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What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

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Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#91

Post by ShannonLimiter »

stetrain wrote: post #12

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…

> 1) Understanding the origin doesn't change the consequences or response to the pandemic

I have the opposite opinion.

If there was a lab leak and a coverup, this meant that the Chinese government likely knew earlier and had more information about the nature of the virus and how it spread. That could have saved millions of lives.

We spent the first several months of the pandemic under the belief that it wasn't airborne. This ended up being false.

If this was a lab leak, it means that this kind of research is far more dangerous than we've been lead to believe and continuing without appropriate safeguards puts us at great risk.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#92

Post by throwawaymaths »

fabian2k wrote: post #51
throwawaymaths wrote: post #2

The lab-leak hypothesis is meta-scientific. When it was first tossed around, the lab leak hypothesis generated two predictions: 1. We would find evidence that someone was doing experiments on furin cleavage sites in coronaviruses. 2. We would find that the furin cleavage site matched a known sequence. We did not find 2, which should have been easy to find. Eventually, we found 1, since a rejected DARPA grant proposal…

I don't find any arguments around the furin cleavage site convincing. This kind of cleavage site is pretty small and the number of variations that have good efficiency is limited. The presence of a specific furin cleavage site is not clear evidence of genetic manipulation.

Evidence comes with context. We're asserting that something like this would be found. Then we found it! After not finding it initially, even. The inability to find it initially should tell you something about the general evolutionary drift around these sites to begin with.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#94

Post by [deleted] »

UIUC_06 wrote: post #39
spamizbad wrote: post #29

I will just say this: Interest in developing and deploying nuclear power dramatically declined after Three Mile Island and the Chernobyl incidents. This lead to an increased reliance on carbon-based energy sources like Coal and Natural Gas, likely killing hundreds of thousands over the years. I think skittish virologists rightly concluded that a lab-leak mea culpa would have a similar effect on virology and perhaps b…

Excuse me, but scientists are not public policy makers. Their job is to follow the evidence, not publish based on what they think will happen if they do.

[deleted]

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#95

Post by Izkata »

edvards wrote: post #35
throwawaymaths wrote: post #2

The lab-leak hypothesis is meta-scientific. When it was first tossed around, the lab leak hypothesis generated two predictions: 1. We would find evidence that someone was doing experiments on furin cleavage sites in coronaviruses. 2. We would find that the furin cleavage site matched a known sequence. We did not find 2, which should have been easy to find. Eventually, we found 1, since a rejected DARPA grant proposal…

Can you tell more about 1 and 2, maybe with some sources added? this is pretty big

2: https://arkmedic.substack.com/p/how-to-blast-your-way-to-the...

Search for "moderna" then scroll up a bit.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#96

Post by encoderer »

sumy23 wrote: post #62
NationalPark wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you link some sources here? Call me skeptical, but if the evidence is as convincing as you make it sound, then it implies a pretty widespread conspiracy among experts (of many countries and affiliations) who would understand the implications yet are deliberately mis-communicating via their podcasts, news appearances, papers in famous journals, etc. Are there any papers published on this or is it just in the book…

This article from Vanity Fair does a good job collection the circumstantial evidence surrounding the lab leak theory: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/03/the-virus-hunting-no... The tl;dr is that there is a group called EcoHealth Alliance that was working with the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) making novel coronaviruses by modifying the furin cleavage site of coronaviruses taken from bats. The WIV (along with…

Thank you for the write up. I’ll add a funny line from Jon Stewart: if an outbreak of chocolate goodness happens outside Hershey, Pennsylvania you don’t need to search for the bat that ate the cocoa bean. It’s the factory, stupid.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#97

Post by 1024core »

9/11 cost us ~ 3000 lives? And we spent 20 years fighting wars, killing 100s of 1000s of people, bombing the shit out of entire countries, and trillions of dollars in trying to exact revenge.

COVID kills 1,000,000 people (and counting...), which is 333X the death toll from 9/11; and we just shrug and do nothing?

Just doesn't compute.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#98

Post by fleddr »

stetrain wrote: post #12

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…

Your "no priority" stance doesn't hold ground if the article is to be believed. The lab leak theory wasn't just low on the agenda, it was actively avoid altogether.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#99

Post by rtkwe »

sixQuarks wrote: post #48

Let’s not forget that talking about the lab leak hypothesis last year resulted in censorship among social media platforms and YouTube This is why free speech is important, it is impossible to rely on “fact checkers”.

The lab leak hypothesis was also pretty tightly coupled with the bioweapon/intentional release theory which is part of why it received so much push back.

Also I don't recall the specific fact check messages but if they were in line with "there's no hard evidence of a lab leak" I'd say that's still pretty accurate.

Re: What happened to the lab-leak hypothesis?

#100

Post by dekhn »

Izkata wrote: post #95
edvards wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you tell more about 1 and 2, maybe with some sources added? this is pretty big

2: https://arkmedic.substack.com/p/how-to-blast-your-way-to-the... Search for "moderna" then scroll up a bit.

"Using BLAST is easy". Yes, it's very easy to use BLAST to convince yourself of something that is not correct. It's a power tool being used by idiots most of the time, no wonder fingers get cut off.
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