3 ms·

The premise that additional hypotheses cause problems is against the basic idea of science.

• drekk 5y ago
  From the article: "Ironically the xenophobic instrumentalization of the lab-leak hypothesis may have made it harder for reasonable scientific voices to suggest and explore theories because so much time and effort has gone into containing the fallout from conspiratorial rhetoric." The idea that hypotheses can waste time is not against the basic idea of science. Especially when you can just move the goal posts, like with RaTG13 which was allegedly the engineered precursor until scientists proved it diverged from a common ancestor with COVID-19 anywhere from 40-70 years ago. Then the theory was that scientists engineered RaTG13 so it would merely look like they had diverged in that way. A lab leak hypothesis is within the realm of possibility. A lot of things are. What we choose to focus on also tells us a lot about what we choose to not take into account. One thing a lot of people didn't take into account is researchers could graph the uptick in crime against Asian Americans starting from the first #ChinaVirus tweet from President Trump. This isn't getting into the fact that we still haven't, for example, conclusively shown Ebola comes from a zoonotic reservoir. Weird how in 2013-2016 our relationship with China wasn't what it is today and nobody accused a country of bioengineering coronaviruses until white people got impacted by them.