> have an incentive to convince the world that it was not their profession, that unleashed this
I think this badly misses the point. Nobody who uncritically promotes lab leak theories is saying 'scientific hubris must be tempered by civic responsibility!' or the like. They'are using it to argue that China launched a bioweapon upon the world, or unscrupulous deep state bureaucrats/freemasons/illuminati did it to cover up the nefarious goings on of this or that politicians etc. etc.
For those people, it's not a medical/scientific ethics & society debate centered around a spirited but civil disagreement between various nerds about the risk calculus. It's a political football thrown about with the goal of breaking as many windows as possible. To ignore this is to consign oneself to the role of a pawn.
Unfortunately, the only folks willing to stick out their necks publicly on this issue are the ones who’re already running around headless. Not sure what fixes this. I can’t imagine anyone reputable with a platform wanting to be the first one to jump into the side of the pool currently filled with schizo posting about how Russia is actually saving the world by blowing up US backed biological weapons labs in Ukraine.
We seem to be sorely lacking in elder statesmen/graybeard type figures who are willing to step into a muddied discourse and create a reasoned discussion from the insanity. There’s obviously a huge demand for such figures (see: the early days of Fauci) but we’re only getting grifters, blatantly political operatives, and those with huge conflicts of interest.
No of course not. That's why I emphasized uncritically. I'm saying that ignoring the fact of it being such a political football is a fatal mistake, because everything anyone says in public is going to be twisted by people who don't actually GAF about safety policy.
I think this badly misses the point. Nobody who uncritically promotes lab leak theories is saying 'scientific hubris must be tempered by civic responsibility!' or the like. They'are using it to argue that China launched a bioweapon upon the world, or unscrupulous deep state bureaucrats/freemasons/illuminati did it to cover up the nefarious goings on of this or that politicians etc. etc.
For those people, it's not a medical/scientific ethics & society debate centered around a spirited but civil disagreement between various nerds about the risk calculus. It's a political football thrown about with the goal of breaking as many windows as possible. To ignore this is to consign oneself to the role of a pawn.