Conspiracy theories
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Source: BBC News: 2007-02-14: 9/11 questions, At 11:48 AM on 14 Feb 2007, Chris Townsend wrote:
The biggest problem with conspiracy theories is that they do not have to prove anything in order to gain widespread credence. They simply have to appeal to the popular belief that 'They' have something to hide. Further, once a conspiracy theory takes root, any attempt by 'Them' to answer it simply serves to prove the initial hypothesis - that 'They' are trying to hide something. As an intellectual exercise, engaging with conspiracy theorists is a fruitless and unappealing exercise precisely because few if any of them have any respect at all for proper, logical analysis of the available facts. [I intend to be one of the exceptions, then.]
However the biggest problem for me, specifically relating to the tangled web of 9/11 conspiracy theories under discussion here, is that they derive a fair degree of weight from the fact that there are simply so many of them. The depth and breadth of conspiracy theories is, sadly, easily mistaken for depth and breadth of evidence in support of them, and the result is they are taken far more seriously than they ought to be. When you consider that many of the theories are in direct contradiction of each other (for example, some say the Pentagon was hit by a missile, while others, forced to take account of eyewitness accounts of the airliner that hit it, maintain that the 'hijack' was a Government plot), and should therefore be treated in isolation, the overall effect is to rob the 'conspiracy' of almost all of its impact.
Source: BBC News: 2007-02-14: 9/11 questions, At 07:56 PM on 14 Feb 2007, ctb wrote:
"The problem with conspiracy theories": that's like saying "the problem with politicians" or "the problem with middle-class white people" or "the problem with Asians".
The problem with the way conspiracy theories are handled is that they are not considered on the ground of their own individual merit (if there is any and this can only be decided through investigative research, not presumption or ignorance).
In the case of 9/11 I believe there to be merit in spades: I think anyone who has the intelligence to look into the event properly will, ultimately, find seriously troubling questions they will want answered.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/conspiracy_files/6213226.stm
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Condemned as paranoid thinking, conspiracy theories are dismissed as mental aberrations which could do only harm.
But a different explanation for its increasingly mainstream popularity is the trickle of revelations about government and corporate wrongdoing that emerged in the 1970s and after, with Watergate the prime example.
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Certainty has given way to doubt, and conspiracy has become the default assumption in an age which has learned to distrust everything and everyone.
It is also arguable that the current climate of fear post-9/11 marks a return to the conspiratorial certainties of McCarthyism.
Why do Americans seem particularly prone to believing in conspiracy theories?
With their Puritan legacy of always seeking the Devil behind inexplicable events, a Republican distrust of secrecy and special privileges, a recurring - but usually unfounded - sense that the exceptional mission of America is threatened by un-Christian enemies, and an abiding faith in the power of individualism closely followed by a fear of anything that threatens the individual, Americans have often been quick to turn to conspiratorial explanations that blame all manner of external forces for why things have not worked as hoped.
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/conspiracy_files/6354139.stm
Conspiracy theories abound all across the world and psychologists have begun to try to understand why people believe in conspiracy theories.
My own research suggests that people think that a major or significant event must have been caused by something similarly major, significant or powerful.
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Magnitude of explanation
However, often official accounts for events, or more mundane, everyday explanations, fail to seem big enough.
We do not feel particularly comfortable with the idea that something unpredictable or accidental like a car crash could have a big effect like the death of a Princess, or that a single mad gunman could assassinate the most powerful man in the world.
That troubles our sense of the world as being a relatively stable, safe place to live in.
Sometimes we try and cast around for an explanation that matches the magnitude of the event that we see in front of us, and conspiracy theories can provide that explanation.
Psychological tests I have carried out suggest that the more you believe in conspiracy theories the more likely you are to mistrust reported facts.
This is, on one level at least, obvious. But it is important to help us to understand how conspiracy theorists often deal with those taking a critical position.
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Closure
People are also more likely to believe in conspiracy theories if they feel powerless in the face of large social authorities or institutions, and not part of the mainstream of society.
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We also hate gaps or inconsistencies in our knowledge. We want "closure" in our thinking and to believe that we live in a stable and predictable world, so we might seek out a simple account of a complex event.
As a rule people tend to accept supporting evidence at face value while subjecting contrary evidence to much more critical evaluation.
People show other cognitive biases in how they evaluate ambiguous evidence.
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So if we accept a conspiracy theory to be true we are more likely to accept explanations that are consistent with a conspiracy and less likely to accept evidence that runs against a conspiracy account.
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It does not mean belief in a conspiracy theory is delusional. At the end of the day there can be a simple reason - the theory itself could be true.
It does not mean belief in a conspiracy theory is delusional. At the end of the day there can be a simple reason - the theory itself could be true.
BBC NEWS: We're all conspiracy theorists at heart (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm).
I admit it. If I'm being really honest, I can't deny that I'm a bit of a conspiracy theorist. Perhaps we all are.
It's easy to dismiss all conspiracy theories as "bunkum", but remember just occasionally they do turn out to be true. Remember Watergate? Iran-contra? Special Branch collusion with loyalist terrorists in Northern Ireland?
As Jim Fetzer, one of the leading 9/11 conspiracy theorists, says: "Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get you."
I've just spent the best part of nine months investigating the numerous conspiracy theories surrounding the al-Qaeda attacks on 11 September, 2001. They range from the plausible - that intelligence agencies in the Middle East may have had some inside knowledge about what was planned - to the totally wacky - that United 93's passengers were abducted by government agents.
