I cite and contextualise the news article in my post (see second half of sec. ‘Misrepresentation of evidence’) Ebright is cited in Butler’s news post on Nature also referred to by Roko. The post is a brief summary of a debate on the usefulness of GoF research, and makes some other points, among which:
-Barich arguing that the project was funded because not so risky as to fall under the moratorium;
-”Although almost all coronaviruses isolated from bats have not been able to bind to the key human receptor, SHC014 is not the first that can do so. In 2013, researchers reported this ability for the first time in a different coronavirus isolated from the same bat population.” Natural coronaviruses were already able to bind to human receptors, that’s arguably why GoF research was conducted in the first place.
In light of this, I don’t think the news article is worth a significant update toward the lab-leak hypothesis: if anything, it shows that it was known since 2013 that coronaviruses could infect humans without host animals.
I cite and contextualise the news article in my post (see second half of sec. ‘Misrepresentation of evidence’)
Ebright is cited in Butler’s news post on Nature also referred to by Roko. The post is a brief summary of a debate on the usefulness of GoF research, and makes some other points, among which:
-Barich arguing that the project was funded because not so risky as to fall under the moratorium;
-”Although almost all coronaviruses isolated from bats have not been able to bind to the key human receptor, SHC014 is not the first that can do so. In 2013, researchers reported this ability for the first time in a different coronavirus isolated from the same bat population.”
Natural coronaviruses were already able to bind to human receptors, that’s arguably why GoF research was conducted in the first place.
In light of this, I don’t think the news article is worth a significant update toward the lab-leak hypothesis: if anything, it shows that it was known since 2013 that coronaviruses could infect humans without host animals.
Some amount of binding to some human receptors doesn’t mean a virus can infect humans. When something can infect humans, people say that instead.
Also, you’re not using those words correctly. Perhaps you mean “without evolution in an intermediate host”—which was, of course, never found.