Coronavirus: 'Nature is sending us a message’, says UN environment chief - Page 3 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#15078891
SolarCross wrote:Ok but why release it in Wuhan then? China is a big country, there are plenty of other places they could release it. Somewhere like Shanghai which would spread the virus to the rest of the world faster because it is a trade hub.


Maybe because Wuhan had a virology lab it already had containment teams and protocols in place to control the vectors, maybe because if it ever did come out that it was a manmade virus the Chinese could plausibly claim it was an accident. I don't have the best answers to those questions but that doesn't mean there aren't good reasons for why they'd do it there. All the major powers have defense think tanks that do highly classified planning and gaming, there could be good reasons to do it there that just aren't that obvious and it takes a team of top secret eggheads to work out the optimal strategy for doing something like that.

As to why they would do that, I can speculate and there are some plausible motives but again I'm not a team of planning geeks that has spent the last 20 years inside the bowels of the PRC defense ministry carefully devising these kinds of scenarios. I guarantee you there are people that do that, in the US they work for like RAND Corp, so it is a thing, but backwards engineering these actions isn't as easy as conspiratards seem to think it is.

I'm not saying it did come out of that lab or that an accidental release is impossible, all I'm saying is if it turns out it did come from a lab then I'm just assuming guilt until it's proven otherwise because only a total idiot would give the Chicom gulagist regime the benefit of the doubt.
Last edited by Sivad on 27 Mar 2020 13:33, edited 1 time in total.
#15078892
The Chinese government initially released the virus in Wuhan because of the anti government demonstrations there. They released it initially in Wuhan rather than Hong Kong because the latter would have looked a bit too suspicious. They may well have followed it up by a second release in Hong Kong. They very probably made a later release in Iran of a more dangerous variant. They chose Iran, because the cretinous religious idiots that run the place were very unlikely to competently track the source of the attack as they might in the West.
#15078900
Sivad wrote:Maybe because Wuhan had a virology lab it already had containment teams and protocols in place to control the vectors, maybe because if it ever did come out that it was a manmade virus the Chinese could plausibly claim it was an accident. I don't have the best answers to those questions but that doesn't mean there aren't good reasons for why they'd do it there. All the major powers have defense think tanks that do highly classified planning and gaming, there could be good reasons to do it there that just aren't that obvious and it takes a team of top secret eggheads to work out the optimal strategy for doing something like that.

As to why they would do that, I can speculate and there are some plausible motives but again I'm not a team of planning geeks that has spent the last 20 years inside the bowels of the PRC defense ministry carefully devising these kinds of scenarios. I guarantee you there are people that do that, in the US they work for like RAND Corp, so it is a thing, but backwards engineering these actions isn't as easy as conspiratards seem to think it is.

I'm not saying it did come out of that lab or that an accidental release is impossible, all I'm saying is if it turns out it did come from a lab then I'm just assuming guilt until it's proven otherwise because only a total idiot would give the Chicom gulagist regime the benefit of the doubt.

Fair enough. Totalitarians do not believe in "innocent until proven guilty" or fair trials so they will just have to be treated the same way. It is what they would want.
#15078906
Rich wrote:
The Chinese government initially released the virus in Wuhan because of the anti government demonstrations there. They released it initially in Wuhan rather than Hong Kong because the latter would have looked a bit too suspicious. They may well have followed it up by a second release in Hong Kong. They very probably made a later release in Iran of a more dangerous variant. They chose Iran, because the cretinous religious idiots that run the place were very unlikely to competently track the source of the attack as they might in the West.



We know what happened, and that ain't it.

This is getting to be a regular occurrence. Both the emergence of disease through improper treatment of animals, and moronic conspiracy theories.

You want to know a secret agency responsible for creating diseases?

Agriculture Dept..
#15078910
late wrote:Industrial farming has gotta stop. I've decided words like sustainable are too big for some in our audience..

Yeah. I figured smugness would be your response.

Godstud wrote:That said, I know we do have to move to a more sustainable way of getting protein, meaning insects, although many people are repulsed by the idea.

