zlacker

In hindsight, I'm not happy with the word "claim" either, but I don't want to edit the comment again.

Let's go with "hypothesis" for the sake of argument:

In this case, we have a basket of competing hypotheses, none of which have any solid evidence going for them.

Yet, some of these hypotheses have not been dismissed as conspiracy theories. Those were the hypotheses that conveniently fit a "humans encroach on wildlife"-narrative.

I'm just pointing this out as "interesting", I'm not arguing that this circumstance gives validity to one hypothesis over another.

>>incrud+(OP)
In the past, we have seen...

So we have prior evidence...so we give more weight...

The investigators should examine all possibilities, of course.

Repeating the most “exciting” theory on Opinion News night after night...

>>mellin+V
We have prior evidence for both lab escapes and gain-of-function experiments on coronaviruses (in Wuhan, no less).

Assigning weights to these circumstances can be done arbitrarily, to the point where the lab escape hypothesis becomes the most plausible one:

https://www.rootclaim.com/analysis/What-is-the-source-of-COV...

>>incrud+v2
Sure, when you get the evidence let me know.

Speculate all you want.

I’ve never heard of the escapes. Perhaps we watch different news sources and you spend a lot of time reading different stories.

I’ve got 55 years of hearing about viruses jumping from animals so my priors are different.

AIDS, SARS, swine flu,...

By the way, the last thing I want to be shown is some random sight on the Internet as evidence. Climate change deniers live by these sites