If there was concrete evidence (of the form I described) beyond speculation, I don't know about it. Bats have a relative of the virus, but as was said further up in the conversation and if I understand correctly, it was found very far away from Wuhan in caves that are a lot more interesting for coronavirus researchers than for wildlife traders.
> sars-cov-1
That was the original SARS (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SARS), which from what I understand didn't have the features that made COVID so suspect and whose existence probably was also one of the main drivers of funding for coronavirus gain-of-function research, so the causality there could go either way.
> I have to say I'm pretty skeptical of the whole lab leak theory thing - and it's hard to pin down what a lab leak means - there seems to be a spectrum of theories that range from a virus sampled from natural origins that escaped a lab in Wuhan to a fully lab created artificial virus, and plenty of theories in between.
I think it's more than fair to be skeptical - as a 60% believer, in a world where it was the accepted gospel, I'd be one of the skeptics! - but I don't see why "there are different theories that could be glossed as 'lab leak'" is any sort of evidence that the total probability of all the theories that could be glossed as such is lower (relative to the situation where there is exactly one theory).
> But at the end of the day, it seems like most people just want it to be true for some reason; perhaps they want to blame China for the pandemic or they just want some explanation that's more satisfying than a random mutation of a virus at the wrong time and the wrong place brought the world to its knees and is still causing downstream affects throughout the global economy through to today and probably will for years to come.
I mean, I could say the same thing of the converse - it seems like most people on the natural origin side just want it to be false for some reason; perhaps they are morally offended by the idea that someone would blame China for the pandemic or certain politicians in the US would get to strut around feeling vindicated, or want some explanation that's more reassuring than that the people who we considered to be our intellectual vanguard to have been short-sighted and irresponsible and caused a lot of damage.
I don't feel a desire to see anything that could be read as "blaming China for the pandemic"; I'm generally for science and skeptical of excessive demands for safety and think that shit happens, and wouldn't even "blame" the Soviet Union for Chernobyl. However, in this particular case, _if_ it were to turn out it was a lab leak, there are obvious comparatively cheap actions we could and should take to make a repeat less likely, and moreover in that situation we would have a strong case to increase oversight over the institutions that worked so hard to try to prevent us from coming to that conclusion (although this last thing might also amount to another grounds on which some people will want the lab leak hypothesis to be false), hopefully increasing our society's general ability to solve problems.
Perhaps I should ask you as well - what would you consider sufficient evidence to convince you that it was a lab leak?
As I said, I really don't have much insight into virology, but I also get a lot of what I'd classify as "god of the gaps"[0] type feelings when people start talking about gaps in the documented evolutionary record of the virus. I suspect there was not much interest in studying the evolution of corona viruses in raccoon dogs of the Wuhan region prior to 2020, so if there's a spotty history of all the variations that it went through, I'm not really surprised.
> but I don't see why "there are different theories that could be glossed as 'lab leak'" is any sort of evidence that the total probability of all the theories that could be glossed as such is lower (relative to the situation where there is exactly one theory)
I didn't say that to mean that I think a spectrum of lab leak theories changes the odds of whether or not it is true; what I'm saying is that I don't know that there is a coherent story of what the "lab leak theory" is supposed to mean; I've seen many different ones. And without a single coherent theory, it just looks like anomaly hunting to me, which is a feature of grand conspiracy theories.
And yes, without a singular theory of a lab leak, I don't understand the goals of those pushing them, but seeking a coherent, understandable explanation for complex and capricious natural phenomena seems like a natural human feature, and perhaps an adaptation to allow us to cognitively process the world around us; it also seems to me like the basis for religion.
> I mean, I could say the same thing of the converse - it seems like most people on the natural origin side just want it to be false for some reason;
I certainly see some of this, and some of it is I'm sure a backfire response to the people pushing the lab leak thing, or perhaps the wilder versions of the lab leak theory. But for myself, the natural origin just seems... natural. Viruses have existed since presumably the dawn of life and been with us and adapted along with us since long before we were homo sapiens, and this is most likely just another one.
As for what would I consider sufficient evidence of a lab leak? Again I don't know much about viruses, so as far as genomic/molecular analysis, a group of well respected authorities in the field who had reason to believe of an artificial tampering would be a nice start, but that will always be tough for me to interrogate and understand, and I have a hard time believing it could be truly definitive. Much better would be human evidence - notes from the lab, scientists espousing their role in the leak, etc...
> sars-cov-1
That was the original SARS (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SARS), which from what I understand didn't have the features that made COVID so suspect and whose existence probably was also one of the main drivers of funding for coronavirus gain-of-function research, so the causality there could go either way.
> I have to say I'm pretty skeptical of the whole lab leak theory thing - and it's hard to pin down what a lab leak means - there seems to be a spectrum of theories that range from a virus sampled from natural origins that escaped a lab in Wuhan to a fully lab created artificial virus, and plenty of theories in between.
I think it's more than fair to be skeptical - as a 60% believer, in a world where it was the accepted gospel, I'd be one of the skeptics! - but I don't see why "there are different theories that could be glossed as 'lab leak'" is any sort of evidence that the total probability of all the theories that could be glossed as such is lower (relative to the situation where there is exactly one theory).
> But at the end of the day, it seems like most people just want it to be true for some reason; perhaps they want to blame China for the pandemic or they just want some explanation that's more satisfying than a random mutation of a virus at the wrong time and the wrong place brought the world to its knees and is still causing downstream affects throughout the global economy through to today and probably will for years to come.
I mean, I could say the same thing of the converse - it seems like most people on the natural origin side just want it to be false for some reason; perhaps they are morally offended by the idea that someone would blame China for the pandemic or certain politicians in the US would get to strut around feeling vindicated, or want some explanation that's more reassuring than that the people who we considered to be our intellectual vanguard to have been short-sighted and irresponsible and caused a lot of damage.
I don't feel a desire to see anything that could be read as "blaming China for the pandemic"; I'm generally for science and skeptical of excessive demands for safety and think that shit happens, and wouldn't even "blame" the Soviet Union for Chernobyl. However, in this particular case, _if_ it were to turn out it was a lab leak, there are obvious comparatively cheap actions we could and should take to make a repeat less likely, and moreover in that situation we would have a strong case to increase oversight over the institutions that worked so hard to try to prevent us from coming to that conclusion (although this last thing might also amount to another grounds on which some people will want the lab leak hypothesis to be false), hopefully increasing our society's general ability to solve problems.
Perhaps I should ask you as well - what would you consider sufficient evidence to convince you that it was a lab leak?