That is indeed the testimony of Steven C. Quay, one of "the lab leak people" that are asserted by GP to be probably wrong.

Very few people would claim that there is no testimony for the lab leak claim, it's simply that relatively few domain scientists support that claim.

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_C._Quay

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_lab_leak_theory

▲

timschmidt 4 hours ago | parent [-]

> relatively few domain scientists support that claim

I spent a decade at a national Science and Technology Research Center responsible for a twelfth of NSF's research budget. We studied biology at all scales and the algorithms it uses to solve difficult problems. I've looked for holes in Quay's testimony and didn't find any big ones. Most of his claims seem to be independently verified.

One thing I can say from my decade of experience is that scientists are not dumb people, and are acutely aware of how their work is perceived, and the connection that has to their research funding. You'll find as many scientists warning about the dangers of lax lab regulation as you will coal miners warning about climate change. Private conversations are very different.

▲

Hikikomori 3 hours ago | parent [-]

What kind of expertise should you possess to be able to comment on a lab theory?

Even if lab leak is true, what is the proposal, that we do not study viruses at all?

▲

timschmidt 3 hours ago | parent [-]

> What kind of expertise should you possess to be able to comment on a lab theory?

Enough.

> Even if lab leak is true, what is the proposal, that we do not study viruses at all?

People love to think in black and white. All on or all off. It is metabolically inexpensive to reduce reality to the binary. But reality is all the colors in between. To the best of anyone's ability to reconstruct the events which led to the outbreak (I think Quay makes a compelling case in that testimony which summarizes a great deal of investigative work by others) many things went wrong. Many of which were predictable. Many choices were made. All that suggests opportunity to reduce risk through less extreme means: restricting gain of function research to higher-BSL labs, removing those labs further from population centers, more closely monitoring inflows and outflows around such research, changes are possible in the review and approval process, the list of possibilities is extensive.

What would your motivation be for seeing it any other way?

▲

Hikikomori 2 hours ago | parent [-]

>Enough.

So someone with expertise in other non relevant fields is enough? Yet people that have expertise in relevant fields dispute his conclusions and its not relevant somehow?

▲

timschmidt an hour ago | parent [-]

You really like to stand up incorrect assumptions to argue against. Second time you've done so in this short interaction.

Not a word yet about your motivation. Huh. You'd think anyone out here demanding others' credentials would lead by presenting their own.

▲

Hikikomori an hour ago | parent [-]

Not your credentials specifically, but Steven Quay. Cursory search suggest he's not an expert in relevant fields, but does have a book about lab leak theory. Immediately suspicious as there are a lot of scientists that turn to grifting in areas that were not relevant to their expertise.

	▲	timschmidt 18 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		I don't much care what the man does with his free time. I'm more interested in the veracity of his statements. On that front he supplies copious references to peer reviewed research by numerous others. Character assassination is for folks who can't argue on the merits. You still haven't offered your own credentials.