3 ms·

Are you talking about a lab-leak hypothesis? When did it became a theory?

telmo 3y ago
How could lab-leak ever become a theory? A theory is an explanation of some repeatable pattern of phenomena that is observed in nature and that can be empirically verified. "Lab-leak" is a single possible event, that may or not have happened. The most that can happen is for strong evidence to emerge for or against the hypothesis that this specific event occurred.
- Retric 3y ago
  There’s plenty of debated scientific theories around single events such as what killed off the dinosaurs or how old the universe is etc. Testability happens when you accurately predict what evidence will be found, ie there’s excess iridium globally at the K-T boundary. Similarly there’s theories around collections of events such as the timing of the ice ages which are collectively significant.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    There is, but all possibly viable theories will have to incorporate the available evidence.
    - Retric 3y ago
      Mostly, some of the available evidence in any domain will come from experimental error etc. Even the hard sciences gets messy at the edges.
  - telmo 3y ago
    That is a very good point, you have convinced me.
- eimrine 3y ago
  > "Lab-leak" is a single possible event I don't agree because there are plethora of possible details depending on level of conspiracy. Was the virus synthesized at least partly? Was the virus selected from a number of not so harmful viruses? Was the virus went from naively non-infected bat when the fact is that it was infected? Was the lab-leak done intentionally, kind of something able to pause WW3? And so on and on.
spamizbad 3y ago
It didn’t. There’s some evidence (taken in isolation) that might point to such a thing could potentially occur but data and historic evidence points to the wet market. At this point I feel like the argument is over some broader meta-argument that the lab leak hypothesis was dismissed too aggressively and the consensus formed too quickly over the wet market.
- stringsandchars 3y ago
  > but data and historic evidence points to the wet market Because almost no-one has covered this news, you may have missed that the data pointing at the wet-market (from Worobey et al) has been thoroughly debunked using solid scientific data.
willcipriano 3y ago
You empiricists often loose the plot when it comes to these sort of matters. A thought experiment: A murder during a fancy dinner party. Victim was shot in the head with a 9mm round. Guest A is very evasive and was in the vicinity where the body was found. Guest A is known to have a 9mm handgun. Guest A quickly destroys his handgun and forensics cannot recover any information from it. Guest A writes a letter explaining that the shot came from outside the house, without any mention of his potential role in the murder, and his friends at the local newspaper not only run the letter, citing him as a expert, but run hit pieces that anyone claiming otherwise is a racist. Reason allows us to know Guest A was involved. In the absence of evidence sometimes reason is all you have. This is one of those cases, no science is required just a little life experience.
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  This analogy gets a little strained when wild Glocks breed in the vicinity of the home, and have randomly shot people fairly regularly over the course of the house's existence. "Guest A quickly destroys his handgun" is, thus far, not supported by evidence in the lab leak hypothesis, which posits but has never proven the existence of samples of SARS-CoV-2 in the lab.

How could lab-leak ever become a theory? A theory is an explanation of some repeatable pattern of phenomena that is observed in nature and that can be empirically verified. "Lab-leak" is a single possible event, that may or not have happened. The most that can happen is for strong evidence to emerge for or against the hypothesis that this specific event occurred.

Retric 3y ago
There’s plenty of debated scientific theories around single events such as what killed off the dinosaurs or how old the universe is etc. Testability happens when you accurately predict what evidence will be found, ie there’s excess iridium globally at the K-T boundary. Similarly there’s theories around collections of events such as the timing of the ice ages which are collectively significant.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  There is, but all possibly viable theories will have to incorporate the available evidence.
  - Retric 3y ago
    Mostly, some of the available evidence in any domain will come from experimental error etc. Even the hard sciences gets messy at the edges.
- telmo 3y ago
  That is a very good point, you have convinced me.
eimrine 3y ago
> "Lab-leak" is a single possible event I don't agree because there are plethora of possible details depending on level of conspiracy. Was the virus synthesized at least partly? Was the virus selected from a number of not so harmful viruses? Was the virus went from naively non-infected bat when the fact is that it was infected? Was the lab-leak done intentionally, kind of something able to pause WW3? And so on and on.

spamizbad 3y ago

It didn’t. There’s some evidence (taken in isolation) that might point to such a thing could potentially occur but data and historic evidence points to the wet market. At this point I feel like the argument is over some broader meta-argument that the lab leak hypothesis was dismissed too aggressively and the consensus formed too quickly over the wet market.

stringsandchars 3y ago
> but data and historic evidence points to the wet market Because almost no-one has covered this news, you may have missed that the data pointing at the wet-market (from Worobey et al) has been thoroughly debunked using solid scientific data.

willcipriano 3y ago

You empiricists often loose the plot when it comes to these sort of matters. A thought experiment: A murder during a fancy dinner party. Victim was shot in the head with a 9mm round. Guest A is very evasive and was in the vicinity where the body was found. Guest A is known to have a 9mm handgun. Guest A quickly destroys his handgun and forensics cannot recover any information from it. Guest A writes a letter explaining that the shot came from outside the house, without any mention of his potential role in the murder, and his friends at the local newspaper not only run the letter, citing him as a expert, but run hit pieces that anyone claiming otherwise is a racist. Reason allows us to know Guest A was involved. In the absence of evidence sometimes reason is all you have. This is one of those cases, no science is required just a little life experience.

ceejayoz 3y ago
This analogy gets a little strained when wild Glocks breed in the vicinity of the home, and have randomly shot people fairly regularly over the course of the house's existence. "Guest A quickly destroys his handgun" is, thus far, not supported by evidence in the lab leak hypothesis, which posits but has never proven the existence of samples of SARS-CoV-2 in the lab.