Does anyone know if there's been any version of this debate that excludes from consideration any evidence whose chain of custody includes the CCP? In other words, only takes into account evidence known or developed independently of CCP influence?
And wouldn't this be the only logical approach to take here? Any other approach assumes implicitly that the CCP is either too honest, or unable, to doctor the evidence to favor of its own "acquittal" here ("acquittal" in terms of a human role, intentional or accidental, vs. just an accident of nature). Is there anyone who actually believes that?
I think the CCP is "guilty" in both cases: either they were too lax with the wet market, or too lax with the biolab. Their official story that they put forward for "acquittal" is that covid came from imported frozen food, but I don't think anybody takes this seriously.
Either way, all available evidence converges on the hypothesis that SARS-CoV-2 is a natural virus that never saw the inside of a lab, and jumped into humans from animals, quite possibly at the Huanan market where the first sustained transmission chains started.
Exactly, can not be faked. We are talking about 600 GB of metatranscriptomics data from environmental samples; there is no way any sequencing reads had been selectively removed from there. Or when we talk about patients in 7 hospitals, that somehow all were geographically associated with the Huanan market as the epicenter through multiple lines of evidence. Or the viral genome itself that has been samples over 10 million times around the world; there is no question that its genetic features and mosaic genome evolved, no matter what China did or did not do. What we know however is one thing; Chinese authorities were covering up live animals at the market long after it was clear that they had been there. They never sampled wildlife, wildlife traders, wildlife farms or wildlife suppliers associated with the market either; which would have been the most logical of all inquiry routes; which was recommended by the WHO mission and still they refused to do so... odd, isn't it?
Wouldn't the simplest explanation for refusal to test the animal related sources be that they expected the results would *conflict* with the narrative they wanted to promote?
Yeah, it is difficult to promote the "anywhere but here" cold-chain hypothesis when you have ancestral SARS-CoV-2 virus strains found in the wildlife supply chain. Beijng loves the whole lab leak idea, pushing it domestically and blaming the US, Fort Detrick and the military games; that is why most Chinese citizens believe it came from the US, whereas most US citizens believe it came from a lab in China. What Beijing does not love is talking about the market, in fact censoring information on social media starting from April 2020 even mentioning that the market might have been the origin of the pandemic. They never censored "lab leak" mentions however... odd again, isn't it?
Interesting rhetorical move there. What you describe is NOT Beijing loving the "lab leak" idea - that's commonly understood to be the idea that the virus first escaped from the lab in Wuhan (whether or not it had been altered in any way from its origins). What you describe Beijing "loving" is very, very different - the idea that the virus was brought there by foreigners.
You seem like an educated person, so why are you conflating those two very different things? Or are you also saying Beijing never censored discussion of the virus coming from the lab in Wuhan?
I apologize for my laziness, as I'm sure I could find the answer in the debate, but what % of the evidence presented related to the "result of GoF vs natural" question, and what % to the "lab leak/transmission by researchers vs non-research related infection" question?
The reason I ask is because I care mostly about what future policy should be, rather than specific blame for a specific viral outbreak. If experts tell me that the data supports zoonotic transmission without GoF, then I accept that. But that does not exclude "a viral researcher went out into the field and contracted (or brought a sample of) a natural virus, then transmitted (or it escaped from the lab) it to other humans in their city."
Where might I go to find similarly (for better or worse!) conclusive information on:
- Given that lab leaks have happened before, are current lab safety standards at labs with highly contagious diseases good enough?
- Is there any research (under whatever official technical description) being done that enhances viral contagiousness or deadliness, that is being done at places with insufficient lab safety?
- what steps were taken by any country/organizations to bias the lab leak debate in a way that, regardless of how it affected "blame" in either direction, reduced our/public health authorities ability to research/fight an outbreak, and how would we prevent those actions in the future?
- given that 1) natural viruses are acquired, 2) research (purposeful or accidental) to make them more effective (in the lab) does happen and 3) lab leaks have happened: we know that the original conspiracy theory is not impossible, even if we conclude that it did not happen in this case. So in general, what are we doing about, as a matter of policy? It would be most disappointing if we use "covid wasn't a GoF lab leak" as a reason to not pursue other helpful policy improvements related to the question.
