Claim of Function - it wasn't a lab-leak and neither was it from the wet-market

Prominent support from credible mainstream quarters

Yes, that old chestnut again!

In May 2024 Jonathan Engler and Martin Neil published an article on ‘Virus Origins and Gain (Claim) of function research on this substack. In it we put forward the argument that the lab-leak versus wet-market explanations for the origins of ‘the virus’ presented a false dichotomy, and that a third explanation was more likely: prior endemicity ‘discovered’ by an outbreak of testing. We had hoped that the article would provoke a re-opening of the debate on the important question of where SARS-CoV-2 came from and how novel it could be.

The original article can be found below (for readers without a paid description the Off-Guardian and TCW published excellent articles discussing our work, which can be read via the links found here.)

Here’s a quick summary of the relevant points made therein:

• The engineering of clones carrying genetic material is and has been standard practice in laboratories around the world for some time. Gain-of-Function (GoF) research, such as the project described in the DEFUSE proposal, was and still is routine. Indeed, it looks like standard practice applied globally across many research groups studying coronaviruses.

• The possibility of long-standing – but hitherto unnoticed - endemicity of SARS-CoV-2 in various animal reservoirs cannot be ruled out. Inherent limits to the dependability of phylogenetic analysis and antibody testing mean that we have, in Popperian terms, an unfalsifiable hypothesis that the virus, or its variants, were endemic and have been for some unknown time.

• The complexity of the relationship between genotype and phenotype is too great and too poorly understood to make the deliberate act of engineering the pathogenicity of viruses ever reliably achievable. Due to ‘the curse of dimensionality’, only the breadth of natural evolution could deliver the time and space needed for this. A review of so-called Gain-of-Function and Loss-of-Function experiments suggests that little practical and / or relevant progress has been made in overcoming this insurmountable barrier.

We had hoped that our carefully documented analysis would trigger renewed debate about these questions; unfortunately, editorial red lines appear to have been drawn, as we’ve reported here, preventing people from realizing that there are other credible explanations and plausible scenarios than the two that have been publicly disseminated. Indeed, our article postulated a third position, that provides a more credible explanation for the origins of the virus than either lab-leak or wet-market.

Given the almost complete lack of interest and support from within the medical freedom movement, one might be tempted to dismiss us as lone, fringe voices in the origins debate (and perhaps even more fringe because we also believe there was no pandemic by any reasonable or useful definition of the word).

Despite what our intellectual opponents might say, we are not alone in our beliefs. In fact, some very prominent people have deployed similar arguments and have done so from much more elevated positions of authority than we occupy (after all we are not academic biologists, virologists or epidemiologists, so what do we know?)

Just who are these ‘more credible’ people who have made statements supporting many of the points in our original article? The first is Professor Sunetra Gupta, Professor of theoretical epidemiology at the Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, and one of the three signatories of the Great Barrington Declaration, and the second is Denis Noble is Professor Emeritus and co-Director of Computational Physiology at Oxford University and a Fellow of the Royal Society.

Prof. Sunetra Gupta

Prof. Gupta took part in the ‘Pandemic Policy Panel Four: COVID-19 Origins and the Regulation of Virology’ which was held as part of the Pandemic Policy: Planning the Future, Assessing the Past symposium at Stanford University on October 4, 2024. Here is the YouTube video of the panel discussion:

Here is a transcript of what she said on SARS-CoV-2 origins, animal reservoirs, and whether GoF poses a threat etc. (the questions themselves are not transcribed):

Where did SARS-CoV-2 come from?

[20:38] ‘…to my mind the discussion about the origin of SARS-CoV-2 rotates around two equally implausible scenarios: Either that the virus was manufactured in a laboratory in Wuhan or that it jumped out of a dish of Pangolin chop suey somewhere nearby. What is far more likely is that the virus had already been circulating over a period of several months in China and only came to light in Wuhan. Just because we found it in Wuhan doesn't mean it came from Wuhan…[it] only came to light in Wuhan.’

[21:16] ‘When it was at sufficient prevalence for an intelligent physician to identify an atypical cluster of hospital cases and raise the alarm, I cannot blame my colleagues for rushing to stem potentially dangerous speculations about a leak that might seem plausible from the coincidence the virus was first detected in such close proximity to the Wuhan lab.’

[28:30] ‘SARS-CoV-2, I think, is very likely to have emerged from some bat or something somewhere, somewhere else in China. Been spreading through humans, got to Wuhan, was detected there. That to me is the most parsimonious explanation for where SARS-CoV-2 came from.’

