Conspiracy Theories

[broncofan]

What is it that attracts individuals to conspiracy theories? Is it frustration with the world? Is it the realization that global politics is complicated and that there is no shortcut to remaining informed about complex issues? Conspiracy theories do seem to get around the need to analyze each issue on its own terms because you can just blame a systemic cause, like for instance, 120 people meeting at a hotel in the Netherlands (this hotel is called the bilderberg btw).

I happen to think conspiracy theorists are more dangerous than simply naive. Their theories are often used to stoke anger among the masses against classes of people and to anesthetize people to the effects of contrary data. For instance, if someone says that a small group of elites chose our President can you rebut this claim with polling data? Can you say, well high finance was involved in the electoral process but ultimately votes were tallied and at some level the public had their say? Of course not. The conspiracy nut will avoid the confrontation by dealing in unsupported obscurities and proselytize other naive people through pamphleteering activities on the street corner. They will never deal head on with the contradictions, and since the ideas they deal in are of such low credibility they can be generated more quickly than they can be rebutted.

You may wonder why I would create a thread about this. It's because I find the conspiracy theorists to be endlessly frustrating, dangerous extremists, and to waste an enormous amount of valuable time people could be discussing real issues. Anyone else agree, and want to point out the conspiracy theory they find most frustrating? If you want to participate, name a conspiracy theory, and discuss its danger. If you think "conspiracy theory" is used as a cudgel, a slander against those who have identified the source of secretive, concerted action, please fear not. By all means, correct this slander.

BTW, those who think the annual meeting at the Bilderberg has a major impact on global politics? The John Birch Society, Lyndon Larouche, oh and Jesse Ventura. But let's not play guilt by association. The idea is plausible in its own right isn't it;.

[hippifried]

But the CFR Trilateralists at the Bilderberg NWO are just waiting for the Rothchilds to finish buying the Federal Reserve before they start herding us all into Area 51 & turned over to the various aliens. It's all so obvious...

[trish]

People are attracted to the idea that they might possess secret knowledge, or radical knowledge. They like to pretend to themselves that they have the special kind of mind that can see past the veils and into the inner heart and workings of the world. It's easier if you're not encumbered with the burden of intellectual integrity, a virtue rarely exercised and in most people takes up no more space than a couple of neurons. Conspiracies can be fit to almost any political persuasion or worldview and can be used to re-enforce any prejudice and any ideology. When information space becomes infested and overwhelmed with false conspiracies, it becomes difficult that much more difficult for the naive to distinguish false from true. Actual conspiracies (like Mike Turzai and his colleagues attempting to suppress the vote and win Pennsylvania for Romney) get camouflaged by the infestation around them.

I actually had some fun debunking (for myself) the theory that a jet airliner crashing into a twin tower would be insufficient to bring it down...demonstrating that a gasoline fire (like a wood fire in a stone oven) can reach temperatures that would melt steel and the first inelastic collision of the top quarter of the tower with the scorched floor can create a series of inelastic collisions that proceed at pretty much the acceleration of gravity, so that the time of fall is on the order of the time of free fall; i.e. there is absolutely nothing inconsistent in the pancake theory of the twin tower collapse. Now just apply Occam's razor and there's no need the bizarre theory that Bush, or The Jews planted charges throughout the twin tower and timed their explosions with attacks on 9-11.

Obama is not a citizen. Obama has an allegiance to an ownership class. Donald Trump is controlled by an alien badly disguised as a toupee. They are all woven of the same cloth. Lies that speak what some echo chamber wants to hear. That widespread belief in false is claims is dangerous is pretty obvious. Early in the twentieth century widely held conspiracy theories about a Jewish cabal designing to take over the world became part of a NAZI design to take over the world and extinguish whole ethnicities.

