Conspiracy mindset and critical thinking

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

One of the better written pieces on conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorists. I wish it were possible for Poly and his conspiracy buddies to grasp the fact of their own suspension of rationality in favor of a fixation on mythology. If only they could let the penny drop in their minds and discover the joy of looking around at a world that wasn't run by shadowy nefariata, if they could just 'get it'. And reality may intrude once they move out of mom's basement and get jobs, assuming they are employable, but it's unlikely that it ever will and it's unlikely for all the reasons this guy suggests.

I took a few snippets out of a very long article, which is "Part II". Part I is good too, and there's a link on the page to it if you want to read it. Both are long, so read them when you have time.

I’ve met a number of these people. I know this is harsh, but I’m sick of watching the damage they are doing to this civilization: these people are, to a man, complete losers. Losers. They are desperate and sad people who need to believe in some dark secret to give meaning to their lives.

On the Kennedy assasination:

If you further believe that the Kennedy Assassination was not the unlucky intersection of a parade route and a commie loser with a rifle, but rather a coup d’etat orchestrated by Johnson or Castro or the Mob, then you believe that your government is willing to kill a man – the duly elected President of the United States – in order for some shadow figure to gain power.
What military man could order such a thing? I am also honored to know many people who have served this country in uniform. To a person, I find they would try to save the life of the President, no matter how much they despised him (or her). They love the office. They love the country. That is why they serve.

There's only one kind of person that can believe a group of U.S. military officers would follow such an order: people who don't know any U.S. military officers. What does that say about how they themselves are wired? Colonel, I want you to shoot the President. That order comes direct from the Vice President!

Well, I’ll get on it right away!

It’s ludicrous. It’s absurd. It’s widely believed. And if you believe the government was willing to do that, then you believe they are willing to do this:

On the moon landing "hoax":

I was there at Cape Kennedy for the launch of Apollo 13. Is he saying I am lying about this whole moon mission conspiracy? I and millions of others who stood there and saw those Saturn V’s climb into the sky?
Of course not, says Joe. They actually launched. The astronauts just stayed in earth orbit the whole time.

I see. So we have the technical expertise to build a 40-story rocket that can produce millions of pounds of thrust. We can build capsules and lunar landers that function in zero-G. We have the means and the will to put these massive objects into Earth orbit, keep them up there for two weeks, but the additional 3-4% of the total launch energy needed to send this package to the moon is so obviously beyond our technical skill that the whole thing must be a hoax?

On 911:

Recently, Rosie O’Donnell said on national television that she believes 9/11 was orchestrated by the US government.
Well, that’s why we went through the steps above. If you believe that the government lied about the moon landing, you can believe they lied about killing JFK. If they lied about JFK, then they can lie about chemtrails. And if they are willing to poison the entire population with aerial spraying, what are a few thousand people in four airliners and a couple of buildings?

Rosie O’ Donnell making such a claim on a major network is a national disgrace. The fact that much of the audience cheered and applauded is nothing less than a national catastrophe.

To her, and to her audience, it is taken as granted that the government is capable of such things. As if “the government” was operated by cyborgs grown in Haliburton vats, rather than by well-meaning and patriotic people that love this country.

"This is the first time in history that fire has ever melted steel," she said. This is a statement of such pristine and perfect idiocy that it surely must be emblazoned in stone across the entrance to the Physics Imbecile wing of the Moron Museum of Natural History. But mastery of physics and engineering requires some intelligence, some perseverance and some discipline: none of which are in evidence in this buffoon. Everything is a conspiracy to a mind this far gone. The 15 British sailors kidnapped at sea? All a plan by our evil (but incompetent!) government to get the next war it so desperately needs. “Gulf of Tonkin! Google It, people!” she said on national TV.

And I will, Rosie. I promise. As soon as I finish googling MAD COW DISEASE.

I will make the point yet again because I believe it is the crux of the issue: what kind of moral universe do you have to inhabit to be able to believe that your own people – airline personnel, demolition experts, police and security forces, faked witnesses and all the rest – are capable of such a thing? How much hate for your own society do you have to carry in order to live in such a desolate and ridiculous mental hell? What psychoses must a mind be riddled with in order to negate what was perfectly obvious and instead believe a theory of such monumental fantasy? How much pure constant hatred does that take?

What, in short, is the miserable black hole of self-loathing that drives a person like Rosie O’Donnell and millions like her?

