What causes some folks to prefer wild-ass theories to facts?
With 9/11, there's a whole raft of theories to float your boat on. It was really caused by the Jews. It was really caused by Bush to justify a war against Iraq. There weren't any people on the planes in the first place. The Pentagon was hit by a truck bomb. It was hit by a missile fired from a Navy ship. The firemen in the WTC were really planting explosives. Flight 93 was really brought down by an F-16. The list goes on and on and on. You can get DVDs with all the popular theories, each more fantastic than the next, each requiring the laws of physics and metallurgy and materials science be ignored or (at best) bent to the point of fracture.
Why do folks believe this shit? Why are they willing to accept as gospel theories that not only can't be proven, but sound bizzare?
My father is/was a long-time listener to Art Bell's show, and believed that the Comet Hale-Bopp was indeed being shadowed by a UFO. Well, we know how that turned out. You want to talk about weird stuff - that's the place...
What is it that tickles the fancy so that someone normally rational and very reality-based (I'm not using this in the political sense - It's my thinking that folks who say that their politics are 'reality-based' inhabit a very different reality than the one I'm using - but rather the psychological sense in that they can tell right from wrong, figure out proper conclusions from sufficient facts and are willing to modify their opinions based on verifiable information...) to the point where they latch onto an idea and aren't willing to examine it rationally?
My father was into the paranormal/UFO stuff for a very long time. Even as late as Hale-Bopp he was thinking we were continually being visited. We haven't talked about it for a while now, but I think the Heaven's Gate suicides really made him reconsider the whole thing. But after that, he started paying a lot of attention to his junk mail. (This wasn't an improvement, BTW. Send off 10 bucks to a snail-mail scammer, and you'll be on a dozen more mailing lists in a month.) And his gullibiity's been sorely used.
In the case of something like 9/11, there's plenty of ridiculous claims, and plenty of sites debunking them. My favorite article on the whole thing was at Popular Mechanics, in their article Debunking the 9/11 Myths
Three and a half years later, not everyone is convinced we know the truth. Go to Google.com, type in the search phrase "World Trade Center conspiracy" and you'll get links to an estimated 628,000 Web sites. More than 3000 books on 9/11 have been published; many of them reject the official consensus that hijackers associated with Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda flew passenger planes into U.S. landmarks.But yet - when faced with facts refuting their theories, the folks who want to believe them will find ways around them. I tend to operate on the "If one point is shown to be false, the rest is very shakey and likely false also" method of verification.Healthy skepticism, it seems, has curdled into paranoia. Wild conspiracy tales are peddled daily on the Internet, talk radio and in other media. Blurry photos, quotes taken out of context and sketchy eyewitness accounts have inspired a slew of elaborate theories: The Pentagon was struck by a missile; the World Trade Center was razed by demolition-style bombs; Flight 93 was shot down by a mysterious white jet. As outlandish as these claims may sound, they are increasingly accepted abroad and among extremists here in the United States.
In a way, it's a lot like troubleshooting a problem with a computer. You don't go in with a pre-selected result in mind - you look at the problems, form a theory about the problem and how to fix it, and then test the theory (and the fix) to see if it does the job. If it does, you're in good shape. If not, you get to start over. Occam's razor doesn't necessarily apply when dealing with Windows problems - but in the real world it's surprising how often it's useful.
In the case of 9/11, which is the simpler theory? That 20 hijackers comandeered 4 planes? Or there was a massive conspiracy with remote controlled aircraft/missiles, and the planes never existed in the first place? (We won't even go into the large numbers of folks who'd be needed for a massive conspiracy like this, and how they could (a) disappear without even being missed, or (b) keep the secret so well that all there is to go on are unsubstantiated fantasies of an omnipotent government deliberately murdering it's own people to provoke a war.
Don't know about you - but I'll take the simpler explanation where it fits with the known facts...
J.
Comments (12)
Ignoring Occam's Razor was the only way the Bush National Guard Memo could have gotten any acceptance:
1. It would have required a rare and hideously expensive (think costing more than a new car at the time) specialized machine to type it at all (I collect antique typewriters and know something of their history).
2. The purported writer's family attested that he disliked typing and was not good at it, so he would have been exceedingly unlikely to have been trained to use the specialized machine.
3. Because the machine in question (the IBM Selectric "Composer") was so expensive, it would have been found only in a base print shop, not on someone's desk for routine typing.
4. The memo could easily be duplicated using Word defaults.
5. It was on the wrong size paper (something I was unaware of; thanks, Jerry); if the memo as produced had been copied from an original on 8.5X10.5 paper,as the military was using at the time, there would be lines showing the edges of the original.
6. Since the man who produced the purported memo was a known Democrat supporter, it is inconceivable that he would have destroyed the original of such an important document and submitted a copy, if he had ever had the original in his possession (inconceivable to me, at any rate; I certainly would have kept the original if it were humanly possible, as it would be far more convincing that any copy).
