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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #40 on: May 09, 2018, 10:29:48 PM »
Russian officials are still yelling "fake!"
Maybe you have to be British to understand how shaky that ground is, quoting a Daily Mail article - the are notorious over here for inaccuracy and twisting of facts.

The headline:
Quote
Russia suggests America has NEVER landed on the moon

Then in the article

Quote
According to the translation in the Moscow Times, Mr Markin claimed Russia were ‘not contending that they did not fly (to the moon) and simply made a film about it.'

(my emphasis)

And the very next sentence:

Quote
But his comments are certain to be seen as a deliberate attempt to suggest there is reason to doubt the lunar landing was real – especially as he also attacked the US investigation into FIFA corruption.

Considering that the Russian official is saying that NASA should be investigated for the missing moon rocks and the 200,000 tapes containing Apollo scientific data from the moon that were mass-erased to "save money," this is absolutely an affront to the legitimacy of the Apollo missions.

Many people have pointed out that these "whoops we lost it all" excuses are a telltale sign of fraud. The Russian official is rightly suggesting that NASA should be investigated over it.

These comments were a direct result of the US investigating Russian FIFA corruption. He is obviously suggesting that the US is hiding something corrupt of their own.
« Last Edit: May 10, 2018, 06:32:40 AM by Tom Bishop »

Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #41 on: May 09, 2018, 10:32:04 PM »
Many people have pointed out that these "whoops we lost it all" excuses are a telltale sign of fraud. The Russian official is rightly suggesting that NASA is investigated over it.
I'm all for an investigation, but don't immediately assume it's because of fraud. It's just as likely to result from mismanagement and incompetence.
Recommended reading: We Have No Idea by Jorge Cham and Daniel Whiteson

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #42 on: May 09, 2018, 10:45:38 PM »
Many people have pointed out that these "whoops we lost it all" excuses are a telltale sign of fraud. The Russian official is rightly suggesting that NASA is investigated over it.
I'm all for an investigation, but don't immediately assume it's because of fraud. It's just as likely to result from mismanagement and incompetence.

I assume, then, that you also buy the story that after receiving a demand from Congress to turn over her data, that Hillary Clinton deleted her emails with BleachBit and had her staff smash cell phones with hammers, because of "mismanagement and incompetence."

Erasing one-of-a-kind scientific data on 200,000 tapes in bulk and losing moon rocks worth millions of dollars is no small thing. These are deliberate actions.

Offline Tontogary

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #43 on: May 09, 2018, 10:48:09 PM »
So toms point is;

Politicians lie.

Sorry to break it to you Tom, but i think it is a generally accepted principle that politicians lie, pretty much about everything.

Then because some politicians created Nasa, then by a leap of imagination, Nasa lies too.

Soviet politicians lie. Now there is no real surprise. Tom has provided what he calls evidence (referencing a book) that shows this.
Soviet politicians were also responsible for creating their space programme, and the Russian space agency also must have been in on the conspiracy for space travel, as launches to the (fake?) ISS rate by Russia.

Yet he is happy to quote “Soviet officials” for calling for inverstigations into Nasa, as some sort of reason to believe that Nasa is lying? A bit hypocritical i must say.
The german rocket programme also created the V2, a usable ballistic missile. Was that a fake? If so i would like to know how the families of the hundreds of people killed by V2 rockets feel about them being killed by random explosions across England which must therefore have been caused by the British government, who were complicit with their enemies.

Politicians also created the National Health Service in the UK, so NHS doctors must all be lying about how much money they need.

By Toms incredible arguments, he would have us believe that ANY organisation created by lying politicians (who are about 99.9% of them) should be discounted and not trusted. United Nations, and All of their research and studies, General medical councils, Federal aviation authority, Internal revenue services, federal reserve, National parks, justice systems, lawyers and parole boards, the list goes on and on and on.

OECD counties employ about 22% of its working population in the public (ie government sector) so all of those employees and industries are by Toms association liars and cannot be trusted.