I think Saar did point out real issues with the debate format they chose. Miller would have won even more decisively in that case, so Saar is (again) kidding himself to think that they would've won under a debate format that addressed the issues he mentions.
The creator of Rootclaim losing $100K using it is one of the best possible arguments that could have been made in favor of the format's credibility. Saar should lead with that every time he challenges someone to another.
Talk about missing the forest for the trees. There were almost immediate responses in early 2020 by government officials, media outlets, and many scientists, that it was not a lab leak yet with minimal evidence at that time. That was the main driver of skepticism as have many proclamations about "following the science" since then. That and, oh yeah, Chinese officials.
Interesting. And informative, as I have not seen the results of this 18-hour debate posted anywhere else. (Maybe it's all over Twitter/X, but I don't go there.) Thanks for the detailed report.
Saar Wilf was indeed hoist by his own Rootclaim petard. That's irony for you. But I, like you, don't think debates help to settle an issue like the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic. Even with smart debaters, debates can entertain, but do little to illuminate. Much like political debates, they are full of sound and fury, but it signifies nothing. Few people who watch political debates change their minds, and those that do, change them for the wrong reasons.
Any ideas on how to move forward the origins investigation using a process that is better than debates? Your careful and thorough writings are a great help, but they leave some questions unanswered.
Fix the broken information ecosystem we all suffer under so that evidence-based discourse does get a chance again to reach the public.
There are no great mysteries left on the origin question, at least whether it pertains to the question of whether this was a zoonotic spillover or some kind of "manmade" virus. Normal scientific inquiry and time form an ever clearer picture that this was a zoonotic spillover, despite all the noise trying to mislead citizens.
I'd wished the conversation would have moved on to "how to prevent SARS-CoV-3 from turning into a global pandemic" by now, because there is no question it will spill over, possibly within the next decade; and nobody has changed anything about the world to prepare for it.
In fact, many have worked to sabotage efforts to do so, social, political and scientific options have been paralyzed in favor of false myths.
So I’ve been on the sidelines of this debate for a while. It sounds like the judges bought the theory that Wuhan animal market was the start of the pandemic. I’ve seen Jesse Bloom say that this isn’t possible because evidence supports human cases which precede the market outbreak in time. Is there a case against this idea that I’m not familiar with?
As someone in the academic sphere I have often doubted my experience and expertise, but then I read about puffed-up self-appointed "geniuses" straying onto my turf and I just can't stop laughing.
Bravo! This is a well-reasoned piece. Giant thanks to Peter Miller for his courage and brilliance in his almost quixotic quest to counter the lab leak theory, and to you for your detailed and well-argued piece in support of the fairness of the outcome of the debate. I am also grateful to the judges for so generously dedicating much time and energy to ensuring a professional process for the debate.
You still generally underestimate the power of the right type of adjudicators in a debate like this if your final position is to still advocate against such debates. If the judges are made of the right stuff (morally and mentally), and the facts (hence, truth) are clearly mostly aligned on one side, why on earth should you ever think it is possible for the mistaken side to carry the day? As Peter himself said, he'd have pulled out if he had not seen that the evidences were heavily tilted to his side of the argument and if he had not been co-instrumental in selecting a pair of competent, unbiased, and conflict-of-interest-free judges. If these pre-conditions and more are met, would it still be sensible to continue to argue against the value of debunking pseudoscience and popular conspiracy theories?
I laid out my worries about the asymmetric payoff. Debates are persuasive because they are human; but they are not a good avenue for truth-finding and can not serve as a stand-in for scientific literacy, experts, and scientific consensus on a topic. It's a spectacle that needs a lot of the right ingredients for truth to carry the day, as come together here, and if replications are possible is dubious; given that Saar already announced he will change the format so his falsehoods have a better chance of winning next time.
Does anyone know if there's been any version of this debate that excludes from consideration any evidence whose chain of custody includes the CCP? In other words, only takes into account evidence known or developed independently of CCP influence?
And wouldn't this be the only logical approach to take here? Any other approach assumes implicitly that the CCP is either too honest, or unable, to doctor the evidence to favor of its own "acquittal" here ("acquittal" in terms of a human role, intentional or accidental, vs. just an accident of nature). Is there anyone who actually believes that?