[broncofan]

But the CFR Trilateralists at the Bilderberg NWO are just waiting for the Rothchilds to finish buying the Federal Reserve before they start herding us all into Area 51 & turned over to the various aliens. It's all so obvious...
I'm just saying we wait until they do that. There's no need to fret about it when they're still in the planning stages. :-)

[broncofan]

How about the theory that HIV does not cause AIDS? This is of immediate danger to those infected who do not take anti-retrovirals or mothers who are pregnant but do not take AZT to reduce the risk of transmission. The cult of Christine Maggiore provided one of the darkest most chilling conspiracy theories. I suppose the conspiracy theory there was that the medical industry was pretending that HIV, a really harmless virus was the cause of the symptoms of AIDs. Rather, these symptoms were caused by nutritional deficiencies or drug use. Believing this nonsense has the real effect of causing people not to take anti-retrovirals and as a result die in the most excruciating manner, pcp pneumonia. It's hard to think of anything more evil than that.

The reason I think it's kind of surprising that conspiracy theorists are so dangerous is that they present themselves as merely curious people. Like scientists, they are out to discover what other people overlook, but unlike scientists there is no rigor to their thinking.

Yes, the birther issue was a mainstream conspiracy theory. 9/11 inside job. Holocaust denial. Federal Reserve creating a one world government. Good post Trish.

[broncofan]

I actually had some fun debunking (for myself) the theory that a jet airliner crashing into a twin tower would be insufficient to bring it down...
Perhaps it was fun because there was an audience of sane people to watch you dissect their poorly constructed fantasy built on the foundation of junk science. Or if not then you are extremely secure in your sanity that you do not need an audience. But if you are surrounded by people impervious to proof by reason and supportive of the most audaciously stupid ideas known to man, the rebuttals cease to matter. Frustration can quickly turn to fear!!!:) (play spooky music).

[robertlouis]

I might be one of the very few here who have actually encountered the Bilderberg.

12 years ago I was staying in the eponymous hotel in Amsterdam when an announcement came asking all guests to report to the foyer, where we were told with little ceremony that we had to move out immediately as some important guests were arriving and that they would be taking over the entire hotel and its facilities. The foyer was also full of large unsmiling men in suits and dark glasses, so the threat, unspoken, against protesting, was pretty obvious. We had 20 minutes to pack our stuff and were then taken to a fleet of taxis which distributed us around the city to other hotels of similar standing. When I went to pay my bill (three days stay - it was a business trip) I was advised that it had been taken care of.

When I mentioned the strange experience a local colleague told me that it was the Bilderberg group and their normal modus operandi - they never "booked ahead' because so many powerful people meeting together in one place would present a very obvious terrorist target - this was about nine months before 9/11.

I never saw any of the attendees - they must have been sitting in the black limos outside - nor do I know anything else about them, but I was certainly impressed and intimidated by the amount of power that they seemed to have.

[martin48]

The greatest living conspiracy guy is David Icke – knocks spots off any one else. We are controlled by The Global Elite, The Shadow Government, The Global Conspiracy and the monumentous "contrick" perpetrated on a cosmically and spiritually asleep human race. These people, including the UK Royal Family, are reptiles. His latest book - Human Race Get off Your Knees – reveals that the Earth and the collective human mind is manipulated from the Moon, which, he says, is not a ‘heavenly body’, but an artificial construct – a gigantic ‘spacecraft’ (probably a hollowed-out 'planetoid') – which is home to the extraterrestrial group that has been manipulating humanity for aeons.

He has just completed a 10-hour talk at Wembley Arena – see http://www.davidicke.com/wembley
OK – he might be harmless but not all conspiracy theories are such – Holocaust Denial being one!
If a person who believes in one conspiracy theory they tend to believe in others.
Psychologists believe that the search for meaning is common in conspiracism and the development of conspiracy theories, and may be powerful enough alone to lead to the first formulating of the idea.
Then, confirmation bias and avoidance of cognitive dissonance will reinforce the belief.

You can not use logical argument and historical evidence in discussion with believers.

[Prospero]

Best book on conspiracy theories was Voodoo Histories by David Aaronovitch.

Some are deadlier than others.
For example, the ongoing poison of The Protocols Of The Elders Of Zion, a fake document produced in Czarist Russia alleging a global conspiracy by the jews. It fuelled Nazi ideology, Russian antisemitism and present day antisemitism among some Muslims.