Also, if you haven't heard of bronies before, that reflects poorly on your understanding of the world that surrounds you. It's practically impossible not to know about them.

Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #44 on: May 09, 2018, 10:49:24 PM »
These were not good people. They are not trustworthy. If they are willing to conduct a secret war then it is certainly no leap that they are willing to create some fake space achievements.
And yet, you can see the ISS from earth.
7 tourists have paid to visit it.
GPS works.
Satellite TV works.
etc. etc.

And there are a bunch of countries who have put things in space.

By all accounts Newton was a bit of an arse, often claiming credit for things which he at best co-invented. Doesn't mean his ideas are without merit.
I know you have to clutch at any straws you can but it's a bit of a leap from "NASA was formed by some bad dudes" to "All space travel has been faked for the last 60+ years"

I believe you mean: 

"I can see a little dot for a brief time in the sky"
"7 tourists I have never met, and many of which who are investors or officers of space aerospace contractors, went into space"
"GPS and Satellite TV technologies, of which I do not have direct knowledge of, works"

Hardly convincing or conclusive.
Interesting that you have failed to explain how you believe satellite TV and GPS work.

Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #45 on: May 09, 2018, 11:57:26 PM »
Erasing one-of-a-kind scientific data on 200,000 tapes in bulk and losing moon rocks worth millions of dollars is no small thing. These are deliberate actions.
A million dollars' worth of moon rocks would be less than 20 grams. Even $100 million could be shipped by mail, so sure, they could have lost them. It would also be a fraction of the total samples.

As for the tapes, how did they even GET 200,000 tapes from only 6 Moon landings? I'd like to see a source for this, as well as what it was they were recording that was so much data.
Recommended reading: We Have No Idea by Jorge Cham and Daniel Whiteson

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Offline jcks

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #46 on: May 10, 2018, 12:10:51 AM »
I don't see the connection.

How does lying about the Vietnam war tie into NASA being a fraud? Is everything that happened during those administrators a lie as well because they covered up this secret war?

These were not good people. They are not trustworthy. If they are willing to conduct a secret war then is is certainly no leap that they are willing to create some fake space achievements. The credibility is shot.

Which ones exactly were the corrupt individuals? The whole administration?

And if they're credibility was lost after the secret war cover up then is it a stretch to say that 3 administrations straight lied about everything they did?

I see where you're going with "if they lied about x then what else are they willing to cover up?" but I can't see that as an excuse to dismiss everything by default, including incidents that have nothing to do with each other (NASA and the Vietnam war).

What do you mean the Vietnam War had nothing to do with NASA? NASA was created as a direct consequence of the Cold War.

Well that's my point right there.

NASA was not created because of the Vietnam war and we didn't enter Vietnam because of NASA. They are two separate incidents. They may have been during the same time period and under the same circumstances but that does not mean they are connected in any way other than those two reasons.

You're claiming that NASA is an organization of liars because the same politicians (Eisenhower) involved with the creation of it just so happened to be involved in the Vietnam war in which they (Johnson) tricked the American public and Congress into participating so they could run a secret war against China and communism. That's a pretty big stretch.

Governments are more than just a few people and the people who would have started this are long gone. "They" would need to carefully select their successors to make sure that the truth never gets out and I find it hard to believe "they" have gone on this long doing just that (and have grown to include even more people at the same time).

I have to say Tom, all this does is help cement the idea that things are actually in space. The fallout from the collapse of the USSR, the rivalry between the two. Neither side during that period was 'debunked' on going into space or orbit. Both sides had all the reason in the world to show they hadn't managed their claims. Hell, the US even after the collapse/fall had more than enough reason (if it was found to be so) to show how Russia and Russians never got into space. How could it have hurt their credibility at all in that time period? To me at least everything you've presented here points away from a now global conspiracy of space flight.

The countries did cast doubt and yell "fake!" after each achievement at the time. It took a long time for NASA to accept Russia's claim of the first man in space. Russian officials are still yelling "fake!"

