When I was doing the research for the little talk I gave at the science fiction convention a couple of weeks ago, something that occurred to me was the similarity between HBs and a couple of other groups of people I’ve come into contact with as a result of my work as a skeptic. These groups include opponents of vaccination, and people who believe in conspiracy theories regarding the assassination of JFK.

In each of these people’s cases, the belief appears to come first and the evidence second. In fact, as a consequence of the belief coming first, evidence is largely optional, though any evidence which can be used to support the belief is eagerly embraced. Evidence which doesn’t support the belief is belittled as faked, irrelevant or unreliable.

But the best bit about the lack of supporting evidence is the suggestion that what’s missing has been suppressed. This is a brilliant argument because it can’t be refuted, and, at least in the case of arguments where the government or big business is the bad guy, sounds plausible to many listeners. Everything slots together: the evidence which supports their belief either exists or has been suppressed, and the evidence which doesn’t support their belief has been fabricated. The result is a proven belief.

The other common factor, now that I think about it, is a complete absence of any understanding of logic (of which the preceding paragraph is an example). This is one of the excellent aspects of Jay’s site – he makes the effort to explain the concepts of logical thinking and argument which are necessary to understand both sides of the HB debate.