Posted on 09/16/2020 6:31:59 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
A new study purporting to show that the novel coronavirus was manufactured in a Chinese lab was published by a pair of nonprofit groups linked to Steve Bannon, the former top Trump strategist now facing felony fraud charges.
The study, co-authored by a Chinese virologist who fled Hong Kong this year, claims that “laboratory manipulation is part of the history of SARS-CoV-2.” Its findings were quickly picked up by a handful of prominent news organizations such as the New York Post, which hyped the “explosive” allegations that run counter to virtually all existing scientific literature on the source of the virus.
The study is the work of the Rule of Law Society and the Rule of Law Foundation, sister nonprofit organizations that Bannon was instrumental in creating. According to documents posted on the Society’s website last year, he served as that group’s chair. The Bannon connection was first spotted by Kevin Bird, a Ph.D. candidate at Michigan State University, and shared by Carl Bergstrom, a biology professor at the University of Washington, who called the study “bizarre and unfounded.”
A search of Google Scholar and the Rule of Law Society and Rule of Law Foundation websites indicates that the organizations have not previously published scientific or medical research, and it’s unclear whether the paper received any peer review. It was posted on Monday on the website Zenodo, a publicly available repository of scientific and academic research to which anyone can upload their work.
Both of the nonprofits behind the study were formed in conjunction with exiled Chinese billionaire Guo Wengui, with whom Bannon has collaborated on a number of advocacy efforts targeting the Chinese government and business endeavors that have drawn the scrutiny of federal law enforcement officials.
(Excerpt) Read more at thedailybeast.com ...
I would believe Steve Bannon before the DailyBeast.
Regardless of WHO is behind the study, the argument is SCIENTIFIC and should stay that way.
Here is the counter argument:
Dr. Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University, told The Daily Beast of the study that Basically, it’s all circumstantial and some of it is entirely fictional.
The paper leads with a claim that the coronavirus’ genes are “suspiciously similar to that of a bat coronavirus discovered by military laboratories” in China—an assertion Rasmussen says shouldn’t be surprising because “they are related SARS-like coronaviruses.”
The study’s authors made a similar claim about a portion of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein—which viruses use to breach and infect cells—and wrote that it’s similar to the original SARS virus in a “suspicious manner” and suggests genetic manipulation. “SARS-CoV also used ACE2 as a cellular receptor, as do other SARS-like bat coronaviruses,” Rasmussen says. “It is not suspicious and is in fact expected that the receptor binding domains that bind the same protein would be similar.”
Rasmussen also said that the paper misrepresented basic facts about another part of coronavirus spike proteins known as furin cleavage sites. The authors claim that SARS-CoV-2’s cleavage site is “unique” and unseen elsewhere in nature. But according to Rasmussen, “Furin cleavage sites occur naturally in many other beta-CoVs, including MERS-CoV and other SARS-like bat coronaviruses.”
THOSE COUNTER ARGUMENTS ARE SCIENTIFIC AND NEED TO BE REFUTED — SCIENTIFICALLY.
The article’s headline is an ad hominem logical fallacy.
Rather than deal with the accuracy of the information, and whether it has been properly corroborated, the article chooses to attack the people that financed the study.
Regardless of WHO is behind the study, the argument is SCIENTIFIC and should stay that way.
Here is the counter argument:
Dr. Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University, told The Daily Beast of the study that Basically, it’s all circumstantial and some of it is entirely fictional.
The paper leads with a claim that the coronavirus’ genes are “suspiciously similar to that of a bat coronavirus discovered by military laboratories” in China—an assertion Rasmussen says shouldn’t be surprising because “they are related SARS-like coronaviruses.”
The study’s authors made a similar claim about a portion of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein—which viruses use to breach and infect cells—and wrote that it’s similar to the original SARS virus in a “suspicious manner” and suggests genetic manipulation. “SARS-CoV also used ACE2 as a cellular receptor, as do other SARS-like bat coronaviruses,” Rasmussen says. “It is not suspicious and is in fact expected that the receptor binding domains that bind the same protein would be similar.”
Rasmussen also said that the paper misrepresented basic facts about another part of coronavirus spike proteins known as furin cleavage sites. The authors claim that SARS-CoV-2’s cleavage site is “unique” and unseen elsewhere in nature. But according to Rasmussen, “Furin cleavage sites occur naturally in many other beta-CoVs, including MERS-CoV and other SARS-like bat coronaviruses.”
THOSE COUNTER ARGUMENTS ARE SCIENTIFIC AND NEED TO BE REFUTED — SCIENTIFICALLY.
On the one hand, they just seem to think the virologist’s study has been “debunked” automatically.
And they seem to be jumping to the “ad hominem” phase of the counter-argument.
The Daily Beast, eh ?
Steve Bannon as the devil incarnate, eh ?
I smell a very large, dead Chinese rat.
What makes it ‘bogus’?
RE: On the one hand, they just seem to think the virologist’s study has been “debunked” automatically.
See Post #3
We can do it too - “George Soros Is Behind Bogus Claim that Police Randomly Kill Blacks Because of Skin Color.”
My mistake, see Post #4.
See #10. The cleavage sights do not appear where nature might have assigned them randomly.
If you see a cow with the head of a deer, rabbit ears, and monkey hands, you can be pretty sure it’s not a random mutation.
BANNON? Seriously? the leftists are getting desperate now that the truth about the China Viral Weapon is out there.
I’ll wait to see a few a few facts instead of sensationalism. Came from a bat or a lab in China or America( Alex Jones)? The governments of the world have surely created a medical-communist all encompassing contact tracing society and I see zero hospitals overwhelmed and also see China back to normal communism.
This could be the Chinese narrative to slander Bannon and the Chinese lady as selling BS?
Wait and see and study.
According to Angela Rasmussen,Virologist at Columbia University — the paper misrepresented basic facts about another part of coronavirus spike proteins known as furin cleavage sites.
The authors claim that SARS-CoV-2’s cleavage site is “unique” and unseen elsewhere in nature. But according to Rasmussen, “Furin cleavage sites occur naturally in many other beta-CoVs, including MERS-CoV and other SARS-like bat coronaviruses.”
China locked down Wuhan traffic internally in January but pushed to open foreign travel through March. Why?
I like that- let’s go with it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.