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Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 3:47 pm
by JoeC
felixflyer wrote: 40+ year olds still living at home who spend most of their time on the computer


90% of the forum fall into two of those three categories!

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 4:01 pm
by JoeC
PS: I wish it was just a harmless kidult minority who believe in conspiracy theories. Unfortunately a huge amount of people do..and they're allowed to vote.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... y-theories

Brexiteers and Trump supporters appear highly in the results of research :wink:

Image

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 4:34 pm
by felixflyer
The results of a few more questions would have been interesting.

Is there an international Jewish conspiracy?

Guardian readers

Everyone else


Do the Union leaders have any incentive to make their members comfortable and happy in the workplace with adequate employment?

Guardian readers

Everyone else


Is Dianne Abbott regularly poked fun at because she is black and female rather than just incompetent?

Guardian Readers

Everyone Else


Is it fine to claim solidarity with the poor working classes whilst on the very next page encouraging people to buy their champagne & oysters from Waitrose?

Guardian Readers

Everyone Else

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 5:17 pm
by eltonioni
In a competition between conspiracy and cock up, the gold medal is going around the neck of Mr C. Up every time. Most people even cock up their conspiracies.

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 6:57 pm
by Leodisflyer
When you’ve had the opportunity to be on the inside of several events that are reported in the media and discussed on Internet forums then you soon learn how homeopathic levels of truth can be transformed into hard facts and analysis.

I don’t apologise for speculating on things that I only read about, while staying clear of topics of which I have first hand knowledge :-)

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:30 pm
by PaulB
spaughty wrote:Sure, but the paper is on the NIH website, which is not best known for spreading medical conspiracy theories :-)


That doesn't mean that there isn't bias in the paper.... that's why potential conflicts of interest have to be declared.

Perhaps the term conspiracy theory in the title of this thread wasn't accurate, but those things which are conspiracy theories (like disbelieving the lunar landings) and other things like the almost religious belief in a specific version of events (like has happened with the B word) have a number of similarities.

Throwing data or facts at them isn't going to change any minds.... So what do we do.

it doesn't help that the media seem to be either as biased as the (mis)believers or treat all arguments (no matter how ridiculous) as equal in the quest for balance.

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:50 pm
by johnm
treat all arguments (no matter how ridiculous) as equal in the quest for balance.


The BBC has fallen deep into this trap through grossly lazy journalism and weak management scared of losing the licence fee.

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 9:32 pm
by Flyin'Dutch'
Somewhere I read that the job of a journalist, when someone claims that it rains, is not to find someone who says 'it isn't' but to stick their head outside the window to see if it does!

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 10:54 pm
by Cns416
PaulB wrote:
So.... Brexit. Nearly all informed commentators believe that a no-deal Brexit will be very bad for the whole of the UK and NI in particular. The Government published a paper setting out those risks. Despite this, there are many people, some highly intelligent who simply deny any evidence put in front of them.
.


We were told exactly the same rubbish when we were in the ERM
We were told it was all wonderful
We were told there was no alternative
All the informed commentators spouted off the same drivel.
Interest rates were raised and raised to keep us in the 'bounds'

Eventually of course it because obvious that all the claims by HMG were a load of twaddle and HMG in the guise of Mr Lamont did a huge u turn and abandoned the ERM withdrawing the £ from the mechanism dropping interest rates to more sensible levels immediately.
After that of course we heard no more about the ERM experiment and it's not talked about anymore.

So no, no one believes the biased reports from those who job's it is to be biased. As the US author Upton Sinclair remarked: It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his entire job and monetary income rely on him not understanding it.

..and I have not even yest mentioned Iraqi Weapons of mass destruction fantasy promulgated by HMG and its lackey's nor the US Secretary of State Colin Powell standing up in the UN brandishing the "evidence"

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 11:03 pm
by spaughty
Which is the point I was also trying to make. If official bodies treated the public more honestly and with more respect, they might have more credibility when it matters.

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Thu Feb 28, 2019 11:04 pm
by johnm
That is an interesting insight but not relevant to conspiracy theory. It is akin to the old “all elephants are grey therefore all grey things are elephants “ discussion

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Fri Mar 01, 2019 6:09 am
by Flyin'Dutch'
@johnm

Whilst that may be true to a certain extent, there have been some breathtakingly stupid things that ministers etc have said and done which clearly have undermined their standing and with that damage to the credibility of government.

John Gummer feeing his granddaughter a burger anyone?


Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Fri Mar 01, 2019 8:08 am
by johnm
This old Newsthump articleremains all too relevant......

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Fri Mar 01, 2019 10:08 am
by Pete L
Just a question - what do all these people have against a brand of cleaning equipment? If it was Dyson I could understand it.

Other jokes are available for IT geeks older than 30. As a former employee of one of their former competitors, I'm definitely anti-VAX.

Re: The psychology/science of conspiracy theories

PostPosted:Fri Mar 01, 2019 11:41 am
by kanga
Cns416 wrote:...

.. Iraqi Weapons of mass destruction fantasy promulgated by HMG and its lackey's ...


.. and that characterisation of the issue might itself be described as a 'conspiracy theory' .. :roll: