You are assuming that all those who are silent have heard the claim, and consider it worthy of refuting, instead of just rolling their eyes and ignoring it as nonsense.
Cheers!
I have to disagree with you here...those who are silent, become suddenly silent when confronted with one of their fellow believers in something, who all of sudden comes out with some very strange ideas...all of a sudden, someone who has been very active on a thread, will just all of sudden disappear, just coincidentally, when someone whose opinion they happened to agree with, all of a sudden says something they did not expect...it happens way to often, that the 'silence' is noticed, as people run for cover...they have seen the claim, for sure, they just cannot and will not refute it publically...