“We’re just asking questions” was the official, voice-over disclaimer. You hear that too from the 9/11 Truth crowd when confronted with the lunacy of their claims. We’re just asking questions…
Well, in that vein I’d like to ask some questions myself. Is Michael Moore a serial pedophile? I’m just asking, and I’m sure a lot of my readers would just like to have some questions answered. I heard that Rosie O’Donell ate a baby at a Satanic Ritual once – is that true? Can you please provide the evidence that this did not in fact happen? Thanks. Who has murdered more hookers: Bill Maher or Charlie Sheen? Come on, you can’t tell me there’s no smoke there. I just want a possible explanation…

So that’s what it has come to now. We deserve better.

God damn it, we do.

ALL of these 9/11 conspiracy sites have museum-grade idiots stating what “obviously” happens at velocities and temperatures that they are flat-out incapable of understanding. Not only are these people too stupid to understand the physics involved with what they are bloviating about…they are too stupid to realize that they are too stupid.

On demolition

The 9/11 Truthers claim that the twin towers were brought down by controlled demolition. Okay.
Have you ever seen a controlled demolition? Shows like this are all over The Discovery Channel. Do these people realize how all of the insulation and paneling must be stripped away from the support beams? Do they not understand how these beams must be cut open and the explosives placed with great care? Have they not any idea of the amount of time this takes – months – and the forest of wires that runs through the structure to the detonating mechanism? Have they given no thought – none? – to what an enormous job this is, and how much work goes into getting these explosives exactly where they need to be?

Apparently not. They just figure someone leaves a suitcase somewhere, I guess.

Anyone who has ever – ever – seen what is required to bring down a building of that size knows that the site is a disaster area of det cord, pulled paneling, and huge bundles of explosives taped to the structural columns across many floors.

Has no one considered that this all had to be started after everyone went home on Monday night and before people reported for work the next day? On multiple floors of two of the busiest public spaces in the world? No one noticed this on Tuesday morning? Hey Jim, what do you suppose that huge bundle of plastic explosives is doing there where the water cooler used to be? And where do those wires go?

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As I was leaving Joe’s, he said something I’m sure he thought was very funny. He said, “Man, I’ll bet a guy like you thinks Lee Harvey Oswald really shot JFK.”
Of course he shot JFK, Joe. Who do you think did it? The American Beef Council?

Joe looked at me the way I had been looking at him. That is to say, he simply could not process that I could hold such a belief in my head.

You’re serious?

I’m dead serious. I recommended Case Closed, by Gerald Posner – without question the best piece of critical reasoning, research and logic I have ever read, bar none.

I suspect he did not follow my advice. Books like that are bad for his business.

Man, you’re out there, said Joe.

You know, the sad thing is, I’m starting to believe he is right.

That sense of uncovering deep layers of ancient cover-ups is what drove the sales of The DaVinci Code. There, too, a web of truths, half-truths and outright fabrication spun a story that left the reader with a palpable sense of awe. It made you feel important, like you knew something absolutely essential that very few others ever were privileged to know.
Now most normal people do not look at life from within a pit of failure and despair. Our lives are measured by small successes -- like raising children, serving in the military, doing volunteer work at your church – or just doing the right thing in a thousand small but important ways, like returning money if someone makes you too much change.

These are simply the small, ordinary milestones of a life of value. They give you a sense of identity.

But if I didn’t have that sense of identity rooted in my own small achievements, I wonder how likely it would have been for me to grab onto that sense of sudden empowerment, of being an initiate in some arcane club of hidden wisdom. I wonder what might have happened to me if being the Holder of Secret Knowledge had been my only source of self-esteem…the one redeeming landmark in a life of isolation and failure. Indeed, I wonder what power such a worldview would have over me if I could believe that behind the scenes lurked vast and unknowable dark forces – forces that could topple a president and perhaps even explain why a person of my deep, vast and bountiful talents was not doing a whole lot better in life?

Intellectually honest people, people without a deep, vested emotional need to believe the worst, are usually relieved to hear the facts that demolish superstitions like the Bermuda Triangle and the Loch Ness Monster. While there may be disappointment at the loss of an unseen world, people who have chosen to live in reality find comfort in the fact that reality is, in fact, made up of the real and not the wished for.
No, what fascinates me is the emotional motive of people who, presented with overwhelming evidence that the events that transpired on November 22nd, 1963 or September 11th, 2001 really happened exactly the way it appeared, continue to spin ever more elaborate webs in order to get to a place they need to be emotionally. Who are you going to believe: them or your own lying eyes?

