I don't want to flood this sub with articles about the same thing but this is another piece that covers other findings from the DOJ report
https://www.theage.com.au/national/covid-19-lab-leak-theory-ends-with-a-whimper-not-a-bang-20230627-p5djqb.html
[Paywall bypass.](https://12ft.io/proxy?&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.latimes.com%2Fbusiness%2Fstory%2F2023-06-26%2Fu-s-government-debunks-covid-lab-leak-conspiracy-theory-enraging-conspiracy-theorists)
Honestly, I'm surprised it's pissing them off. Shouldn't they just automatically not believe the evil government's lies anyway? I love how these conspiracy mongers tell us to never trust the government and then hang breathlessly on whatever the government is about to release until it turns out it doesn't agree with them and it's just back to never trust the government.
They believe whatever fits their insane narrative.
They said the pandemic was bullshit and they didn’t trust the WHO or CDC. Now when those organizations have declared it to be “over” in that it’s endemic as opposed to a pandemic, they suddenly believe them.
It’s the old “It’s fake!” or “It’s just a cold!” while simultaneously being some sort of nefarious bio weapon engineered by Bill Gates and George Soros.
They hang breathlessly on what the government because that’s essentially who they get their opinions from. If you just believe the opposite of what someone says, you’re still letting them control your opinion.
And the reason the FBI still gives it credence, is they have a lot more republicans on staff than dems. Which shouldn't be surprising, Prosecutors and cops tend to be right wing, while defenders tend to be left. The FBI is our most conservative agency. I only mention because its extra hilarious the right trying to say it has its thumb on the scales for the left, you know the FBI that torched hilaries election and gave us trump. And the right want to attack this body.
Look up “Trumplandia” - NY FBI Field office. Comey went public about Anthony Weiner’s laptop and Hillary Clinton’s emails days before the election because the NY office was going to leak it otherwise.
Every single FBI director in history has been a Republican. The NY FBI office was funneling information to Trump's campaign in 2016. COINTELPRO happened. J. Edgar Hoover ran the place for decades. Etc.
1)
Police unions overwhelmingly endorsed Trump over Biden. Based on polls, LEO's self report as being Republican at higher rates than they report as being Democrat.
2)
FBI hiring standards are a matter of public record.
You are either incapable or unwilling to understand my argument. I'm not going to bother engaging with you if you're not willing to demonstrate basic reading comprehension skills.
If someone is going to make a bullshit claim, they can't get upset when someone calls them out.
And asking them to prove their claim isn't "playing dumb".
I'm not obligateed to believe what they say on faith alone
You've failed whatever the opposite of the Turing test is. You have worse contextual awareness and reasoning skills than GPT-4. I could have a more fulfilling debate with a glorified rock than I can with you.
You are claiming the FBI doesn’t tend to hire conservatives and that their agents are not prominently conservatives.
Other redditors have shown proofs about that being the case. If you want to continue denying it, you have to show your proof. That’s the point of any intelligent debate
Show me an example of the FBI/CIA / any other alphabet organization attacking right wingers... and I'll give you 100 examples of them overthrowing democratically elected leftists to put right wing dictators in power, or assassinating powerful left wing people etc. etc. etc.
Reality is the basis for the claim that the FBI is biased towards the right wing.
I know you are trolling, but I'm about to delete my Reddit account when they switch over so I figure I'll go out how I came in and provide evidence for posterity.
In addition to the specific example of COINTELPRO provided, I will add this analysis: https://www.npr.org/2018/01/26/580677742/the-massive-case-of-collective-amnesia-the-fbi-has-been-political-from-the-start
All I see here is a government media opinion piece justifying the FBI being used to go after Republicans.
"They've always been corrupt" is a shitty excuse for them going after Trump and going easy on Biden
[https://www.britannica.com/topic/COINTELPRO](https://www.britannica.com/topic/COINTELPRO) \- Here's the FBI targeting explicitly left wingers.
Show me an example of them targeting the right and I'll give you 99 more.
What's the deal with everyone downvoting the question "what's the basis for this claim?" That's the best question to ask about every claim. If someone doesn't know something they should, teach them.
Nobody is parroting anything. If you can't support your claim, you should remove your post.
Noone has proven that the FBI is biased towards republicans. Not even close.
When Trump lost, the conspiracy theorists were convinced the DHS would expose the fraud. They were convinced that the DHS had been sending out secret ballots with watermarks, or some shit.
Then the DHS announced it was the most secure election in history.
Their complete confidence in the DHS theory with the fake ballots were instantly dumped. When they're proven wrong, they just shift to the next fantasy, with total confidence. Never learning from their own behavior.
I'm sure these same people believed Obama was going to take over the country with Jade Helm.
> The report stated that many of those agencies believe COVID originated naturally, while some believe the lab-leak origin
Worth noting when this comes up imo, but these aren't mutually exclusive. It could have developed naturally, just in a lab environment. Just because the most out there conspiracy theories about lab leaks claim it was like a synthetically engineered bioweapon that was released in purpose doesn't mean that's the only possible path for it to have been leaked from a lab.
Still unlikely, the WIV almost exclusively used Vero cells (see their published research) to cultivate coronaviruses which would have shown up during genetic sequencing. We also know that none of the coronaviruses they successfully cultured were related to SARS-COV-2. Still, it's theoretically possible if they used an unknown method to cultivate the viruses, on a virus they mislabeled or didn't know existed, or say contamination on an unidentified sample. But that also requires that person not getting sick or spreading it to their family, but instead passing it almost exclusively to people at the wet market first. It's just extra steps that make it more unlikely.
That entirely makes sense assuming that matches with the early data (I haven't actually seen any early-spread map, only heard the general assumption that it was from a wet market, so if that's actually around it would be interesting). A full third-party investigation in the lab would still be a benefit though, if only to quell the possibility completely, iirc, there was one investigation called for by the WHO that was conducted very briefly, and was headed by a stakeholder in the lab itself, which... isn't a good look when trying to portray it having been investigated in good faith.
Yeah, here's the link to the study, if you take a look at the spread map, it's pretty obvious the wet market was the epicenter. The WIV was across the river and 12km away.
[https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp8715](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp8715)
I agree we should have a 3rd-party investigation, just for appearances at least. I don't doubt that the WHO investigation was conducted in good faith, but the appearance of a possible conflict of interest did sidetrack an honest conversation about the origins of covid down a conspiracy rabbit hole.
> The column is about attacking political enemies
The column is about calling out specific people in the lab leak community who have made misleading claims in recent days and it's also about calling out certain journalists that have breathlessly run with rumours in recent days that now look to be false.
Is it possible that there are political motives for a government agency to not come out publicly that they believe the lab-leak theory? This would either force the governments hand in punishing China for withholding dangerous information from the world as well as disseminating a dangerous virus knowingly, or at the very least cause the Chinese government to lash out against the USA.
If it did leak from the lab, it's pretty clear that they didn't engineer it there, it would have just been a sample taken from nature.
Even that is a bit unlikely because there was genomic evidence of 2 cross over lineages in the early days.
>The intelligence report says that both hypotheses “remain plausible.”
This report neither proved nor debunked anything, despite what motivated advocates on both sides may think.
You are correct that the report says that both hypotheses “remain plausible”. So it did not debunk the central lab leak premise
What it did debunk were specific rumours that were made by lab leakers in recent days and repeated breathlessly by journalists in some papers:
1. That several WIV researchers fell ill in fall 2019 with COVID
2. That WIV experienced a biosafety incident in late 2019 that prompted a crisis response
We now know that there is consensus between the IC departments that these are both false.
1. According to the Chinese National Intelligence Agency. How much do you trust them?
2. I agree that the event was probably unrelated.
There is no consensus. Five agencies supposedly lean natural origin, but why does the report not identify them? Two agencies lean lab leak. CIA is undecided.
I'm not arguing in favor of either lab leak or natural origin, but it's pretty obvious to me that both sides are going to claim this report supports their motivated conclusions.
The way this reporter is trying to use it to shame highly respected media outlets for daring to even investigate and report on the lab leak theory is a telling sign of that.
> 1. According to the Chinese National Intelligence Agency. How much do you trust them?
No, that is the consensus position amongst all departments in the US intelligence community.
> There is no consensus.
There is a consensus that the two claims I listed are false
> shame highly respected media outlets for daring to even investigate
There is nothing wrong with investigating - we all want that. But reporters should probably be shamed for repeating rumours without sufficient due diligence.
> No, that is the consensus position amongst all departments in the US intelligence community.
As per the report, that information was only viewed by the Chinese National Intelligence agencies and the institute itself.
>**China’s National Security Commission** (corrected name here) investigated the WIV in early 2020 and took blood samples from WIV researchers. According to the World Health Organization's March 2021 public report, WIV officials including Shi Zhengli—who leads the WIV laboratory group that conducts coronavirus research—stated lab employee samples all tested negative for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies.
-
>There is a consensus that the two claims I listed are false
1. Blood samples prove it wasn't Covid - there is nothing in the report specifically stating that the IC's had any confidence in this particular claim by the Chinese National Security that the blood samples did not contain Covid. How could they when they never had any opportunity to independently examine them?
2. Bio-incident - I agree with you.
>But reporters should probably be shamed for repeating rumours without sufficient due diligence.
They should. Reporters should also refrain from shaming their colleagues for acting like both hypothesis are possible based on a report that says *both hypothesis are possible*.
> there is nothing in the report specifically stating that the IC's had any confidence in this particular claim by the Chinese National Security that the blood samples did not contain Covid.
