Conspiracy Theorists and the Edge of Reason.

Recognising a Conspiracy Theorist and other bad thinking.

When considered, the title Conspiracy “Theorist” might lead someone to believe that what this person thinks is somehow based in fact and evidence. The word ‘theory’ rings synonymous with scientific research to many people; theorising is something learned intellectuals do. However, when one goes deeper into the opinionated and fallacy filled world of conspiracy theorists it becomes clear that the title in itself appears rather oxymoronic. Conspiracy Theorists, or perhaps a better title; Conspiracy 'Assumptionists', come in all shapes and sizes but like most Assumptionists (Creationists, Anti-‘Vaxers’, etc) there are common trends which make then easily identifiable. Furthermore, it stops you wasting your time trying to discuss things with them. It seems that in recent times the internet has become full of these self-styled Assumptionists, maybe it is the lax rules for joining the internet; one only needs a router an something capable of connecting to it after all, there is no entrant’s exam. Maybe it’s the lack of decent training in Critical Thinking. Maybe it has something to do with gullibility and how suggestible certain people are.

There are certainly links between gullibility and conspiracy Assumptionist behaviours, indeed, Stephen Greenspan defined gullibility as referring to  “...a pattern of being duped, which repeats itself in different settings, even in the face of warning signs”¹. It could be fairly argued that Conspiracy Assumptionists are prone to believing wild and inconceivable things despite the evidence that points to the opposite. Though there is indeed little research around the area of gullibility, so we shall have to suffice with sighting the warning signs before getting sucked into a world of crop circles, chem-trails, far reaching government conspiracies and Big Pharma.

The trend usually starts with an outright rebuttal of established fact/s. However, on closer inspection one will discover that it is not a rebuttal proper. It is more a cobbled together group of assumptions that vaguely (strongly, in the mind of the Conspiracy Assumptionist) support each other by way of very select and cherry picked evidence, outward denial of contrary evidence and various forms of confirmation biases and logical fallacies. Here I have compiled a top X of things to look out for...

1) Use of unqualified statements of fact. 

You've all heard it "Vaccines cause Autism"², "At least 33% of people have been abducted by Aliens", "It it well known that...". Unsubstantiated statements of fact are the enemy of intelligent discussion and debate. A Conspiracy Assumptionist will come out with some truly wild claims, however, they will never back them up and if they do it will be with...

 2) "Spurious References" 

If a Conspiracy Assumptionist ever does back up a wild claim it will be from a very select source; one that ultimately is heavily biased in favour of their position on the subject. It will almost never be and academic source and if it is they will cherry pick it, typically you can expect to see Blogs, Conspiracy websites and YouTube videos cited as "references" or as they like to call it; "proof". Yes, the Bible/Quran falls under this heading too – just because it’s old and millions of people think they are right does not mean they actually are (argument from popularity and anachronistic thinking).

3) Higher conspiracies as an avoidance of facts. 

Often when challenged about some fact they will retort not with a qualification but a get out clause "it's a [government] conspiracy". What they mean to say is that they have no clue what they are talking about; therefore it must be a conspiracy.

4) The "TRUTH". 

The majority of Conspiracy Assumptionists are obsessed with the truth. But their truth and actual reality are very different things. What constitutes as “truth” to a Conspiracy Assumptionist is anything that supports their argument. Anything that doesn't support their argument is a conspiracy.

5) Lack of Reason and Logic 

Conspiracy Theorists have one agenda; to push their agenda and ignore everything else. They are not interested in discussion unless it supports their argument; they are not interested in debate unless it concludes that they are right. During a debate or discussion you can expect to see a good load of logical fallacies fielded in support of their claims (see; list of logical fallacies most encountered when discussion something with a Conspiracy Assumptionist). 

6) Mixing philosophic and subjective 'experiences' with established logic and/or scientific facts. 

This is used as a way to interpret something which would not typically fall within the sphere of a particular subject in order to support an argumentative position on that subject. You’ll often find things like quantum mechanics cropping up in places that it has no place in, like a philosophical debate about ethics. Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle seems to be a favourite, the Conspiracy Assumptionist of course ignoring the fact that it has nothing to do with uncertainty or probability in a general sense. Thermodynamics and laws of entropy, because of their links to the mathematical concept of chaos, are often fielded wildly out of context as well.

7) Ad-hominen. 

When all else fails with the Assumptionist don’t be surprised when they start hurling abuse in your direction; “you’re just f*cking ignorant”, “you wouldn’t know the truth if it f*cked you in the ass”, “why don’t you do your reading you f*ggot” are just some of my favourites.   

