re hundreds of incorrect theories that fade into deserved obscurity. And some that don't fade simply because their authors don't know when to quit.
There is a more fundamental and philosophical reason for placing the burden of proof on the claimant: science can never actually "prove" anything. We can only disprove. We can find contradictions between the predictions of a theory and our empirical observations, and if the observations are correct then the theory must go or at least change. When a theory has has been found to be compatible with a very large amount of evidence, and if it makes predictions that can be tested with experiments that also produce consistent evidence, then it becomes established and accepted. But it is still in principle subject to being overturned by or at least modified in response to new evidence.
This brings out another fundamental property of every scientific theory: falsifiability. There must, at least in principle, be some experiment or evidence that could conceivably overturn the theory. If it is not possible to even conceive of a test that could overturn the theory, then it is simply not scientific though it may still be a perfectly good topic for philosophers or theologians. This issue can be seen in the way many HBs argue. Whenever you show them information generated by or about an Apollo mission, their near-instantaneous response is to say that it was faked. Rarely do they give any evidence to support their contention; they simply say that it could have been faked, therefore it cannot be used as evidence for the reality of Apollo. When you point out that they haven't shown any indications that the evidence was indeed faked, they respond that this is merely because the fakery is of very high quality. The problem, of course, is that a fake that is of such high quality that it cannot be distinguished in any way from the genuine article is a non-falsifiable claim. There is no answer, nothing that one could say to prove that the article or item is genuine and not a high quality fake that can't be distinguished from the real thing. This is perhaps the most important reason why the burden of proof is properly placed on the HB claimants. [......]
A good example of the HB argumentation style involves an excerpt from the video record of Apollo 15. During the second EVA, Jim Irwin and Dave Scott have just erected the US flag and are taking pictures of each other standing next to it. We watch through the TV camera on the nearby Lunar Rover. After they finish picture taking, Dave Scott walks between the camera and the stationary flag. After he passes, the flag swings slightly and eventually stops. "Ah ha!", exclaim the HBs. "This was shot on earth on a soundstage with an atmosphere; the astronaut disturbed the flag with his wake as he passed!"
Why is this conclusion incorrect? There are several reasons. The most obvious and fundamental is that the HBs have failed to rule out the other ways that Scott may have disturbed the flag. Every proper forensic investigation starts by listing every conceivable explanation for the phenomenon in question. This is the time to let your imagination run wild. So the list can include the possibility, however unlikely, that the scene was faked on an earth set with an atmosphere as the HBs allege. But he may simply have brushed the flag with his left side as he passed, or he could have kicked up some lunar regolith that hit the flag or its staff, or there may have been an electrostatic attraction between the nylon flag and the pressure suit and life support system covered with beta cloth (Teflon-coated fiberglass), or gases emanating from the life support system may have disturbed the flag.
The next step is to walk down the list of possibilities evaluating each one against all of the available evidence. If a hypothesis conflicts with the evidence, then either the hypothesis or the evidence must go. Hopefully, when you are done, only one explanation remains. It becomes your conclusion, yet you still can't say that you've actually "proved" it; you can only say that this 