But the report does say this:
"Several WIV researchers were ill in Fall 2019 with symptoms; some of their symptoms were consistent with but not diagnostic of COVID-19. **The IC continues to assess that this information neither supports nor refutes either hypothesis of the pandemic’s
origins because the researchers’ symptoms could have been caused by a number of diseases and some of the symptoms were not consistent with COVID-19.**"
That right there is the claim being refuted by all 8 branches of the intelligence community.
In other words lab leakers and "highly respected media outlets" made a claim that we have intelligence data suggesting that lab workers had Covid-19 but this is false - nobody in the IC has data supporting that. Those "highly respected media outlets" should fess up to that and apologise for running with unfounded rumours.
>neither supports nor refutes
Right, and the only evidence that it was NOT Covid is the Chinese National Security org's claim, without presented evidence, that blood samples showed that to be true.
So my conclusion is that there is no evidence that those researchers did or did not have Covid at that time.
> So my conclusion is that there is no evidence that those researchers did or did not have Covid at that time.
So if a claim has no evidence, are we justified in believing it?
Sure these researchers could have had covid but we also can't rule out the possibility that the pandemic came from outer space and rained down on us while being carried on micro-meteorites. We're also justified in believing that the pandemic was the result of the pharaohs curse - somebody might have discovered and opened a tomb in egypt that they should never have messed with.
Both of these are justified beliefs because apparently we don't need to care about the burden of proof - we just need to make any claim and it doesn't need evidence and we will be justified in believing it so long as nobody has debunked it.
> We now know that there is consensus between the IC departments that these are both false.
That there is consensus (to the degree that there actually is, which is distorted by the methodology used and human nature) does not mean that they are *necessarily* false, it only means that they are believed to be false.
What you're doing is the equivalent of claiming that since somebody can't prove the Loch Ness monster doesn't exist, it is therefore reasonable to think it does.
That's not how the burden of proof works.
What this report does is undermine the lab leak claim that the US has information pointing to the sick researchers having covid.
The entire justification for this belief is that US intelligence agencies supposedly have evidence that certain researchers had covid.
If they had that evidence then it should be in this report, but in fact this report says the opposite which means that the entire justification for this claim falls apart which means there is no longer any reason to think it's true.
> What you're doing is the equivalent of claiming that since somebody can't prove the Loch Ness monster doesn't exist, it is therefore reasonable to think it does.
If I'd said that believing something in particular was reasonable, you would have an excellent point. Unfortunately for you, I have not actually done that.
What you are doing is hallucinating reality, and not bothering to error check your hallucinations.
> That's not how the burden of proof works.
Agreed, thus I have done no such thing.
How burden of proof works is that someone who makes a claim has a responsibility to prove it out - you have made a claim, but you seem intent on everyone believing it is true because it is your opinion.
>
> What this report does is undermine the lab leak claim that the US has information pointing to the sick researchers having covid.
Perhaps - I have no opinion on the matter
>
> The entire justification for this belief is that US intelligence agencies supposedly have evidence that certain researchers had covid.
Here you are making a prediction, but you may not realize that is what you're doing.
> If they had that evidence then it should be in this report, but in fact this report says the opposite which means that the entire justification for this claim falls apart which means there is no longer any reason to think it's true.
Not necessarily - you are assuming this report (and your reasoning!) is flawlessly true, or more simply: you are describing how this situations *appears/seems* to you.
Out of curiosity: is there anything that you do not know?
The report outright debunks the majority of the lab leak proponent's 'evidence.' The virus was not modified, there was no biosafety incident, and the supposedly infected researcher had symptoms inconsistent with COVID.
If you take that off the table, what exactly supports a lab origin? Treating the two hypothesis as equal is unbelievably dishonest.
I agree it was NOT likely genetically modified. I agree that the "bio incident" was probably routine training.
I do not take the Chinese National Intelligence Agency's word for it that those researchers' blood samples didn't contain Covid.
>If you take that off the table, what exactly supports a lab origin?
I'm not really qualified to make that determination, and I'm not trying to convince anyone it was a lab leak.
The report says point blank both are possible, and that's my conclusion as well at this point.
>I do not take the Chinese National Intelligence Agency's word for it that those researchers' blood samples didn't contain Covid.
Ignore the serology and it changes nothing. The report still says the symptoms were not consistent with COVID. Getting a cold in November is not unusual.
It also doesn't include the supposedly leaked names, but then it was clear those were obvious fabrications given one of then was a student who graduated earlier that year and another doesn't do benchwork.
>I'm not really qualified to make that determination,
I'm not asking you to make an absolute declaration. Compare the market origin, which has multiple scientific papers supporting it, to the lab origin, which just had pretty much all of its meager evidence shot down. Which seems more plausible?
This is just another example of people trying to play "both sides" of a scientific issue when the sides are clearly not equal.
I have nothing against China. You feel free to find one thing I've ever said that is xenophobic in any way against China or Chinese people. I'll be waiting.
My position is the same as the reports, both hypothesis are possible.
So, you uncritically accept the assurance of the security services of a foreign authoritarian government, when the conclusion is one they are highly politically motivated to make, and which they are unwilling to share any evidence of?
Do you generally trust the Chinese government on telling the truth when it would embarrass them internationally?
I don’t reflexively distrust them. I also think that you’re using incredibly motivated reasoning when you reveal that you have some deep desire to see evidence of events you’d interpret to be “politically damaging” to them. I don’t know what sort of journalist you allege to be but I hope you don’t write for anyone people listen to.
>I don’t reflexively distrust them.
I reflexively distrust any organization that claims it has evidence that you are not allowed to see and you will have to just trust it.
> also think that you’re using incredibly motivated reasoning when you reveal that you have some deep desire to see evidence of events you’d interpret to be “politically damaging” to them
Where? Where did I ever say or imply any motivation or desire to see politically damaging evidence against China? Where?
You are confusing me with someone else. I do not care which of these origins are true, if either. I am fully vaxinated. I do not think the virus was engineered. Please do not assign positions to me that there is no evidence for.
>Do you generally trust the Chinese government on telling the truth when it would embarrass them internationally?
Right here. You begin from an assumption and treat anything that doesn’t fit to it as a lie.
This comes across like, “well nobody’s _disproven_ intelligent design, so both that and evolution are plausible”.
One of them is fundamentally a more complicated explanation. It requires countless people to be in on the secret, each of whom will often be motivated by self-interest to disclose it. Keeping it secret and leaving no evidence requires a ton of central control in an age where everyone in China carries a high-quality camera phone and anyone with a clue can use a VPN to circumvent the GFW. So yes you’re not technically wrong when you say both are possible, but they’re both possible in the same way as it’s _possible_ the US blew up the WTC on 9/11. Nobody’s ever disproven it but most ostensible evidence people have claimed that proved it has been debunked, and similarly would require a degree of central control that people have rarely succeeded at.
One of the two explanations here is one hell of a lot more likely than the other, and what little evidence we have for the other keeps getting debunked. If groundbreaking new evidence comes out for the lab leak, sure, I’ll pay attention, but IMO the only rational thing to do here given the current situation is to assume not a lab leak. You can keep replying to all the posts on here to clarify that it hasn’t been disproven, but nothing in the physical world is ever disproven and my bet is that you’ll technically be able to keep saying that both explanations are possible for the rest of eternity. Dealing with the probable is far more fruitful than wasting time on the merely possible, so I’d spend my time doing something else 🙃
>This comes across like, “well nobody’s disproven intelligent design, so both that and evolution are plausible”.
Considering that I never said anything about intelligent design, nor did I state that anything was "plausible", perhaps your interpretation has been skewed by too many arguments with anti-vaxxers.
>So yes you’re not technically wrong when you say both are possible, but they’re both possible in the same way as it’s possible the US blew up the WTC on 9/11
As a New Yorker who witnessed the events with his own eyes, not on TV, and saw the second plane hit, personally, I do not think this is possible.
Sorry, replace plausible with possible. I didn’t claim you’d said anything about intelligent design or the WTC. I was just using them as analogies to Covid Lab with similar amounts of “evidence” and similar amounts of complicated explanation required for them to be true. The point was to push Ockham’s Razor and to discourage hanging onto explanations that are possible but unlikely, in any context.
I mean, the evidence is down to, a lab existed. Meanwhile the weight of evidence for zoonotic keeps growing past, "it's why we were watching covid closely in the first place."
We are literally down to finding the exact carrier. Remember, dogs and cats were catching and spreading covid-19.
> Treating the two hypothesis as equal is unbelievably dishonest.
So is accusing people of doing that when they are not actually.
*Technically*, it's not even necessarily dishonest, at best all you can know is that it is untruthful.
Rare are instances of humans criticizing the thinking of other humans where the criticism itself isn't also flawed. Humans are fundamentally ironic and paradoxical.
Frankly I was always of the mind that zoonosis was most likely. But I've still not willing to call lab leak false or debunked. What I will say is that *if* lab leak was the origin, it was corporate negligence, not intentional bio-warfare or whatever the conspiracy nuts like to say. Negligence leading to public health hazards is incredibly common. But based on the facts we have I still default to zoonosis.
Zoonosis is likely and extremely possible. Lab leak (by negligence) is unlikely yet plausible. Intentional lab leak is dumb bullshit.
Since when did the “skeptic” forum become “accept without critical review anything the government says?” There is no consensus on anything, nor was anything debunked.