You have no idea what you are talking about. What are you are claiming what would happen has happened. The world just ignored it.

OK so if we've never been to space, and Russia has never believed we've been to space, who are we fooling? Wouldn't it be more effective to actually go to space than continue faking it and run the risk of having our bluff called?

Also if we're accepting Russia's claim of being the first to go to space how is that good for us. They could essentially wipe us all out with the press of a button, seeing as there's a huge military advantage to controlling space and all.

Offline Tontogary

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #47 on: May 10, 2018, 12:17:46 AM »
Erasing one-of-a-kind scientific data on 200,000 tapes in bulk and losing moon rocks worth millions of dollars is no small thing. These are deliberate actions.
A million dollars' worth of moon rocks would be less than 20 grams. Even $100 million could be shipped by mail, so sure, they could have lost them. It would also be a fraction of the total samples.

As for the tapes, how did they even GET 200,000 tapes from only 6 Moon landings? I'd like to see a source for this, as well as what it was they were recording that was so much data.

I think this was covered in another thread.
The ORIGINAL storage tapes were erased or destroyed, but the data contained on them was not was the answer i think that was shown.

Just because i have a picture or data, and transfer it to a different storage medium, and have lost or destroyed the original, it does not mean the data is lost.

As for the loss of moon samples, i think this article deals with it.

https://www.space.com/13878-nasa-apollo-moon-rocks-misplaced-lost-report.html

Most of what is unaccounted for has been sent out on loan, and someone has probably helped themselves to a bit of moon rock....i know that it might be tempting to some, as it would be for me!
As the samples were lost, or not returned intact (and this does not apply to ALL of them) then the loss is possible to have occurred in facilities not under NASAs control, so they are not part of the conspiracy.

Plus it was a Nasa internal audit that revealed the loss. Why would they do such a thing if it was going to fuel speculation? They can fake the moon landings, but cannot suppres an internal report that says that not all of the loaned samples have returned????
« Last Edit: May 10, 2018, 12:19:59 AM by Tontogary »

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #48 on: May 10, 2018, 12:26:56 AM »
So toms point is;

Politicians lie.

Sorry to break it to you Tom, but i think it is a generally accepted principle that politicians lie, pretty much about everything.

They are liars. They have proven to be liars. They have lied continuously. Why should we believe liars?
 
Quote
By Toms incredible arguments, he would have us believe that ANY organisation created by lying politicians (who are about 99.9% of them) should be discounted and not trusted. United Nations, and All of their research and studies, General medical councils, Federal aviation authority, Internal revenue services, federal reserve, National parks, justice systems, lawyers and parole boards, the list goes on and on and on.

OECD counties employ about 22% of its working population in the public (ie government sector) so all of those employees and industries are by Toms association liars and cannot be trusted.

United Nations respectable research? Are you kidding?

The United Nations supports forced sterilization in Mexico, and has been caught sterilizing women in Kenya. The UN also supports forced abortion in China.

The UN actively promotes various schemes for depopulation and has many studies which promote that agenda. UN Unveils Plot to Reduce African Population. The UN's Agenda 21 states that the overarching goal is to lower humanity's numbers to about 500 Million.

According to you, we should just blindly follow along and not question our authorities or the conclusions from their scientific organizations.
« Last Edit: May 10, 2018, 12:32:27 AM by Tom Bishop »

Offline Tontogary

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #49 on: May 10, 2018, 12:37:47 AM »
So toms point is;

Politicians lie.

Sorry to break it to you Tom, but i think it is a generally accepted principle that politicians lie, pretty much about everything.

They are liars. They have proven to be liars. They have lied continuously. Why should we believe liars?
 
Quote
By Toms incredible arguments, he would have us believe that ANY organisation created by lying politicians (who are about 99.9% of them) should be discounted and not trusted. United Nations, and All of their research and studies, General medical councils, Federal aviation authority, Internal revenue services, federal reserve, National parks, justice systems, lawyers and parole boards, the list goes on and on and on.