[59:50] ‘I think the idea that it's spilled over from raccoon dogs playing mahjong in the market is bonkers.’

Why has no animal reservoir or intermediate host for SARS-CoV-2 been found?

[26:43] ‘With regard to find — not being able to find it in animals, the fact is that it clearly, it's a specific evolutionary event, which may or may not make it transmissible in animals. And in the case of SARS-CoV-1, SARS-1, it happened to be something that was around in other animals. That doesn't have to be the case with SARS-CoV-2. SARS-CoV-2 may easily have just been spreading, may only be something -- it seems to be in fact clearly the -- but is specifically adapted to humans, so it could have been spreading through humans in China. How do we know? What do we know? We have no evidence that it wasn't doing that. So I think it's more likely that it was…MERS is actually an endemic infection in many parts of the world. You go, you bleed the Turana tribe, 50% of them have antibodies to MERS. These are different types of viruses. They have different epidemiologies.’

Does Gain-of-Function research pose a threat?

[22:16] ‘…the hysteria around gain of function is misplaced. Those who are clamoring for it to be restricted would do well to recognize that many of the proponents of lockdown were also firmly in favor of stopping gain of function research in pre-pandemic times. My own assessment of gain of function - which I believe is shared by many other biologists - is that it's an unfortunately-named Standard Process for determining the properties of viruses and carries a very low risk for — to any of (I can substantiate on that…). In fact, gain of function experiments are far more likely to lead to medical interventions that improve the lives of people than to spawn a new pandemic. Nature is far more adept at that.’

[1:05:22] ‘I think the threat [of Gain of Function] is hugely overblown.’

So, scientists can’t adulterate or ‘create’ a virus in a lab that is able to escape or be leaked and do any real damage?

[48:44] ‘…in terms of making something - a virus a viable virus - at least in my experience, because even though I'm a theoretical epidemiologist, I actually do have a lab. It's really very difficult to make a viable virus in a lab. It's extremely difficult. It's difficult to make anything that even vaguely infects a cell. It's really, really tricky.

[1:05:28] ‘I think that it's very difficult to make a crazy virus in the lab. I think most of these insertions of furin cleavage sites or polybasic cleavage sites are happening in nature all the time anyway, and what we have to remember is the competition is, what's driving this, an immune selection is the main driver, not whether or not this thing exists at all.’

If Gain-of-Function research (or other scientific experiments) doesn’t/can’t produce viruses that can transmit or survive in the real world, then why conduct the research at all? Isn’t the goal to make a pathogen more virulent, transmissible, etc.?

[48:01] ‘Because you want to learn. When—why do we do experiments at all? We create artificial systems. We mutate things….Obviously, the reason why people want to do it is because it's useful to know. It's very important to know what the virulence factors are. It's very important to characterize them.’

[46:19] ‘…what you have to remember, or what we must remember, is in the evolutionary Ecology of these systems, these - what what's limiting the spread of a virus is not just whether it comes into existence or not. That's just an event. Is it. And these viruses they have high mutation rates, they recombine all the time. I can assure you that they are interrogating a lot of the possibilities for what they could possibly be. Then why don't we get these, an explosion of new viruses all the time? It's because viruses, new viruses have to compete against the existing viruses. They have to compete on a landscape of immunity that exists towards related viruses. And when you put all of that together, you realize that a virus that you've made by passaging it through a million ferrets until it can actually go from one ferret to another is not necessarily – is actually very unlikely to make it in the wild. It's like you can squeeze it into a box. You can keep selecting and selecting and selecting until it does something that it doesn't normally do in the wild. But actually that virus is not going to compete very successfully in the wild.’

[49:50] ‘Um, clearly one performs experiments with - I mean, you have to you have to trust the scientists. They do perform experiments in order to understand a system so that we can get the measure of it and make design interventions that will stop, you know, disease –’

[1:05:57] ‘I have been arguing for gain of function studies against people like Marc Lipsitch and, indeed, Tony Fauci was very nervous about gain of function. I think there's a certain safetyism involved here, is that ‘Oh, gain of function. Oh dear what's that going to do?” So I have been arguing for gain of so-called gain of function studies, which I think are just standard ways of exploring the properties of viruses, which often lead to I think very useful insights, some of which I'm currently exploiting in making a universal flu vaccine…I think the threat is overblown.’

So, you don’t think Gain of Function can create pandemic potential pathogens?