I think the CCP is "guilty" in both cases: either they were too lax with the wet market, or too lax with the biolab. Their official story that they put forward for "acquittal" is that covid came from imported frozen food, but I don't think anybody takes this seriously.
Some data set can not be selectively faked.
Others have been verified independendly.
Either way, all available evidence converges on the hypothesis that SARS-CoV-2 is a natural virus that never saw the inside of a lab, and jumped into humans from animals, quite possibly at the Huanan market where the first sustained transmission chains started.
You say that the first sustained transmission chains started at the wet market. That's exactly the category of "evidence" I'm talking about.
Exactly, can not be faked. We are talking about 600 GB of metatranscriptomics data from environmental samples; there is no way any sequencing reads had been selectively removed from there. Or when we talk about patients in 7 hospitals, that somehow all were geographically associated with the Huanan market as the epicenter through multiple lines of evidence. Or the viral genome itself that has been samples over 10 million times around the world; there is no question that its genetic features and mosaic genome evolved, no matter what China did or did not do. What we know however is one thing; Chinese authorities were covering up live animals at the market long after it was clear that they had been there. They never sampled wildlife, wildlife traders, wildlife farms or wildlife suppliers associated with the market either; which would have been the most logical of all inquiry routes; which was recommended by the WHO mission and still they refused to do so... odd, isn't it?
Wouldn't the simplest explanation for refusal to test the animal related sources be that they expected the results would *conflict* with the narrative they wanted to promote?
Yeah, it is difficult to promote the "anywhere but here" cold-chain hypothesis when you have ancestral SARS-CoV-2 virus strains found in the wildlife supply chain. Beijng loves the whole lab leak idea, pushing it domestically and blaming the US, Fort Detrick and the military games; that is why most Chinese citizens believe it came from the US, whereas most US citizens believe it came from a lab in China. What Beijing does not love is talking about the market, in fact censoring information on social media starting from April 2020 even mentioning that the market might have been the origin of the pandemic. They never censored "lab leak" mentions however... odd again, isn't it?
Interesting rhetorical move there. What you describe is NOT Beijing loving the "lab leak" idea - that's commonly understood to be the idea that the virus first escaped from the lab in Wuhan (whether or not it had been altered in any way from its origins). What you describe Beijing "loving" is very, very different - the idea that the virus was brought there by foreigners.
You seem like an educated person, so why are you conflating those two very different things? Or are you also saying Beijing never censored discussion of the virus coming from the lab in Wuhan?
I apologize for my laziness, as I'm sure I could find the answer in the debate, but what % of the evidence presented related to the "result of GoF vs natural" question, and what % to the "lab leak/transmission by researchers vs non-research related infection" question?
The reason I ask is because I care mostly about what future policy should be, rather than specific blame for a specific viral outbreak. If experts tell me that the data supports zoonotic transmission without GoF, then I accept that. But that does not exclude "a viral researcher went out into the field and contracted (or brought a sample of) a natural virus, then transmitted (or it escaped from the lab) it to other humans in their city."
Where might I go to find similarly (for better or worse!) conclusive information on:
- Given that lab leaks have happened before, are current lab safety standards at labs with highly contagious diseases good enough?
- Is there any research (under whatever official technical description) being done that enhances viral contagiousness or deadliness, that is being done at places with insufficient lab safety?
- what steps were taken by any country/organizations to bias the lab leak debate in a way that, regardless of how it affected "blame" in either direction, reduced our/public health authorities ability to research/fight an outbreak, and how would we prevent those actions in the future?
- given that 1) natural viruses are acquired, 2) research (purposeful or accidental) to make them more effective (in the lab) does happen and 3) lab leaks have happened: we know that the original conspiracy theory is not impossible, even if we conclude that it did not happen in this case. So in general, what are we doing about, as a matter of policy? It would be most disappointing if we use "covid wasn't a GoF lab leak" as a reason to not pursue other helpful policy improvements related to the question.
https://protagonistfuture.substack.com/p/natures-neglected-gof-laboratory
Thank you!
I think Saar did point out real issues with the debate format they chose. Miller would have won even more decisively in that case, so Saar is (again) kidding himself to think that they would've won under a debate format that addressed the issues he mentions.