OECD counties employ about 22% of its working population in the public (ie government sector) so all of those employees and industries are by Toms association liars and cannot be trusted.

United Nations respectable research? Are you kidding?

The United Nations supports forced sterilization in Mexico, and has been caught sterilizing women in Kenya. The UN also supports forced abortion in China.

The UN actively promotes various schemes for depopulation and has many studies which promote that agenda. UN Unveils Plot to Reduce African Population. The Georgia Guidestones and the UN's Agenda 21 state that the overarching goal is to lower humanity's numbers to about 500 Million.

According to you, we should just blindly follow along and not question our authorities or the conclusions from their scientific organizations.

Straw man Tom, and you know it.

Where did I say we need to “blindly follow along and not question our authorities”? There are many ways to question and hold to account public officials, but if i was to do this personally, I cannot ever trust anything. EVER.
However i do trust (mostly) advice from my doctor, who works in a professional capacity in an organisation created by politicians. If no one trusted a doctor then more people would die. Are you advocating disbelieving all doctors Tom?

You have been known to be wrong on numerous occasions, therefore your facts and data cannot be trusted. Therefore you have no standing in any of your comments, so why should I believe what you say about the politicians? That argument gets very circular.

You made the point that Nasa was not to be trusted because it was created by politicians who lied.


Also, if you haven't heard of bronies before, that reflects poorly on your understanding of the world that surrounds you. It's practically impossible not to know about them.

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #50 on: May 10, 2018, 01:38:11 AM »
Straw man Tom, and you know it.

Where did I say we need to “blindly follow along and not question our authorities”? There are many ways to question and hold to account public officials, but if i was to do this personally, I cannot ever trust anything. EVER.
However i do trust (mostly) advice from my doctor, who works in a professional capacity in an organisation created by politicians. If no one trusted a doctor then more people would die. Are you advocating disbelieving all doctors Tom?

You have been known to be wrong on numerous occasions, therefore your facts and data cannot be trusted. Therefore you have no standing in any of your comments, so why should I believe what you say about the politicians? That argument gets very circular.

You made the point that Nasa was not to be trusted because it was created by politicians who lied.

Your argument seems to be exactly that we should trust our authorities. Yet you say that is not your argument?

You give the doctor example. But, you know what? You should not unquestionably trust you doctor on all matters either. You should research the matter for better alternatives. Consult a naturopathic doctor for alternatives to having to take harmful drugs. Traditional western doctors are not the be-all end-all of health. Some traditional western doctors will send you to get radiation-laden CT scans because they are cheaper than the safer MRI scans. Others will fill you with pain drugs rather than curing the issue. Still others will poison you with a variety of nasty drugs in attempt to kill the disease. There are natural alternatives for many conditions. Drugs are not always necessary.

Authority is not correct because it is the status quo. We should not automatically blindly believe or trust in anything. Why would you encourage such a thing? You should know why you believe in something, not blindly believe it out of ignorance! Anyone who is content to just "trust in authority" without care or knowledge of details or truth is a sad fool. This really reflects on the heart of these discussions.

Offline Tontogary

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #51 on: May 10, 2018, 03:15:54 AM »
Straw man Tom, and you know it.

Where did I say we need to “blindly follow along and not question our authorities”? There are many ways to question and hold to account public officials, but if i was to do this personally, I cannot ever trust anything. EVER.
However i do trust (mostly) advice from my doctor, who works in a professional capacity in an organisation created by politicians. If no one trusted a doctor then more people would die. Are you advocating disbelieving all doctors Tom?

You have been known to be wrong on numerous occasions, therefore your facts and data cannot be trusted. Therefore you have no standing in any of your comments, so why should I believe what you say about the politicians? That argument gets very circular.

You made the point that Nasa was not to be trusted because it was created by politicians who lied.

Your argument seems to be exactly that we should trust our authorities. Yet you say that is not your argument?