[1:07:40] ‘…even if [that possibility] does exist, if there is the possibility - and indeed there always will be a small  possibility that at least that it - you could make this - can we actually prevent pandemics from arising by stopping gain of function studies? I mean, I think I'm worried in this whole sort of narrative about “it was a lab leak” and we should just stop gain of function studies…I'm not saying that you're suggesting that if we stopped gain of function studies, we won't have pandemics anymore. But there is a sense that of control. Again, I think of us being able to control a process, which I think we really can't. I think pandemics are going to occur over and over again and stopping gain of function [doesn’t stop pandemics]

Note that her comments were given in response to questions about the purported ‘threat’ posed by GoF research, and we do not necessarily agree with all of her comments, especially those about regulation, but want to highlight some of the statements she made and summarize her sentiments we do agree with as follows:

• GoF research is standard process in virology.

• The virus was widespread in China, could have arisen from anywhere, and was widespread before 2020.

• Nature can generate novel viruses that pose a threat to humanity, but man cannot.

• Engineering of pathogens with designed-in features that guarantee functional properties such as pathogenicity or transmission fitness has not been demonstrated scientifically.

• Claims about the threat posed by GoF are ‘hugely overblown’.

So, Prof. Gupta’s statements strongly support our position, that the virus was endemic, that GoF research is standard practice and that man, to date, does not have the scientific or engineering capability to create novel, hazardous, viruses.

Where we do disagree with Gupta is that the virus presented any kind of additional risk over and above other influenza or coronaviruses i.e. it was not a threat that necessitated any kind of response. Likewise, although we agree that GoF is routine and does not pose a direct threat it presents a means by which imaginary threats can be invented and it is the manifestation of this fear that presents the real threat.

Professor Denis Noble

Prof. Noble is one of the pioneers of a subject called ‘systems biology’ that disputes the currently dominant neo-Darwinian theory of natural selection via ‘the selfish gene’, much popularised by Richard Dawkins, who said:

"Now they [genes] swarm ... safe inside gigantic lumbering robots ... they created us, body and mind; and their preservation is the ultimate rationale for our existence"

Noble’s ideas try to explain the connection between what happens at the molecular (or genetic) level within an organism and the physiological functioning of the organism as a whole. He is against the idea of genetic determinism (wikipedia provides a useful biography).

So, what has Noble said that supports our stance? Here is a short (27 minute) YouTube video summarising his revolutionary ideas. Note that it is NOT about Covid but is about the current intellectual state of biology and is in places very insightful and quite philosophical.

He discusses the Human Genome Project, genetic sequencing and the use of advanced technologies, like CRISPR, to biologically enhance humanity and defeat disease. Bear in mind what he is saying about these technologies and these applications applies just as universally to virus and vaccine research. A lot of what he says has wider implications for the feasibility of the wider transhumanism project and reveals that the current state of biology given that recent events have demonstrated that far less is biologically possible than investors and public previously may have been safely led to safely assume. Given this we think there should be more uneasiness about the over confidence of those making the lab-leak and wet-market narratives (as well as those pushing vaccines).

Here are some choice quotes from the interview:

On genetic manipulation

“I think the big issue for me is when are we going to wake up to the fact that we've spent 20 years now sequencing as many genomes as we can [and] the output as promised simply hasn't appeared? If we appreciate why that happened, why that failure happened, we can then shift to a better way of doing it. And we know what that was. Before genome sequencing, what we did was to look at the high-level organization of the system - the living system - locate what is going wrong there, and then work down to find what you might do at lower levels with a drug (or any other kind of treatment for that matter) to put it right. And that works much better than trying to go the other way. Because going the other way, oh, the space for possible molecules and possible effects, and even more, possible combinations of those effects, because those complex diseases are going to require combinations of treatment, there are too many. You can’t do clinical trials on all of those possibilities. It’s just far too expensive. So, I think we just need to take a different approach to research - medical research - to try to benefit from the human genome sequencing in a way that's different from what they originally promised. The new medications haven't fallen out of the sky.”

“….we, organisms, are capable of changing our genomes. But when you come to the question could we use it to, as it were, deliver the promises of the Human Genome Project, even though they've not yet produced it, because we can say, ‘Okay, if you could correct this gene, would we have the future reassured and we can then avoid all of these diseases,’ I very much doubt it and I think it's very dangerous. Because we do not know the function of all genes. Most genes in any way contribute to many functions. So, when you manipulate this one because you know it produces this disease, what else are you doing? And if we don't know that before we use CRISPR, how do we know that modifying the germline - because that's what it amounts to - isn't going to produce problems in the future? So that's why I say that I think it's dangerous.”

