Um I shared analysis 15 days ago from a doctor who did an in-depth analysis and determined it to be from a lab. My post got one comment. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25965751
Disclaimer: I didn't read much of the analysis you linked. I'm not a virologist, but I do have a PhD in Bayesian Statistics.
As a general rule, I don't take this kind of analysis via repeated repeated repeated repeated repeated repeated repeated application of Bayes' Rule with somewhat-to-completely arbitrary probabilities at each step very seriously. At all.
It's a kind of gish gallop [1] with additional window dressing purporting to wrap it all up into one easy number. From a probabilistic point of view it ignores any dependency between observed facts, which is a serious issue but not necessarily the most damning one.
This particular case is even worse than usual. According to a quick Ctrl-F-aided skim of the document, the author doesn't identify a single fact that increases the probability of zoonotic origin, which is extremely suspicious. If every single available fact in a complicated issue points to the same conclusion that's probably because you are messing with your facts, not because that's how things actually are.
After noticing the one-sided-ness of the Bayesian updates I rolled my eyes and closed the tab.
Tests with thresholds so high may detect not just live virus but also genetic fragments, leftovers from infection that pose no particular risk — akin to finding a hair in a room long after a person has left, Dr. Mina said.
The author is CEO of ATOS Therapeutics. He has invented seven FDA-approved pharmaceuticals which have helped over 80 million people. He has been cities over 9,000 in various works. I heard his company's breast cancer treatment had a major win last week - phase 2 so successful that it's being halted and moved immediately to phase 3. I don't think it's fair to put his work in the YouTube loon bucket.
> phase 2 so successful that it's being halted and moved immediately to phase 3
Doesn't that sound super fishy to you, too good to be true, doesn't sound like it would be legal if you think about it for a second, that sort of thing?
Substantial peer feedback has been received that this record does not follow the norms of scientific rigour or balance, and thus the main claims may not stand the test of scientific scrutiny.