You give the doctor example. But, you know what? You should not unquestionably trust you doctor on all matters either. You should research the matter for better alternatives. Consult a naturopathic doctor for alternatives to having to take harmful drugs. Traditional western doctors are not the be-all end-all of health. Some traditional western doctors will send you to get radiation-laden CT scans because they are cheaper than the safer MRI scans. Others will fill you with pain drugs rather than curing the issue. Still others will poison you with a variety of nasty drugs in attempt to kill the disease. There are natural alternatives for many conditions. Drugs are not always necessary.

Authority is not correct because it is the status quo. We should not automatically blindly believe or trust in anything. Why would you encourage such a thing? You should know why you believe in something, not blindly believe it out of ignorance! Anyone who is content to just "trust in authority" without care or knowledge of details or truth is a sad fool. This really reflects on the heart of these discussions.

Wrong again Tom, i never said we need to trust our government without fail. Please feel free to quote me where i said that?

I was pointing out the flaw in Your argument that says because politicians were not open with all aspects of a conflict, they were lying, and therefore by creating an Agency, then whatever that agency subsequently reports is not to be believed either.

That might be your personal view, but because i do not agree with that view, does not mean by default that i then believe something you make up to be opposite to your statement.
That is putting words into my mouth, and saying I have beliefs, upon which you cannot possibly be certain.

I do trust some authorities, however my default is not automatically to distrust them. Mr Doctor i trust. I cannot help it if you dont trust your doctor, but then mine in the UK is not necessarily prescribing treatments that they make a profit from, or get kickbacks for doing so. Maybe it is different in your country.
“Natural” healers are unregulated in the UK (well some are) and as such can offer to sell snake juice and JuJu therapies, for which there is no real EVIDENCE of cures. I would offer that a patient that gets cured by some of these alternative therapies would have gotten better without it, but i cannot make a blanket statement to that effect, so dont do so.

When you fly (however if i had the same trust issues you appear to have I would NEVER fly) do you interrogate the pilot? If, like some, they learned to fly in the Air Force, do you ask the airline to change the pilot? Or disembark? They would have been trained by the military, so therefore cannot in any way be trusted as they were trained by the government.

There are degrees of trust, from blind faith to downright paranoia. I am in between, on the trusting side above the middle. I would hate to be so scared that i cannot rely upon anyone who has ever had any training or appointment made by the state.

Also, if you haven't heard of bronies before, that reflects poorly on your understanding of the world that surrounds you. It's practically impossible not to know about them.

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #52 on: May 10, 2018, 06:27:44 AM »
You are implying that we should trust authorities because they are authorities. You were JUST implying that we should trust the United Nations. Then you backtracked.

Now you are arguing that we should trust our doctors.

http://www.wrcbtv.com/story/8919828/vitamin-c-cancer-treatment

Quote
Go home and die. that's what doctors told 59 year old Arlindo Olivera.

His lung cancer was so advanced, it had spread to his brain and doctors said there was nothing they could do.

Today, Arlindo is cancer free.

Arlindo Oliviera a Lung Cancer Survivor says "My pulmonary doctor told me, whatever you are doing, keep doing it."

Arlindo believes his cancer is gone because of vitamin C treatment.

Arlindo says "It's working on me from what the doctor says."

Dr. Scott Greenberg says he has successfully treated many people with vitamin C infusions, including Arlindo.

You are diagnosed with incurable Stage 4 lung and brain cancer and are told by your doctor to "go home and die." You have two choices.

1. You follow your doctor's advice and go home and die
2. You go to a naturopathic doctor for their intravenous "juju juice"

The doctor's advice is the only advice that is officially approved by the cancer industry, yet naturopathic doctors claim that they are able to help people with that condition and you seem to be able to find several similar news articles to the one above. What do you do? Will you trust in the authority and instructions of your doctor and the cancer industry or will you trust in your own research?
« Last Edit: May 10, 2018, 10:17:04 AM by Tom Bishop »

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Offline AATW

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #53 on: May 10, 2018, 08:56:10 AM »
This thread is a good example of the way Tom works.
Picks up and runs with bits of argument he feels he can deal with, ignores other people's arguments which he can't.
Then runs off claiming victory.