While long since proven to be a fake it can still be purchased in bookstores all over the Middle East alongside Henry Ford's despicable book "The International Jew" - a four volume diatribe against Jews.

I've seen both in bookstores in the Gulf and Egypt.

[Stavros]

In his study of post-war American fiction, City of Words, the late Tony Tanner discusses conspiracy theories as being integral to the American novel, and also relates it to theories of society and language that concern the socially constructed ideas we have of ourselves, and the inheritance of a language that we use, that we can manipulate but never entirely control without becoming unintelligible to others. In particular, because of the concept of freedom in the American experience and its liberation from the complex structures of church, monarchy and state that were left behind in Europe, the fear of being taken precisely by such forces infiltrated the American mind. Here in his introduction is a perceptive remark where he refers to

the American writer's dread of all conditioning forces to the point of paranoia which is detectable not only in the subject matter of many novels but also in their narrative devices. Narrative lines are full of hidden persuaders, hidden dimensions, plots, secret organizations, evil systems, all kinds of conspiracies against spontaneity of consciousness, even cosmic take-over. The possible nightmare of being totally controlled by unseen agencies and powers is never far away in contemporary American fiction. The unease is revealed in such novels is related to a worried apprehension on the part of the author that his own consciousness may be predetermined and channeled by the language he has been born into.
(Tony Tanner, City of Words, 1971).

Are Americans more prone to conspiracy theories than anyone else? I don't think so, although Tanner's argument is persuasive; I have met Arabs and Iranians who are convinced their lives are controlled by the Americans, 'the Jews' and so on, but they live in states where secret government is often a daily reality, or simply cannot accept that they are the architects of their own misfortune and thus external powers must have been the cause, common amongst Iranians. Perhaps the feeling is that we have lost control of our own political systems, but even if that is true, and I am not sure it is wholly true, doesn't that improve the argument for more transparency?

[danthepoetman]

I usually find conspiracy theories entertaining in general. But I will admit that they eventually turn out to be dangerous. All of them, or better: all of them together.
No topic, no subject, no aspect of our society or political life seems exempt of some conspiracy theory. Anything can be the object of intense suspicion, nowadays.
Culture is not the privilege of the few, today. And of course it’s all for the best. Literacy is largely widespread, although less than we sometimes think. I had a friend who was working on literacy on a wide territory in North America who was telling me that functional analphabetism was reaching close to 35% of people on that territory in the early 80s! The expansion of electronic media has somewhat empowered people culturally, has given everybody the capacity to have an opinion and sometimes, to voice it. Most of them are obviously in good faith, but many find there the opportunity to make a lot of dough; they’re wolves amongst sheep. And the first weapon they will use is of course suspicion.
The greatest problem is that at some point, people feel totally manipulated and stop believing anything serious about anything. Any opinion seems equal to any other, and anyone, be they expert scientists, emeritus professors, or people who have work in the field being the object of the conspiracy all their life, as credible as anyone else, and not anymore. And the phenomenon has had such an expansion that you can find some elements of it in the arguments of well educated and very rational people, today. It has come to reinforce a tendency that has been enduring since the 70s (around maybe the Watergate and the Vietnam war time) of incredible cynicism, especially for the political class.
You just have the feeling that, as more and more people from more and more backgrounds, and for more and more different reasons, are trying to take advantage of it, the capacity of an ordinary man or woman to follow and understand actuality is diminish geometrically. So I’m suggesting to you we might be facing a conspiracy of gigantic proportion, here! Of course I’m joking… All in all I think the phenomenon is mainly linked to the internet (and electronic media), and is sociological in nature.

Although it is not a perfect argument, I like the falsifiability process as developed by Karl Popper. Any serious, positive hypothesis can be tested; you can apply some verification on it either to disprove it or simply to come to some common understanding on how to modify or to adjust it to the reality it refers to. Conspiracy theories are obviously pseudo-sciences or pseudo-knowledge because every time out, there’s absolutely no way not only to disprove it, but even to just get a grasp of any factor in the theory that you can discuss on in order to establish some verification. Your interlocutor will invariably slip on another aspect of the so called theory, invoke something else or even suspect you of being either naïve or a part of that very conspiracy. Not any principle of falsifiability in any conspiracy theory. Best example, the extra-terrestrial conspiracy. They’re here, are controlling things behind the scene, are known from governments, etc., yet there’s not even minimalistic evidence of any of this, and any discussion on the subject is futile, as we’ll invariably slip from one of these aspect to another without being able to grasp anything concrete nor going anywhere in terms of common understanding.



