4 ms·

It's sad that it's so politicized, because there was definitely a coverup of at least the appearance of a lab leak and probably of a lab leak itself, but I disa

by ftxbro 3y ago

It's sad that it's so politicized, because there was definitely a coverup of at least the appearance of a lab leak and probably of a lab leak itself, but I disagree with the politics of basically everyone with that opinion. I know you guys probably haven't read the Vanity Fair reporting by Katherine Eban because I mean what hackers would read Vanity Fair but it was pretty convincing, especially if you read the supplementary materials and if you have any background in life sciences.

e40 3y ago
There was a recent NYT article about this (why ppl believe the lab leak hypothesis). Was eye opening for me. I read the Vanity Fair article and believed it, too.
wredue 3y ago
The only evidence I’ve seen is -some US agencies don’t outright reject it -labs around the world work on SARS viruses -early people said it may have leaks (and these people subsequently retracted those statements after research) -china And that’s literally it. What exactly is so convincing? People who actually study virus origins still seem to believe that Covid has markers of natural evolution. Lab leak theory tends to side step that fact though. The lab leak conspiracy theorists put more weight in to a head of department of energy over the virologists who state that he’s probably wrong. Do you have any papers from scientists that back up the lab leak?
- potatototoo99 3y ago
  The matter at hand is not how Covid originated but whether there was pressure to rush to the conclusion that it wasn't man-made.
  - vibrio 3y ago
    “Man-made”: What exactly does that mean? Creation of a virus de novo? A natural isolate passaged a couple of times? Somewhere in between?
    - baja_blast 3y ago
      Man-made as in a natural sample collected in the wild that was manipulated to bind to human ACE2.
- saalweachter 3y ago
  The thing I find annoying is that the lab leak narrative has shifted to: 1. Repeat the same things we've known since mid-2020. 2. Declare the lab-leak hypothesis vindicated. 3. Complain about being suppressed/censored. Repeating the same thing does not count as an argument, dammit.
  - dent9876543 3y ago
    I think the point being made by the “other side” is not so much that the lab leak is probable, not even that it is possible, but rather it’s about whether we’re being told the truth and treated like adults and allowed to make our own judgements.
- tonystubblebine 3y ago
  I liked this article (paywalled) that interviewed relevant scientists anonymously. Answers seemed to range from unclear to probably not. https://medium.com/the-nuance/i-asked-leading-covid-scientists-off-the-record-about-the-viruss-origins-and-the-lab-leak-fecbec71ee61 https://medium.com/the-nuance/i-asked-leading-covid-scientis...
- wendyshu 3y ago
  Well there's a whole book on it by Matt Ridley
  - wredue 3y ago
    I really don’t give a fuck what random perpetual contrarians have to say. The biologists who study viruses say that it has markers of natural evolution with at least 2 hops from human back to animal back to human.
    - gadders 3y ago
      "Yeah, not that evidence. I mean evidence by someone I like who agrees with me."
    - tripletao 3y ago
