> No it's not! Reasonably minded persons consider this entirely plausible.
I didn't say it was implausible. In fact, I have at least one sentence in my comment that acknowledges it is plausible to entertain. It doesn't appear to be plausible as a conclusion (see the two articles I linked, which do include sources who initially wanted to explore the lab leak theory), but it was plausible enough as a hypothesis.
What I said is that even if it is the truth, it evokes conspiracy-oriented thinking in a specific way, and elaborated on the dynamic.
> Each scenario has different lessons to learn, culpability, etc.
"Culpability" -- thank you for reinforcing my point about human threat agents. And also regarding "lessons to learn", or as I put it, managing risks in viral research vs the risks of not doing viral research... which of course is a conversation that goes on anyway.
I have to agree. The desperation to “blame China” seems to be driven by people with fantasies about going to war with China. Not even economic war with China beyond current tensions is possible without completely wrecking the economy in ways that will take all of us but the Bezos of the world down. Very little of this seems grounded in reality or good faith desire to know the truth of the matter.
I didn't say it was implausible. In fact, I have at least one sentence in my comment that acknowledges it is plausible to entertain. It doesn't appear to be plausible as a conclusion (see the two articles I linked, which do include sources who initially wanted to explore the lab leak theory), but it was plausible enough as a hypothesis.
What I said is that even if it is the truth, it evokes conspiracy-oriented thinking in a specific way, and elaborated on the dynamic.
> Each scenario has different lessons to learn, culpability, etc.
"Culpability" -- thank you for reinforcing my point about human threat agents. And also regarding "lessons to learn", or as I put it, managing risks in viral research vs the risks of not doing viral research... which of course is a conversation that goes on anyway.