But the deeper you dig in the dark world of conspiracies, the more you realise that different theories share much in common. The conspiracy theorist seizes on any apparent inconsistency and from that germ of truth the story is built up.
What happened to the white car apparently involved in Diana's accident? Was there a second gunman on the Grassy Knoll? And why did it take so long to scramble US fighters on 9/11?
And we can't help but be fascinated by them.
Perhaps it's because deep down, we're all story tellers. It's one of the things that makes us who we are. Since the dawn of time, we've been creating heroes and monsters as a way of trying to make sense of the world. In the beginning, we told those tales round camp fires. Now, it's through internet chat rooms or on mobile phones. But it's still basically the same process - weaving stories out of real life.
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When something awful, inexplicable or just plain evil rocks our world, we have an instinctive need to construct elaborate explanations to try and make sense of our anxiety and fear.
Many eye-witnesses to 9/11 thought, "This terrible event can't just be something as simple as 19 young hijackers armed with pocket knives. There must be more too it than that - because the alternative is just too horrific to contemplate."
That alternative is a realisation we are all vulnerable to forces beyond our control; even princesses and presidents aren't immune to "everyday" tragedies like road accidents or random acts of violence.
"I believe the idea that conspiracy theorists are looking for a bigger reason is absolutely right," says Frank Spotnitz, writer of The X Files.
Feels 'unfair'
"I think the most potent targets for conspiracy theories are events of disproportionate tragedy. For example, the president of the United States is assassinated by a lone gunman. It doesn't seem fair, it doesn't seem right, it can't be. This one guy couldn't have done it - there must be larger forces at work."
And so we take comfort in complicated stories about wider conspiracies, usually involving remote, distant figures.
In the past it was mythical gods and monsters. In the more secular modern world, ancient superstitions have been discarded - now it's out-of-touch leaders and unseen government agencies who fill the role of the bogeymen.
We find it reassuring to create an explanation that vindicates our world view. It reinforces our beliefs, suspicions and, yes, even our prejudices.
And from Homer to Harry Potter, the stories we weave always have a hero who is trying to seek out "the truth". Their mission is to go where mere mortals fear to tread - whether it be the Minotaur's labyrinth or the labyrinthine recesses of the secret state - and bring back knowledge to share with the rest of us.
In the age of the internet, those fearless warriors are the self-styled conspiracy theorists whose hunting grounds are the furthest strands of the web. There one can find any number of rumours, stories or scenarios which can be strung together to create the perfect explanation for just about anything that goes wrong in the world.
Your rational half knows these theories probably aren't true, but our instinctive side thinks, well just maybe there's something in it.
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm, Steve Wilson, Weymouth, Dorset
I totally disagree with the author of this piece. Obviously he must work for an undercover government department and is trying to poo poo conspiracy theories. The reason I believe some CT's is not due to some romantic storytelling desire. It is because sometimes there are so many inconsistencies in the official versions of events. Also sometimes there is proof and evidence that something different happened to what the authorities (who may have their own reasons for you to believe differently) are telling you.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm, Sophie, Plymouth
I believe that every human being enjoys analysing different conspiracy theories, wouldn't life be dull without someone else's views? The fact is, we can't settle on a particular answer without totally checking every possible theory, whether it's a huge disaster such as 9/11 or who took the last of the lemonade. It's human nature to question, that hasn't changed in 5,000 years, so therefore won't ever change. It's a way of life.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm, Chandra, London
I think it's the factual discrepancies of 9/11, such as steel allegedly melting at an unnaturally low temperature, and the numerous anomalies around the Pentagon impact, that has given rise to doubts rather than any inability to deal with reality. If reality is causing a problem to anyone with that event, it will be the people who claim that the laws of physics changed beyond all recognition that day.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm: A comment
The problem I have with many conspiracy theories is that they often rely on the fallacy that because of the perceived lack of evidence to support version A of why something happened, version B MUST be the right one. Imagine you are arrested for the murder of someone you have never met. You might not be able to produce any evidence that you weren't responsible, but that does not, on its own, mean that you MUST therefore be guilty. The police would need evidence that you were responsible at least on the face of it in order to charge you. The journalists involved in breaking the Watergate story revealed the "alternative" truth about the burglary, supported by evidence. Why don't we demand the same standards today?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm, Grant , London UK
There have been conspiracies in the past, so you can't dismiss a conspiracy theory on the grounds that conspiracies never exist. Second, the reason humans have a deep-seated weakness for these theories is that we are programmed to try to find patterns in order to explain the world. Sometimes the patterns are random and we impose a false order on the information, but it is wrong to say that this desire is anything to do with storytelling.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm, Iman Morales, New York City
I have worked on a TV show called the Conspiracy Zone which aired on the now defunct TNN network. Conspiracy theories are like good gossip, everybody wants to hear - truth or not.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6368341.stm, Tim Crilly, Hahnheim, Germany
I do not in principle disagree that conspiracy theories cannot always be attributed to such events as pointed out in your article. I also understand that in the cases of Diana and JFK we do tend to want to find the bogeyman lurking in the background. I am led to believe that the US government of 1941 knew about the Japanese coming to bomb Perl Harbour and allowed it to happen in order to overcome political opposition to joining WWII. It is a logical political thing to happen, however distasteful it may seem.
Conspiracy theories edit (Category edit) Category:Conspiracy theories