All of this conspiracy nonsense comes after the fact. What we saw on those days was clear and vital and unmistakably obvious. In the case of the Kennedy assassination we are asked to believe – against all physical evidence to the contrary – what a few professional witnesses recall for pay ten or twenty or thirty years after the fact. Some guy who claims to see a puff of smoke on the grassy knoll is now a world-wide celebrity and not just some dude with time on his hands on a November afternoon. (And don't be deterred by the fact that a musket firing black powder was the last firearm that emitted "a puff of smoke;" perhaps Kennedy was murdered by a re-animated Stonewall Jackson. Prove it didn't happen!)

http://www.ejectejecteject.com/archives/000140.html

PolyNewbie · April 14, 2007

Wow. What an astounding piece of reasoning. I wonder what kind of genius came up with that. Maybe Einstein is still alive..

margrace · April 14, 2007

Yes I guess we should make our own judgements. I remember coming home from watching slide shows in our church of what was discovered in Germany after the war. I was young and idealistic, I was horrified. I will never forget the pictures of American Soldiers on Buldozers with their noses and mouths covered by cloth pushing the skeletons and what was left of the bodies into mass graves in Buchenwald and Auswitch.

I came home to my parents and I said why did you do nothing, their answer was we didn't know.

Today we have a differnet situation, we have the internet with all kinds of information and we can make up our own minds. My parents trusted what they were told, but we do not need to.

Is there a change in the weather, there definitly is? Should we trust people who have been proven to have backed the German regime? What will you tell your grandchildren if and when these so called conspiracy theories are proven true.

The sinking of the battleship Maine at Havana is a prime example of an attack on a country being orchestrated by the same people or anyway their descendants who now would have us believe there are no conspiracies.

There are people on here who would try to shut us up. Will we let them?

Figleaf · April 14, 2007

... I’m sick of watching the damage they are doing to this civilization:

This is like a paranoia-tennis match...

YOU'RE DESTROYING CIVILISATION!<=!poc!= :unsure: =!poc!=>NO! YOU'RE DESTROYING CIVILISATION!

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

I came home to my parents and I said why did you do nothing, their answer was we didn't know.

This is plagiarism. I've seen it spread across the internet a million times before. Whoever first made the claim, it has long since faded into an urban legend trotted out by truthies to draw a false analogy between Bush and the concentration camps and gas chambers of Hitler.

There are people on here who would try to shut us up. Will we let them?

If only we would, the forum would be a more sane place.

Drea · April 14, 2007

You'd like that wouldn't you Scotty?

To shut people up. To make the tow the rightwing line. To accept pap as it is fed rather than asking questions.

Do you have an evangelical TV show btw? LOL

You are funny, sooo funny (loopy funny, not ha ha funny)

Free speech is free speech. Free speech means I can say "the Holocaust did not happen" and you can say "Jesus loves you and hates gays".

If you curb my free speech, then yours will also be curbed.

This is what you want?

Higgly · April 14, 2007

You need to get out more. Take a few days off. Really...

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

You'd like that wouldn't you Scotty?
To shut people up. To make the tow the rightwing line. To accept pap as it is fed rather than asking questions.

Do you have an evangelical TV show btw? LOL

You are funny, sooo funny (loopy funny, not ha ha funny)

Free speech is free speech. Free speech means I can say "the Holocaust did not happen" and you can say "Jesus loves you and hates gays".

If you curb my free speech, then yours will also be curbed.

This is what you want?

Yes. I think all dissenters should be shot, or in the case of the internet, infested with viri. Please open port 23 and stand by for bluescreen.

I'm not sure why you interpret mockery of idiotic conspiracy theories as some kind of assault on free speech. I'm merely using my right of free speech to mock your free speech. Are we suffering from category error this week?

PolyNewbie · April 14, 2007

You don't have to read threads about shady international bankers, the secret government, kiddie brothels, and about 911 being an inside job. If they bother you so much why do you participate ?

Methinks thou doth protest too much.

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

Methinks thou doth protest too much.

Yes, I'm conducting a sinister plot too. You found me out.

Drea · April 14, 2007

I'm not sure why you interpret mockery of idiotic conspiracy theories as some kind of assault on free speech. I'm merely using my right of free speech to mock your free speech.