I actually had some fun debunking (for myself) the theory that a jet airliner crashing into a twin tower would be insufficient to bring it down...demonstrating that a gasoline fire (like a wood fire in a stone oven) can reach temperatures that would melt steel and the first inelastic collision of the top quarter of the tower with the scorched floor can create a series of inelastic collisions that proceed at pretty much the acceleration of gravity, so that the time of fall is on the order of the time of free fall; i.e. there is absolutely nothing inconsistent in the pancake theory of the twin tower collapse. Now just apply Occam's razor and there's no need the bizarre theory that Bush, or The Jews planted charges throughout the twin tower and timed their explosions with attacks on 9-11.
I’ll admit I don’t understand half of what you’re saying, Trish. So I don’t believe one word of it all… Of course, I’m joking! I still don’t understand much of your argument, but I do believe you. lol
Anyways, you know, to destroy a middle size building with several floors, lets say 50 or 60 units on 5 floors, it can take up to a couple of weeks of work by demolition experts to install the charges; they have to dig through pillars to put the charges and cut through wall to install the wires, which by the time it is ready, will be crossing on all the surface of each floor. It’s long, hard work. A bigger one can take up to a month, six weeks and more. Imagine the work it would have taken to destroy these towers, if they had been destroyed by explosives instead of planes, or by explosives at the moment a plane hit them…

[Stavros]

And the phenomenon has had such an expansion that you can find some elements of it in the arguments of well educated and very rational people, today. It has come to reinforce a tendency that has been enduring since the 70s (around maybe the Watergate and the Vietnam war time) of incredible cynicism, especially for the political class.
You just have the feeling that, as more and more people from more and more backgrounds, and for more and more different reasons, are trying to take advantage of it, the capacity of an ordinary man or woman to follow and understand actuality is diminish geometrically. So I’m suggesting to you we might be facing a conspiracy of gigantic proportion, here! Of course I’m joking… All in all I think the phenomenon is mainly linked to the internet (and electronic media), and is sociological in nature.

Although it is not a perfect argument, I like the falsifiability process as developed by Karl Popper. Any serious, positive hypothesis can be tested; you can apply some verification on it either to disprove it or simply to come to some common understanding on how to modify or to adjust it to the reality it refers to.

Dan, consider the 1950s in the US with the McCarthy hearings and the hysteria over the communists in Hollywood and elsewhere who were loyal to an enemy of the USA. Conspiracies do not have to be politically 'right-wing' or ultra-conservative, Herbert Marcuse's theory of repressive tolerance was based on his view that capitalism had the ability to co-opt ordinary people into a repressive system they did not properly understand because they were diverted from the truth by household commodities that appeared to improve the quality of their lives at the same time as they were being exploited -is this any different, structurally, from the Matrix, other than Marcuse not claiming the people were offered two different coloured pills?

Popper's theory was long ago chaellenged by Thomas Kuhn's concept of shifting paradigms (in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions) -scientific theories if dependent on the falsifiability hypothesis could remain unchanged for decades, but change the paradigm and ask a set of different questions and the problem moves toward a solution. It also argues/reinforces the viw that science most often progresses by accident rather than by patient and methodical testing, although I suspect both are involved. And you may be aware of the famous (?) encounter between Popper and Wittgenstein at the heart of which is the dependence of science on language without which it cannot describe what science is let alone explain it.

