[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by DiracSpike

I'm open to the possibility that it was a natural origin. I'll just use strong language talking about the lab leak because right now, in my mind, the balance of evidence is weighing heavily in favor of the lab leak and it's not particularly close. But it's certainly not 100%. And I wouldn't call anyone who believes in a natural origin an idiot, or a science denier, or a conspiracy theorist, or state that there's categorically no chance it could be natural in origin like we saw play out in the other direction basically up until now.

Did I say I was gonna solve it? No. I'm calling for people to do the work. That's literally my argument.

I'd say a worse outcome that has happened this year is the complete politicization of real science by people who would rather make lazy appeal to authority arguments with the bonus of castigating those they disagree with. This thread is a perfect example of that, just look at the first few pages. Everyone who said there was 100% no chance this was possibleclaimed they were following the science and listening to experts, when actually they were just listening to a handpicked few that corroborated what they wanted the truth to be based on illogical reasoning that I've pointed out already. You would have to be a technical molecular biologist to say that the spike protein doesn't bind with 100% affinity, but you don't have to be a molecular biologist to say that that is not proof positive of a natural emergence. Everyone who claimed they were "following the science" by saying you'd have to be an idiot to think this was a lab leak are the ones looking stupid today. Because they weren't following science, they were politicizing it. A trademark of a truly intelligent person is the ability to ask smart penetrating questions about a subject they don't have expertise in, and if those answers don't make sense or don't follow logically they have the right to be skeptical and it's up to the experts to answer good questions fully. Can people ask dumb questions, take illogical stances, and have an ignorant view of science no matter what? Yeah, of course. But that doesn't mean you can throw out the ability to question things all together. This would be like me saying, "oh no one's allowed to question the Government of Alberta's stance on pipelines or energy cuz Sonya Savage has a masters degree in environmental law. Where's your masters degree? Then shut up". Is that a reasonable standard to you? You'd cave and say oh i guess you're right I cant have a reasoned opinion on any of this, guess the government knows best? I doubt it, there's always reasonable intelligent questions any lay person can ask about any field. It's disingenuous lazy way of making arguments and I'm done with it.

I don't think I'm guessing, or jumping to conclusions, or not using fact base reasoning like you accuse me of doing. If so I challenge you to point out where I have instead of just lobbing that out there. I'd also ask you what you think the strongest evidence of natural emergence is, because right now all you have is a seafood market were some but not all of the early cases are. That's it, unless you have something better? Or do we both need to get PHD's in virology before we're allowed to debate stuff like this.

I find your position rather baffling, because the balance of evidence and expert opinions is that it is a natural source. I've asked what expert is putting forth the idea that it is created, and no one replied with one. We have the journalist, who isn't an expert..and we now have some investigations. But at this point, as has been since ealry last year, the prevailing theory and knowledge all do not support the lab theory. Yet you seem to think that is the most likely scenario. So again, what experts are proposing this and what evidence are they presenting?