Touche!

So when I say you are an idiot for believing in an omnipotent ineffectual judge in the sky, you are okay with it?

The idea of a god in the sky is the largest conspiracy perpetrated on the people of this planet, yet you fall for it hook, line and sinker.

Who says you don't believe in a good 'ol conspiracy! LOL you believe that one. I guess you also believe that god talks to George every morning before breaky and that he told him to invade Iraq.

Har de har har.

PolyNewbie · April 14, 2007

Obviously ScottSA is a holocaust denier because that would have been a giant conspiracy if it happened.

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

I'm not sure why you interpret mockery of idiotic conspiracy theories as some kind of assault on free speech. I'm merely using my right of free speech to mock your free speech.

Touche!

So when I say you are an idiot for believing in an omnipotent ineffectual judge in the sky, you are okay with it?

The idea of a god in the sky is the largest conspiracy perpetrated on the people of this planet, yet you fall for it hook, line and sinker.

Who says you don't believe in a good 'ol conspiracy! LOL you believe that one. I guess you also believe that god talks to George every morning before breaky and that he told him to invade Iraq.

Har de har har.

Glad you're having so much fun chortling. Yeah I'm fine with you calling me an idiot for my beliefs. Why would you think otherwise? I don't know if I believe God talks to George, but I believe you are a simplistic nut.

GostHacked · April 14, 2007

Yes. I think all dissenters should be shot, or in the case of the internet, infested with viri. Please open port 23 and stand by for bluescreen.
I'm not sure why you interpret mockery of idiotic conspiracy theories as some kind of assault on free speech. I'm merely using my right of free speech to mock your free speech. Are we suffering from category error this week?

And I think all sheep that blindly follow the leader's word (eventhough deep down inside you are against what he says but yet you follow anyways) should be shaved and put out in the cold.

If there were no dissenters, you may never know the actual truth. Or maybe not even have an idea that the truth is actually out there.

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

Yes. I think all dissenters should be shot, or in the case of the internet, infested with viri. Please open port 23 and stand by for bluescreen.
I'm not sure why you interpret mockery of idiotic conspiracy theories as some kind of assault on free speech. I'm merely using my right of free speech to mock your free speech. Are we suffering from category error this week?

If there were no dissenters, you may never know the actual truth. Or maybe not even have an idea that the truth is actually out there.

The truth is indeed out there. But I don't think the existence of dissenters changes it one way or another. And on that note, let's discuss the probability of a faked moon landing.

Drea · April 14, 2007

Glad you're having so much fun chortling. Yeah I'm fine with you calling me an idiot for my beliefs. Why would you think otherwise? I don't know if I believe God talks to George, but I believe you are a simplistic nut.

Yup, only simplistic nuts understand gravity as a force of nature (that's gravity, hon, when an apple falls from a tree, not god's hand pushing it to the ground)

... and that the world is round... (of course it could be a vast left wing conspiracy to make you think the earth is a sphere)

...and more than 6000 years old (Dinosaur bones were not put there by god as a "test" of faith silly, they were put there by the devil to trick you!). :rolleyes:

Simplistic is following a belief as childish as the belief in a rabbit that lays chocolate eggs -- and yet the nutbar rightwing calls science "simplistic".

Yer makin' me sides hurt from laughin' Scotty!

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

Glad you're having so much fun chortling. Yeah I'm fine with you calling me an idiot for my beliefs. Why would you think otherwise? I don't know if I believe God talks to George, but I believe you are a simplistic nut.

Yup, only simplistic nuts understand gravity as a force of nature (that's gravity, hon, when an apple falls from a tree, not god's hand pushing it to the ground)

... and that the world is round... (of course it could be a vast left wing conspiracy to make you think the earth is a sphere)

But you see, when you make up silly simplistic strawmen like that, what you're really saying is that you are incapable of looking at the problem on a deeper level, and want to keep it at a nonsensical level. Whatever makes you feel good, I guess...

PolyNewbie · April 14, 2007

ScottSA: And on that note, let's discuss the probability of a faked moon landing.

Real moon landing = 40 billion dollars cost and no profit

Fake Moon Landing = 10 million cost + 39.99 billion profit.

Its that simple. What is on the moon that anyone would want ?

In NY Times or Washington post there was an article about the French wanting to go to the moon about a year ago. They were first going to put a test craft up to make sure the moon wasn't made of powder and their landing craft wouldn't sink into it and dissapear. If the Americans already landed on the rock, why build this test space craft ?

