Virologists aren't actuaries. As Alex described, calculating actual risks (as probabilities), and estimating the potential range of costs when things go wrong, is a highly-technical science unto itself. Ask a group of virologists what the break-even monthly insurance premium should be on a random single-family house in Akron, OH. The best they could do is throw out a guess, just like any other layman. So the assertion by virologists that they themselves are the best people to estimate and govern the risks of their own GOF experiments is not just absurd; it's a recipe for disaster.
For one thing, the *scale* of the risks imposed by GOF engineering seem utterly unappreciated by virologists. It's not, "Oh, if this experiment goes sideways, 3 lab workers could get killed." It's "Oh, if this experiment goes sideways, 30 million people could get killed." Sometimes people will compare SC-2 to Chernobyl. That doesn't come close. The meltdown of a nuclear power plant has the potential to kill, what, maybe 10,000 people? In terms of scale, the risks imposed by GOF research are matched only by the risks imposed by nuclear war. That is not hyperbole.
It's a lot to explain and unpack. One easy-to-understand number would be: a monthly insurance premium. Specifically, "If a laboratory in the US, doing GOF engineering on live viruses, called AIG and said they wanted insurance that would fully cover them against any and all damages, globally, arising from a pandemic caused by the accidental or intentional release of an experimental virus from their lab, how much would the monthly insurance premium be?"
While no insurance company would or could write such a policy, they could still calculate the number. That monthly premium cost would distill and express the risks imposed by GOF research w/ PPP in a single, immediately understandable number. My guess is that it would be in the $10's of millions per month.
FWIW, I am a bit closer to an actuary than most virologists - I did some work on life insurance valuations and claim estimation from COVID mortality. The ballpark above doesn’t include the float requirements necessary to foot the bill of even a highly leveraged claim, let alone pay the costs in full.
Well put. If we used SARS-CoV-2 as an example, the $35T bill was incurred with just 5 years of modern gain of function research (2011-2014; 2017-2019) across fewer than 50 labs. So 250 lab-years for a $35T bill implies a $140 billion annual risk for every lab, so maybe $10 billion a month?
For the insurance company to make a profit, that might be more like $12-15B a month.
Wow. It's an insane number, because it's an insane risk. It's is like a physics lab in downtown Manhattan tinkering around with a live 100 megaton nuclear bomb.
This is a great economic analysis, but I think the legal liability issues might come out differently. And I wonder how this fits into Princeton (your alma mater) sociologist Charles Perrow's thinking in his books Normal Accidents and The Next Catastrophe.
I haven’t read that book so I can’t comment specifically on it, but in terms of legal liability issues there’s a spectrum of possibilities. Funders may like to consider themselves limited liability, even if the agents their funding develops are released with negligence or malice, but the court of global opinions and attitudes may not care about US or European laws in such event.
Given the joint GOF research in Wuhan, funded by the US, with lab protocols agreed with the US, I'd have thought the reason for the opacity is that neither side can accuse the other. The various players and research institutions in the US seem to be up to their necks in covid/mRNA vaccine development. No one realistically expects the global superpowers to pay for their damage and the US regime moves on to war, erasing the covid malignancy regardless of continuing harms.
Scientific research should be funded voluntarily. Government-funded research requires the threat of physical force against honest, peaceful adults, therefore it is funded immorally. Just because there is a government sticking the gun to the citizens' heads does not make the forced wealth transfers any less evil. It is irrational to think that anything good can come from such a brutish process. In addition, government money tends to flow to researchers who support whatever narrative the government is pushing.
Because logic and mathematics generally arrive at the same conclusions, I don't think mathematics is essential in coming to the conclusion that the only reason for conducting GOFROC is the creation of bioweapons. All other arguments in favor of GOFROC break down into illogical absurdity very early in the presentation.
«imagine if SARS-CoV-2 had been produced by a lab leak due to negligence not in Wuhan, but in Raliegh, North Carolina»
«The sooner the US can provide NIH/NIAID transparency and clearly demonstrate that US taxpayers did not fund this research (I pray we didn't fund it... and if we did, I pray we can shift all responsibility to the few incompetent fools who did)»
Virologists aren't actuaries. As Alex described, calculating actual risks (as probabilities), and estimating the potential range of costs when things go wrong, is a highly-technical science unto itself. Ask a group of virologists what the break-even monthly insurance premium should be on a random single-family house in Akron, OH. The best they could do is throw out a guess, just like any other layman. So the assertion by virologists that they themselves are the best people to estimate and govern the risks of their own GOF experiments is not just absurd; it's a recipe for disaster.
