Censoring virology
"On reading," by Simon Wain-Hobson, is a weekly discussion of scientific papers and news articles around gain of function research in virology.
Since January 2024, Dr. Wain-Hobson has written weekly essays for Biosafety Now discussing risky research in virology. You can read his entire series here.
The paper starts thus: Science is humanity’s best insurance against threats from nature, but it is a fragile enterprise that must be nourished and protected. The preponderance of scientific evidence indicates a natural origin for SARS-CoV-2. Yet, the theory that SARS-CoV-2 was engineered in and escaped from a lab dominates media attention, even in the absence of strong evidence. We discuss how the resulting anti-science movement puts the research community, scientific research, and pandemic preparedness at risk.
The reasons for writing the piece would seem to be the hurt engendered by Dr. Fauci facing insults during and outside of his testimony to US Congress plus the hassle many virologists experienced post COVID. Plus, the fact that the New York Times had the temerity to publish a guest essay on the SARS2 virus lab leak hypothesis by Dr. Alina Chan.
Insults have no place in discussion, period.
On reading will concentrate on the first and last sentences of this opening paragraph. Before doing so, a few words once again about the natural and lab leak hypotheses which is entwined in this paragraph. A preponderance of evidence in favor of a hypothesis doesn’t make it right. It might make it the leading ‘hypothesis’ but no more. Sign on papers like this don’t override facts. Next, the lab leak theory never required the virus to have been engineered.
We’re referred to a This Week in Virology podcast that recycles tired arguments about the Huanan seafood market as well as the purported introduction of two viral strains that doesn’t bear scrutiny. Not even the Chinese by into them (Pangolin paper). Testimony by Drs. Baric and Morens clash with the establishment’s preferred hypothesis of a natural zoonosis (Cancel virology).
As it is the jury is out, dixit WHO. What’s more, the authors say as much: We cannot currently disprove the lab leak hypothesis. The sentence is followed by Nevertheless, a literary device used to override the preceding confession. This is standard fare when you can’t prove your case.
In fact, ‘nonetheless’ was used by Drs. Fauci and Collins to override their difficulties in adequately justifying gain of function research on bird flu viruses (Chilled virology).
They can’t prove their case, but alternatives should be shut down as per This discourse has inappropriately led a large portion of the general public to believe that a pandemic virus arose from a Chinese lab. These unfounded assertions are dangerous. As discussed in detail below, they place unfounded blame and responsibility on individual scientists, which drives threats and attacks on virologists. It also stokes the flames of an anti-science, conspiracy-driven agenda, which targets science and scientists even beyond those investigating the origins of SARS-CoV-2.
• A hypothesis is dangerous because people could be blamed? First, it’s just a hypothesis that stays on the table until knocked off by data. Second, the number of hypotheses on any topic are inversely proportional to the amount of data. All the authors know this. Third, discombobulating any hypothesis before it’s disproved is abysmal.
• By definition, a lab leak indicates something didn’t work according to plan. As we have seen, laboratory acquired infections are underreported because the blame game is uppermost, when it is paramount to understand what went wrong (Lab acquired infections). This information helps scientists alter the way they work in the lab so reducing subsequent accidents and occasionally loss of life.
Agreed, the world’s press feeds on the blame game, but we’re scientists first and foremost. We’re supposed to get to the essential and not get distracted. At least, that is what we tell ourselves.
Stoking the flame of anti-science. This is where their confusion is greatest. To realize the degree a few more quotes are needed.
The unsubstantiated claims of the lab leak theory have provoked harassment, intimidation, threats and violence towards scientists, which are often vile in the online space. An article in Science reported that, of 510 researchers who had published on SARS-CoV-2 or COVID-19, 38% acknowledged harassment ranging from personal insults to threats of violence, “doxing,” and personal contact (18). A second survey, which included 1,281 scientists in a wide range of fields, found that 51% experienced at least one form of harassment, sometimes repeatedly for years.
The lab leak narrative fuels mistrust in science and public health infrastructures. Scientists and public health professionals stand between us and pandemic pathogens; these individuals are essential for anticipating, discovering, and mitigating future pandemic threats.
Take a very different example. A 2021 Gallup poll found that four in 10 Americans now think some UFOs that people have spotted have been alien spacecraft visiting Earth from other planets or galaxies. This is up from a third saying so two years ago. This suggests that,
• The scientific establishment isn’t getting its message across to the public at all well enough on many issues, or
• As science is everywhere in society, deniers and conspiracy theorists are drawn to it in the hope of making a name for themselves. Feeding off the strength of science, aka parasitism.
Plus, there is so much disinformation trying to sow dissent in the US and Europe, sorting out what is what is difficult.
The authors of this paper and many elsewhere make no effort to separate serious comment from scientists interested in the lab leak hypothesis, which is still on the table, and the conspiracy theorists who don’t care a toss about data or method. Dr. Chan is a serious scientist who knows the data and arguments. Which is why she’s criticized.
The question for the present authors is, do they really think they can fight nonsense or conspiracy theories with reason? USG doesn’t control the weather. It's a sorry situation but there are multiple forces wanting it this way. Dr. Chan is light years from them.