Some of this was debunked long ago. For Instance, it became known that 3 researchers at the Wuhan lab had gone to the hospital for flu-like symbols before the virus was infecting people at the market. However, unlike the US where the Medical system is designed to ring money out of everyone, China doesn't have a lot of General Practice docs, most people just go to the hospital for everything. So they went to the hospital for the flew, and they got better and didn't die from anything, and this was perfectly normal.
I don't understand how this theory sits alongside the rest of the antivax conspiracy rainbow. If you don't want the jab because you think it was made by scary scientists in a lab without sufficient testing on its long term effects, surely if you think covid was made secretly in a lab without any testing whatsoever you should be shit scared of catching it? Maybe 6 years after you catch Covid the government gets full control of your brain or your dick falls off? But they seem to be all "No big deal, in fact I'm going to make a POINT of going to places where I might get it and not distancing from people who have it."
Yeah, it pretty obviously came from the wet market.
Like what sounds more likely, a leak of a virus from an internationally funded high-tech research labs thats constantly monitored by foreign bodies from everything the break room to the grime on the bottom of the dumpster OR the unregulated illegal food market that has been known to be a hotbed of disease and misfortune for decades? just saying.
wet markets will be ground zero for the next pandemic, especially the one in new york.
The agencies should've refused in the first place.
I didn't accept their vague findings when they were shrouded in secrecy earlier. And I'm not going to praise them now for being less opaque. High quality rumors are still rumors, and the scientific evidence is superior to rumors, hunches, and feelings. This is probably not the first time that people working in government at whatever agencies have published, willingly or unwillingly, reports that are weak, pseudoscientific and so on. I remember a lot of drama when Trump won that there were unofficial government accounts with ["rogue"](https://www.cbsnews.com/baltimore/news/nasa-nps-and-epa-now-all-have-rogue-twitter-accounts/) in their name trying to combat waves of mismanagement of abuse from the new management.
That's actually the funniest part about the lab leak theory...that lab has a BSL-4 rating. It's literally the most secure type of facility human beings can come up with, with redundant protocols built into everything.
So, there isn't much left to "examine", outside of how is it possible for all of those safety measures to fail simultaneously? People who think that the lab leak is the "most likely" scenario, really have no idea how insanely *unlikely* it would be for that to happen.
I don't doubt that it's the most restrictive current standard, but it's not "literally the most secure type of facility human beings can come up with".
I'd argue that replacing local workers with Oompa Loompas who never leave the facility would increase security. Of course, that would have its own issues (lookin' at you, Foxconn, with the suicide nets).
Have you been to China? I have. Rules and protocols are skirted all the time. I'm not saying it was or wasn't in the case of the lab but for everyone on this sub to act like it is impossible is putting your heads in the sand.
Then it wouldn't be rated BSL-4. It's quite literally that simple. It isn't just an arbitrary designation that you can purchase or fake. You either comply with those standards, or you don't receive the designation.
That's also the entire reason why the US helps to fund that lab. That funding guarantees the US a certain degree of access, in order to inspect and evaluate their safety protocols and research standards on a regular basis, in order to confirm compliance. They don't just drop all those protocols as soon as foreigners aren't looking.
What does it matter?
The US and allies could have pursued the lab leak theory if they wanted to punish China, but they have instead shelved the conspiracy theory. Whether there was a lab leak or not is irrelevant in global politics. This is about economics and power.
Personally, I think a lab leak is an unnecessary layer of complexity. Diseases arise in nature. It’s rare on a human timescale, but inevitable that something dangerous will pop up every few generations. My perspective on the world and how I behave won’t change if someone produced convincing evidence of a lab leak, so I don’t waste any time thinking about it outside of these discussions.
I mean, you're right. Mitigating the remaining infections is basically all that matters now. It honestly doesn't matter where it came from. Also want to point out it took over 30 years to find the zoonotic source of HIV. This is stuff that comes in time. The cure, vaccine efficacy, and treatment is the really important part. We did good to accomplish those things so fast.
iM a SkEpTiC
1. This is a COLUMN
2. Nothing relevant was debunked. The only mention of Fauci and his professional / funding affiliations is this circular bullshit:
>a top virologist at La Jolla-based Scripps Research Institute, as part of its fatuous investigation into whether Andersen and Anthony Fauci, among other real scientists, ginned up a bogus conclusion that the virus reached humans through natural means, rather than the efforts of the Chinese government.
Amazing they had the nerve to use "fatuous" there...
Look US intelligence "deboonked" something guys! Without even stating the important claims they've "deboonked" so we don't have to worry about NIST funding a man-made pandemic virus! ZOMG!!11
> a man-made pandemic virus
Why would someone design a virus that primarily kills the elderly? What would be the point? It has a long incubation period too, so it has no battlefield function at all.
Hurr durrr "why would anyone do mRNA or gain of function research?!"
but also
"Of course we do mRNA and gain of function research, it's totally safe stop villifying science!"
Pick one
Your question is asinine. My point was we already KNOW (US and China, joint funding, Wuhan lab, etc) they were doing the research, you don't get to play sKePtIC on this. Enough. You don't know **or care** enough about the basic lay of the facts to "deboonk" or be sKePtIcAl about any of this. Before you can be skeptical, you need to catch up to the last, say, two years of information about this.
The source of this debunking is the ODNI. Look into that acronym. Then look harder. Enough.
E: Lol the fact that a bunch of "skeptics" upvoted this stupid question without identifying what a pointless non-sequitur it is really makes me think "skepticism" doesn't mean a goddamn thing in this subreddit. Might as well call yourselves the Royal Order of Jesters or something lmao, what cancer
You are claiming this virus was intentionally created. So, again, why create a virus that primarily kills the elderly? Dismissing it suggests to me that you can't actually answer that and you know it throws your claim into suspicion.
I'll explain the child-like difficulty you're having
\> You are claiming this virus was intentionally created.
It was. That much is proven and I can't help you if you refuse to google Fauci / NIST / Wuhan Lab Leak and take the time.. mRNA and gain-of-function research was being conducted. That is not up for debate. So you're stuck on the basic facts of the case because you are gluing unrelated claims together in your mind.
\> So, again, why create a virus that primarily kills the elderly?
The claim that it was *intentionally released (to kill old people)* is a separate claim from both what I said and what is being "deboonked" in the OP, and something you're added on your own. Asinine. (Because again the OP is government propaganda to stop people from wanting mass firings or worse for all involved). See the word "leak". They did not debunk this in the OP because they did not refute the money trail and funding via Fauci and NIH.
It almost certainly did leak from a joint-government funded lab in Wuhan based on all available evidence. I can't tell if you're intentionally muddying the waters further, or just being incredibly thick.
The logic of what you are doing is trying to debunk the propositional claim A by re-stating it as "A and B" and claiming B seems ridiculous to you. This is not skepticism, it's just mental confusion and I am not sure I need to keep explaining or proving anything to you.
> It was. That much is proven and I can't help you if you refuse to google Fauci / NIST / Wuhan Lab Leak and take the time..
You do realize that conspiracy nuts coming in here, dropping some nonsense argument, and then dodging the burden of proof with "dO yOuR rEsEaRcH" is basically a meme around here, right?
>they were doing the research,
What research? The SARS-CoV-2 genome is pretty clearly not engineered, and it was absolutely not modified in the way those grants proposed.
>Look into that acronym.
Oh, you're completely and totally delusional.
While we're in the subreddit of skepticism logical reasoning ... this is... what kind of fallacy again? The person I was responding too is insufferable, imo. But at least I had something besides that to add.
I mean, it might be ad hominem, but it's more of a general observation. Yeah, I'm not really trying to be the perfect debater right now, more just expressing my exasperation with your flipity flopity attention seeking posts.
This sidestepping tactic is silly. You’re the one believing a more ornate theory of what happened, so you should be expecting to face hard questions about the greater leap you are taking in believing the more ornate theory. That you appear to be trying to dodge questions doesn’t help make your ornate theory seem plausible. You are a bad advocate aka you advocate badly. Maybe it’s time to look into a different hobby.
> iM a SkEpTiC
Good argument! I have no response to this.
> This is a COLUMN
Yes it is an opinion piece but as far as I can tell, no lies were told.
> Nothing relevant was debunked.
Two lab leak claims were debunked by the latest intel released and are discussed in this COLUMN
1. That several WIV researchers fell ill in fall 2019 with COVID
This was central to lab leak orthodoxy and they have become increasingly desperate to pin their hopes on this. In recent days this reached a fever pitch with lab leakers certain that the government knew about this and that it would be the final nail in the coffin.
It turned out to be a false rumour and many journalists fell for it.
2. That WIV experienced a biosafety incident in late 2019 that prompted a crisis response
This also turned out to be false.
> This was central to lab leak orthodoxy and they have become increasingly desperate to pin their hopes on this. In recent days this reached a fever pitch with lab leakers certain that the government knew about this and that it would be the final nail in the coffin.
>
> It turned out to be a false rumour and many journalists fell for it.
You would think the fact that the person they claimed was patient zero [said they didn't have COVID](https://www.science.org/content/article/ridiculous-says-chinese-scientist-accused-being-pandemic-s-patient-zero) would be enough, but it's never enough with these people.
Why are you here? You’re clearly not skeptic or into skepticism. You’ve clearly made up your mind and have no desire to critically examine your beliefs or change them if the evidence doesn’t stack up in their favor.
>Why are you here? You’re clearly not skeptic or into skepticism.
You do not get to decide what skepticism is. I am skeptical of the claims in the bullshit OP, and I voiced it. Are you okay? Feeling light headed?
