3 ms·
It isn't bad to investigate or ask questions; the problem is that many of the people who are vocal proponents of the lab-leak theory are making a motte and bail
by hraedon 5y ago
It isn't bad to investigate or ask questions; the problem is that many of the people who are vocal proponents of the lab-leak theory are making a motte and bailey argument that takes the form of "the virus escaped from a lab in China" as the motte and "China deliberately released the virus to hurt its enemies/Trump/etc" as the bailey. I don't have a strong opinion on the origin of the virus, but the idea that China released it deliberately is very stupid and where most of the lab-leak conversations I've followed end up.
It also doesn't help that China's current leadership is extremely allergic to anything that implicates China at all, so their actions are largely compatible with what you'd see in a coverup.
- germinalphrase 5y agoMotte and Bailey Definition: “ Motte and bailey (MAB) is a combination of bait-and-switch and equivocation in which someone switches between a "motte" (an easy-to-defend and often common-sense statement, such as "culture shapes our experiences") and a "bailey" (a hard-to-defend and more controversial statement, such as "cultural knowledge is just as valid as scientific knowledge") in order to defend a viewpoint. Someone will argue the easy-to-defend position (motte) temporarily, to ward off critics, while the less-defensible position (bailey) remains the desired belief, yet is never actually defended.” https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Motte_and_bailey https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Motte_and_bailey