Why is this downvoted? This is a valid method for measuring frequency of visited sites. The exist node has to know the unencrypted destination to be able to provide the requested content.
> decide to continue doing dangerous GoF research in metropolises, that is bad.
How do you know GoF research is bad? By analysing the consequences of previous GoF research.
If lab origin is confirmed, it adds support to GoF research being bad hypothesis helps creating relevant regulations. If zoonotic origin is confirmed, it adds another data point of naturally created dangerous pathogens and weakens the argument of banning GoF research.
There are no _a priori_ truths, only approximations at a time based on past statistics.
> If zoonotic origin is confirmed, it adds another data point of naturally created dangerous pathogens and weakens the argument of banning GoF research.
Why would a zoonotic origin of COVID reduce the risk of GoF?
Zoonotic origin reduces the risk of GoF research because understanding the underlying biology becomes more useful to address novel variants popping up in the wild (apart from other potential uses).
A poor analogy is suppose in 1800s humans encountered nuclear explosion near nuclear research lab. It could have human or natural origin. If natural then it is important for us to accelerate nuclear research with relatively lax regulations and develop countermeasures. If human origin, lack of sufficient regulation is a more probable cause.
> understanding the underlying biology becomes more useful to address novel variants popping up in the wild (apart from other potential uses).
This is effectively not true in light of the mRNA platform, which negates the rest of your argument as well, because the existence of the mRNA platform is not contingent upon the origin.
Dangerous GoF was made excessively dangerous by the invention of the mRNA platform regardless of whether COVID itself even happened, never mind the specific origin of it.
Doing GoF research in major metropolitan areas is very obviously unacceptable and should have been considered such prior to COVID, and should be widely considered such after COVID. Again regardless of whether COVID itself came from WIV.
We already know everything we need to know about zoonotic possibilities which is that nature can produce pathogens orders of magnitude worse than COVID on any dimension.
If after learning that COVID was zoonotic, your conclusion is "guess it's okay to keep WIV and WIV-like labs in major cities doing the type of research they were doing," then you are simply insane.
Any new technology has its dangers and its uses. The whole EA vs e/acc is a more recent example. A utilitarian will try to probabilistically measure expected benefit of the technology based on existing data points.
> Doing GoF research in major metropolitan areas is very obviously unacceptable.
It is not so obvious to the people wanting to accelerate the research and solve cancer, aging or whatever their pet problem at (in their opinion) slim risk of catastrophe.
> nature can produce pathogens orders of magnitude worse than COVID on any dimension
Everything is possible, including nature producing mass extinction pathogens. The key missing information is the probability. Else we all will be living in bunkers.
> If after learning that COVID was zoonotic, your conclusion is "guess it's okay to keep WIV and WIV-like labs in major cities doing the type of research they were doing," then you are simply insane.
Agree, a single data point does not warrant extreme change in status quo. But it does weaken the argument to a non-zero extent that GoF research leads to global pandemic. This has trickle down effects of eschewing additional regulations which would have been added otherwise.
> It is not so obvious to the people wanting to accelerate the research and solve cancer, aging or whatever their pet problem at (in their opinion) slim risk of catastrophe.
What GoF research either a) increases contagiousness of a pathogen or b) increases pathogenicity of a contagion and has anything to do with "cancer, aging, or whatever their pet problem" is?
> The key missing information is the probability.
COVID did - not - change the probability.
> But it does weaken the argument to a non-zero extent that GoF research leads to global pandemic.
No! It literally doesn't! The probability of GoF research leading to a future pandemic was the same the day before the COVID outbreak as it was the day after which is the same as it is today.
The only thing that will shift those probabilities are mitigations that we put in place.
We know so little about biology that any kind of research can lead transformative benefits. Therefore the outcomes of a certain line of biological research including GoF are unknown. Penicillin is a great example of this.
> COVID did - not - change the probability.
True from the perspective of omniscient universe, but for humans with limited knowledge, it will change our priors based on the origin.
There is a valid reasoning for how GoF research can lead to pandemic but we do not know how often it will happen in practice. There are many things we already do with potential global consequences. Historical example is the risk of chain reaction during first atomic test. Contemporary example is the universal dependance on digital infrastructure which can be hacked. Timeless example is asteroid hitting the earth.
We make decisions for each of the scenarios based on perceived (objective + subjective) probabilities and the tradeoffs.
If natural origin is proved, there is less reason to add mitigations to the GoF research because mitigations are hard to design and limit the exploration space.
It is destruction from whose point of view? Life will find its way. If AI actually elevates humanity as promised, climate change would be just another adaptation challenge.
Or maybe our universe represents the dregs of what once was a vibrant dense universe teeming with life, working hard to maximize entropy. We are like the end stage bacteria relegated to do a deep clean.
Ultimately there appears to be no purpose of life apart from child rearing for the majority. There's subconscious hope that kids might eventually figure it out for the rest of us. The only thing constant is the increase in entropy. At least that is what bound to happen. Should the purpose be accelerating that process or joining the resistance?
I suspect 5yo won’t be arrested for hit and run either. What matters is the intent and the punishment proportional to the harm. If someone is doing unacceptable acts to my property I should have a way to disincentivize the act.
you "suspect" a 5yo won't be arrested for a hit and run? Gosh, I'd love for a legal system to be based on a little bit more firm grasp than "suspicions" or else you and I don't have much of a hope of not committing crimes accidentally.
As someone who has taken a sticker off of a car, that someone else put on the car, before... it was fine. I was fine. No one was harmed in the removal of the sticker. Depending on the sticker it takes between 1 and 30 seconds to remove it.
The law is not a disincentive because people don't actually know the law. It will never be a disincentive because people do not understand the law. Which leads me back to my original question:
Why are we okay with a child risking a felony when they put a sticker on someone's car? They think it looks nice? Do we want to live in the world where this is at risk of being a felony? Note, I'm not talking about anything more destructive than a sticker.
It's clear the answer is yes, I just want you to think about what that means.
The quote resonated with me so well that I decided to read the article. It is telling that individual failures do not make _risk_ undesirable if it strengthens the community as a whole. OP is not communicating information but emotion which is _much_ harder task with language defined by the common denominator and for me as a reader, he is quite skilled at it.