[Stavros]

Dan I forgot to add these two links to accounts of the encounter between Popper and Wittgenstein which might interest you:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2001/nov/21/guardianfirstbookaward2001.gurardianfirstbookaward

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/30/books/ludwig-has-left-the-building.html?pagewanted=1

[danthepoetman]

Yes, of course, hysteria is not typical of our era. But notice something interesting about our time: the incredible expansion and multiplication of the intellectual and artistic “messages”. We live in a society in which “information” (about anything) circulates as it never has at any time in history. And not only is it infinitely more plentiful, and in fact omnipresent, it is also almost every bit as diversify; not only is it more present in quantity, it is more diversified in quality. You can find absolutely anything culturally, today. Any book, any play, any text, you can find stuff on any topic, any opinion ever given, any theory, etc.; we live in an era of ecclectism like never before. There have been fears in the past, there has been conspiracy theories, but never as many and never on this scale. But what you’re referring to is interesting in that those that are present everywhere now seems to arise much less feeling or fear, and much less emotions than those you mentioned, for instance during the McCarthy era. I think one is related to the other: such a plethora that we don’t know where to turn anymore and get to be universally cynical. People are so filled with such discourses that they’re desensitized. Some kind of cynicism falling into dumb confusion.
Popper’s falsifiability test has been discussed and argued by many people in many scientific fields. It still retains validity simply because it’s a purely practical tool rather than a theory of science; a theory on how we can find what is a science rather than a scientific theory in itself; in other words, it’s a epistemological tool. Khun is most definitely right, and it’s one of the most fascinating aspect to observe, when you follow the history of ideas, these switches in a whole perspective on the world, as if everything was rewritten in relatively short amount of time; a bubble explode and leave room to another. But we have to remain careful: some other epistemologists have shown that sometimes, those changes in paradigms are more complex than they seem to be, and involve long, complex processes that they can often detail. As to Wittgenstein and in general the thinkers of circle of Vienna, I respect enormously their work and accomplishments. They have literally sanitized philosophy in particular and human sciences in general, despite the persistence of gibberish writers in both fields. But I can’t agree with the idea that every philosophical question is a pure linguistic problem, nor that the whole of thinking is linguistic, and not either that the process of thinking is purely linguistic. Such perspective would flatten any humanly important question. Neurology is teaching us more and more about the process of thinking today, and understand it as a complex exchange between different specialized parts of the brain, including the cerebral trunk and the limbic system, which are the center of sensations, emotions, territoriality and more primal way of processing sensitive information, as well as parts of the cortex, pre-frontal lobe, more associated with rationality, language related parts on the left side, spatial references on the right, parts which relate more to sensation with mirror cells in the parietal lobe, and so on. Thinking happens as a whole, and conceptualization is a matter of multiple neural connections. Language is the essential part of “philosophy”, but certainly not the whole of it. But anyways, it’s a very different issue. We’re not quite sure what happened in that Popper-Wittgenstein face-up, but it did revolved around such questions, and I'm not sure it's relevant to the question of the thread in itself. Thanks nontheless for the links, Stavros!

I realize I’m ridiculously writing a novel here. I apologize. All I meant was that the plethora of cultural information today gives everybody the possibility to share anything they feel. And in itself, it’s great! But some people abuse such possibility and take advantage of weaker or less informed people. The massive information era is that of the net and even more of the social network developing more now; and moreover with the possibility to reach mass information platforms with a small device or a miniature telephone. Never have we been in such a situation.
(On the topic, Marshall Mcluhan would have much more stimulating ideas for us).

[trish]

Unfortunately the acquisition of real knowledge is hard work. Is climate change happening and is it due in significant part to greenhouse gas emissions, or is it all a conspiracy to expand governmental control over private corporations? Short of becoming an expert in the relevant sciences and personally investigating all the leads in the conspiracy story, how does one legitimately judge these conflicting claims? What we can’t or won’t test and verify on our own is left to others, some of whom we take to be trustworthy authorities and some we don’t. How do legitimately pick and choose our authorities? Some say we shouldn’t; that we should instead remain skeptical on every issue until we ourselves have acquired the necessary expertise to make a serious judgment. Personally I think we have to make judgments on issues that go beyond our own expertise. Parents need to decide whether they are going to have their children inoculated against pertussis and measles and tetanus etc. Reliable public heath information is a service that government has provided through agencies like the CDC and FDA. But when conspiracy theories undercut the authority of the CDC and “big government” generally, then parents panic and make decisions that not only endanger their children but their community as well.