      No one is asserting that SARS-CoV-2 initially spilled from human to animal to human. You're perhaps misunderstanding the assertion from Pekar et al. that it spilled from animal to human twice (i.e., from Animal A to Human A forming Lineage A, and from Animal B to Human B forming Lineage B), in "The molecular epidemiology of multiple zoonotic origins of SARS-CoV-2". I think their argument is weak, and mostly agree with the criticisms in https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.10.10.511625v1 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.10.10.511625v1 I can at least repeat their argument correctly, though. You've also grossly mischaracterized the evidence for a research-related origin. For example, it's not that "labs around the world work on SARS viruses"--the WIV was one of only two labs in the world (with UNC) genetically manipulating coronaviruses in ways consistent with SARS-CoV-2, and has the largest collection of novel sarbecoviruses anywhere. David Relman (of Stanford) published a note in 2020, which I believe has aged quite well: https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.2021133117 https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.2021133117 Many other impeccably-credentialed academics consider this origin to be an open question. Bluntly, I don't think you're well-informed here. (Did you know that the 1977 flu killed ~700k people, and is uncontroversially accepted to have arisen from a research accident? If not, does that shift your priors on research-origin pandemics?) I would urge you to learn more from scientific sources, instead of repeating shallow headline claims.
- 762236 3y ago
  The papers are hard to publish since the politics pervade the peer reviewers and editors. But I've seen some in my Twitter feed from scientists that I follow, including one who became independently wealthy by making accurate predictions about how the pandemic would play out, which he was able to capitalize on since people weren't using their heads and so he had an advantage.
- everdrive 3y ago
  I think you've mentioned there currently there is only circumstantial evidence. However, broadly speaking circumstantial evidence can be very convincing for people. (and 'being convincing' is not the same thing as 'being true.') It's further the case that there is no hard forensic evidence (at least that I'm aware of currently) that this is natural. In other words, because there's not really a lot of hard forensic evidence available to people, it makes the the circumstantial evidence weigh heavier in people's minds. I also haven't followed this very closely, so if there is great specific evidence that I'm unaware of, I apologize. I'm not trying to advocate a particular position here, just trying to explain why the lab leak theory is convincing to people. In fact, I think a lot of people would take the list of evidence you've presented and draw the opposite conclusion that you have -- ie, that with the list you've provided, the lab leak is the likeliest conclusion. Just to reiterate, I'm not suggesting that circumstantial evidence _does_ prove anything, I'm only making the point that circumstantial evidence successfully convinces a large number of people.
  - baja_blast 3y ago
    Also keep in mind all the evidence in support of a natural origin is also circumstantial. So much so Worobey's paper included a photo Eddie Holmes took on his iPhone in 2014 of animals at a market as evidence. So we are working with ufology levels of evidence here. The fact that we lack so much data to support zoonosis when compared to the two previous coronavirus outbreak really stands out. We are missing: - an intermediate host being identified. Something that was identified within months for SARS and MERS. - Lack of non human mtDNA reads - Missing point mutations as the virus adapts towards humans. - Explanation on how the virus binds better toward human ACE2 than any other animal species. - Separate spillover events And the list goes on, it's honestly shocking