Well, you'll have a low-cost supply of protein. My high cost alternative will be meat, and my low cost alternative will be legumes.

AFIAK wrote:A third of China's pigs died last year due to disease. Farmers aren't compensated so they sell infected animals anyway, spreading the disease or they dump them in rivers so the symptomless livestock doesn't get culled.

China is totally awesome. :roll:

SolarCross wrote:I think the message nature is sending us is that crazy control freak totalitarians are as shit at keeping bioweapons from getting loose as they are at managing nuclear power stations. Wuhan Institute of Virology is China's Chernobyl.

This is pretty much China's Chernobyl. Fucking commie douchebags.

Sivad wrote:If it came out of that lab it wasn't an accident.

China's behavior suggests that it was from that lab. Even scientists do stupid shit. In this case, we had a whistleblower who ostensibly died from the disease, although I have my doubts.

B0ycey wrote:So why are the conspiracists focused on bioterrorism than the more likely scenario of crossing the species divide? :roll:

Terrorists are surely taking notice of how this is far more disruptive than 9/11; however, it will kill Muslim fundamentalists just as fast as anyone else. However, a lot of terrorists are pretty nihilistic.

SolarCross wrote:I think the question is why are the totalitarians ignoring the very high probability that their favourite totalitarian regime might just be a bunch of clowns?

It's probably the same reason they refuse to understand why the Western electorates have given up on the technocrats and voted in populists.

late wrote:No virus cares about your paranoiac BS.

Nor do they care about your smug, condescending self assuredness.

late wrote:What the above means is that the rate of disease coming from animals is increasing, and a lot of it comes from industrial farming...

There is nothing to suggest that this came from an industrial farming operation. It likely came from either the Wuhan virology lab where they might be studying viruses in animals, or the wet market where foodstuffs like bats are sold which are not industrially farmed and hence aren't subject to the same regulatory controls for food safety.

late wrote:Back in the real world (consider visiting us sometime) a hypothesis needs support, and you have none.

There are several. The Wuhan virology lab and the wet market. Both are far more likely scenarios than you've offered.

B0ycey wrote:We cannot know that it originated there.

We do know the outbreak centered there.

B0ycey wrote:China is pretty darn efficient. They sorted this out in two months.

First, you have to believe they sorted it out. Second, they don't have to respect human rights. They can simply execute anyone with a fever and ensure the press doesn't report it.

B0ycey wrote:Which is why, except Atlantis, I cannot understand why those who advocate health over economics are happy with the Wests half open half closed rising cases and soon we'll all be infected but a damn sight poorer strategy.

People who have been lamenting capitalism should be happy about this, because it has brought much of the capitalist system to its knees.

SolarCross wrote:You and late could be a little less obvious shills for winnie the pooh.

This is sort of like the Democrats are racists behind the scenes and collude with the MSM meme that they downplayed until Wikileaks laid it bare. I've said for years, its unlawful to bribe politicians, but not media mouthpieces. Lots of money goes into the pockets of talking heads to push the agendas of all sorts of nation-states and NGOs. That's why the craziest people in our country are either shitting themselves in doorways in the downtown area of large cities, or they are on television spouting crazy shit.

Godstud wrote:Suspicious isn't cause for speculation about China wanting to destroy itself with disease. :knife:

It is unlikely deliberate. It's more likely some fuck up at the Wuhan virology lab. Never attribute to conspiracy which can be explained by incompetence. However, the virus has a peculiar trait. It's asymptomatic among much of the population, but it preys on the elderly and infirm. Now consider the cost of welfare states with an aging population. In the US and Europe, the cost of taking care of the elderly is staggering. In the US, both Social Security and Medicare dominate the federal budget leaving little for everything else. What happens if you have a pandemic that kills mostly old people? Tremendous relief on the budgets of the welfare state. It will be hard on insurers of working age insured--those people with the weaker immune systems and other chronic health conditions. However, the virus could be called the "Hitler" virus, because it does much of what the Nazi-state wanted to do in getting rid of the weak and "useless eaters."

SolarCross wrote:I suspect an ACCIDENTAL release.