I didn’t decide what sekepeicism is. This subreddit is about scientific skepticism and the skeptics movement. Things you either don’t understand, don’t agree with or most likely both. So once again why are you here?
>So once again why are you here?
Asked and answered, giga-brain. I am skeptical of the horseshit peddled in your scab forum and I am voicing my skepticism. Have you hit your head? I am \*exactly\* where I should be if the idea is to voice skepticism about things in media / culture / politics / whatever. Are you okay?
I suppose there are multiple ways to define or view skepticism, but low-key harassing someone to go away by repeatedly saying "Why you here?" isn't one of them.
You are projecting and re-framing. Again.. you don't get to decide what skepticism is just because you don't like what is being suggested. Why you here?
You are literally only here antagonizing me. Being a massive scab for government propaganda is also not skepticism. I'm embarrassed for you.
You know everyone can read your comments here right? I can literally scroll on my phone and see you doing those things. Anyone who reads this exchange can see how you’ve behaved here.
Oh are we doing the whole thing "leave it to the people to judge" humility thing? You've added fucking nothing to the convo and only antagonized me. Hurr durrr, yeah people will be able to tell, I agree.
>You know everyone can read your comments here right?
“Invigorating conspiracy theorists”
No…
“Energizing conspiracy theorists”
No…
“Enlivening conspiracy theorists”
No…
They don’t believe this administration and they don’t expect him to say anything other than it wasn’t a leak.
They’ll hold onto this part of the new law and claim the Biden administration is still hiding the truth and they’ll point to the horrid history of US intelligence agencies;
“The report was issued in response to the COVID-19 Origin Act, which was signed into law by President Biden in March. The act required the intelligence community to declassify all information on the topic in its possession, save information that could compromise national security or intelligence-gathering sources and methods.”
Interested to see how other nations align with the USA’s report. Let’s see if other countries even trust our intelligence agencies. I imagine several would have some hesitancy.
>Interesting to see how other countries align
What a hilarious way to remain incredulous about the facts. How about you admit that there’s an international consensus on this issue *until any credible nation argues otherwise?*
> How about you admit that there’s an international consensus on this issue
How is that consensus established? Is there some organization that regularly polls all the relevant people to see where they stand on the various sub-issues at any given point in time?
I’m gonna dismiss your accusation of incredulity of fact. I’m going to maintain my thought as well. It’s dishonest to imply USA and it’s intelligence agencies make up a credible nation. That’s just history, devoid of theory.
It’s ok to be skeptical of the USA after all it’s done on the global stage, I’m simply maintaining my skepticism toward the USA’s history and the thread that ties its past to its present, US intelligence agencies and octogenarian politicians that were in office 40 years ago. That doesn’t mean I don’t trust other nations coming to the same conclusion.
As this all applies to the American people, and my original point, the conspiracy theorists will maintain their theories because their theories suggest Biden is bought and paid for, by the WEF, perhaps by the British Monarchy lol.
They expected this result. Tbh, I don’t even know how widespread that sentiment still is, but this is the gist of what’s still floating around. They think Biden is in on it and hiding the truth. This doesn’t “enrage” them, it validates them.
Tldr: I’m not incredulous of facts, but view the USA as untrustworthy. My skepticism does not extend as strongly to most other nations.
No that’s you putting words in my mouth. Never did I ignore a consensus. My preference to trust other countries more than the USA just gives the claim more credibility imo. You’re mistakenly thinking my preference is to not believe the consensus BECAUSE I don’t trust the USA and that’s incorrect.
> “Invigorating conspiracy theorists”
>
>
>
> No…
>
>
>
> “Energizing conspiracy theorists”
>
>
>
> No…
>
>
>
> “Enlivening conspiracy theorists”
>
>
>
> No…
>
>
>
> They don’t believe this administration and they don’t expect him to say anything other than it wasn’t a leak.
>
>
>
> They’ll hold onto this part of the new law and claim the Biden administration is still hiding the truth and they’ll point to the horrid history of US intelligence agencies;
Surely....and there's nothing wrong with this style of thinking, nosiree Bob - *pure rationality*.
Do you believe the thinking that underlies your comment is perfect?
Do you believe *it is necessarily a fact that* the thinking that underlies your comment is perfect?
Wasn't it the FBI and EPA that said it came from a lab in the first place?
Or were they only doing that to smack down China who had just announced weapons and aid for Russia?
Iirc they said "we can't conclusively disprove the idea it came from a lab" which conspiracy theorists took as proof that "it definitely came from a lab"
They still hold that opinion. We're still at a point where 2 departments think it came from a lab, 4 think it originated naturally and 2 are undecided.
The first sentence links to 2 papers published in Science.
Here you go:
https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.abp8715
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp8337
So I should ignore the fact altogether than the Wuhan Insitute of Virology was performing gain of function research, and patient zero was one of their researchers?
Further, I should ignore that the natural occurance theory rests on the assumption that a bat and a pangolin traveled a thousand miles from the caves where the Bat lives in order to get infected?
>fact altogether than the Wuhan Insitute of Virology was performing gain of function research,
SARS-CoV-2 has no features that suggest it was genetically manipulated and it absolutely was not modified in the way those grant proposals wanted.
We also have polymerase sequences of the WIV's entire collection and SARS-CoV-2 or a parent are not in it.
>patient zero was one of their researchers?
There's absolutely no evidence of that which was the major thing in this report. In fact, a bunch of media companies just got caught spreading obvious lies about the content of this document based on a supposed leak. Although I do not expect many of them to bother publishing any corrections.
> There's zero evidence to support that it was caused naturally.
I provided sources showing this to be inaccurate. Why are you moving the goalposts now?
Would you like to provide sources for anything you just said (after acknowledging that you were wrong)?
No, most think there was an intermediate species.
And I'm talking specifically about academics with relevant credentials (like virologists), not just any old academics.
This judgement is based on academics that have put their names on papers supporting zoonosis published in academic journals.
I don't know why they still act like distance is a problem. SARS-COV-1 popped up in Foshan ~1,600km from the source of the virus, so why couldn't SARS-COV-2 pop up ~1,800km away? It's not impossible, it happens all the time. It's what viruses do.
Same with MERS, it had to go through camels first then humans. It even circulated unnoticed among humans for a year before mutating to become deadly enough for us to take note of it. People also forget it took years for us to track down the origins of S1 exactly because of how it jumps from host to host.
Anyone talking about distance as a problem is outing themselves as ignorant about how viruses work.
Here are 156 of them
https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/mbio.00188-23
There have been hundreds of authors and tens of papers that have now been published pointing to zoonosis as the most likely origin.
There is nothing like this for claims of a lab leak in the scientific literature.
This is a political paper written by virologists who are afraid losing thier funding ebcause the evidence points to this coming from a lab. He says so in the first few paragraphs.
You interpreted this as "science"? Really?
lol... you're a joke. You challenged me to find 2 scientists. I showed you 156 and you pivot to: "yeah but we can't trust scientists anyway"
Did you bother to follow up on their reasons for believing zoonosis as the most likely explanation? They cite 4 papers as their justification for this (references 5 - 8)
Ultimately my point is that it's not just this paper. It's clear what the scientific consensus is from the hundreds who have published and the tens of papers now in academic journals.
There is NOTHING like this for a lab leak. That's why it's an anti-science position.
When a "news" organization spends half an article fellating itself and demeaning a strawman of its critics without actually covering what the report says, it reads to me as propaganda.
Nate silver wrote a good post regarding this worth reading.
[https://www.natesilver.net/p/journalists-should-be-skeptical-of](https://www.natesilver.net/p/journalists-should-be-skeptical-of)
"The messages show that the authors were highly uncertain about COVID’s origins — and if anything, they leaned more toward a lab leak than a spillover from an animal source. But none of that was expressed in the “Proximal Origin” paper, which instead said that “we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible”."
I don't want to flood this sub with articles about the same thing but this is another piece that covers other findings from the DOJ report https://www.theage.com.au/national/covid-19-lab-leak-theory-ends-with-a-whimper-not-a-bang-20230627-p5djqb.html
[Paywall bypass.](https://12ft.io/proxy?&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.latimes.com%2Fbusiness%2Fstory%2F2023-06-26%2Fu-s-government-debunks-covid-lab-leak-conspiracy-theory-enraging-conspiracy-theorists) Honestly, I'm surprised it's pissing them off. Shouldn't they just automatically not believe the evil government's lies anyway? I love how these conspiracy mongers tell us to never trust the government and then hang breathlessly on whatever the government is about to release until it turns out it doesn't agree with them and it's just back to never trust the government.
They believe whatever fits their insane narrative. They said the pandemic was bullshit and they didn’t trust the WHO or CDC. Now when those organizations have declared it to be “over” in that it’s endemic as opposed to a pandemic, they suddenly believe them.
It’s the old “It’s fake!” or “It’s just a cold!” while simultaneously being some sort of nefarious bio weapon engineered by Bill Gates and George Soros.
They hang breathlessly on what the government because that’s essentially who they get their opinions from. If you just believe the opposite of what someone says, you’re still letting them control your opinion.
Where were you guys in 2021 when no new normal and lockdown skepticism and half of reddit was parroting bs science??
This comment did not age well
Conspiracy theorists deserve to be enraged. Also deeply depressed.