8) Esotericism. 

Nothing inflates the Conspiracy Assumptionist ego quite like the belief that they know something that no one else does. What they have actually done, however, is usually one of two things; either they have misinterpreted something to such a degree that it has become something that often bares little or no resemblance to the original thing or they will have simply made it up completely.

9) Cognitive Dissonance. 

Overtones of the ongoing conflict with reality will really start to ring when the Conspiracy Assumptionist is challenged heavily; when they begin to run out of answers and don’t know enough about their own subjects to comment on it. Some truly believe what they are saying, like devout creationists, for most their investment in what they believe is not so strong and the cracks of the conflict of what they think is true and what actually is true will start to open.  

10) Making up their own “reference” material. 

Nothing pleases a conspiracy Assumptionist more than being able to cite various references as proof of their assertions. This leads back to the spurious reference material and quite often a Conspiracy Assumptionist will point their opponent to their own blog/YouTube channel/website as a place to find supporting evidence for their position. In these places one will typically find copy-pasted materials or opinions from other biased sources. Creationism has gone a step further and has an “academic” Journal; the Journal of Creation. Which claims to feature “in-depth, peer-reviewed comment, reviews and the latest research findings that relate to origins and the biblical account of Creation”³. Naturally their peer-review process is in complete support of the biblical creation account rendering the entire publication extremely biased in favour of creationism. Subsequently, outside of Creationism The Journal of Creation is generally not considered to be a reliable academic source for anything other than religious opinion.

11) Parroting.  

Because a Conspiracy Assumptionist typically has one agenda (to push theirs) and sources all their information from very select sources that agree with their opinions when asked to expand on a topic they are discussion or debating they simply cannot; usually they end up parroting what they have already said, some of the more creative ones will change some words and rearrange the sentences but it will still be a carbon copy of what they have already said.

In summation

One thing you may have noticed about this little list is that there is one glaringly obvious trend running though everything; bad thinking. There is a reason why people often fall into the bad thinking hole and seem not to want to, or be able to, climb out again. The reasons were discussed in an article by Joel Achenbach, in March 2015, in the National Geographic. In relation to scientific method he tells us that quite often it leads us to conclusions which are not only hard to swallow but are also inherently counter intuitive. When, in the 17^th century, Galileo claimed that the Earth spins on an axis and orbits the sun he was not just refuting established doctrine – he was asking people to believe something that defied common sense – it looks like the sun goes around the Earth.

Most people’s understanding of the world comes from personal experience and anecdotes, writes Achenbach. We prefer to rely on stories rather than statistical evidence. We are prone to rejecting things that counter common sense as concluded in a study by Andrew Shtulman⁴ which showed that even people who were professional scientists still had to think a bit before responding true or false to questions like “Does the Earth orbit the Sun?” (counter-intuitive). While questions such as “Does the moon orbit the Earth?” (intuitive) were answered with much less thought.

People like to feel safe; whether that is in their home, while on holiday or in the comfort of their mind.  Personal experience and anecdotes are safe, they do not require going out on a limb or into the unknown. If they surround themselves with supporting “evidence” and like-minded people they can extend that wall of safety that protects them from anything that might infringe on their world view. This is why, when challenged, a Conspiracy Assumptionist will simply retreat to a position of safety by parroting or resorting to fallacious evidence and arguments. They are not trying to convince you that they are right as much as they are trying to reaffirm their position for themselves. 

Does this grant them some concession in logical discussion or debate however? 

No. Every instance of fallacy or bad thinking should be called out and challenged.

Commonly encountered Conspiracy Assumptionists;Though there are essentially distinct areas of conspiracy thinking many cross over and the assumptions in place in one will be present in a different form in the others as well.

Creationists – Odd though it may seem, Creationists absolutely fit under the umbrella of Conspiracy Assumptionists for the fact that they display all of the qualities above.

Crop-Circle believers – This, in a way, fits under the Alien Theorists category, but some have differing views about what causes crop circles.

Alien Theorists – No I do not mean those that support and make an effort to understand the work of the SETI institute, I mean the ones who believe ardently the stories of abduction and probing.

Government Conspircists – This often rears its head as an outward rejection of the government or ‘system’ as a dysfunctional machine that requires urgent resolution. Though this may or may not be true in some cases, the Conspiracy Assumptionist when pressed will rarely if ever provide an effective alternative. They much prefer to pick holes rather than solve the issues they complain about.

