Have you considered the possibility that your frustration with CTs around the globe on a variety of issues would cause you to have a knee-jerk negative reaction to anything which smells vaguely like one?
Attack the post, not the poster.
Well, organisations such as the WHO, IHREC and CDC have all determined that the evidence points to the wet market being the origin, based on all evidence available. They have not mentioned any evidence of other sources.
I disagree with that “i.e.”; the two things are different questions.
If the question is why is it CT territory, that’s because it is a theory positing an ongoing conspiracy.
If the question is why is that possibility not being taken seriously, it’s because there is no supporting evidence at this time.
If the question is why it is being treated as nutty, I would dispute that characterization.
Disagree.
It’s always fine to throw around hypotheses. Sometimes we’ve got nothing more to go on than intuition. But they’re not “worth” anything until evidence is presented or found,
Especially when we’re discussing some situation like the Kennedy assassination, the moon landings or coronavirus, where there’s already evidence supporting a particular set of events, and only speculation to suggest otherwise…the speculation is completely unwarranted and really doesn’t bear any consideration until evidence is found or presented.
If my knee-jerk reaction is “evidence first”, then good. My reflexes are in great shape!
“not mentioned any evidence of other sources” is not the same thing as “scientists say there’s no evidence that it came from the lab” especially in the context of the claim that this “means THEY LOOKED”.
I believe phrases like “CT territory” are commonly used to describe nutty theories, and that’s how I used it in the OP.
I’m not sure what “worth” anything means, especially in quotes.
I have zero evidence that anyone is planning to break into my house tonight. But I intend to lock my doors anyway. I also have zero evidence that I’m being bombarded by mind-control rays. I do not intend to wear a tin-foil hat. The difference is not in how much evidence there is for each possibility. There is zero evidence for both. The difference is in how plausible each one is.
I completely agree that evidence of one scenario would rule out the possibility of a competing scenario. If there was compelling evidence that the virus was introduced to the market from (wild-caught) animals being sold there, then that would rule out the competing notion that it was leaked from the lab. It’s my understanding that the market hypothesis is not much more than a working hypothesis at this time.
It was in thefirst cite I posted for you. Are you looking at all evidence, or only that which supports your theory?
The OP asks many questions. I’m directly answering them, and you are claiming that all of the questions really meant some straw man.
But OK, I’ll answer it again for you. If the question is “Why is the theory that it escaped from a virology lab being treated as nutty”, my answer is that I dispute the premise.
What do I win?
Because you said “[this hypothesis is] *worth *paying more attention to”. I disagree, and think it is not worth anything at this time.
False analogy. There is no claim being evaluated in your hypothetical: I would neither be affirming nor denying the claim that someone is going to break into my house tonight, only claiming it is possible for someone to try.
If you were only JAQing that hypothetically a virus could escape a virology lab, then sure. And if you are suggesting we take every imaginable precaution to prevent such a scenario…I’m right with you, brother.
But that’s a big difference from ignoring prima facie evidence and repeatedly JAQing a claim that has nothing behind it.
I addressed this when you first cited it.
That cite - including your quote- are about whether the virus was bio-engineered. As I said when you first cited this, I specifically made the distinction in the OP between the claim that the virus was bio-engineered and the general claim that it was leaked from the lab. You seemed to appreciate this at the time, because we exchanged several posts on the subject.
Please don’t keep bouncing back with further debunking of bio-engineering claims. It just wastes time and confuses things.
You don’t win anything. The thread was started in GQ. I’ve seen others referencing the “lab” theory as CT-type with a connotation of nuttiness, and I was wondering why this should be so, or if indeed it was (perhaps only the bio-engineering claim was considered nutty).
More than that - the possibility that someone could try is worth “paying attention to” in the rather concrete manner of locking your doors.
So perhaps on some scientific scorecard the lab hypothesis doesn’t rise to this or that level. But in the real world of actual possibilities it could well be out there, as long as it’s plausible. Which would be of possible interest to people more focused on what actually happened than in what level of scientific theory it falls under.
Please read the cite. It is NOT talking about bioengineering. It is talking about the non-engineered virus itself escaping from the lab.
The Chinese people, if I may be permitted a gross generalization, hold the Chinese government to be something close to God. War, Famine, Pestilence, and that rider on the white horse who’s role isn’t entirely clear. All the role of the government. As shown both by experience and by the insistence of the Communist Party that it is the core of every part of society.
Americans believe in conspiracy theories because experience taught them that government lies. The Chinese believe in conspiracy theories because experience has taught them that the government is at the center of everything.
You really don’t get the difference between the claim that a specific event *happened *versus the claim that a kind of event is possible, and the different standards of evidence for the two kinds of claim? Even after I just explained it?
Sure, and those fancy, hoity-toity sciencey types might say there’s no evidence that the moon landings were faked, and plenty of evidence that they did in fact happen. But the moon hoax hypothesis seems plausible to me, so it’s worth paying attention to. I’m just asking questions.
I’ve lived in China for the past 7 years. I disagree with this characterization. I hear plenty of criticism of the Chinese government, as well as awareness that they are only human. And lamenting that they cannot say these things publicly.
However, it is true that the Chinese people in general hold the government in high esteem. It is quite typical of countries rising out of economic poverty. It won’t last forever and the coronavirus and economic fallout may be an important test.
Maybe that’s how it started, but nowadays it’s very self-serving. People believe conspiracy theories that reinforce what they wanted to believe anyway. Many people even fart out ad hoc conspiracy theories to avoid accepting something in reality.
Broadly agree. Since there are many instances of the government making decisions on a whim that affect hundreds of millions of people, it does make a lot more hypotheses more plausible. (Before FP jumps in here: as I’ve said, plausibility doesn’t count for much, especially when there’s a competing explanation with supporting evidence).