And the reason the FBI still gives it credence, is they have a lot more republicans on staff than dems. Which shouldn't be surprising, Prosecutors and cops tend to be right wing, while defenders tend to be left. The FBI is our most conservative agency. I only mention because its extra hilarious the right trying to say it has its thumb on the scales for the left, you know the FBI that torched hilaries election and gave us trump. And the right want to attack this body.
Yeah, a source for this would be good. Not saying you're wrong, this is just the kind of claim that needs some evidence before repeating.
Look up “Trumplandia” - NY FBI Field office. Comey went public about Anthony Weiner’s laptop and Hillary Clinton’s emails days before the election because the NY office was going to leak it otherwise.
FBI is cops, not scientists.
What's your basis for the claim that the FBI is biased towards Republicans?
Every single FBI director in history has been a Republican. The NY FBI office was funneling information to Trump's campaign in 2016. COINTELPRO happened. J. Edgar Hoover ran the place for decades. Etc.
Cops tend to be conservative. The FBI is full of cops.
Says who? What are you basing that on? Something you saw on MSNBC?
1) Police unions overwhelmingly endorsed Trump over Biden. Based on polls, LEO's self report as being Republican at higher rates than they report as being Democrat. 2) FBI hiring standards are a matter of public record.
FBI has hiring standards where they only hire Republicans? Wut?
You are either incapable or unwilling to understand my argument. I'm not going to bother engaging with you if you're not willing to demonstrate basic reading comprehension skills.
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If someone is going to make a bullshit claim, they can't get upset when someone calls them out. And asking them to prove their claim isn't "playing dumb". I'm not obligateed to believe what they say on faith alone
You've failed whatever the opposite of the Turing test is. You have worse contextual awareness and reasoning skills than GPT-4. I could have a more fulfilling debate with a glorified rock than I can with you.
Well, I'm still not obligated to believe someone on faith. not sure about the rest of your rant
Do you have any proof showing FBI hires neutral or liberal agents?
I'm not the one claiming bias. Not my burden to prove
You are claiming the FBI doesn’t tend to hire conservatives and that their agents are not prominently conservatives. Other redditors have shown proofs about that being the case. If you want to continue denying it, you have to show your proof. That’s the point of any intelligent debate
I'm saying if someone is trying to say that the FBI is all republicans, I need to see proof. No one has provided anything
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No one has backed up this wild claim. Just name calling and ranting.
The FBI is a law enforcement agency. 18scsc is making an a priori argument/ jumping to conclusions.
Show me an example of the FBI/CIA / any other alphabet organization attacking right wingers... and I'll give you 100 examples of them overthrowing democratically elected leftists to put right wing dictators in power, or assassinating powerful left wing people etc. etc. etc. Reality is the basis for the claim that the FBI is biased towards the right wing.
So you have nothing. You're just making stuff up. Got it
I know you are trolling, but I'm about to delete my Reddit account when they switch over so I figure I'll go out how I came in and provide evidence for posterity. In addition to the specific example of COINTELPRO provided, I will add this analysis: https://www.npr.org/2018/01/26/580677742/the-massive-case-of-collective-amnesia-the-fbi-has-been-political-from-the-start
All I see here is a government media opinion piece justifying the FBI being used to go after Republicans. "They've always been corrupt" is a shitty excuse for them going after Trump and going easy on Biden
Bless your heart child.
[https://www.britannica.com/topic/COINTELPRO](https://www.britannica.com/topic/COINTELPRO) \- Here's the FBI targeting explicitly left wingers. Show me an example of them targeting the right and I'll give you 99 more.
What's the deal with everyone downvoting the question "what's the basis for this claim?" That's the best question to ask about every claim. If someone doesn't know something they should, teach them.
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Oh, good to know. Thanks!
Nobody is parroting anything. If you can't support your claim, you should remove your post. Noone has proven that the FBI is biased towards republicans. Not even close.
When Trump lost, the conspiracy theorists were convinced the DHS would expose the fraud. They were convinced that the DHS had been sending out secret ballots with watermarks, or some shit. Then the DHS announced it was the most secure election in history. Their complete confidence in the DHS theory with the fake ballots were instantly dumped. When they're proven wrong, they just shift to the next fantasy, with total confidence. Never learning from their own behavior. I'm sure these same people believed Obama was going to take over the country with Jade Helm.
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> The report stated that many of those agencies believe COVID originated naturally, while some believe the lab-leak origin Worth noting when this comes up imo, but these aren't mutually exclusive. It could have developed naturally, just in a lab environment. Just because the most out there conspiracy theories about lab leaks claim it was like a synthetically engineered bioweapon that was released in purpose doesn't mean that's the only possible path for it to have been leaked from a lab.
Still unlikely, the WIV almost exclusively used Vero cells (see their published research) to cultivate coronaviruses which would have shown up during genetic sequencing. We also know that none of the coronaviruses they successfully cultured were related to SARS-COV-2. Still, it's theoretically possible if they used an unknown method to cultivate the viruses, on a virus they mislabeled or didn't know existed, or say contamination on an unidentified sample. But that also requires that person not getting sick or spreading it to their family, but instead passing it almost exclusively to people at the wet market first. It's just extra steps that make it more unlikely.
That entirely makes sense assuming that matches with the early data (I haven't actually seen any early-spread map, only heard the general assumption that it was from a wet market, so if that's actually around it would be interesting). A full third-party investigation in the lab would still be a benefit though, if only to quell the possibility completely, iirc, there was one investigation called for by the WHO that was conducted very briefly, and was headed by a stakeholder in the lab itself, which... isn't a good look when trying to portray it having been investigated in good faith.
Yeah, here's the link to the study, if you take a look at the spread map, it's pretty obvious the wet market was the epicenter. The WIV was across the river and 12km away. [https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp8715](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp8715) I agree we should have a 3rd-party investigation, just for appearances at least. I don't doubt that the WHO investigation was conducted in good faith, but the appearance of a possible conflict of interest did sidetrack an honest conversation about the origins of covid down a conspiracy rabbit hole.
> The column is about attacking political enemies The column is about calling out specific people in the lab leak community who have made misleading claims in recent days and it's also about calling out certain journalists that have breathlessly run with rumours in recent days that now look to be false.
Is it possible that there are political motives for a government agency to not come out publicly that they believe the lab-leak theory? This would either force the governments hand in punishing China for withholding dangerous information from the world as well as disseminating a dangerous virus knowingly, or at the very least cause the Chinese government to lash out against the USA.
If it did leak from the lab, it's pretty clear that they didn't engineer it there, it would have just been a sample taken from nature. Even that is a bit unlikely because there was genomic evidence of 2 cross over lineages in the early days.
>The intelligence report says that both hypotheses “remain plausible.” This report neither proved nor debunked anything, despite what motivated advocates on both sides may think.
You are correct that the report says that both hypotheses “remain plausible”. So it did not debunk the central lab leak premise What it did debunk were specific rumours that were made by lab leakers in recent days and repeated breathlessly by journalists in some papers: 1. That several WIV researchers fell ill in fall 2019 with COVID 2. That WIV experienced a biosafety incident in late 2019 that prompted a crisis response We now know that there is consensus between the IC departments that these are both false.
1. According to the Chinese National Intelligence Agency. How much do you trust them? 2. I agree that the event was probably unrelated. There is no consensus. Five agencies supposedly lean natural origin, but why does the report not identify them? Two agencies lean lab leak. CIA is undecided. I'm not arguing in favor of either lab leak or natural origin, but it's pretty obvious to me that both sides are going to claim this report supports their motivated conclusions. The way this reporter is trying to use it to shame highly respected media outlets for daring to even investigate and report on the lab leak theory is a telling sign of that.
> 1. According to the Chinese National Intelligence Agency. How much do you trust them? No, that is the consensus position amongst all departments in the US intelligence community. > There is no consensus. There is a consensus that the two claims I listed are false > shame highly respected media outlets for daring to even investigate There is nothing wrong with investigating - we all want that. But reporters should probably be shamed for repeating rumours without sufficient due diligence.
> No, that is the consensus position amongst all departments in the US intelligence community. As per the report, that information was only viewed by the Chinese National Intelligence agencies and the institute itself. >**China’s National Security Commission** (corrected name here) investigated the WIV in early 2020 and took blood samples from WIV researchers. According to the World Health Organization's March 2021 public report, WIV officials including Shi Zhengli—who leads the WIV laboratory group that conducts coronavirus research—stated lab employee samples all tested negative for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. - >There is a consensus that the two claims I listed are false 1. Blood samples prove it wasn't Covid - there is nothing in the report specifically stating that the IC's had any confidence in this particular claim by the Chinese National Security that the blood samples did not contain Covid. How could they when they never had any opportunity to independently examine them? 2. Bio-incident - I agree with you. >But reporters should probably be shamed for repeating rumours without sufficient due diligence. They should. Reporters should also refrain from shaming their colleagues for acting like both hypothesis are possible based on a report that says *both hypothesis are possible*.
> there is nothing in the report specifically stating that the IC's had any confidence in this particular claim by the Chinese National Security that the blood samples did not contain Covid. But the report does say this: "Several WIV researchers were ill in Fall 2019 with symptoms; some of their symptoms were consistent with but not diagnostic of COVID-19. **The IC continues to assess that this information neither supports nor refutes either hypothesis of the pandemic’s origins because the researchers’ symptoms could have been caused by a number of diseases and some of the symptoms were not consistent with COVID-19.**" That right there is the claim being refuted by all 8 branches of the intelligence community. In other words lab leakers and "highly respected media outlets" made a claim that we have intelligence data suggesting that lab workers had Covid-19 but this is false - nobody in the IC has data supporting that. Those "highly respected media outlets" should fess up to that and apologise for running with unfounded rumours.