I haven't followed it but if you are curious you may want to look into the French space program.

ScottSA · April 14, 2007

ScottSA: And on that note, let's discuss the probability of a faked moon landing.

Real moon landing = 40 billion dollars cost and no profit

Fake Moon Landing = 10 million cost + 39.99 billion profit.

Its that simple. What is on the moon that anyone would want ?

In NY Times or Washington post there was an article about the French wanting to go to the moon about a year ago. They were first going to put a test craft up to make sure the moon wasn't made of powder and their landing craft wouldn't sink into it and dissapear. If the Americans already landed on the rock, why build this test space craft ?

I haven't followed it but if you are curious you may want to look into the French space program.

Oh Christ. You're a complete loon.

DogOnPorch · April 15, 2007

Three new minerals were found in Lunar rock samples brought back by the Apollo program. They are common on the Moon. Tranquillityite, Armalcolite and Pyroxferroite.

The first is not found on Earth while the other two were found on Earth in very small amounts long after the Apollo program was over. All are related to volcanic activity.

Generally though, Moon hoaxers are very selective about what 'evidence' they consider. Many of the thousands of photos look like anything but shot in a studio in Nevada. So they don't look at those.

As well, the Soviets were of course watching the Apollo program like hawks and would have been the first to cry fake. They were engaged in a Lunar program of their own (The N-1 rocket). It's the part Moon hoaxers have an impossible part explaining...lol. But watch Poly...he's a master. The Russians were in on the hoax or some other nonsense. The Cold War was a hoax...the Beatles were a hoax...LBJ was JFK in a rubber mask.

For a good laugh, one of the prime Moon hoaxers, Bill Kaysing, did an interview with Nardwuar the Human Serviette...worth checking out.

http://www.nardwuar.com/vs/bill_kaysing/

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Whoopee! Man, that may have been a small one for Neil, but it's a long one for me.

---Astronaut Pete Conrad, Apollo 12

PolyNewbie · April 15, 2007

I don't know if the moon landing was faked or not. I haven't investigated it, but generally I don't believe anything until the government denies it so I'm inclined to believe it was faked but for anyone that is really interested there is "The Moon Movie" and the French space program. Thats where I would look if I was more interested.

I have always wondered why there were no stars in the background of these moon shots. No clouds on the moon to block the stars. I can't imagine the people that run the USA not faking the whole thing and pocketing the 39 + billion dollars.

They could have a big ceremony and tell everyone they need to divert the 39 billion dollars into secret accounts to fight the godless communists and for going along everyone gets a gold star for keeping quiet. Spill the beans and we send your kids to one of our brothels.

Can't you see the whole system is corrupt just based on the (now) 3.5 trillion dollars missing ? What if you had you buddy over then learned he stole ten bucks out of your house. Would you trust him again or believe anything he said ?

DogOnPorch · April 15, 2007

...so I'm inclined to believe it was faked but for anyone that is really interested there is "The Moon Movie" and the French space program. Thats where I would look if I was more interested.

You mean this stunning bit of science/engineering? You gotta love the explanation Sibrel gives...or his cheerleader...as to how it's impossible. Nice book she's carrying, too. Big letters...Easy to read.

http://www.moonmovie.com/moonmovie/intro.html

My favorite is still when Buzz Aldrin punches Sibrel in the face.

Nice punch...

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Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon. July 1969 AD. We came in peace for all mankind.

---Astronaut Neil Armstrong, Apollo 11

ScottSA · April 15, 2007

I don't know if the moon landing was faked or not. I haven't investigated it, but generally I don't believe anything until the government denies it so I'm inclined to believe it was faked

Please stfu now. This is not intended to be another conspiracy thread, and certainly not about a 40 year old moon landing that every sane individual knows took place. I brought it up as a rhetorical, assuming for some reason that even you wouldn't be ncrazy enough to believe it.

This thread is about the mental deficiencies of people like you.

ScottSA · April 15, 2007

...so I'm inclined to believe it was faked but for anyone that is really interested there is "The Moon Movie" and the French space program. Thats where I would look if I was more interested.
You mean this stunning bit of science/engineering? You gotta love the explanation Sibrel gives...or his cheerleader...as to how it's impossible. Nice book she's carrying, too. Big letters...Easy to read.

Hey, she's cute. Obviously not smart, but sexy.