And you're doing it too! Saying there "may actually be evidence" is not saying there is evidence. There is no evidence. The WHO conceded that more investigation is needed in a report that deemed the lab leak hypothesis "extremely unlikely".

But to the conspiracist mind, any statement other than an unambiguous "THIS IS UNCONTROVERTABLY FALSE" becomes twisted into something that sounds like evidence for the conspiracy.

Which is why debunkings need to be firm and clear. Admitting that something is possible in theory is just nodding to people who want to hear something very different.

> There is no evidence

I don't remember it well enough to say whether I consider it evidence or not. If you haven't seen what I'm referring to then I think you're just being dismissive. In any case, there was a post here many considered credible that claimed to have evidence that it could have come from a lab. Do with that what you will. In the mean time, I don't know whether it came from a lab or not and I don't need to.

Just listen to yourself: you admit you don't have evidence and that you haven't seen (or just don't remember having seen) any. But you cite "many" people who "consider it credible" as evidence anyway. Because you want to believe it, you're willing to cede logic and decisionmaking to the internet crowd, figure that someone must have done the homework.

And that's how we get conspiracy theories. No one did the homework. There is no completed homework. You're all just cribbing from a faked assignment.

> But you cite "many" people who "consider it credible" as evidence anyway.

That's not what's happening here at all. I responded to you originally to tell you what someone was referring to.

> Because you want to believe it, you're willing to cede logic and decisionmaking to the internet crowd, figure that someone must have done the homework

No I don't want to believe it and you need to stop. I never knew, never cared, I still don't know and still don't care. You're tilting at windmills here.

Let's strengthen the claim then. The article in question argued clearly and cogently that there is a lot of evidence that COVID was developed in a lab and then leaked, and specifically, far more evidence for that belief than evidence that the virus arose naturally. The article also provides evidence that virologists drastically over-stated their confidence in leaks being unlikely without having any reason to believe this is so, for career related reasons.

Does that help? You're doing the same thing here that a lot of failed debunkers do:

1. Citing establishment authority as if it's the last word. By definition anyone who believes in a "conspiracy theory" has reached that point by concluding the authorities aren't being truthful. That's rather inherent in the nature of what a conspiracy theory is.

2. You aren't taking it seriously. If you were, you would have done a quick bit of Googling and encountered the articles in question that go into a lot of depth on the evidence of the lab leak hypothesis, including a lot of micro-biological evidence.

3. You're making statements that are clearly false. There is evidence, quite a lot of it. Perhaps you won't agree that it's strong enough, but to claim there is no evidence is false. When a debunker makes a statement like this and people know it's false, it degrades the credibility of the whole anti-theory-position, because now people start to suspect that the people denying there's a conspiracy don't really know what they're talking about.

You wrote 254 words on all the evidence that exists without restating any of it nor citing any. Again, this is how conspiracy theories work. When pressed for evidence proponents make process arguments against the debunker(alleging that I'm not taking it seriously, that I haven't googled for evidence myself) and appeals to authority (that there was an undescribed and uncited "article" discussed elsewhere).

None of that is evidence. Bring evidence.

Because it's a large article. Apologies, I figured you could find it, there was no deliberate intention to obfuscate anything. So here's the link. It was discussed on HN a few days ago.

https://nicholaswade.medium.com/origin-of-covid-following-th...