zlacker

>>codech+(OP)
Anybody who has ever worked in a wet lab, or a lab of any sort, knows that accidents happen. All the time. Things catch fire, things are dropped, labeling issues happen, anything you can think of.

I worked for many years in a lab, the accidental leak hypothesis was and still is what I consider the most probable. Calculate the joint probability of everything we know about the origin of SARS-CoV-2 happening and it should be obvious that the "lab leak" should be _thoroughly_ investigated before dismissing it.

>>tpfour+88
What makes lab leak more probable than cross species transfer, something that happens all the time?

>>542458+B8
It's the joint probability of everything we know.

p(Epidemic started in Wuhan) * p(origin in market right next to lab) * p(lab is one of 3 in the world to conduct gain-of-function research on conronaviruses) * p(lab scientists were notably sick prior to outbreak) * p(no accident ever happening in a lab) * p(et cetera) = very small number.

That's not evidence per se, but it does show you how probable a human error is.

>>tpfour+da
I can’t help but feel you’re taking all the “for” factors and none of the “against”, then bending the “for” factors even further.

Calling the market “right next to the lab” is a bit of a stretch - it’s a three and a half hour walk.

The scientists getting sick early doesn’t actually seem to be confirmed - there’s still debate in the US intelligence community whether it’s true. And going to the hospital because you’re sick means something a bit different in China where primary care is rare.

And as for “against”... no mention of the virus not matching any backbones in use for genetic experimentation, or the suboptimal binding to humans, both of which would suggest against engineering.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7095063/

>>542458+Fb
> no mention of the virus not matching any backbones in use for genetic experimentation, or the suboptimal binding to humans

Are you going to cite sources? And then are you going to cite the other sources which have addressed both of these weak counter arguments? Some of us have done a lot of homework on this one, so you need to bring your A game.

>>jkhdig+uh
The optimal binding for humans would have been SARS-COV1 at that time, so the fact it was not reused shows the suboptimality.

>>henear+rr
There is a vast amount of unpublished research, not because of malicious intentions, but because it's either still ongoing, or abandoned, or postponed, or waiting for other results, or for review, or qualified specialists to help, whatever.

The VF article specifically mentions that the closest known virus was 96% similar (vs 90% for SARS-CoV-1), and had actually been renamed by the scientists studying it and that fact hadn't been put forward to the community.

It can still be shown that this has a completely natural (i.e. no human error involved) origin, but the burden of proof gets higher every day. It's much more probable that human error is involved, which is something that happens every day.

>>tpfour+fh1
General closeness does not guarantee that the binding site was as much efficient.

The SARS-CoV-1 had a spike protein binding very efficiently to humans, but that was not the case for the other, hence the above said suboptimality.