Which brings us back to the topic of this thread. This is the conspiracy theorist mindset.
It requires ignoring the evidence which shows you to be wrong and clinging on to any shreds of evidence, no matter how flimsy, which appear to add weight to your belief.
It's a mess of confirmation bias and cognitive dissonance - something we are all prone to, but something we need to be careful of as there can be serious consequences:

Quote
In 1968, a grandmother was raped and murdered in the middle of the night in her own living room. Then, in a nearby bedroom, her six-year-old granddaughter was raped, beaten and left for dead. However, she survived. When asked by the police to describe her attacker, whom she had seen for only a few seconds in the darkness before she was knocked unconscious, the six-year-old said that he looked like her uncle Clarence. After a couple of rounds of questioning by the police, they had converted that to it was Uncle Clarence, Clarence Elkins, and they concluded that he was the perpetrator. After that point, virtually every piece of evidence that was uncovered pointed away from Clarence Elkins as the perpetrator. But none of it swayed the police and prosecutors who had made up their minds.

Clarence’s wife testified that Clarence was with her several miles away in their home. She had been up most of the night with a sick child and would have known if Clarence had left. She certainly had no strong motive to protect the killer of her own mother. Although the murder house was a bloodbath, there was not a single fingerprint or hair traceable to Clarence. Nor could the police find blood on any item belonging to Clarence. They even looked in his shower drains to see if there was any blood from the victims. Nope. Nonetheless, the prosecution convicted Elkins, who had no criminal record, and sent him away for life.

When DNA testing advanced, the Ohio Innocence Project had new DNA tests performed that found semen from a male in the grandmother’s vaginal cavity and skin from the same male on the panties of the six-year-old. The DNA did not match Elkins. He clearly was not the perpetrator. Yet, when the OIP asked for Elkins’ exoneration, the prosecutors and police fought like wildcats with the most ridiculous arguments that one can imagine.

Even when the DNA was matched with a prisoner with a history of violent crimes who had been living just two doors away from the victims and admitted the crime, and resembled Elkins, the prosecutors still argued that Elkins was guilty. He just must have been accompanied by the real rapist, who the OIP dubbed an “unindicted co-ejaculator” because this is a typical prosecution reaction to exonerating DNA evidence. “OK, this new guy raped her. But the guy we charged raped her, too. He just somehow didn’t leave any physical traces at the scene of the crime” is the common response.

So much do police officers and prosecutors wish to believe that they did not send an innocent person to jail, cognitive dissonance causes their minds to accept the most outlandish theories and to reject the most compelling evidence. Their actions caused Elkins to remain in jail much longer than he should have given the overwhelming evidence of his obvious innocence.

http://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/cognitive-dissonance-case-unindicted-co-ejaculator
Tom: "Claiming incredulity is a pretty bad argument. Calling it "insane" or "ridiculous" is not a good argument at all."

TFES Wiki Occam's Razor page, by Tom: "What's the simplest explanation; that NASA has successfully designed and invented never before seen rocket technologies from scratch which can accelerate 100 tons of matter to an escape velocity of 7 miles per second"

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #54 on: May 10, 2018, 09:49:18 AM »
This thread is a good example of the way Tom works.
Picks up and runs with bits of argument he feels he can deal with, ignores other people's arguments which he can't.
Then runs off claiming victory.

Wrong. This thread is a good demonstration of the fallacious argument of "Conspiracies can't exist. There is no reason not to trust in authority."

I notice that no rebuttal was made to the existence of the Secret War, the United Nations population control techniques, or doctors telling people to die despite known treatments. I assure you that I can list one hundred other things that you will have no words for.

The danger is automatically believing in authority, not in questioning what you are told.
« Last Edit: May 10, 2018, 09:54:31 AM by Tom Bishop »

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Offline AATW

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #55 on: May 10, 2018, 09:52:10 AM »
Wrong. This thread is a good example of the fallacious argument of "Conspiracies can't exist.
Straw man. Where has anyone said that?