All this for a memo that was for the writer's personal files, not for distribution. I'm sorry; it was a non starter from the word "Go" if you look at it logically. But for weeks people kept trying to claim that since the Selectric "Composer" existed at the time the memo was supposedly typed, the falsity of the document had to be established beyond a reasonable doubt, rather than by a preponderence of evidence. This is the mindset that keeps these conspiricy theories alive; both the gullibility and the agendas.
Posted by JohnC. | September 12, 2005 5:54 AM
Posted on September 12, 2005 05:54
What's the attraction of crazy conspiracy theories? Dunno exactly, but it's a real hallmark of the human condition...I think "Foucault's Pendulum" by Umberto Eco offers as good an insight as I've ever found.
And try this: read back through your blog, noting the number of times you foresee dark times ahead, or things getting worse before they get better. See how that's a similar attraction, for you?
We are all apples, not so far from our trees ;)
Posted by CaptainCanuck | September 12, 2005 6:30 AM
Posted on September 12, 2005 06:30
There are still people around who think the moon landing was faked, too. Shrug.
Posted by LindaY | September 12, 2005 8:15 AM
Posted on September 12, 2005 08:15
John:
Actually, the paper size the AF was using was 8x10.5 - but all your other points are accurate. The formatting should NOT have corresponded to standard Word defaults, and there's no way a common typewriter would produce laser-printer quality type.
In something like this, I run on the '3-legged stool' theory of proof. If you need X number of verified/verifiable facts to support your contention, and all you have are X-1 - your stool has two legs and will fall over. Most conspiracy theories require at least one suspension of disbelief - therefore the leg's missing before they even try to call it a stool. And as far as the media goes, they're really bad about checking to make sure there's a proper number of legs.
J.
Posted by JLawson | September 12, 2005 8:43 AM
Posted on September 12, 2005 08:43
CaptainCanuck -
One of the things I've noticed about myself is that when I let my feelings override my reason I'm usually headed for trouble. And occasionally, I get a trifle depressed. When I'm down, I get pretty darn pessimistic, with generalized feelings of gloom and doom and premonitions of vague imminent catastrophes. And you won't believe how glad I am when I'm proved wrong - which is the main difference between the conspiracy theorists and myself.
J.
Posted by JLawson | September 12, 2005 8:51 AM
Posted on September 12, 2005 08:51
Linda -
Re the Moon Landings - it would certainly be possible to fake things. That the hardware was developed and built is without question. That it was risky as hell considering the level of technology then even more so. That the entire effort was documented is undisputable - and every manned flight in that series went off and could be tracked. So - how could it be faked, and why?
The why would be since we couldn't do it - but we could get men into orbit and back, around the moon and back, and reporters were watching the whole time - so why would to moon orbit and then down to the moon and back be so impossible that it made more sense to fake it for all the moon shots? (Of course, Apollo 13 had to have the 'emergency' because the lunar sets at Area 51 weren't ready...(grin))
One leg missing or cracked - the stool falls over.
J.
Posted by JLawson | September 12, 2005 9:15 AM
Posted on September 12, 2005 09:15
Jerry,
Actually, a one-legged stool is quite comfortable, and is superior to a three-legged stool for some applications - but then, I'm picking nits again....
Posted by John C. | September 12, 2005 1:04 PM
Posted on September 12, 2005 13:04
Can it stand by itself? (Barring a hole in the floor or something...)
J.
Posted by JLawson | September 12, 2005 4:17 PM
Posted on September 12, 2005 16:17
No; you use your feet to keep it upright (so it in effect is a three-legged stool after all...). But unlike a three-legged stool, which is stable by itself, a one-legged stool allows you to lean and pivot. I've seen pictures of one that was belted into place so it went with you; it was the traditional stool for those milking cows somewhere in Europe (I can't remember where). It made you look like you had a tail.
Posted by John C. | September 12, 2005 5:42 PM
Posted on September 12, 2005 17:42
The other thing about "faking" the moon landings (or any other big "conspiracy" for that matter) is the sheer number of people involved that have to keep the secret, especially in this day and age. SOMEBODY would blab.
Posted by James | September 12, 2005 6:19 PM
Posted on September 12, 2005 18:19
John...
I've seen those. And since it can't stand on its own...
I rest my case. On a three-legged stool. (grin)
J.
Posted by JLawson | September 12, 2005 10:08 PM
Posted on September 12, 2005 22:08
James -
Fully agree. The only way to keep that large an effort secret would be to, um... make sure they couldn't, you know... um, like talk to anyone about it. So, they all had to disappear... along with their families... and their acquanitances... and their families... and their acquanitances... and their families...
Without anyone noticing.
The Men in Black were very busy, and the graveyard at Area 51 was enlarged by several orders of magnatude to handle the... um... inflow.
J.
Posted by JLawson | September 12, 2005 11:02 PM
Posted on September 12, 2005 23:02