><i>Sometimes something even simpler than the “I used to think so too but now I know better” criterion can be used to unmask bunk; if there’s a good story and one that’s disappointingly banal, usually the latter is the one that’s unfortunately true.</i><p>A problem with this is that there are now increasingly more people who automatically opt for the "disappointingly banal" story even in cases when the good story is the actually true one (and insist on it) -- because it enables them to take pride in "debunking" and feel superior to others.<p>In other words, where once most people went for the "good story" for psychological reasons (because it's more satisfying, makes for interesting talk, etc), now, with the raise of sites like Snopes, "fact-checking" forums, sceptic sites, and so on, there's an increasing equally bogus motive for preferring the banal story.<p>(And this is orthogonal to Occam's razor. For one, because the banal and the interesting story might be of equal simplicity and with equally few prerequisites. Beside's Occam's razor is just an observation, not an absolute law: sometimes the more elaborate course is indeed what happened).