You’ve evidently misunderstood the cite.
The context of the article is about various mutations in SARS-CoV-2 (in the receptor binding domain, and polybasic cleavage site), and the question is where and how those mutations arose. The article discusses various mechanisms by which these may have come about (selection in an animal host, or cryptic adaptation to humans), and then goes on to discuss the alternative possibility that they arose “during adaptation to passage in cell culture”, i.e. in the lab. That possibility is rejected as unlikely for reasons stated. But that’s all about how the SARS-CoV-2 with its mutations arose. It has zero bearing on whether it might have arisen via one of the other mechanisms discussed and been transmitted via the lab.
To the extent that it has a bearing on the question altogether, it’s in that if one were to argue that the mutations are indications of bio-engineering, then the authors present arguments against that and suggest that other explanations are more likely to account for these mutations. But that is not any indication the lab is not the source of the outbreak itself.
You didn’t “explain” anything, because you had nothing to explain. You simply declared it to be a “false analogy” and asserted that there’s a “big difference”. But it’s not a false analogy and there isn’t any difference at all.
But if you’re hung up on that, I’ll give you an example of the possibility “that a specific event *happened *” (I reject your word “claim” since this is not about claims but only about considering the possibility).
Suppose the police are investigating a murder. And they discover that there’s a known serial killer who lives a few houses down from the victim. But he has zero known connection to the victim or the murder. He is not the last guy to see him alive, he was not known to have interacted with him, etc. Using your “logic”, you would say that the possibility that this guy is the murderer should not even be considered, because there is no “evidence” connecting him to the murder, and the police should focus entirely on people who are connected via “evidence” (e.g. last guy to see him etc.) This is obviously ridiculous.
This is a specious comparison, and I highly doubt that the moon hoax hypothesis really “seems plausible” to you. You’re presenting it that way because you’re trying to obscure the key issue.
The reason the moon hoax is rightly rejected is not because of the ridiculous logical process that you’re trying to argue for. It’s because an enormous amount is known about the moon landing, and the evidence that it was real is overwhelming and the notion that it could have been faked is not plausible.
In an alternative universe, where as little was known about the moon landing as is currently known about the origins of the covid-19 outbreak, and where the possibility that the moon landing was faked was as plausible as the possibility that the covid virus escaped from the lab, then it would absolutely be worth considering that possibility. But the point is that that’s not the case, and therein lies the difference.
He’s not “attacking” anyone. It’s obvious that this is a debate fueled by opinion, not a general question with a specific answer.
It is not obviously ridiculous to investigate where the available evidence tells you to investigate. What’s ridiculous is to assume that when the police say “there’s zero connection to SK” they mean to ignore any evidence that would link the serial killer to this victim because they refuse to consider the possibility. They don’t, they simply do not have that evidence yet.
Back to the real situation… the CDC isn’t populated by morons. They know there’s a lab in Wuhan, they know that places that store viruses can be places viruses escape from. Because that’s their business.
The only way they ignore that possibility is if they’re criminally stupid, and they are not. The investigators gathered what evidence they could, and continue to do so, and if any of it points to the lab, you can bet that they’ll be on it like white on rice. Right now, the evidence points to a non-lab source, so that is where they should focus, but they will continue to gather a wide swath of evidence to help them understand this disease.
Anything can become a “debate fueled by opinion” if people happen to respond with opinions that the questioner disagrees with. That doesn’t mean that the original question wasn’t a legitimate GQ-type question or that the questioner was not interested in facts.
To repeat what I’ve said before, if you have a cite that the CDC or a similar body (e.g. WHO) have said “there’s zero connection to [the lab]” that would be valid. But you’ve not done that. For some reason you seem content to repeatedly imply that the CDC has said this, without backing it up.
[I would note that while the CDC et al would probably be interested in knowing whether it escaped from the lab, they probably have other priorities in dealing with it that they’re more focused on, especially as - if the hypothesis has anything to it - it’s not like the Chinese government is going to make it easy to find this out. So I wouldn’t expect that they’ve made this type of statement in any event.]
I agree with that and your general take on this. If the virus was not bio-engineered, and apparently nothing suggests it is, then whether it was a natural bat virus that was transmitted to humans (probably though intermediate hosts) via the mistakes of a lab or via a wild animal market isn’t really that relevant to the CDC. It would not be central to their investigation nor would they be much more able to determine those facts than anyone else, except by assuming honest and full information from Chinese official sources. Which would be stupid to assume (whether or not it could be assumed in some hypothetical involving the US govt, it manifestly can’t with the Chinese govt).
I believe the posts saying ‘all the evidence’ points to the market and none to the lab are overstating things. Information provided from China, which can’t be counted on as reliable somewhat points in that direction. IOW it’s not close to being known and maybe never be.
Treating as ‘fact’ that it came from the lab is CT. Dismissing that possibility is overboard counter-CT, stemming from various ‘counter-biases’ people often adopt in reaction to biases they perceive (‘why doubt the Chinese govt when the US govt lies all the time?’, a dubious idea IMO on more than one count, etc). If you really ‘stick to the evidence’, from reliable sources, there isn’t much either way.
I think calling this a conspiracy theory is a misuse of the term. Conspiracy theories imply some sort of bad intent by whoever did the act. In this case, since we all agree that the virus was not bio-engineered and the release wasn’t intentional, this is just an “alternate theory” for how it got started, if you ask me. It seems most likely that it was started by some animal-to-human transfer. It’s also possible, but seems less likely, that it started because some lab in China was researching the virus and accidentally let it out or someone working in the lab was accidentally infected.
So what? What’s the conspiracy? Just the Chinese government keeping that possibility on the DL?