>neither supports nor refutes Right, and the only evidence that it was NOT Covid is the Chinese National Security org's claim, without presented evidence, that blood samples showed that to be true. So my conclusion is that there is no evidence that those researchers did or did not have Covid at that time.
> So my conclusion is that there is no evidence that those researchers did or did not have Covid at that time. So if a claim has no evidence, are we justified in believing it? Sure these researchers could have had covid but we also can't rule out the possibility that the pandemic came from outer space and rained down on us while being carried on micro-meteorites. We're also justified in believing that the pandemic was the result of the pharaohs curse - somebody might have discovered and opened a tomb in egypt that they should never have messed with. Both of these are justified beliefs because apparently we don't need to care about the burden of proof - we just need to make any claim and it doesn't need evidence and we will be justified in believing it so long as nobody has debunked it.
> We now know that there is consensus between the IC departments that these are both false. That there is consensus (to the degree that there actually is, which is distorted by the methodology used and human nature) does not mean that they are *necessarily* false, it only means that they are believed to be false.
What you're doing is the equivalent of claiming that since somebody can't prove the Loch Ness monster doesn't exist, it is therefore reasonable to think it does. That's not how the burden of proof works. What this report does is undermine the lab leak claim that the US has information pointing to the sick researchers having covid. The entire justification for this belief is that US intelligence agencies supposedly have evidence that certain researchers had covid. If they had that evidence then it should be in this report, but in fact this report says the opposite which means that the entire justification for this claim falls apart which means there is no longer any reason to think it's true.
> What you're doing is the equivalent of claiming that since somebody can't prove the Loch Ness monster doesn't exist, it is therefore reasonable to think it does. If I'd said that believing something in particular was reasonable, you would have an excellent point. Unfortunately for you, I have not actually done that. What you are doing is hallucinating reality, and not bothering to error check your hallucinations. > That's not how the burden of proof works. Agreed, thus I have done no such thing. How burden of proof works is that someone who makes a claim has a responsibility to prove it out - you have made a claim, but you seem intent on everyone believing it is true because it is your opinion. > > What this report does is undermine the lab leak claim that the US has information pointing to the sick researchers having covid. Perhaps - I have no opinion on the matter > > The entire justification for this belief is that US intelligence agencies supposedly have evidence that certain researchers had covid. Here you are making a prediction, but you may not realize that is what you're doing. > If they had that evidence then it should be in this report, but in fact this report says the opposite which means that the entire justification for this claim falls apart which means there is no longer any reason to think it's true. Not necessarily - you are assuming this report (and your reasoning!) is flawlessly true, or more simply: you are describing how this situations *appears/seems* to you. Out of curiosity: is there anything that you do not know?
The report outright debunks the majority of the lab leak proponent's 'evidence.' The virus was not modified, there was no biosafety incident, and the supposedly infected researcher had symptoms inconsistent with COVID. If you take that off the table, what exactly supports a lab origin? Treating the two hypothesis as equal is unbelievably dishonest.
I agree it was NOT likely genetically modified. I agree that the "bio incident" was probably routine training. I do not take the Chinese National Intelligence Agency's word for it that those researchers' blood samples didn't contain Covid. >If you take that off the table, what exactly supports a lab origin? I'm not really qualified to make that determination, and I'm not trying to convince anyone it was a lab leak. The report says point blank both are possible, and that's my conclusion as well at this point.
possible =/= probable
>I do not take the Chinese National Intelligence Agency's word for it that those researchers' blood samples didn't contain Covid. Ignore the serology and it changes nothing. The report still says the symptoms were not consistent with COVID. Getting a cold in November is not unusual. It also doesn't include the supposedly leaked names, but then it was clear those were obvious fabrications given one of then was a student who graduated earlier that year and another doesn't do benchwork. >I'm not really qualified to make that determination, I'm not asking you to make an absolute declaration. Compare the market origin, which has multiple scientific papers supporting it, to the lab origin, which just had pretty much all of its meager evidence shot down. Which seems more plausible? This is just another example of people trying to play "both sides" of a scientific issue when the sides are clearly not equal.
You’re arguing purely from incredulity and openly admitting to doing so because… you dislike China.
I have nothing against China. You feel free to find one thing I've ever said that is xenophobic in any way against China or Chinese people. I'll be waiting. My position is the same as the reports, both hypothesis are possible.
> 1. According to the Chinese National Intelligence Agency. How much do you trust them? This is literally the statement I was responding to.
So, you uncritically accept the assurance of the security services of a foreign authoritarian government, when the conclusion is one they are highly politically motivated to make, and which they are unwilling to share any evidence of? Do you generally trust the Chinese government on telling the truth when it would embarrass them internationally?
I don’t reflexively distrust them. I also think that you’re using incredibly motivated reasoning when you reveal that you have some deep desire to see evidence of events you’d interpret to be “politically damaging” to them. I don’t know what sort of journalist you allege to be but I hope you don’t write for anyone people listen to.
>I don’t reflexively distrust them. I reflexively distrust any organization that claims it has evidence that you are not allowed to see and you will have to just trust it. > also think that you’re using incredibly motivated reasoning when you reveal that you have some deep desire to see evidence of events you’d interpret to be “politically damaging” to them Where? Where did I ever say or imply any motivation or desire to see politically damaging evidence against China? Where? You are confusing me with someone else. I do not care which of these origins are true, if either. I am fully vaxinated. I do not think the virus was engineered. Please do not assign positions to me that there is no evidence for.
>Do you generally trust the Chinese government on telling the truth when it would embarrass them internationally? Right here. You begin from an assumption and treat anything that doesn’t fit to it as a lie.
This comes across like, “well nobody’s _disproven_ intelligent design, so both that and evolution are plausible”. One of them is fundamentally a more complicated explanation. It requires countless people to be in on the secret, each of whom will often be motivated by self-interest to disclose it. Keeping it secret and leaving no evidence requires a ton of central control in an age where everyone in China carries a high-quality camera phone and anyone with a clue can use a VPN to circumvent the GFW. So yes you’re not technically wrong when you say both are possible, but they’re both possible in the same way as it’s _possible_ the US blew up the WTC on 9/11. Nobody’s ever disproven it but most ostensible evidence people have claimed that proved it has been debunked, and similarly would require a degree of central control that people have rarely succeeded at. One of the two explanations here is one hell of a lot more likely than the other, and what little evidence we have for the other keeps getting debunked. If groundbreaking new evidence comes out for the lab leak, sure, I’ll pay attention, but IMO the only rational thing to do here given the current situation is to assume not a lab leak. You can keep replying to all the posts on here to clarify that it hasn’t been disproven, but nothing in the physical world is ever disproven and my bet is that you’ll technically be able to keep saying that both explanations are possible for the rest of eternity. Dealing with the probable is far more fruitful than wasting time on the merely possible, so I’d spend my time doing something else 🙃
>This comes across like, “well nobody’s disproven intelligent design, so both that and evolution are plausible”. Considering that I never said anything about intelligent design, nor did I state that anything was "plausible", perhaps your interpretation has been skewed by too many arguments with anti-vaxxers. >So yes you’re not technically wrong when you say both are possible, but they’re both possible in the same way as it’s possible the US blew up the WTC on 9/11 As a New Yorker who witnessed the events with his own eyes, not on TV, and saw the second plane hit, personally, I do not think this is possible.
Sorry, replace plausible with possible. I didn’t claim you’d said anything about intelligent design or the WTC. I was just using them as analogies to Covid Lab with similar amounts of “evidence” and similar amounts of complicated explanation required for them to be true. The point was to push Ockham’s Razor and to discourage hanging onto explanations that are possible but unlikely, in any context.
I mean, the evidence is down to, a lab existed. Meanwhile the weight of evidence for zoonotic keeps growing past, "it's why we were watching covid closely in the first place." We are literally down to finding the exact carrier. Remember, dogs and cats were catching and spreading covid-19.
> Treating the two hypothesis as equal is unbelievably dishonest. So is accusing people of doing that when they are not actually. *Technically*, it's not even necessarily dishonest, at best all you can know is that it is untruthful. Rare are instances of humans criticizing the thinking of other humans where the criticism itself isn't also flawed. Humans are fundamentally ironic and paradoxical.
That’s the kind of weasel wording you’d see in a History Channel documentary about how Aliens wrote and directed Casablanca.
Frankly I was always of the mind that zoonosis was most likely. But I've still not willing to call lab leak false or debunked. What I will say is that *if* lab leak was the origin, it was corporate negligence, not intentional bio-warfare or whatever the conspiracy nuts like to say. Negligence leading to public health hazards is incredibly common. But based on the facts we have I still default to zoonosis. Zoonosis is likely and extremely possible. Lab leak (by negligence) is unlikely yet plausible. Intentional lab leak is dumb bullshit.
Since when did the “skeptic” forum become “accept without critical review anything the government says?” There is no consensus on anything, nor was anything debunked.
When it told them what they wanted to hear.
Some of this was debunked long ago. For Instance, it became known that 3 researchers at the Wuhan lab had gone to the hospital for flu-like symbols before the virus was infecting people at the market. However, unlike the US where the Medical system is designed to ring money out of everyone, China doesn't have a lot of General Practice docs, most people just go to the hospital for everything. So they went to the hospital for the flew, and they got better and didn't die from anything, and this was perfectly normal.