They always misread in coordination with the hope that others of us will have been too lazy to see the sleight of hand.

Godstud wrote:It's still conspiracy theory nonsense.

Conspiracy suggests intent. A fuckup either in a virology lab or a wet market is not a conspiracy. China's government's effort to control the narrative is a conspiracy for which there is plentiful evidence.

SolarCross wrote:Maybe because Wuhan had a virology lab it already had containment teams and protocols in place to control the vectors, maybe because if it ever did come out that it was a manmade virus the Chinese could plausibly claim it was an accident.

The virus doesn't have to be man-made for the transmission to humans to have occurred in that lab. They could have simply been isolating viruses from various species, and some fuckwit didn't follow protocol. That's the more likely explanation. Chernobyl happened because of a bunch of fuckwits too. And the fucking Soviets didn't even bother building blast proof containment structures. Sure, totalitarians are efficient. As I said, an airplane with no triple redundancy systems would be more efficient too. Want to take your chances?

Godstud wrote:New York has labs. They must have released it on the population, there. :knife:

New York has woke leftists politicians encouraging people to go out in groups even after an emergency was declared, just like Milan.

late wrote:We know what happened, and that ain't it.We know what happened, and that ain't it.

There is no evidence it came from an industrial farm.
#15078911
blackjack21 wrote:


There is nothing to suggest that this came from an industrial farming operation. It likely came from either the Wuhan virology lab where they might be studying viruses in animals, or the wet market where foodstuffs like bats are sold which are not industrially farmed and hence aren't subject to the same regulatory controls for food safety.






This is the latest in a series of zoonotic diseases, most come from industrial agriculture.

Back in the real world, you need more than dumbass speculation.
#15078916
late wrote:This is the latest in a series of zoonotic diseases, most come from industrial agriculture.

Back in the real world, you need more than dumbass speculation.

Industrial agriculture is well-regulated. Wet markets aren't. Virology labs are well-regulated, but still subject to fuck ups. The epicenter, and the Chinese government's response suggest that the Chinese government--probably inadvertently--has some culpability. Saving face is a big deal in Chinese culture.
#15078918
blackjack21 wrote:
Industrial agriculture is well-regulated.

Wet markets aren't.

Virology labs are well-regulated, but still subject to fuck ups.



In America, regulation in general is in decline. But trying to assert industrial ag is well regulated is a joke. Biologists have been trying to get the government to actually regulate the damn things for about a generation.

China has banned a lot of that, and being the fun loving guys they are, I kinda expect they are going to come down on wet markets like a dropped anvil on a watermelon.

I linked to an article earlier that explains why this didn't come from a lab. Of course, that's in the real world. Ever been there?
#15078949
late wrote:In America, regulation in general is in decline.

That's immaterial. The coronavirus did not originate in the United States.

late wrote:I linked to an article earlier that explains why this didn't come from a lab. Of course, that's in the real world. Ever been there?

You are conflating whether the virus was engineered and whether it jumped from animals to humans. I'm perfectly capable of reading an explanation. That doesn't mean I accept the explanation at face value. I don't think the coronavirus was genetically engineered. I think it's reasonable to suspect that it jumped from animals to humans in a wet market or at the Wuhan virology lab. I'm gravitating toward the latter based on the Chinese government's response, lack of candor, and treatment of whistleblowers.
#15078971
blackjack21 wrote:
That's immaterial. The coronavirus did not originate in the United States.


You are conflating whether the virus was engineered and whether it jumped from animals to humans. I'm perfectly capable of reading an explanation. That doesn't mean I accept the explanation at face value. I don't think the coronavirus was genetically engineered. I think it's reasonable to suspect that it jumped from animals to humans in a wet market or at the Wuhan virology lab. I'm gravitating toward the latter based on the Chinese government's response, lack of candor, and treatment of whistleblowers.



I realise you see yourself as some sort of clown, but this is serious.

Why you prefer speculation over science is hardly germane. That's just you one more time shitting on science so you can be a clown.
#15079119
SolarCross wrote:Well if they released it on purpose why do it on their own doorstep? They could put a vial on a plane and drop it anywhere. Tokyo, Seoul, Washington...

