I have also heard it postulated that the first “White horse of the apocalypse” is representative of a “Lab Coat”
LOL!
Quite droll.
I will point out that, in Revelation, whenever John introduces something intended to be understood as a symbol, he tells his reader what it is a symbol of. So, having set his pattern, if John DOESN’T highlight a particular thing as symbolic, we ought not read it as symbolic.
Now. The Four Horsemen, for example. Ought we be looking for a small cadre of high-profile equestrians? The New Jerusalem Polo Team, perhaps? Manifestly not.
Yet, John relates the advent of these riders literally.
It can only be, then, that they are NOT symbolic, but ARE not evident is this plane of existence; that they are literal events, but on a spiritual plane unseen to us, although the fallout of their work will certainly be felt experientially by those alive at the time.