(btw, anyone interested here is a synopsis of the pancake model of collapse that I posted back in 2008 -> http://www.hungangels.com/vboard/showpost.php?p=506571&postcount=4 )

[Stavros]

Unfortunately the acquisition of real knowledge is hard work. Is climate change happening and is it due in significant part to greenhouse gas emissions, or is it all a conspiracy to expand governmental control over private corporations? Short of becoming an expert in the relevant sciences and personally investigating all the leads in the conspiracy story, how does one legitimately judge these conflicting claims? What we can’t or won’t test and verify on our own is left to others, some of whom we take to be trustworthy authorities and some we don’t. How do legitimately pick and choose our authorities? Some say we shouldn’t; that we should instead remain skeptical on every issue until we ourselves have acquired the necessary expertise to make a serious judgment. Personally I think we have to make judgments on issues that go beyond our own expertise. Parents need to decide whether they are going to have their children inoculated against pertussis and measles and tetanus etc. Reliable public heath information is a service that government has provided through agencies like the CDC and FDA. But when conspiracy theories undercut the authority of the CDC and “big government” generally, then parents panic and make decisions that not only endanger their children but their community as well.

(btw, anyone interested here is a synopsis of the pancake model of collapse that I posted back in 2008 -> http://www.hungangels.com/vboard/showpost.php?p=506571&postcount=4 )

Is it the case that language is critical because the way in which the science of climate change is described in language that people can understand determines whether or not people believe it? And is this not the same with all of science? Popper's -alleged- 'common sense' approach to language is at best naive, at worst an evasion, because science is also political, and can be manipulated, so that how one uses language is as important as the philosophical arguments that Wittgenstein wrestled with, some of which he himself was aware were obscure.

[Stavros]

Popper’s falsifiability test has been discussed and argued by many people in many scientific fields. It still retains validity simply because it’s a purely practical tool rather than a theory of science; a theory on how we can find what is a science rather than a scientific theory in itself; in other words, it’s a epistemological tool.

How can Popper's method be both a practical tool and an epistemology? Surely that is precisely what Wittgenstein was complaining about- that Popper's 'common sense' or 'practical reality' had no permanent meaning because it lacked a language to permamently express it? It was scientifically true for Aristotle that the sun moved round the earth, it is currently scientifically true that the earth moves round the sun; the language that gives meaning to these contradictions has changed as the science has changed, yet Popper seems to cling to a fixed meaning in language that Wittgenstein claims is not there, and is even an obstacle to thought. This is why critics of Wittgenstein accuse him of relativism, and why critics of Popper accuse him of a naive belief that if science has proven something to be true, it must always be true.

[danthepoetman]

How can Popper's method be both a practical tool and an epistemology? Surely that is precisely what Wittgenstein was complaining about- that Popper's 'common sense' or 'practical reality' had no permanent meaning because it lacked a language to permamently express it? It was scientifically true for Aristotle that the sun moved round the earth, it is currently scientifically true that the earth moves round the sun; the language that gives meaning to these contradictions has changed as the science has changed, yet Popper seems to cling to a fixed meaning in language that Wittgenstein claims is not there, and is even an obstacle to thought. This is why critics of Wittgenstein accuse him of relativism, and why critics of Popper accuse him of a naive belief that if science has proven something to be true, it must always be true.
I said it’s an epistemological tool. As such it allows us to examine and determine, and in this case, to know if a “knowledge” or a field or a theory is science or not.

For Witgenstein, Stavros, philosophy is pure language. So is thinking. Language must reflect as he says, “what is the case” (and by that he means a structure within reality that must be seek by verifying). Anything above that, to him, is a chimera. He means to be a language police in philosophy and human sciences. In essence, questions related to reality are entirely dependent on how they are expressed. And not just from a historical perspective, but as a matter of fact. I don’t know if it’s relativistic; I suppose you can see it that way. I personally find it simply a bit thin, in terms of exploring philosophical, or existential, matters. I do not believe that such questions are purely dependant on their linguistic expression. And Popper neither. Both are realists, and believe in a reality totally independent from the mind. Popper believes in the progression of science, but not in unalterable scientific truths. The falsifiability principle works precisely to the opposite: a theory is always modifiable as our knowledge changes. But it is precisely because we can verify it and come to a common understanding as how to modify it, that we know it is a scientific theory. It’s interesting discussing that, Stavros, but once again, I’m not sure it has anything to do with the thread topic. I was just invoking Popper’s principle as an easy way (a practical tool) of finding if any one of these conspiracy theories has any credibility or not.