Refuters of Established Education – This often comes as extension of the greater government conspiracy and shares much of the same thinking; again preferring to poke holes in established education rather than seek an effective alternative. Oddly enough, many Conspiracy Assumptionists seem not to have had much experience with established education. 

Commonly Encountered Fallacies

Confirmation Bias – Searching for only that which confirms ones preconceptions about a topic or point. People who quote the bible in support of the bible for instance show astounding amounts of confirmation bias.

Strawmen – Misinterpreting the opponent’s argument in order to make it easier to attack.

X: “We should have tighter gun laws”

Y: “No, we shouldn’t. Because then crime would run rampant if people were not allowed the right to defend themselves.”

Y has exaggerated X’s position for the sole purpose of attempting to make it harder to defend - X did not say anything about restricting people’s rights to defend themselves.

False-Dichotomy – When someone proposes that there are only two options, when there are in fact more. Probably one of the most famous false-dichotomies ever was made by President Bush in 2001 when addressing Congress. The infamous words were of course “either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists”.

Reductio ad Hitlerum – Where someone makes an observation that their opponent’s views are comparable to that of Hitler or the Nazi part. Essentially this is a form of ad hominen.

X: “Well I honestly think that Atheism gives us a better and clearer world view”

Y: “Hitler was an atheist you know”.

Ignoratio elenchi - Presenting an argument that may or may not be valid but nonetheless fails to address the point/topic; an irrelevant conclusion.

X: A Welshman smashed into my car the other day; I’d like to use the unwritten law allowing an Englishman to kill a Welshman with a longbow.

Y: No judge is going to recognise that unwritten law.

X: Well, they should.

Whether the any judge should recognise it is irrelevant, the point is that murder is illegal under the current judicial system.

Argumentum ad lipidem – Dismissing something as absurd or outrageous without providing proof of its absurdity.

Historian’s Fallacy - Occurs when one assumes that decision makers of the past viewed events from the same perspective and having the same information as those subsequently analyzing the decision.

Argumentum ad ignorantiam - It asserts that a proposition is true because it has not yet been proven false (or vice versa). This represents a type of false dichotomy in that it excludes a third option; which is that there is insufficient investigation and therefore insufficient information to prove the proposition satisfactorily to be either true or false.

Argumentum ad infinitum – Constant repetition of the argument until no one cares to discuss it further. Once this point is reached the person repeating the argument assumes victory. The most common reason people resort to argumentum ad infinitum is that they have no other means of supporting their position.

~

A good counter to a suspected logical fallacy is Reductio ad Absurdum or to ‘reduce to absurdity’. When a suspected fallacious argument is analysed, or reduced, into its logical parts it will more often than not reduce to absurdity; take the following example borrowed from (http://www.logicallyfallacious.com):

X: I am going into surgery tomorrow so please pray for me. If enough people pray for me, God will protect me from harm and see to it that I have a successful and speedy recovery.

Now to reduce - We first assume the premise is true: if “enough” people prayed to God for her successful surgery and speedy recovery, then God would make it so.  From this, we can deduce that God responds to popular opinion.  However, if God simply granted prayers based on popularity contests, which would be both unjust and absurd.  Since God cannot be unjust, then he cannot both respond to popularity and not respond to popularity, the claim is absurd, and thus false.

Please share this and help to stop the rampant spread of stupidity, because ultimately, it affects us all.

Democracy does not mean- “my ignorance is just as good as your fact”.

~

¹ Greenspan, S., (2009). The Annuls of Gullibility; why we get duped and how to avoid it. Praeger Publishing: Westport.

² The doomed paper by Andrew Wakefield that linked MMR vaccines to Autism was thoroughly debunked and called out on its fraudulent conclusion. If you’re of a scientific bent you might still like to view the paper though; http://briandeer.com/mmr/lancet-paper.pdf

³ http://creation.com/journal-of-creation

⁴ Shtulman, A., & Harrington, K. (in press). Tensions between science and intuition across the lifespan. Topics in Cognitive Science. Sourced: http://sites.oxy.edu/shtulman/vitae.html

#LogicShotgun

@ARB_itrary

Written by A.R Bell 2015

A Culture of Offensive Behavior, or is it?

“It's now very common to hear people say, 'I'm rather offended by that.' as if that gives them certain rights. It's actually nothing more than a whine. 'I find that offensive.' It has no meaning; it has no purpose; it has no reason to be respected as a phrase. 'I am offended by that.' Well, so fucking what." – Stephen Fry, The Guardian, 5^th June 2005.