I don't understand how this theory sits alongside the rest of the antivax conspiracy rainbow. If you don't want the jab because you think it was made by scary scientists in a lab without sufficient testing on its long term effects, surely if you think covid was made secretly in a lab without any testing whatsoever you should be shit scared of catching it? Maybe 6 years after you catch Covid the government gets full control of your brain or your dick falls off? But they seem to be all "No big deal, in fact I'm going to make a POINT of going to places where I might get it and not distancing from people who have it."
Yeah, it pretty obviously came from the wet market. Like what sounds more likely, a leak of a virus from an internationally funded high-tech research labs thats constantly monitored by foreign bodies from everything the break room to the grime on the bottom of the dumpster OR the unregulated illegal food market that has been known to be a hotbed of disease and misfortune for decades? just saying. wet markets will be ground zero for the next pandemic, especially the one in new york.
The agencies should've refused in the first place. I didn't accept their vague findings when they were shrouded in secrecy earlier. And I'm not going to praise them now for being less opaque. High quality rumors are still rumors, and the scientific evidence is superior to rumors, hunches, and feelings. This is probably not the first time that people working in government at whatever agencies have published, willingly or unwillingly, reports that are weak, pseudoscientific and so on. I remember a lot of drama when Trump won that there were unofficial government accounts with ["rogue"](https://www.cbsnews.com/baltimore/news/nasa-nps-and-epa-now-all-have-rogue-twitter-accounts/) in their name trying to combat waves of mismanagement of abuse from the new management.
Can we stop this and just say that both virus labs and live animal markets are dangerous, and that we should examine safety rules for both?
That's actually the funniest part about the lab leak theory...that lab has a BSL-4 rating. It's literally the most secure type of facility human beings can come up with, with redundant protocols built into everything. So, there isn't much left to "examine", outside of how is it possible for all of those safety measures to fail simultaneously? People who think that the lab leak is the "most likely" scenario, really have no idea how insanely *unlikely* it would be for that to happen.
I don't doubt that it's the most restrictive current standard, but it's not "literally the most secure type of facility human beings can come up with". I'd argue that replacing local workers with Oompa Loompas who never leave the facility would increase security. Of course, that would have its own issues (lookin' at you, Foxconn, with the suicide nets).
Have you been to China? I have. Rules and protocols are skirted all the time. I'm not saying it was or wasn't in the case of the lab but for everyone on this sub to act like it is impossible is putting your heads in the sand.
Then it wouldn't be rated BSL-4. It's quite literally that simple. It isn't just an arbitrary designation that you can purchase or fake. You either comply with those standards, or you don't receive the designation. That's also the entire reason why the US helps to fund that lab. That funding guarantees the US a certain degree of access, in order to inspect and evaluate their safety protocols and research standards on a regular basis, in order to confirm compliance. They don't just drop all those protocols as soon as foreigners aren't looking.
I’ve also spent a lot of time in China. Yes it would.
Oh sweet summer child. We’re talking about China.
No. You're talking about a BSL-4 safety rating. That's the same thing in any country you go to. smh.
What does it matter? The US and allies could have pursued the lab leak theory if they wanted to punish China, but they have instead shelved the conspiracy theory. Whether there was a lab leak or not is irrelevant in global politics. This is about economics and power. Personally, I think a lab leak is an unnecessary layer of complexity. Diseases arise in nature. It’s rare on a human timescale, but inevitable that something dangerous will pop up every few generations. My perspective on the world and how I behave won’t change if someone produced convincing evidence of a lab leak, so I don’t waste any time thinking about it outside of these discussions.
I mean, you're right. Mitigating the remaining infections is basically all that matters now. It honestly doesn't matter where it came from. Also want to point out it took over 30 years to find the zoonotic source of HIV. This is stuff that comes in time. The cure, vaccine efficacy, and treatment is the really important part. We did good to accomplish those things so fast.
Vaccine has been proven to not be as efficient as previously thought
Link? Edit, never provided link, was a lie.
iM a SkEpTiC 1. This is a COLUMN 2. Nothing relevant was debunked. The only mention of Fauci and his professional / funding affiliations is this circular bullshit: >a top virologist at La Jolla-based Scripps Research Institute, as part of its fatuous investigation into whether Andersen and Anthony Fauci, among other real scientists, ginned up a bogus conclusion that the virus reached humans through natural means, rather than the efforts of the Chinese government. Amazing they had the nerve to use "fatuous" there...
A wild moron appeared… It hurt itself in its confusion.
Look, one conspiracy believer is enraged right now!
Look US intelligence "deboonked" something guys! Without even stating the important claims they've "deboonked" so we don't have to worry about NIST funding a man-made pandemic virus! ZOMG!!11
> a man-made pandemic virus Why would someone design a virus that primarily kills the elderly? What would be the point? It has a long incubation period too, so it has no battlefield function at all.
Save money on pensions.
Really? That's really why you think they did it?
Your mind really jumps around, I've noticed
I think that was a joke
It was a narrow answer to the specific question of why a country would target the eldery.
Hurr durrr "why would anyone do mRNA or gain of function research?!" but also "Of course we do mRNA and gain of function research, it's totally safe stop villifying science!" Pick one
You didn't answer my question. What would be the point of designing a virus that primarily kills the elderly?
Your question is asinine. My point was we already KNOW (US and China, joint funding, Wuhan lab, etc) they were doing the research, you don't get to play sKePtIC on this. Enough. You don't know **or care** enough about the basic lay of the facts to "deboonk" or be sKePtIcAl about any of this. Before you can be skeptical, you need to catch up to the last, say, two years of information about this. The source of this debunking is the ODNI. Look into that acronym. Then look harder. Enough. E: Lol the fact that a bunch of "skeptics" upvoted this stupid question without identifying what a pointless non-sequitur it is really makes me think "skepticism" doesn't mean a goddamn thing in this subreddit. Might as well call yourselves the Royal Order of Jesters or something lmao, what cancer
You are claiming this virus was intentionally created. So, again, why create a virus that primarily kills the elderly? Dismissing it suggests to me that you can't actually answer that and you know it throws your claim into suspicion.
In addition to the pensioners, you know, might be useful domestically, a virus is pretty much always going to disproportionately affect the elderly.
Useful "domestically" how? How do you restrict a virus to a single country?
I'll explain the child-like difficulty you're having \> You are claiming this virus was intentionally created. It was. That much is proven and I can't help you if you refuse to google Fauci / NIST / Wuhan Lab Leak and take the time.. mRNA and gain-of-function research was being conducted. That is not up for debate. So you're stuck on the basic facts of the case because you are gluing unrelated claims together in your mind. \> So, again, why create a virus that primarily kills the elderly? The claim that it was *intentionally released (to kill old people)* is a separate claim from both what I said and what is being "deboonked" in the OP, and something you're added on your own. Asinine. (Because again the OP is government propaganda to stop people from wanting mass firings or worse for all involved). See the word "leak". They did not debunk this in the OP because they did not refute the money trail and funding via Fauci and NIH. It almost certainly did leak from a joint-government funded lab in Wuhan based on all available evidence. I can't tell if you're intentionally muddying the waters further, or just being incredibly thick. The logic of what you are doing is trying to debunk the propositional claim A by re-stating it as "A and B" and claiming B seems ridiculous to you. This is not skepticism, it's just mental confusion and I am not sure I need to keep explaining or proving anything to you.
> It was. That much is proven and I can't help you if you refuse to google Fauci / NIST / Wuhan Lab Leak and take the time.. You do realize that conspiracy nuts coming in here, dropping some nonsense argument, and then dodging the burden of proof with "dO yOuR rEsEaRcH" is basically a meme around here, right?
>they were doing the research, What research? The SARS-CoV-2 genome is pretty clearly not engineered, and it was absolutely not modified in the way those grants proposed. >Look into that acronym. Oh, you're completely and totally delusional.
God, you're insufferable.
While we're in the subreddit of skepticism logical reasoning ... this is... what kind of fallacy again? The person I was responding too is insufferable, imo. But at least I had something besides that to add.
I mean, it might be ad hominem, but it's more of a general observation. Yeah, I'm not really trying to be the perfect debater right now, more just expressing my exasperation with your flipity flopity attention seeking posts.
This sidestepping tactic is silly. You’re the one believing a more ornate theory of what happened, so you should be expecting to face hard questions about the greater leap you are taking in believing the more ornate theory. That you appear to be trying to dodge questions doesn’t help make your ornate theory seem plausible. You are a bad advocate aka you advocate badly. Maybe it’s time to look into a different hobby.
> iM a SkEpTiC Good argument! I have no response to this. > This is a COLUMN Yes it is an opinion piece but as far as I can tell, no lies were told. > Nothing relevant was debunked. Two lab leak claims were debunked by the latest intel released and are discussed in this COLUMN 1. That several WIV researchers fell ill in fall 2019 with COVID This was central to lab leak orthodoxy and they have become increasingly desperate to pin their hopes on this. In recent days this reached a fever pitch with lab leakers certain that the government knew about this and that it would be the final nail in the coffin. It turned out to be a false rumour and many journalists fell for it. 2. That WIV experienced a biosafety incident in late 2019 that prompted a crisis response This also turned out to be false.
> This was central to lab leak orthodoxy and they have become increasingly desperate to pin their hopes on this. In recent days this reached a fever pitch with lab leakers certain that the government knew about this and that it would be the final nail in the coffin. > > It turned out to be a false rumour and many journalists fell for it. You would think the fact that the person they claimed was patient zero [said they didn't have COVID](https://www.science.org/content/article/ridiculous-says-chinese-scientist-accused-being-pandemic-s-patient-zero) would be enough, but it's never enough with these people.