(And oups! thanks for the pancake, Trish!:))

[trish]

Is it the case that language is critical because the way in which the science of climate change is described in language that people can understand determines whether or not people believe it? And is this not the same with all of science? Popper's -alleged- 'common sense' approach to language is at best naive, at worst an evasion, because science is also political, and can be manipulated, so that how one uses language is as important as the philosophical arguments that Wittgenstein wrestled with, some of which he himself was aware were obscure. The art of transliterating a scientific argument into lay terms is always a challenge and almost always critical to getting the lay-public to understand and care about the argument. I do think the basic mechanisms of climatology are easier to convey than the symmetry breaking mechanisms that underlie condensed matter physics. This may be why there is in fact a public discussion of climate change and why the Superconducting Super Collider was never built.

There is politics in science, though it’s rarely the left vs right issues that most people associate with the word “politics.” In any academic department there are factions who fight hard to hire people who research this rather than that. There are of course the politics that accompany the personal jealousies that arise in any organization. The organizations and panels that are responsible each year for gifting awards and grants are pressured by people who think this field is trivial and that field is cutting edge. There is also fraud in science. But Kuhn not withstanding, these flaws rarely delay progress toward honest understanding. Most researchers are fairly quick at recognizing which models are working and which are not, and in a rush to make or maintain their own reputations they will be guided by the ones that work. Progress moves so fast in the 21st century no one can afford to get hung up on ideas that show no promise.

What Popper has right is that falsifiability is an epistemological virtue. If he was attempting to describe how one SHOULD proceed in the aquisition of knowledge, he was on the right track, but dangerously close to the very metaphysics he eschewed (since a “should” claim would be metaphysical). If he was attempting to describe what scientists do when they do science he did leave out the “political” component. What Wittenstein got right is that the correspondence theory of truth is probably too simplistic a model of language. But do we really want to go so far as to claim, as did Wittgenstein, that talk of truth is just a language game.

[martin48]

Why is it when one of these threads gets started, it quickly falls into - what is science anyway? Climate change is not proved (We will have attacks on evolution within two pages)? Oh, and a tendency to boast about our epistemological knowledge?

Can we accept this:

The scientific method — the method wherein inquiry regards itself as fallible and purposely tests itself and criticizes, corrects, and improves itself.

As a starting point

[hippifried]

Well I'm seeing a major plot to discredit the people who know the REAL TRUTH!! All your faith in method worship of science theology won't save you. Butteye'll be protected under my rock. The end is rear.

[martin48]

Well I'm seeing a major plot to discredit the people who know the REAL TRUTH!! All your faith in method worship of science theology won't save you. Butteye'll be protected under my rock. The end is rear.


You are right, my friend, and only you and I know the truth. Great pressure is being put on us to supress the truth by those who would use logic, reason and the power of common sense. But in the end, we will prevail. The greatest conspiracy theory is that there is a conspiracy that there are no conspiracies. The obvious falsehoods that the earth is round, that it made some 4.5 billion years ago, that man is but the end of the current evolutionary trail, and much more will be shown to be the great lies thrust upon us. As you say my wise friend - the end is rear!

[Quiet Reflections]

I thought the Builderberg group met all over the world. I know they were in Virginia this year and have been a few other times as well. It is said that they have only had the meeting at the actual hotel once. You can look up where they meet but who knows how accurate that is.

[trish]

Here's their secret website

http://www.bilderbergmeetings.org/index.php

[barney fife]

does anyone think if an admirer of transexuals ran for public office he would have alot of trouble getting elected because of it?