Quote
The danger is automatically believing in authority, not in questioning what you are told.
Agreed, actually.
But you are guilty of the other extreme. You don't believe anything unless it fits in with your existing world view.
Cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias writ large. See above.
Tom: "Claiming incredulity is a pretty bad argument. Calling it "insane" or "ridiculous" is not a good argument at all."

TFES Wiki Occam's Razor page, by Tom: "What's the simplest explanation; that NASA has successfully designed and invented never before seen rocket technologies from scratch which can accelerate 100 tons of matter to an escape velocity of 7 miles per second"

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Offline Tumeni

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #56 on: May 10, 2018, 09:56:26 AM »
Authority is not correct because it is the status quo. We should not automatically blindly believe or trust in anything. Why would you encourage such a thing? You should know why you believe in something, not blindly believe it out of ignorance! Anyone who is content to just "trust in authority" without care or knowledge of details or truth is a sad fool. This really reflects on the heart of these discussions.

You're simply cherry-picking which "authority" you wish to trust and which you don't, Tom.

In your daily life, you take hundreds of things for granted without question. If you truly questioned everything in front of you, your life would grind to a halt.

You've just singled out Flat Earth as the one thing / main thing that you're going to take issue with. You've cherry-picked it.
=============================
Not Flat. Happy to prove this, if you ask me.
=============================

Nearly all flat earthers agree the earth is not a globe.

Nearly?

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #57 on: May 10, 2018, 10:03:56 AM »
Wrong. This thread is a good example of the fallacious argument of "Conspiracies can't exist.
Straw man. Where has anyone said that?

You did. You are posting in a thread supporting the generalizations of "what Conspiracy Theorists believe..."

If you believe that conspiracies exist, then that makes you a... wait for it... Conspiracy Theorist.

You should just admit that it is a childish label applied in attempt to discredit people who are really just questioning what they are told.

Authority is not correct because it is the status quo. We should not automatically blindly believe or trust in anything. Why would you encourage such a thing? You should know why you believe in something, not blindly believe it out of ignorance! Anyone who is content to just "trust in authority" without care or knowledge of details or truth is a sad fool. This really reflects on the heart of these discussions.

You're simply cherry-picking which "authority" you wish to trust and which you don't, Tom.

In your daily life, you take hundreds of things for granted without question. If you truly questioned everything in front of you, your life would grind to a halt.

You've just singled out Flat Earth as the one thing / main thing that you're going to take issue with. You've cherry-picked it.

Why not question the world? Why not question what you are told? Maybe it is a better idea to know why you believe something rather than just accept it at face value. My ability to question all aspects of the world, and your inability or refusal to question, makes me smarter than you. You are promoting ignorance. One of us is open for growth and learning and the other is not.

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Offline Tumeni

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #58 on: May 10, 2018, 10:30:13 AM »
Why not question the world? Why not question what you are told? Maybe it is a better idea to know why you believe something rather than just accept it at face value. My ability to question all aspects of the world, and your inability or refusal to question, makes me smarter than you. You are promoting ignorance. One of us is open for growth and learning and the other is not.

You're missing my point. You're cherry-picking what you choose to question while accepting multiple other 'authority statements' at face value. If you weren't, your life would come to a halt.

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Not Flat. Happy to prove this, if you ask me.
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Nearly all flat earthers agree the earth is not a globe.

Nearly?

Offline Tontogary

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Re: What Makes conspiracy Theorists believe.
« Reply #59 on: May 10, 2018, 10:46:36 AM »
Wrong. This thread is a good example of the fallacious argument of "Conspiracies can't exist.
Straw man. Where has anyone said that?

You did. You are posting in a thread supporting the generalizations of "what Conspiracy Theorists believe..."


Wrong Tom, The title is “What Makes conspiracy theorists believe

Not What they believe. A rather important difference I believe.

Also, if you haven't heard of bronies before, that reflects poorly on your understanding of the world that surrounds you. It's practically impossible not to know about them.