Do you have evidence that serious protagonists of the lab leak theory like Dr. Chan are behind the harassment, intimidation, threats and violence towards scientists, which are often vile in the online space? As scientists you’d never make an unsubstantiated comment. Right?
It is this confusion, perhaps deliberate, that is driving these remarks.
Scientists and public health professionals stand between us and pandemic pathogens; these individuals are essential for anticipating, discovering, and mitigating future pandemic threats.
Exactly, couldn’t agree more, although only fools would disagree. The above is followed by a sad sentence: Yet, scientists and public health professionals have been harmed and their institutions have been damaged by the skewed public and political opinions stirred by continued promotion of the lab leak hypothesis in the absence of evidence.
Remember your admission We cannot currently disprove the lab leak hypothesis. The corollary is that the natural zoonosis is not proven either.
Yet it gets worse. If these narratives are left unchecked, we become a society that dismisses and vilifies those with expertise and experience relevant to the challenges we face. We then base decisions affecting large populations worldwide on speculation or chosen beliefs that have no grounding in evidence-based science. By continuing to conflate rational lab leak individuals with conspiracy theorists the authors ram down people’s throats unsubstantiated claims. This is exactly what you are accusing the other side of doing.
This is a step too far. You can’t cancel a competing hypothesis to protect your own. This is an attack on the very foundation of scientific method. Your logic is hopelessly flawed. Inevitably other flaws will show up under scrutiny.
What you’re asking for is called censorship.
What about US First Amendment rights? And by the way, freedom of scientific enquiry is enshrined in the German constitution. And with it the genesis of hypotheses. Since everyone agrees that that science has been international for donkey’s years, you can’t pretend not to know this.
Read Alina Chan on this. “Scientists shouldn’t be censoring themselves,” she says. “We’re obliged to put all the data out there. We shouldn’t be deciding that it’s better if the public doesn’t know about this or that. If we start doing that, we lose credibility, and eventually we lose the public’s trust. And that’s not good for science.”
The method chosen is pretentious. Diverting attention, effort and resources in response to the unsupported lab leak hypothesis harms the mission of pandemic preparedness aka we’re wasting our time.
• Diverting resources? Evidence please.
• The hypothesis is on the table. That is your problem. It’s not science’s problem. It’s not society’s problem.
• How can a hypothesis harm pandemic preparedness? Would you have us believe that next time round you’ll get pandemic preparedness right? Everyone would love to believe you, but the data doesn’t suggest that.
The last two paragraphs are very telling, so let’s take them one at a time. Science is humanity’s best insurance against threats from nature, but it is a fragile enterprise that must be nourished and protected. What is now happening to virology is a stark demonstration of what is happening to all of science. It will come to affect every aspect of science in a negative and possibly a dangerous way, as has already happened with climate science. It is the responsibility of scientists, research institutions, and scientific organizations to push back against the anti-virology attacks, because what we are seeing now may be the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Universities and research institutions need policies for protecting scientists from anti-science attacks and a legal liability framework for research conducted in accordance with institutional biosafety frameworks. Emphasis added.
• Conspiracy theories abound and cover all of science. Anti-science is no more than parasitism. Science has been so influential these last fifty years that parasites don’t focus on virology. Science is both extraordinarily tolerant and robust. So long as there is experimentation, science will survive. And so long as attempts at censoring are clobbered.
• Who gets to choose what is an anti-virology attack? The best way to push back on a hypothesis you don’t like is to conceive and conduct experiments that distinguish it from the hypothesis you prefer. For COVID origins go out and generate a thousand or more genome sequences of SARS2 like bat coronaviruses. If there are something like 60,000+ bat coronavirus spillovers to humans per year, make an effort to characterize some of them.
• Yes, universities must do what they can to physically protect their staff, students and visiting scientists from attacks. The counterpoint is that they promote engagement with serious scientists who share different points of view, who espouse competing hypotheses.
If everyone admits they could be wrong, that they’re not the smartest person in the room then, along with civil discourse, this will reduce tension overnight.
For the health of scientific inquiry, the attacks on scientists should be a priority for national science institutions and foundations. Major scientific organizations must unite in developing programs to counter anti-science movements. It is imperative that we carefully prioritize threats and direct resources that allow us to strive to counter the most high-risk threats for future pandemics. If we fail to do this, then the next pandemic, like COVID-19, will largely be the result of failed policies for countering known and unknown viral threats.
• This last paragraph reeks of the establishment wanting to flush out and suffocate awkward or bothersome hypotheses. It is for the scientists at the coal face to get the data, sort out the conflicting details and generate a consensus, not university presidents, not science administrators, not learned societies.
Combatting anti-science is a never-ending process that few scientists engage in. Many more must speak up for science. The authors of this paper could do this starting yesterday. The method? Discuss with those you don’t agree with in public. The public is thirsty for science and can’t get enough of it. They just want to know a little more of what we know. That’s not a big ask.
Finally, whenever evoking pandemic preparedness or anything else scientific, don’t censor the right to free speech and thought. Ever.
Conclusions
• Openness, experimentation and discussion are science’s strongest cards.
• A top-down Big Science approach will backfire.
• 2+2≠5.
The term “ethical virologist” is an oxymoron.