[robertlouis]

Here's their secret website

http://www.bilderbergmeetings.org/index.php

Not that secret then..... :tongue:

[Ben]

Conspiracy means: secret plan or the action of plotting.
I mean, when the Board of Directors get together at General Motors, well, that's a conspiracy.
Same thing can be said when, say, the British Prime Minister David Cameron gets together with his inner cabinet.
Or Bush and company when they were conspiring to invade Afghanistan and Iraq.
Or overthrowing Hugo Chavez in 2002. I mean, the Bush administration conspired to overthrow a democratically elected government.
Same with Iran back in 1953. When the Eisenhower administration conspired -- with CIA officer Kermit Roosevelt Jr. -- to overthrow the democratic government of Mosaddegh.
Or President Kennedy conspiring to overthrow Fidel Castro.
Anyway, there's a much broader definition than the ones we use in popular culture, as it were.

[robertlouis]

Conspiracy means: secret plan or the action of plotting.
I mean, when the Board of Directors get together at General Motors, well, that's a conspiracy.
Same thing can be said when, say, the British Prime Minister David Cameron gets together with his inner cabinet.
Or Bush and company when they were conspiring to invade Afghanistan and Iraq.
Or overthrowing Hugo Chavez in 2002. I mean, the Bush administration conspired to overthrow a democratically elected government.
Same with Iran back in 1953. When the Eisenhower administration conspired -- with CIA officer Kermit Roosevelt Jr. -- to overthrow the democratic government of Mosaddegh.
Or President Kennedy conspiring to overthrow Fidel Castro.
Anyway, there's a much broader definition than the ones we use in popular culture, as it were.

Don't forget Nixon and Peace prizewinner Kissinger conniving with the CIA to remove the democratically elected Allende in 1973. Or Iran Contra in the 80s, when that addled actor Reagan sleepwalked his way through a scandal that somehow never affected him

Wonder why most of Latin America distrusts the USA? Look at your record.

[trish]

Me and a couple of friends plotted to meet for lunch tomorrow.

[robertlouis]

Me and a couple of friends plotted to meet for lunch tomorrow.

The spooks are staking out the restaurant already. Scream into the flowers and deafen the bastards.

[Stavros]

The art of transliterating a scientific argument into lay terms is always a challenge and almost always critical to getting the lay-public to understand and care about the argument. I do think the basic mechanisms of climatology are easier to convey than the symmetry breaking mechanisms that underlie condensed matter physics. This may be why there is in fact a public discussion of climate change and why the Superconducting Super Collider was never built.

There is politics in science, though it’s rarely the left vs right issues that most people associate with the word “politics.” In any academic department there are factions who fight hard to hire people who research this rather than that. There are of course the politics that accompany the personal jealousies that arise in any organization. The organizations and panels that are responsible each year for gifting awards and grants are pressured by people who think this field is trivial and that field is cutting edge. There is also fraud in science. But Kuhn not withstanding, these flaws rarely delay progress toward honest understanding. Most researchers are fairly quick at recognizing which models are working and which are not, and in a rush to make or maintain their own reputations they will be guided by the ones that work. Progress moves so fast in the 21st century no one can afford to get hung up on ideas that show no promise.

What Popper has right is that falsifiability is an epistemological virtue. If he was attempting to describe how one SHOULD proceed in the aquisition of knowledge, he was on the right track, but dangerously close to the very metaphysics he eschewed (since a “should” claim would be metaphysical). If he was attempting to describe what scientists do when they do science he did leave out the “political” component. What Wittenstein got right is that the correspondence theory of truth is probably too simplistic a model of language. But do we really want to go so far as to claim, as did Wittgenstein, that talk of truth is just a language game.

Fair dues, and all fair points. I should explain that I came to Popper through his two volume study The Open Society and its Enemies, a book dismissive of history and with a chapter on Hegel that is risible for its lack of understanding. It would take too long to go into the limited value of the book, which has not been anywhere near as influential as The Logic of Scientific Discovery, and is not really pertinent to this thread.

[hippifried]

Hmmmm... Bilderberger huh? Can I pile on all the cheese I want?