“This virus was likely man-made because gain of function man made viruses are quite common in research” - this doesn’t seem a convincing argument on its own (ignoring the comments on conspiracy / sense-making / politicisation).
Gain of function research seems valuable precisely in the sense it is identifying the mechanisms that govern infectivity. We wouldn’t have this discussion on furin cleavage sites without it.
The most likely case if we accept the lab leak hypothesis is that there was a base virus that was modified, with a similar virus that had a slightly different spike protein. This then infected staff and from there entered society.
This gains plausibility from the fact that it wouldn’t be readily distinguishable from a natural virus, as it would just be a combination of the two genomes.
However this is exactly why we can’t say for certain either way whether the source is natural or not - they’d be indistinguishable genetically.
It is more likely on the face of it that evolutionary pressure on the virus to spread and the natural process of mutation and selection caused the mutations in question, simply because of the volume of natural mutations versus artificial mutations.
"this doesn’t seem a convincing argument on its own"...
you're right, I should have said that "man made gain of function viruses-that-infect-humans are quite common in research and many times moreso than random mutation zoonotic species-jumping viruses are in nature"
"Gain of function research seems valuable"...
and then I will note that I must have scored a point in that sentence even as I wrote it, because the next thing you do is hurry to defend gain-of-function research. I wasn't attacking it, I was simply pointing out that the public is not aware how prevalent it is in urban virology centers in their own cities. I'm a sciency type, I like research, but I'm sure the average Joe would take a much dimmer view.
"This gains plausibility from the fact that it wouldn’t be readily distinguishable from a natural virus, as it would just be a combination of the two genomes. However this is exactly why we can’t say for certain either way whether the source is natural or not - they’d be indistinguishable genetically."
you really need to read the Yuri Deigin page I linked: for exactly the reason you cite, it actually is plausibly readily distinguishable as man-made because the bats and the pangolin viruses that were spliced together don't occur in the same geographic areas and the Wuhan lab published papers about them before their more recent info was wiped from view, and in nature the likelihood of such a clean crisp (CRISPR!) gene splice would be astronomically the worst luck ever as a mutation, but quite likely for exactly the research goals you defend above.
"It is more likely on the face of it that evolutionary pressure on the virus to spread and the natural process of mutation and selection caused the mutations in question, simply because of the volume of natural mutations versus artificial mutations."
again, nope, artificial splicing (not mutation) is quite common and becoming much moreso as the cost of doing it has dropped within reach (something like $100K IIRC) of just about anybody. Natural mutations that follow the path of precisely covid-19's genetics, quite uncommon.
Read the Yuri Deigin piece, listen to the youtube. If you're in too big a hurry, skip the first 25% of each and jump in later, still completely clear to grok.
How are you not attacking gain-of-function with “the real problem vis a vis Covid19 is not the lab leak. The real problem is "gain of function" research, using gene splicing to make more virulent-to-humans pathogens.”?
Perhaps I’ve misunderstood but you seem to be saying it’s a problem without any caveats regarding any potential benefits.
Artificial splicing is common, I agree, but we are talking a handful of mutations per paper rather than the billions of natural mutations that occur. I wasn’t arguing for frequency of mutations that follow the exact path of Covid 19 genetics, I would expect those to be very uncommon, but you only need one in a billion or more.
I've read the Yuri Deigin paper now. It touches on convergent evolution as a possible explanation for the existence of similar protein spike morphologies, but dismisses it without argument ("Talk about Intelligent Design!). It also seems to miss the key point of "computational analysis" when deciding exactly which viruses to synthesise.
The problem isn't synthesising a virus given its genome, it's choosing the genome of the virus to synthesise. As Yuri states, it took 30 days for a Swiss team to synthesise the virus given the genome. You just can't iterate this process very many times, and the chance of getting a virus that spreads effectively is not very high with each mutation (or recombination).
Gain of function research seems valuable precisely in the sense it is identifying the mechanisms that govern infectivity. We wouldn’t have this discussion on furin cleavage sites without it.
The most likely case if we accept the lab leak hypothesis is that there was a base virus that was modified, with a similar virus that had a slightly different spike protein. This then infected staff and from there entered society.
This gains plausibility from the fact that it wouldn’t be readily distinguishable from a natural virus, as it would just be a combination of the two genomes.
However this is exactly why we can’t say for certain either way whether the source is natural or not - they’d be indistinguishable genetically.
It is more likely on the face of it that evolutionary pressure on the virus to spread and the natural process of mutation and selection caused the mutations in question, simply because of the volume of natural mutations versus artificial mutations.