by ftxbro 3y ago

e40 3y ago

There was a recent NYT article about this (why ppl believe the lab leak hypothesis). Was eye opening for me. I read the Vanity Fair article and believed it, too.

wredue 3y ago

The only evidence I’ve seen is -some US agencies don’t outright reject it -labs around the world work on SARS viruses -early people said it may have leaks (and these people subsequently retracted those statements after research) -china And that’s literally it. What exactly is so convincing? People who actually study virus origins still seem to believe that Covid has markers of natural evolution. Lab leak theory tends to side step that fact though. The lab leak conspiracy theorists put more weight in to a head of department of energy over the virologists who state that he’s probably wrong. Do you have any papers from scientists that back up the lab leak?

potatototoo99 3y ago
The matter at hand is not how Covid originated but whether there was pressure to rush to the conclusion that it wasn't man-made.
- vibrio 3y ago
  “Man-made”: What exactly does that mean? Creation of a virus de novo? A natural isolate passaged a couple of times? Somewhere in between?
  - baja_blast 3y ago
    Man-made as in a natural sample collected in the wild that was manipulated to bind to human ACE2.
saalweachter 3y ago
The thing I find annoying is that the lab leak narrative has shifted to: 1. Repeat the same things we've known since mid-2020. 2. Declare the lab-leak hypothesis vindicated. 3. Complain about being suppressed/censored. Repeating the same thing does not count as an argument, dammit.
- dent9876543 3y ago
  I think the point being made by the “other side” is not so much that the lab leak is probable, not even that it is possible, but rather it’s about whether we’re being told the truth and treated like adults and allowed to make our own judgements.
tonystubblebine 3y ago
I liked this article (paywalled) that interviewed relevant scientists anonymously. Answers seemed to range from unclear to probably not. https://medium.com/the-nuance/i-asked-leading-covid-scientists-off-the-record-about-the-viruss-origins-and-the-lab-leak-fecbec71ee61 https://medium.com/the-nuance/i-asked-leading-covid-scientis...
wendyshu 3y ago
Well there's a whole book on it by Matt Ridley
- wredue 3y ago
  I really don’t give a fuck what random perpetual contrarians have to say. The biologists who study viruses say that it has markers of natural evolution with at least 2 hops from human back to animal back to human.
  - gadders 3y ago
    "Yeah, not that evidence. I mean evidence by someone I like who agrees with me."
  - tripletao 3y ago
    No one is asserting that SARS-CoV-2 initially spilled from human to animal to human. You're perhaps misunderstanding the assertion from Pekar et al. that it spilled from animal to human twice (i.e., from Animal A to Human A forming Lineage A, and from Animal B to Human B forming Lineage B), in "The molecular epidemiology of multiple zoonotic origins of SARS-CoV-2". I think their argument is weak, and mostly agree with the criticisms in https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.10.10.511625v1 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.10.10.511625v1 I can at least repeat their argument correctly, though. You've also grossly mischaracterized the evidence for a research-related origin. For example, it's not that "labs around the world work on SARS viruses"--the WIV was one of only two labs in the world (with UNC) genetically manipulating coronaviruses in ways consistent with SARS-CoV-2, and has the largest collection of novel sarbecoviruses anywhere. David Relman (of Stanford) published a note in 2020, which I believe has aged quite well: https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.2021133117 https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.2021133117 Many other impeccably-credentialed academics consider this origin to be an open question. Bluntly, I don't think you're well-informed here. (Did you know that the 1977 flu killed ~700k people, and is uncontroversially accepted to have arisen from a research accident? If not, does that shift your priors on research-origin pandemics?) I would urge you to learn more from scientific sources, instead of repeating shallow headline claims.
762236 3y ago
The papers are hard to publish since the politics pervade the peer reviewers and editors. But I've seen some in my Twitter feed from scientists that I follow, including one who became independently wealthy by making accurate predictions about how the pandemic would play out, which he was able to capitalize on since people weren't using their heads and so he had an advantage.
everdrive 3y ago
I think you've mentioned there currently there is only circumstantial evidence. However, broadly speaking circumstantial evidence can be very convincing for people. (and 'being convincing' is not the same thing as 'being true.') It's further the case that there is no hard forensic evidence (at least that I'm aware of currently) that this is natural. In other words, because there's not really a lot of hard forensic evidence available to people, it makes the the circumstantial evidence weigh heavier in people's minds. I also haven't followed this very closely, so if there is great specific evidence that I'm unaware of, I apologize. I'm not trying to advocate a particular position here, just trying to explain why the lab leak theory is convincing to people. In fact, I think a lot of people would take the list of evidence you've presented and draw the opposite conclusion that you have -- ie, that with the list you've provided, the lab leak is the likeliest conclusion. Just to reiterate, I'm not suggesting that circumstantial evidence _does_ prove anything, I'm only making the point that circumstantial evidence successfully convinces a large number of people.
- baja_blast 3y ago
  Also keep in mind all the evidence in support of a natural origin is also circumstantial. So much so Worobey's paper included a photo Eddie Holmes took on his iPhone in 2014 of animals at a market as evidence. So we are working with ufology levels of evidence here. The fact that we lack so much data to support zoonosis when compared to the two previous coronavirus outbreak really stands out. We are missing: - an intermediate host being identified. Something that was identified within months for SARS and MERS. - Lack of non human mtDNA reads - Missing point mutations as the virus adapts towards humans. - Explanation on how the virus binds better toward human ACE2 than any other animal species. - Separate spillover events And the list goes on, it's honestly shocking