If it happens on the doorstep then that looks like an accident to me.

For the sake of conversation and of not fully discounting any possibilities, it would lend the Chinese a tremendous clout of deniability (as you effectively pointed out). I didn't see this disease rip through the CCP, it'd be rather easy to inoculate the important people (rule 1, as I understand it, is never create a biological weapon that you don't have a vaccine for), and sacrificing a couple of politicians would add to the deniability aspect (and if they are from Wuhan it's easy to dismiss because of the proximity to the outbreak, and moreover the Central Government and Chinese people were quick to scapegoat the local government, so local party members also had diminished worth).

Moreover, releasing it into a logistics and transportation megapolis like Wuhan would serve a double purpose of allowing the virus to gestate within a population and to spread far and wide (e.g. worldwide) (and the Chinese common citizenry are of course expendable--although you might say the same of the unwashed masses in most places and at most times in the world); while at the same time providing the aforementioned cover of deniability.

Not saying I buy into this, or anything. But international politics are wicked and wretched indeed, and in the contemporary age in which conventional warfare between great powers is obsolete due to nuclear weapons, I suppose that one can't completely dismiss the possibility of a country unleashing a global pandemic and global depression, in order to orchestrate a major adjustment to the prevailing international order of nations.
#15079139
SolarCross wrote:^ It remains to be seen. The trouble is totalitarians are absolutely untrustworthy people who lie all the time. And they have their fanboys even in the west who will lie for them too.


That's the received wisdom, so it does come as a bit of a shock that Western democracies did even worse.

The initial delay of 1 or 2 weeks to address the outbreak in Wuhan pales in comparison to the failure of Western governments to mount an adequate response even after 2 months.

@Crantag, as @late described, the lab-released conspiracy has been debunked for over a month. Just let it rest. Anyways, the Chinese could not have predicted the total failure of the West. Politicians love the status quo, they wouldn't want to disrupt their exports markets just for fun.

@AFAIK, industrial crop harvesting without animal manure is even more destructive than industrial animal husbandry. The destruction of soil organisms doesn't touche the sentiments of denatured city folks like pictures of slaughtered animals, but it's much worse for the environment. As I said, nature romanticism is the problem not the solution.
#15079174
late wrote:Why you prefer speculation over science is hardly germane. That's just you one more time shitting on science so you can be a clown.

I have a bachelor of science in business. The science part of the degree is that they put you one hell of a lot of math and statistics to qualify it as a bachelor of science instead of a bachelor of arts. However, I've read enough medical texts and worked on enough medical projects to have a somewhat jaded opinion of the medical field.

Crantag wrote:For the sake of conversation and of not fully discounting any possibilities, it would lend the Chinese a tremendous clout of deniability (as you effectively pointed out). I didn't see this disease rip through the CCP, it'd be rather easy to inoculate the important people (rule 1, as I understand it, is never create a biological weapon that you don't have a vaccine for), and sacrificing a couple of politicians would add to the deniability aspect (and if they are from Wuhan it's easy to dismiss because of the proximity to the outbreak, and moreover the Central Government and Chinese people were quick to scapegoat the local government, so local party members also had diminished worth).

Interesting point and true. However, the CCP would just lie about it if their leaders had the virus as well. Prince Charles and Boris Johnson both have tested positive. So have a few US politicians, such as Rand Paul.

Crantag wrote:But international politics are wicked and wretched indeed, and in the contemporary age in which conventional warfare between great powers is obsolete due to nuclear weapons, I suppose that one can't completely dismiss the possibility of a country unleashing a global pandemic and global depression, in order to orchestrate a major adjustment to the prevailing international order of nations.

