more to ensure lab biohazard safety regardless of the origin of COVID-19, which is one reason I don't think knowing the answer has a lot of practical significance.

If you'd like to see greater regulation of biological research, then I'm pretty sure strong evidence that it killed millions of people would help with political support for that? So I'm not sure why we wouldn't look, especially when many obvious paths (e.g. subpoenas for all data potentially containing early viral genomes as contamination, like from Illumina's cloud services) remain unexplored.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#520

Post by SiempreViernes » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 1:22 AM UTC

gojomo wrote: post #447

SiempreViernes wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One animal shedded... two variants of virus Maybe, but more likely two different ones out of the many millions of poorly documented animals in the East Asia animal trade. Certainly more plausible than a single lab engineering two very distinct linages for no good reason. > That didn't mean that actually outracing nature to make the hypothesized worse viruses in accelerated lab processes was a good risk-reducing ide…

How would two different non-bat animals shed two different (but closely-related) bat viruses, in a market with no bats, and far away from the bat caves where related viruses are documented? And further, manage this with no evidence of any other animals infected with related viruses in that region, nor along the trade routes any such animals/viruses must have followed? Those were the two luckiest bat-viruses ever! On…

Uh, are you aware that many different species have confirmed infections of Covid-19? The US department of agriculture has a list of different species where the virus was found: https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/dashboards/tableau/sars-das... So evidently the virus has many options for intermediary hosts, there's no reason to require that there must be a bat nest directly on top of the market.

Further, note that we've found very similar Covid viruses in bats that are from caves around ~1000 km apart (RshSTT182 and RmYN02) while the individuals of the species have never been observed to move more than 200 km. Clearly virus strains can get very far even if they aren't literally carried all the way there by a single individual.

But of course, you also had your own evidence: the allegedly highly suspicious fact that a group of academics hadn't finished all their old projects before starting new ones. Oh yes, how unsurprising.