The creator of Rootclaim losing $100K using it is one of the best possible arguments that could have been made in favor of the format's credibility. Saar should lead with that every time he challenges someone to another.
Talk about missing the forest for the trees. There were almost immediate responses in early 2020 by government officials, media outlets, and many scientists, that it was not a lab leak yet with minimal evidence at that time. That was the main driver of skepticism as have many proclamations about "following the science" since then. That and, oh yeah, Chinese officials.
Interesting. And informative, as I have not seen the results of this 18-hour debate posted anywhere else. (Maybe it's all over Twitter/X, but I don't go there.) Thanks for the detailed report.
Saar Wilf was indeed hoist by his own Rootclaim petard. That's irony for you. But I, like you, don't think debates help to settle an issue like the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic. Even with smart debaters, debates can entertain, but do little to illuminate. Much like political debates, they are full of sound and fury, but it signifies nothing. Few people who watch political debates change their minds, and those that do, change them for the wrong reasons.
Any ideas on how to move forward the origins investigation using a process that is better than debates? Your careful and thorough writings are a great help, but they leave some questions unanswered.
Fix the broken information ecosystem we all suffer under so that evidence-based discourse does get a chance again to reach the public.
There are no great mysteries left on the origin question, at least whether it pertains to the question of whether this was a zoonotic spillover or some kind of "manmade" virus. Normal scientific inquiry and time form an ever clearer picture that this was a zoonotic spillover, despite all the noise trying to mislead citizens.
I'd wished the conversation would have moved on to "how to prevent SARS-CoV-3 from turning into a global pandemic" by now, because there is no question it will spill over, possibly within the next decade; and nobody has changed anything about the world to prepare for it.
In fact, many have worked to sabotage efforts to do so, social, political and scientific options have been paralyzed in favor of false myths.
So I’ve been on the sidelines of this debate for a while. It sounds like the judges bought the theory that Wuhan animal market was the start of the pandemic. I’ve seen Jesse Bloom say that this isn’t possible because evidence supports human cases which precede the market outbreak in time. Is there a case against this idea that I’m not familiar with?
Yes, Jesse Bloom's assertions are not only unsubstantiated but wrong.
Pekar et al. would be the reference, and more recently Zach Hensel and Flo Debarre also address specifically where Bloom went wrong in his phylogeny https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.02.15.580500v1
Here is also a scicomm explain from Peter who won the debate: https://twitter.com/tgof137/status/1759743323789722043
As someone in the academic sphere I have often doubted my experience and expertise, but then I read about puffed-up self-appointed "geniuses" straying onto my turf and I just can't stop laughing.
Bravo! This is a well-reasoned piece. Giant thanks to Peter Miller for his courage and brilliance in his almost quixotic quest to counter the lab leak theory, and to you for your detailed and well-argued piece in support of the fairness of the outcome of the debate. I am also grateful to the judges for so generously dedicating much time and energy to ensuring a professional process for the debate.
Thank you for reading.
It is a quixotic quest, but both Peter and I believe that it is impactful to not let a false myth take over pandemic prevention policy.
Great article. Well researched. Thank you.
You still generally underestimate the power of the right type of adjudicators in a debate like this if your final position is to still advocate against such debates. If the judges are made of the right stuff (morally and mentally), and the facts (hence, truth) are clearly mostly aligned on one side, why on earth should you ever think it is possible for the mistaken side to carry the day? As Peter himself said, he'd have pulled out if he had not seen that the evidences were heavily tilted to his side of the argument and if he had not been co-instrumental in selecting a pair of competent, unbiased, and conflict-of-interest-free judges. If these pre-conditions and more are met, would it still be sensible to continue to argue against the value of debunking pseudoscience and popular conspiracy theories?
I laid out my worries about the asymmetric payoff. Debates are persuasive because they are human; but they are not a good avenue for truth-finding and can not serve as a stand-in for scientific literacy, experts, and scientific consensus on a topic. It's a spectacle that needs a lot of the right ingredients for truth to carry the day, as come together here, and if replications are possible is dubious; given that Saar already announced he will change the format so his falsehoods have a better chance of winning next time.