Chat message

Slack / Private Message Drop, p.1066 [SLACK_001280] · slack_pm:msg:11125

Date: 2022-01-20 10:33
Type: chat message · slack
recipient: Robert F. Garry, Edward C. Holmes, Andrew Rambaut
speaker: Kristian G. Andersen
Topics: Proximal Origin paper Natural origin / zoonotic spillover

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On that last point, I'd probably stick to a version of Andrew's language - "We provided some initial assessments ofthe plausibility of the various hypotheses and then undertook a more detailed analysis and review of data (including new data from the Pangolins). All of our conclusions were written in our published and peer-reviewed papers (i.e., inNature Medicine and then updated in Cell late last year). All of the emails show the establishment of the hypotheseswe later outlined in the Proximal Origins paper and then the assessment of these based on the available evidence. Opinions simply shifted as the result of analysis and the examination of new data. Since then more data has been published that further supports our conclusions from that initial review."

Extracted statements

Rule-extracted, not adjudicated. The grade says what may be done with each one; read the document above before relying on any of them.

Statement	Grade	Attribution	Stance
All of our conclusions were written in our published and peer-reviewed papers (i.e., inNature Medicine and then updated in Cell late last year).	quoted / not their view	quoted_external inside quotation marks	asserts
All of the emails show the establishment of the hypotheseswe later outlined in the Proximal Origins paper and then the assessment of these based on the available evidence.	quoted / not their view	quoted_external inside quotation marks	asserts

Statement

Grade

Attribution

Stance

All of our conclusions were written in our published and peer-reviewed papers (i.e., inNature Medicine and then updated in Cell late last year).

quoted / not their view

quoted_external inside quotation marks

asserts

All of the emails show the establishment of the hypotheseswe later outlined in the Proximal Origins paper and then the assessment of these based on the available evidence.

quoted / not their view

quoted_external inside quotation marks

asserts

In context

A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.

2022-01-20 10:25 Robert F. Garry open

Dear Professor Garry, I hope you are well. I am a reporter with The Sunday Times newspaper and I am writing an article for this weekend's paper about the scientific community's investigations into the origins of SARS-CoV-2. In this article I suggest that the scientific consensus reached around the possibility of a laboratory origin for SARS-CoV-2, driven in large part by the seminal Proximal Origin paper, may have been unduly influenced by the political ramifications of the hypothesis. Sorry to say this, but your suggestion is misinformed and completely inaccurate.I mention that the authors have maintained that the process behind the paper was strictly scientific.It was - I concur.I also mention that on a February 1 teleconference you felt a natural scenario to be implausible. Again apologies, but that's completely ridiculous. We were looking at the various SARS-CoV-2 origins scenarios -natural and lab-based - agnostically. I was simply putting the best argument forward in the moment that the FCS might have been engineered - it wasn't. Amongst all the other arguments/emails/discussion on this topic I was having it's cherry-picking and completely out-of-context. There were dozens of other contemporaneousemails/conversations where I was arguing the opposite. It's how science is done.If you would like to respond, please could you do so by my deadline at midday tomorrow? I cannot guarantee that any response will be printed in the piece. Very best,Madeleine
2022-01-20 10:27 Robert F. Garry open

This Sunday Times will be bad - I think Wade's will be much worse.
2022-01-20 10:30 Kristian G. Andersen open

Yup, I think it'll be complete junk - with more junk to come. "completely inaccurate" - I'd say "false" - as it's not really "inaccurate" it's just totally false.
2022-01-20 10:31 Kristian G. Andersen open

"I also mention that on a February 1 teleconference you felt a natural scenario to be implausible" This is also false - you did not mention that you felt that a natural scenario was implausible on the call. The quote she's referring to was from a very early email, taken out of context, and did not reflect your opinions on the "origin" question - it's another example of science in progress.
2022-01-20 10:33 Kristian G. Andersen

On that last point, I'd probably stick to a version of Andrew's language - "We provided some initial assessments ofthe plausibility of the various hypotheses and then undertook a more detailed analysis and review of data (including new data from the Pangolins). All of our conclusions were written in our published and peer-reviewed papers (i.e., inNature Medicine and then updated in Cell late last year). All of the emails show the establishment of the hypotheseswe later outlined in the Proximal Origins paper and then the assessment of these based on the available evidence. Opinions simply shifted as the result of analysis and the examination of new data. Since then more data has been published that further supports our conclusions from that initial review."
2022-01-20 10:41 Robert F. Garry open

good suggestions
2022-01-20 11:06 Robert F. Garry open

I'm thinking she is mostly going to quote Andrew and Eddie, but we'll see....
2022-01-20 11:27 Robert F. Garry open

So distracting - geez...
2022-01-20 11:42 Kristian G. Andersen open

Yes - however, we have a grant to write @Robert Garry with a deadline a week from now... :wink:So let's make surewe focus on that - otherwise the conspiracy theorist will actually have been successful in interfering with science!

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