In new study, I have analyzed correlation between SARS-CoV-2 & animal genetic material in full set of environmental samples from Huanan Seafood Market.
https://t.co/MEeG0r414I
Analysis clarifies what sequencing these samples can & cannot tell us about early outbreak at market.
The sample that has attracted the most attention is the mostly light green pie circle, for which the dominant mtDNA is from a raccoon dog. This has attracted attention because raccoon dogs are one of several species known to be susceptible to SARS2.
In my mind, the lab leak hypothesis should be a warning case study in how hypotheses about a high-uncertainty event can arbitrarily align with political orientations early on, and have massive negative repercussions later in how we objectively weigh evidence and discuss things.
@WashburneAlex @m_de_spinoza Because it’s 1-indexed 😂 it also breaks many other important comp sci heuristics that are quite important when engineering something moderately big. R simply is not general purpose.
@WashburneAlex The first computer program I ever wrote was the trapezoidal approach to estimating integrals for calculus. Miss a few points for not using parabolas 🤦♀️
@nntaleb In my opinion the best way to drink a nice whiskey is … however you like to drink a nice whiskey. It seems petty and immature to tell others how they should enjoy.
@vsbuffalo Hard to say if I’ve had this exact problem. But I delete and reinstall miniconda regularly and that’s solved all sorts of random bugs especially wrt jupyter
This is a thoughtful, enjoyable essay on why we should ditch peer review entirely by @a_m_mastroianni. Peer review is an outrageously expensive recent intervention in the scientific system. Does it help make science better? Not for the cost.
https://t.co/K1sh3Pn2vi
If we can't tell whether or not the pandemic began from a lab leak, maybe we should stop funding and promoting virus hunting + engineering research under lax oversight and in labs that cannot be investigated?