Dear Roger, I gladly join the choir of highly appreciative comments! Sadly, here too, mis/disinformation is the name of the game. It appears that scientific integrity can only exist in conditions where structural threats against it are at a minimum. Which means, that the subject matter is of little social, political or economic interest. To end more optimistically, it may be that ‘time heals all wounds’, albeit not in the time-frame we would prefer.
VERY well written, making it blindingly obvious to everyone that Fauci & Co. rigged the game from start to finish, and got away with it. Anyone care to guess how many $millions he made in the process, not to mention short-circuiting a line of investigation that would have led right back to his actions in funding the Wuhan lab?
My personal opinion, based on nothing more than my circumspect opinion of the players involved, is that Fauci and Collins came to the conclusion that a WHO panel could not be sufficiently influenced to the definitive opinion that supported. Likely because of their involvement in gain of function (or gain of function facsimile) studies that they had supported. Whether this was a CYA position or they truly feared an inconvenient result would stall GoF studies in the future I cannot begin to speculate.
The origins of COVID-19 are well worth knowing, but it has always struck me that the single greatest factor turning what should have been a local outbreak into a world-wide pandemic was the action of the Chinese government to permit free travel out of Wuhan to the rest of the world early in 2020 even though they had forbidden travel from Wuhan to other cities in China. This strikes me as an act so cynical as to rise to the level of manslaughter with depraved indifference. For which the Chinese government has never been held to account.
Roger, your research is of the highest order, something we have come to expect of you: Measured, balanced, and apolitical. It’s a powerful indictment of political science.
Scott Alexander of the Astral Codex Ten blog reviewed a debate over the origin of the virus conducted by a rationalist who posed a $100,000 challenge and a challenger who emerged as very well versed in the opposing argument
The panel of judges was excellent and I rest very well assured that I will not encounter a comparable debate in either quality or integrity from the current top science journals
There were obviously virologists, epidemiologists, etc... who trusted Proximal Origins, promoted it publicly, and thus got used as political pawns. So, in addition to the disturbing non retraction by Nature at this late date, an equally unpleasant non event is the lack of public outrage by the virology & epidemiology community against the publication, the authors of the paper, Fauci, Collins and so forth.
Where is the Barrington Declaration from them, making the points you have?
An 18 year old college football player receives heavier scrutiny if he gets busted for smoking weed.
The corruption of science documented here over covid is typical of climate science.
Dear Roger, I gladly join the choir of highly appreciative comments! Sadly, here too, mis/disinformation is the name of the game. It appears that scientific integrity can only exist in conditions where structural threats against it are at a minimum. Which means, that the subject matter is of little social, political or economic interest. To end more optimistically, it may be that ‘time heals all wounds’, albeit not in the time-frame we would prefer.
Roger,
VERY well written, making it blindingly obvious to everyone that Fauci & Co. rigged the game from start to finish, and got away with it. Anyone care to guess how many $millions he made in the process, not to mention short-circuiting a line of investigation that would have led right back to his actions in funding the Wuhan lab?
"... No long after, the editor of Science expressed his view that a consensus existed in... "
Should be:
"NOT long after, the editor of Science expressed his view that a consensus existed in...
Frank
My personal opinion, based on nothing more than my circumspect opinion of the players involved, is that Fauci and Collins came to the conclusion that a WHO panel could not be sufficiently influenced to the definitive opinion that supported. Likely because of their involvement in gain of function (or gain of function facsimile) studies that they had supported. Whether this was a CYA position or they truly feared an inconvenient result would stall GoF studies in the future I cannot begin to speculate.
Great piece.
As I recall, Fauci called himself “science” (I thought Piltdown is science?)
Then in testimony in congress “science” answered “I don’t recall” >55 times?
Is that how science works?
The origins of COVID-19 are well worth knowing, but it has always struck me that the single greatest factor turning what should have been a local outbreak into a world-wide pandemic was the action of the Chinese government to permit free travel out of Wuhan to the rest of the world early in 2020 even though they had forbidden travel from Wuhan to other cities in China. This strikes me as an act so cynical as to rise to the level of manslaughter with depraved indifference. For which the Chinese government has never been held to account.
Roger, your research is of the highest order, something we have come to expect of you: Measured, balanced, and apolitical. It’s a powerful indictment of political science.
Scott Alexander of the Astral Codex Ten blog reviewed a debate over the origin of the virus conducted by a rationalist who posed a $100,000 challenge and a challenger who emerged as very well versed in the opposing argument
The panel of judges was excellent and I rest very well assured that I will not encounter a comparable debate in either quality or integrity from the current top science journals
https://open.substack.com/pub/astralcodexten/p/practically-a-book-review-rootclaim?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=q4k5f
Roger: Thank you for putting this together and including links. I now have a lot more background reading to do!
There were obviously virologists, epidemiologists, etc... who trusted Proximal Origins, promoted it publicly, and thus got used as political pawns. So, in addition to the disturbing non retraction by Nature at this late date, an equally unpleasant non event is the lack of public outrage by the virology & epidemiology community against the publication, the authors of the paper, Fauci, Collins and so forth.
Where is the Barrington Declaration from them, making the points you have?
An 18 year old college football player receives heavier scrutiny if he gets busted for smoking weed.