For one thing, the *scale* of the risks imposed by GOF engineering seem utterly unappreciated by virologists. It's not, "Oh, if this experiment goes sideways, 3 lab workers could get killed." It's "Oh, if this experiment goes sideways, 30 million people could get killed." Sometimes people will compare SC-2 to Chernobyl. That doesn't come close. The meltdown of a nuclear power plant has the potential to kill, what, maybe 10,000 people? In terms of scale, the risks imposed by GOF research are matched only by the risks imposed by nuclear war. That is not hyperbole.
It's a lot to explain and unpack. One easy-to-understand number would be: a monthly insurance premium. Specifically, "If a laboratory in the US, doing GOF engineering on live viruses, called AIG and said they wanted insurance that would fully cover them against any and all damages, globally, arising from a pandemic caused by the accidental or intentional release of an experimental virus from their lab, how much would the monthly insurance premium be?"
While no insurance company would or could write such a policy, they could still calculate the number. That monthly premium cost would distill and express the risks imposed by GOF research w/ PPP in a single, immediately understandable number. My guess is that it would be in the $10's of millions per month.
But I'm not an actuary. Neither are virologists.
FWIW, I am a bit closer to an actuary than most virologists - I did some work on life insurance valuations and claim estimation from COVID mortality. The ballpark above doesn’t include the float requirements necessary to foot the bill of even a highly leveraged claim, let alone pay the costs in full.
Good point. Rolling the GOF dice at BSL2 = willful negligence, any day of the week.
Well put. If we used SARS-CoV-2 as an example, the $35T bill was incurred with just 5 years of modern gain of function research (2011-2014; 2017-2019) across fewer than 50 labs. So 250 lab-years for a $35T bill implies a $140 billion annual risk for every lab, so maybe $10 billion a month?
For the insurance company to make a profit, that might be more like $12-15B a month.
Not worth the risk IMO.
Wow. It's an insane number, because it's an insane risk. It's is like a physics lab in downtown Manhattan tinkering around with a live 100 megaton nuclear bomb.
This is a great economic analysis, but I think the legal liability issues might come out differently. And I wonder how this fits into Princeton (your alma mater) sociologist Charles Perrow's thinking in his books Normal Accidents and The Next Catastrophe.
I haven’t read that book so I can’t comment specifically on it, but in terms of legal liability issues there’s a spectrum of possibilities. Funders may like to consider themselves limited liability, even if the agents their funding develops are released with negligence or malice, but the court of global opinions and attitudes may not care about US or European laws in such event.
Given the joint GOF research in Wuhan, funded by the US, with lab protocols agreed with the US, I'd have thought the reason for the opacity is that neither side can accuse the other. The various players and research institutions in the US seem to be up to their necks in covid/mRNA vaccine development. No one realistically expects the global superpowers to pay for their damage and the US regime moves on to war, erasing the covid malignancy regardless of continuing harms.
Scientific research should be funded voluntarily. Government-funded research requires the threat of physical force against honest, peaceful adults, therefore it is funded immorally. Just because there is a government sticking the gun to the citizens' heads does not make the forced wealth transfers any less evil. It is irrational to think that anything good can come from such a brutish process. In addition, government money tends to flow to researchers who support whatever narrative the government is pushing.
Because logic and mathematics generally arrive at the same conclusions, I don't think mathematics is essential in coming to the conclusion that the only reason for conducting GOFROC is the creation of bioweapons. All other arguments in favor of GOFROC break down into illogical absurdity very early in the presentation.
«imagine if SARS-CoV-2 had been produced by a lab leak due to negligence not in Wuhan, but in Raliegh, North Carolina»
«The sooner the US can provide NIH/NIAID transparency and clearly demonstrate that US taxpayers did not fund this research (I pray we didn't fund it... and if we did, I pray we can shift all responsibility to the few incompetent fools who did)»
Little to add…
Hear hear once again, Alex. Well said and addressed!