People love to be offended. They do. No one admits it, but they love it. They love it because they feel like it gives them power over someone else. You can really put someone in their place when you explain “how utterly offended you were” by what they said. Not so much on the sterile and detached world of the internet but in real life, to watch that person shrink into their little box and worry about every word they next might say for risk of offending you again, that you might smite them once more. How satisfying.

Jeremy Clarkson is one example, he’s a high and mighty in the world of presenters and TV personalities and in realism the loud mouthed Doncastian should have known better than to blow his top while already having chalked up a number of other infractions - however deservedly or not. Was his outburst out of order? Probably, yes. Was the reaction to it justified? Or rather – was it equal to the outburst? Hmmm...

There is a culture of over-sensitivity creeping through society like a rash. Just look around. Poke around on the internet, say something out of place or something which has the smallest possibility of being misconstrued and you’ll be on the end of a keyboard warrior in the blink of an eye. Complaining about how you hurt their feelings and you’re just a big fat bully, trolling all these innocent, gentle people who've done nothing wrong ever in their entire whitewashed lives. You've all met them.

You meet them in real life too, more and more these days. I recall a time, not so long ago, when one could make a joke in mixed company and, provided it wasn’t spectacularly racist, you could pretty much get away with anything. Not now though, ooh no; no jokes, no quips and no wisecracks. Lest you inadvertently offend someone who was eves-dropping or who stumbled in on your conversation, someone who probably should have been minding there own business in the first place, but who has now made it the sole goal in life to be offended by you.

If we return to Top Gear, Mr Clarkson and the recent fiasco in Argentina we see a fantastic example of this. If you are unfamiliar with the story, it has to do with the number plate characters of the car used by Mr Clarkson during a Top Gear Argentina special. The number plate reads H982 FKL. In case you’re modern history or international abbreviations are a bit rusty, someone inferred from this random assignment of numbers given to a 1990 Porche that it made reference to the Falklands conflict in some derogatory sense.

Let’s look at the logic behind this a little more closely. 

Firstly it has to be said this is an exceptionally unfortunate arrangement of alpha-numerical characters, or then again, is it? Firstly, the producers buy the vehicles for the show specials; the presenters might have a choice of the type of car they want but the producers find and purchase it. Initially then it would seem the fault is with the producers but is there blame to be applied here? Can it be reasonably argued that upon deciding the Argentinean destination for the show special that the producers searched millions of registrations for this exact one? No, of course not, that would be ridiculous.

Secondly there is the problem of the actual Falklands reference, 982 FKL. Naturally you discount the first two characters leaving the 82 FKL. However, though the 82 may be attributed to 1982, the start of the Falklands war by Argentina invading the Falkland Islands, the FKL isn’t even the recognised abbreviation for the Falklands; it is FLK, a minor variance you will agree but as we’re being pernickety and nit-picking every little detail to suit this argument... As I was saying; making it their sole purpose in life to make sure they have something to be offended about.  

Equally though, could not English viewers be offended by Richard Hammonds number plate - EKH 646J? After all in 1646 there was a bloody battle in Great Torrington, the last battle of the English Civil War no less. Yet I hear no cry of offense from English historians or the general English public.

The problem is that there is a sense of entitlement like never before in society and being offended seems to have become not only trendy but also an extension of some warped narcissistic entitlement complex. People don’t have thick skin anymore; they don’t seem to have skin at all. Every tiny comment no matter how harmless with be tirelessly picked apart for something, anything, to take offence to so they can feed their lust for self-absorption. You can almost imagine them salivating with baited breath, having not fed their addiction, waiting for you to say something wrong – or even something right that can be twisted into something wrong; “those trousers look brilliant on you”, “so you’re saying all my other clothes look terrible? How can you say that!? That’s so rude!”

And so it goes.

So what are we to do about this culture of over-sensitive delicate little flowers with raging superiority complexes? What Indeed. Are they going to have to learn to suck it up or are we going to have to learn to tone it down. The truth is, they are going to have to learn to suck it up and here’s why; there are already a number, nay, a myriad of concessions made for various levels of offensive materials – be it pornography or racist remarks etc and quite rightly so I might add. There is enough protection for what might be regarded as the ‘protected characteristics’ of any individual or group. Anything beyond that begins to creep towards oppression of the freedom we have to express ourselves and that is a dangerous thing. In regards to making sure you don’t call an Afro-Caribbean person a ‘nigger’ or make lewd remarks about the deceased at a funeral I think we can all agree that these things are unacceptable and successfully differentiate between acceptable behaviour and being an ass without being babysat.