The global economy already produces too much; however, nation states have a huge liability with supporting elderly populations. That would be an obvious way of reducing costs. I'm 52 now. When I was in my early 20s, I remember visiting my grandfather who was born in 1892 and it had occurred to me that he had been retired longer than I had been alive. He died in 1992 just a month after his 100th birthday. Retiring in 1957 and living until 1992? That's retirement for 35 years. I thought about that into my early 30s. Both of my grandfathers lived to be 100. One great grandfather lived to by 99 and 7 months. If that's the case for me, I'm merely middle aged. However, for welfare actuaries, it's a scary proposition. If you are seriously taxing the young to pay for the old, you have a looming political crisis, which is greatly alleviated by a mass death of elderly people.

Atlantis wrote:@Crantag, as @late described, the lab-released conspiracy has been debunked for over a month.

If you use words like "discredited" or "debunked", you only add fuel to the fire as that is establishment language.

Atlantis wrote:Anyways, the Chinese could not have predicted the total failure of the West.

Why not? They control the medical supply chain. This is yet another reason why the establishment is continuing to lose support in the US.
#15079206
blackjack21 wrote:Why not? They control the medical supply chain. This is yet another reason why the establishment is continuing to lose support in the US.


I love it, you actually admitted that the mess created by Trump could have been predicted by the Chinese. :lol:

Don't worry, Trump has the same problem. He can't remember when he told what lie. It's impossible not to contradict yourself.

At times like this, I enjoy that I'm just a simple soul who can't be bothered with all your propaganda lies.
#15079215
“The animals have been transported over large distances and are crammed together into cages. They are stressed and immunosuppressed and excreting whatever pathogens they have in them,” he said. “With people in large numbers in the market and in intimate contact with the body fluids of these animals, you have an ideal mixing bowl for [disease] emergence. If you wanted a scenario to maximise the chances of [transmission], I couldn’t think of a much better way of doing it.”


A shrimp peddler at the Chinese market, where the coronavirus pandemic likely began, is identified as the “patient zero.” Wei Guixian was the first woman to test positive for the deadly bug. Wei believes she caught the infection from a toilet she shared with wild meat sellers at the market. Vendors on either side of her live shrimp stall caught the disease, as did members of her family. Snakes or bats were initially suggested to be the source of the virus, especially considering the variety of wild animals sold at the market. Probably interviewing wild meat sellers she worked with at the market would lead us to the ultimate source of the coronavirus.

She suspects she became infected sharing a toilet with wild meat sellers at Wuhan's Huanan market.

The person believed to be the first ever human infected with COVID-19 has broken her silence.

Wei Guixian is a 57-year-old seafood merchant at the Huanan Market in Wuhan where the virus is suspected to have first made the jump from a bat to a human -- her.

She was identified by the Wall Street Journal as potentially Patient Zero; speaking to Chinese publication The Paper (via News.com.au), she described how she first started to feel ill on December 10, believing she had caught a cold or maybe the flu.

https://toofab.com/2020/03/27/wuhan-cor ... ro-speaks/
#15079296
blackjack21 wrote:
I have a bachelor of science in business. The science part of the degree is that they put you one hell of a lot of math and statistics to qualify it as a bachelor of science instead of a bachelor of arts. However, I've read enough medical texts and worked on enough medical projects to have a somewhat jaded opinion of the medical field.






Thanks for the laugh. I was a math tutor in college, and spent a lot of my time babying business majors.

Some go to college to get a job, some to get an education. Not usually tough to tell the difference, eh?
#15079361
Atlantis wrote:I love it, you actually admitted that the mess created by Trump could have been predicted by the Chinese. :lol:

Trump didn't create any mess. The health care system in the United States is private.

ThirdTerm wrote:A shrimp peddler at the Chinese market, where the coronavirus pandemic likely began, is identified as the “patient zero.”

Which seems apocryphal, since shrimp are unlikely to be infected.

late wrote:Thanks for the laugh. I was a math tutor in college, and spent a lot of my time babying business majors.

Some go to college to get a job, some to get an education. Not usually tough to tell the difference, eh?

So you can probably tell why doctors are taking hydroxychloroquine, but not giving it to their patients.
#15079485
late wrote:Try running a hospital without doctors.

But it's heartwarming seeing you trying to help Trump add to the body count.

But not the sentimental kind of warmth.

A little off your game today, I see.

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