“We need first to know more about the functions of genes in general, in cooperation with each other, because they tend to work in cooperation with each other, rather than as isolated elements in the system. In that case, we need to know that before we interfere with that system. It's like a watchmaker suddenly saying, ‘Well, I'm going to fix this watch by bashing this cog and changing it this way,’ without understanding the finesse of what has been created.”

On the curse of dimensionality

Much of what Noble says here answers our question as to whether it is possible to reliably engineer lethal viruses. We ourselves answered that by referring, in our “Claim of Function” article, to the ‘curse of dimensionality’:

“In many problems where each variable (protein, genomes, cells, virions) can take on several values, taking the variables together, a huge number of combinations of values must be considered, leading to a combinatorial explosion. This results in an exponential set of possibilities each of which must be considered and evaluated. In the biological domain things are even more challenging because of non-monotonicity – any phenotype (trait or function) cannot be directly matched to a single specific genotype; hence the problem is not reducible and there exists no algorithm that can feasibly search the space of possibilities and identify the single genotype sequence that delivers the phenotype required.”

Clearly, we are in accordance with Noble. There is no good evidence that the many and complex hurdles in front of deliberately engineering viruses to become more pathogenic or transmissible in humans have been overcome. Indeed, we suspect he would agree that most GoF is functionally and financially useless (but maybe has great utility as a generator of revenue and an instrument of propaganda).

During the Covid event the public health and scientific establishment force fed us ‘the Science’. Clearly there was no homogenous unassailable scientific knowledge and what we were served tasted nothing like the ideas espoused by Noble. However, on reflection, neither did many of the ideas espoused by ‘dissenting Science’, such as the lab-leak hypothesis or the idea that vaccines can change humanity by reprogramming our genetic sequences (and variants thereof). It appears to us that both sides are locked into a biological paradigm that is well past its ‘sell by date’ and its advocates are either unaware of Noble’s work or want to ensure the public are not exposed to it under any circumstances in case it undermines political policy or strategy.

Looking beyond Covid, Noble raises the prospect that the great leaps forward that have supposedly occurred during the last 50 years of biological research, such as the Human Genome Project, which has cost untold billions, is useless because its foundational premises are plain wrong. Genetic therapies will not cure cancer, Alzheimer’s or heart disease, never mind protect us from respiratory illnesses. Doubtless this is a depressing prospect but one that we need to confront. If we continue to ‘flog a dead horse’ it will result in the continued waste of both blood and treasure and do so on an increasing scale.

Final remarks

We have brought up the ‘old chestnut’ of virus origins because our voices, and that of others, are being censored on this issue on the grounds that our views are ‘fringe’.

Plainly our views are not as ‘out there’ as our challengers would wish you to believe. Both Gupta and Noble, considered by many as highly reputable voices in both academic epidemiology and biology, have made public statements about either virus origins, or the purpose and viability of genetic research, that do not support either of the hypotheses that the virus resulted from either a lab-leak or spontaneously in a wet market.

This is no casual intellectual debate. We believe there was no pandemic by any reasonable or useful definition of the word. We also believe if there was a novel virus it was simply novel to detection and certainly not any more hazardous than other respiratory viruses. Indeed, there is now overwhelming evidence to support both propositions. Yet the global pandemic preparedness industry and public health infrastructure will not revisit the incorrect premises, beliefs and assumptions that underpin their understanding of the covid event. They appear to be unwilling to learn from the huge amount of evidence available.

Armed with these falsehoods these disciplines therefore continue to insist they, and they alone, have a duty to protect humanity from imaginary or wholly invented pandemic threats. But by doing so, despite the best of intentions, we have to ask - is it they that are a threat to humanity rather than a virus?

The constant hunting for viral sequences and frenzied analysis of those thought to be novel help lay the foundations for a constantly fearful humanity, empowering those who wish to impose ‘pandemic preparedness’ on the world, with its paraphernalia of control mechanisms and attendant loss of freedoms.

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Alfred Wallace

As an aside, in the video Noble gives a hat tip to the joint papers Charles Darwin wrote with Alfred Wallace, who is best known for independently conceiving the theory of evolution through natural selection. His 1858 paper on the subject was published that year alongside extracts from Charles Darwin's earlier writings on the topic. An interesting aside - and, what the establishment don’t want you to know about Wallace is that he was a steadfast, thoughtful and prominent vaccine critic and wrote extensively on the subject. Below is a report to Members of the UK Parliament from 1889.

Readers of that report may (or may not) be surprised to see that many of the ‘tricks’ which we have identified and discussed in previous articles in relation to the claims made for the efficacy of the so-called covid vaccines are not new at all but have a pedigree going back more than a century. Some of these are described here.