How do we stop this culture of over-sensitivity? Not by being overtly insensitive but by simply maintaining that level of good courteous and polite behaviour that the civilised world has been built on, we don’t need to change how we act, those with a problem with everything need to alter how they chose to over-react.             

   

A.R. Bell

#LogicShotgun

@ARB_itrary

Religious Indoctrination and the Infinite Universe of Children

There is something profoundly wrong about the religious indoctrination of children. 

It is theft and I will tell you why. When a child is born they are born free from everything, they are born as empty slates, clear minds. As they grow they turn into little scientists; watch any child play and soon you will realise that it is not idle play, they are constantly conducting experiments; what happens if I put this ball in this cup? What happens why I put it in that cup? If I throw sand in the air, what happens? If I make annoying sounds, how long will it be before daddy gets mad? How much does this weigh? Why can I not reach that? Everything interaction is an experiment, every event studied intently to learn more about it, every sound listened to, every taste savoured and every touched sends a spike of inquisitiveness to the infant mind. They are adventurers with infinite imagination on a never ending quest for new knowledge. Their world is one full of wonder and discovery every day. This constant questioning and discovery is made possible because they are not limited in the scope of their understanding; their universe is as it should be to them (and likely how it is in reality) – infinite.

When all questions are reduced to one simple answer there ceases to be great moments of discovery; Why has the giraffe got such a long neck? God. Where did the world come from? God. Why are some stars brighter than others? God. Where once there was a rich and colourful gallery of explanations there is not one plain answer to everything – God. For adults this can be rationalised but to reduce everything to just God in a child’s mind is stealing that discovery and wonder from them. It limits their once infinite scope to the boundaries of God. It squashes their naturally inquisitive minds; it removes the adventure and wonder because now it can all be explained so easily, it is all reduced to God.

Imagine a library. Maybe situated in a fantastically interesting old building, a maze of wood panelled rooms and heavy oak doorways inside of which sit towering bookshelves brimming with thousands of books by thousands of authors. Walking through it you notice all the different books on different subjects; factual books, fictional books, comedy, satire, reference, children’s stories, history, academic journals maybe. You notice how they are all bound differently in different colours. The library is a canvas of colours and titles stretching on forever, covering every subject known to humanity, every thought, every invention, every event in every language. The shelves bow under the weight of the work of thousands of years of discovery and imagination. You can smell it in the air, that wonderful papery smell of books – the smell of knowledge and understanding.

Now remove all those books, sweep them off of the shelves and into some abyss never to be seen again. Take all the knowledge and imagination and cast it away. In its place, amongst the empty shelves where only the dust outlines of the spines remain, place on a table a single religious tome. This is now your library. This is maximum scope of understanding and imagination available to you – your library has been reduced to God.

There is no denying that religious texts are indeed useful and should have a place in every library both figurative and real. They are useful because they provide insight into human history; those people who put together Genesis, for instance, tried to figure out the world was made. After all, they didn’t have much later scientific advances to rely on, so they did their best. Later stories were added to try and form some sort of treatise on morals and human interaction and through hundreds of years these religious texts began to take shape. However, as time advanced there became a following, a stoic and dogmatic following of these texts. They became preached pieces that were no longer about explaining the world but were about political means and ends and financial gain, they were, and still are, about control. Take the Bible for instance, it features the ten ‘commandments’, not ‘the ten suggestions’ or ‘the ten good ideas that you might want to use’ they are commands. More and more organised religion became about them and us, being either with it or against it. It became narrow minded and has stayed that way ever since.

Children do not need narrow minded thought being introduced to their infinite universes. They do not need to be told everything they are going to burn in hell for or how God will hate them if they do this, that or something else and they do not need a warped version of emotional blackmail masquerading as morality. They need morality and ethics based on real human interactions not ancient doctrines that condone rape, murder, discrimination and hatred as long as God says it is alright. What children need is encouragement in the things they are good at and a free world to explore and discover with no limitations imposed on their imaginations by anyone, imaginary or not.

Children only need the limits of their own imagination and inquisitiveness, their desire for adventure and knowledge. 

They deserve to be shown that the world is even more fascinating and amazing than they could imagine; they deserve better than to have their infinite universes reduced to God. 

#LogicShotgun 
A.R. Bell 2015
Twitter: @ARB_itrary