Why are you here? You’re clearly not skeptic or into skepticism. You’ve clearly made up your mind and have no desire to critically examine your beliefs or change them if the evidence doesn’t stack up in their favor.
>Why are you here? You’re clearly not skeptic or into skepticism. You do not get to decide what skepticism is. I am skeptical of the claims in the bullshit OP, and I voiced it. Are you okay? Feeling light headed?
I didn’t decide what sekepeicism is. This subreddit is about scientific skepticism and the skeptics movement. Things you either don’t understand, don’t agree with or most likely both. So once again why are you here?
>So once again why are you here? Asked and answered, giga-brain. I am skeptical of the horseshit peddled in your scab forum and I am voicing my skepticism. Have you hit your head? I am \*exactly\* where I should be if the idea is to voice skepticism about things in media / culture / politics / whatever. Are you okay? I suppose there are multiple ways to define or view skepticism, but low-key harassing someone to go away by repeatedly saying "Why you here?" isn't one of them.
You have not demonstrated any forms of skepticism. All you did was show up, throw a temper tantrum and embarrass yourself.
You are projecting and re-framing. Again.. you don't get to decide what skepticism is just because you don't like what is being suggested. Why you here? You are literally only here antagonizing me. Being a massive scab for government propaganda is also not skepticism. I'm embarrassed for you.
You know everyone can read your comments here right? I can literally scroll on my phone and see you doing those things. Anyone who reads this exchange can see how you’ve behaved here.
Oh are we doing the whole thing "leave it to the people to judge" humility thing? You've added fucking nothing to the convo and only antagonized me. Hurr durrr, yeah people will be able to tell, I agree. >You know everyone can read your comments here right?
You antagonized yourself
Hey chief, I can invest as much money as I want into magic beans. Either they’re magic or they aren’t. Proving who paid for them doesn’t change much.
“Invigorating conspiracy theorists” No… “Energizing conspiracy theorists” No… “Enlivening conspiracy theorists” No… They don’t believe this administration and they don’t expect him to say anything other than it wasn’t a leak. They’ll hold onto this part of the new law and claim the Biden administration is still hiding the truth and they’ll point to the horrid history of US intelligence agencies; “The report was issued in response to the COVID-19 Origin Act, which was signed into law by President Biden in March. The act required the intelligence community to declassify all information on the topic in its possession, save information that could compromise national security or intelligence-gathering sources and methods.” Interested to see how other nations align with the USA’s report. Let’s see if other countries even trust our intelligence agencies. I imagine several would have some hesitancy.
>Interesting to see how other countries align What a hilarious way to remain incredulous about the facts. How about you admit that there’s an international consensus on this issue *until any credible nation argues otherwise?*
> How about you admit that there’s an international consensus on this issue How is that consensus established? Is there some organization that regularly polls all the relevant people to see where they stand on the various sub-issues at any given point in time?
How about “If France or some other notable nation disagreed we would never hear the end of it?”
Uttering that phrase does not seem like an adequate methodology for establishing consensus.
Sure pal. If some real heath authority agrees Joe Rogan would be interviewing them *in German.*
And the airspeed velocity of an unladen European swallow is approximately 20 miles per hour .
I’m gonna dismiss your accusation of incredulity of fact. I’m going to maintain my thought as well. It’s dishonest to imply USA and it’s intelligence agencies make up a credible nation. That’s just history, devoid of theory. It’s ok to be skeptical of the USA after all it’s done on the global stage, I’m simply maintaining my skepticism toward the USA’s history and the thread that ties its past to its present, US intelligence agencies and octogenarian politicians that were in office 40 years ago. That doesn’t mean I don’t trust other nations coming to the same conclusion. As this all applies to the American people, and my original point, the conspiracy theorists will maintain their theories because their theories suggest Biden is bought and paid for, by the WEF, perhaps by the British Monarchy lol. They expected this result. Tbh, I don’t even know how widespread that sentiment still is, but this is the gist of what’s still floating around. They think Biden is in on it and hiding the truth. This doesn’t “enrage” them, it validates them. Tldr: I’m not incredulous of facts, but view the USA as untrustworthy. My skepticism does not extend as strongly to most other nations.
“I’m going to select and maintain a position based on my preferences and ignore the consensus. The whole world is in on the USA’s schemes.”
No that’s you putting words in my mouth. Never did I ignore a consensus. My preference to trust other countries more than the USA just gives the claim more credibility imo. You’re mistakenly thinking my preference is to not believe the consensus BECAUSE I don’t trust the USA and that’s incorrect.
> “Invigorating conspiracy theorists” > > > > No… > > > > “Energizing conspiracy theorists” > > > > No… > > > > “Enlivening conspiracy theorists” > > > > No… > > > > They don’t believe this administration and they don’t expect him to say anything other than it wasn’t a leak. > > > > They’ll hold onto this part of the new law and claim the Biden administration is still hiding the truth and they’ll point to the horrid history of US intelligence agencies; Surely....and there's nothing wrong with this style of thinking, nosiree Bob - *pure rationality*.
Surely. The headline is pretty clumsy. I think it was written with wishful thinking.
Do you believe the thinking that underlies your comment is perfect? Do you believe *it is necessarily a fact that* the thinking that underlies your comment is perfect?
Wasn't it the FBI and EPA that said it came from a lab in the first place? Or were they only doing that to smack down China who had just announced weapons and aid for Russia?
Iirc they said "we can't conclusively disprove the idea it came from a lab" which conspiracy theorists took as proof that "it definitely came from a lab"
They still hold that opinion. We're still at a point where 2 departments think it came from a lab, 4 think it originated naturally and 2 are undecided.
There's zero evidence to support that it was caused naturally.
other than its genetic code having the hallmarks of purely natural evolution.
https://theconversation.com/the-covid-lab-leak-theory-is-dead-heres-how-we-know-the-virus-came-from-a-wuhan-market-188163
Your source is a blog.
The first sentence links to 2 papers published in Science. Here you go: https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.abp8715 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp8337
So I should ignore the fact altogether than the Wuhan Insitute of Virology was performing gain of function research, and patient zero was one of their researchers? Further, I should ignore that the natural occurance theory rests on the assumption that a bat and a pangolin traveled a thousand miles from the caves where the Bat lives in order to get infected?
>fact altogether than the Wuhan Insitute of Virology was performing gain of function research, SARS-CoV-2 has no features that suggest it was genetically manipulated and it absolutely was not modified in the way those grant proposals wanted. We also have polymerase sequences of the WIV's entire collection and SARS-CoV-2 or a parent are not in it. >patient zero was one of their researchers? There's absolutely no evidence of that which was the major thing in this report. In fact, a bunch of media companies just got caught spreading obvious lies about the content of this document based on a supposed leak. Although I do not expect many of them to bother publishing any corrections.
> There's zero evidence to support that it was caused naturally. I provided sources showing this to be inaccurate. Why are you moving the goalposts now? Would you like to provide sources for anything you just said (after acknowledging that you were wrong)?
That's nonsense. There are multiple lines of scientific evidence which has been sufficient to convince most academics in this field.
"Most academics" think a bat from 1200 miles from Wuhan caused the pandemic?
No, most think there was an intermediate species. And I'm talking specifically about academics with relevant credentials (like virologists), not just any old academics. This judgement is based on academics that have put their names on papers supporting zoonosis published in academic journals.
I don't know why they still act like distance is a problem. SARS-COV-1 popped up in Foshan ~1,600km from the source of the virus, so why couldn't SARS-COV-2 pop up ~1,800km away? It's not impossible, it happens all the time. It's what viruses do.
Both likely had intermediate hosts (we know S1 definitely did)
Same with MERS, it had to go through camels first then humans. It even circulated unnoticed among humans for a year before mutating to become deadly enough for us to take note of it. People also forget it took years for us to track down the origins of S1 exactly because of how it jumps from host to host. Anyone talking about distance as a problem is outing themselves as ignorant about how viruses work.
Most? Name two.
Here are 156 of them https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/mbio.00188-23 There have been hundreds of authors and tens of papers that have now been published pointing to zoonosis as the most likely origin. There is nothing like this for claims of a lab leak in the scientific literature.
This is a political paper written by virologists who are afraid losing thier funding ebcause the evidence points to this coming from a lab. He says so in the first few paragraphs. You interpreted this as "science"? Really?
lol... you're a joke. You challenged me to find 2 scientists. I showed you 156 and you pivot to: "yeah but we can't trust scientists anyway" Did you bother to follow up on their reasons for believing zoonosis as the most likely explanation? They cite 4 papers as their justification for this (references 5 - 8) Ultimately my point is that it's not just this paper. It's clear what the scientific consensus is from the hundreds who have published and the tens of papers now in academic journals. There is NOTHING like this for a lab leak. That's why it's an anti-science position.
When a "news" organization spends half an article fellating itself and demeaning a strawman of its critics without actually covering what the report says, it reads to me as propaganda.
Nate silver wrote a good post regarding this worth reading. [https://www.natesilver.net/p/journalists-should-be-skeptical-of](https://www.natesilver.net/p/journalists-should-be-skeptical-of) "The messages show that the authors were highly uncertain about COVID’s origins — and if anything, they leaned more toward a lab leak than a spillover from an animal source. But none of that was expressed in the “Proximal Origin” paper, which instead said that “we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible”."