Over at Nationwide Evaluate, Jim Geraghty has a collection of articles suggesting that the Covid virus escaped from a analysis lab in Wuhan, China. At this time, he has a narrative with the next headline:
Guess The place the Presumably Nuclear-Gasoline-Leaking Sunken Chinese language Submarine Is?
I didn’t have a lot hassle guessing—it was Wuhan. What did shock me is the way in which he spun the story:
You most likely keep in mind that one, on account of the truth that it utterly disrupted your life for a yr or two and triggered 27 million or so “extra deaths” around the globe. However I’ll wager you don’t bear in mind the Wuhan College researchers who allowed synthetic intelligence to manage an Earth-observation satellite tv for pc, which led the satellite tv for pc to begin taking a look at Indian army bases and a Japanese port utilized by the U.S. Navy. Lead researcher Wang Mi boasted, “This method breaks the prevailing guidelines in mission planning.” Sure, and everyone knows all the nice issues that occur when scientific researchers in Wuhan break the prevailing guidelines. First the Andromeda Pressure, then SkyNet.
What different kinds of experiments are they doing over there in Wuhan today? Summoning demons? Reaching out to say “hello” to some hostile alien empire in outer house? Are they only flipping by means of outdated Marvel comics, studying in regards to the villains’ plots, and considering, “Hey, that will make a cool experiment”? All of the troubles on the planet apparently lead again to Wuhan.
That ultimate paragraph—particularly the ultimate sentence—is the kind of factor I’d count on from a conspiracy concept skeptic, somebody who wished to make enjoyable of the concept sure coincidences are suspicious. I might think about somebody mocking the declare that, “Wuhan has solely about 1% of China’s inhabitants, so how doubtless is it that the submarine would occur to sink in the identical metropolis the place Covid began?” In different phrases, making enjoyable of somebody for not understanding Bayesian reasoning.
To see the issue contemplate how the ultimate sentence of the primary quoted paragraph may very well be re-written:
Sure, and everyone knows all the nice issues that occur when wild animal wholesalers in Wuhan break the prevailing guidelines. First a repeat of what occurred with SARS-1, then SkyNet.
Sure, I perceive that Geraghty is generally simply being humorous right here. However when you deal with the column as humor, then he’s poking enjoyable at his personal views on Covid. Thus I ponder if he’s being at the least barely critical. At some degree he appears to be assuming that digging up extra grime about Wuhan makes it by some means extra doubtless that readers will imagine (if solely subconsciously) that one thing unhealthy occurred there again in late 2019. However we already know that one thing unhealthy occurred in Wuhan—a person was promoting raccoon canine within the meals market.
What this instance truly exhibits is that bizarre coincidences occur on a regular basis, and it could be silly to make any causal claims based mostly on their existence.
Right here’s one other coincidence. For the primary time in 36 conferences, the Fed reduce its fed funds fee goal. What are the probabilities that politics had nothing to do with a fee reduce occurring on the ultimate assembly earlier than the November election?
I’d say the probabilities are fairly good. (BTW, the earlier fee cuts have been additionally in an election yr.)
Right here’s one other attention-grabbing sample: There has by no means been a time when the 3-month common of the unemployment fee rose by greater than 0.5% and not using a recession. What are the probabilities that the latest enhance within the unemployment fee over that threshold is not going to result in a recession?
I’d say the probabilities are fairly good.
If you happen to hunt down patterns, you’ll discover them. A lot of them. However the world is filled with uncommon occasions.
