Suppressing the truth

[nigel99 144]

Rant time!

Why do people believe utter nonsense from people like Joe Rogan who claim that there are massive conspiracies to hide the truth on various issues? 

First of all if that was really true and the mystical powers that be are able to suppress scientific evidence they could suppress a silly little podcast?

The area that really riles me is the rubbish about 5g and radio frequencies (the particular trigger that set me off today). I'm an RF engineer and spent over 5 years in committees writing EU radio standards and regulations as well as designing equipment. I've also done a minor in microbiology. 

It doesn't make me an expert, it's a complicated issue and we don't know everything yet. But throwing fancy technical terms together as some form of word salad on a podcast seems to carry more weight with some people I know. 

5Ghz and 5th generation are 2 entirely different things, and it would not take more than 2 minutes on google to know that! But of course you heard it on Joe Rogan, so the nuances that 5g actually operates on lower not higher frequencies than 3g and often with lower transmit power from your phone as well is irrelevant. 

[wmw999 2,122]

Welcome to the "throw it on the wall and see if it sticks" school of discussion. Unfortunately, some walls these days are very sticky.

Wendy P.

[billvon 2,400]

51 minutes ago, nigel99 said:

5Ghz and 5th generation are 2 entirely different things, and it would not take more than 2 minutes on google to know that! But of course you heard it on Joe Rogan, so the nuances that 5g actually operates on lower not higher frequencies than 3g and often with lower transmit power from your phone as well is irrelevant. 

Agree with most of what you said, but 5G also uses millimeter wave in the NR spec.  The frequency bands go as high as 49,000MHz in the n79 band.  (Standard 3G frequencies were 800 and 1900 MHz.)  Agreed on the lower power (on average, not all the time) - and they also use some lower frequencies (600MHz for n71 which is new.)

[nigel99 144]

2 hours ago, billvon said:

Agree with most of what you said, but 5G also uses millimeter wave in the NR spec.  The frequency bands go as high as 49,000MHz in the n79 band.  (Standard 3G frequencies were 800 and 1900 MHz.)  Agreed on the lower power (on average, not all the time) - and they also use some lower frequencies (600MHz for n71 which is new.)

True, although I don't believe in Aus we have the higher frequency variants. Certainly not the last time I looked. 

[Stumpy 256]

Joe Rogan seems to gain some measure of credibility from the things he DOES know about that then seems to carry over into the other BS he covers. I have never really understood the appeal

[olofscience 421]

10 minutes ago, Stumpy said:

I have never really understood the appeal

For conspiracy theories in general:

1. they're a simple "explanation" for complex issues. It's usually simpler to understand a conspiracy than an actual complex issue
2. It makes the conspiracy theorist feel special - that THEY're specially aware of the conspiracy, while the rest of the "masses" are ignorant (i.e. they're in possession of scarce "knowledge")
3. confirmation bias - they want the conspiracy to be true, because of the above and other reasons (usually ego-related)

Just off the top of my head, I might have missed a few more.

[wmw999 2,122]

Oh, those sound good to me. But then I'm afraid I find it hard even to use the word "theory" for that, as it widens its meaning hugely, and as far as I'm concerned, unacceptably.

Wendy P.

[SkyDekker 1,122]

3 hours ago, olofscience said:

For conspiracy theories in general:

1. they're a simple "explanation" for complex issues. It's usually simpler to understand a conspiracy than an actual complex issue
2. It makes the conspiracy theorist feel special - that THEY're specially aware of the conspiracy, while the rest of the "masses" are ignorant (i.e. they're in possession of scarce "knowledge")
3. confirmation bias - they want the conspiracy to be true, because of the above and other reasons (usually ego-related)

Just off the top of my head, I might have missed a few more.

Same argument for religion really.

[billvon 2,400]

4 hours ago, olofscience said:

Just off the top of my head, I might have missed a few more.

I've been fascinated by the study of conspiracy theorists.  Believers of conspiracy theories tend to have specific personality markers:

paranoid or suspicious thinking
eccentricity
low trust in others
stronger need to feel special
belief in the world as a dangerous place
seeing meaningful patterns where none exist

https://econtent.hogrefe.com/doi/10.1027/1614-0001/a000268

In general, many of those feed into some people’s need for uniqueness.  Most conspiracists have a strong need to feel special or unique; a "wolf and not a sheep" to use Internet jargon.

There is also an evolutionary component to this.  People who are suspicious of other people, groups of people, plans, organizations etc can have an evolutionary advantage in a lawless society because sometimes there ARE other people out to get them.  Thus the desire to believe in conspiracy theories tends to be conserved over time.

We also all have a very strong "pattern matching" ability that we use every day, from tasks as mundane to finding a fork or figuring out how to get to work all the way up to looking for the best advertising approach to sell your latest gadget.  Pareidolia (seeing faces in burned toast, trees, clouds) is a simple example.  In one sense, conspiracy theorists are using this ability and it's just getting away from them; they are seeing faces in EVERYTHING.

This can often progress to apophenia, the assigning of false interpretations or consequences to those patterns.  If you see a face in a cloud, no one is much bothered by that.  If you see three faces in the clouds one day, most people will decide that it's an odd coincidence.  But someone with apophenia will more likely decide they have been targeted by someone or something, and those faces are a sign of that targeting.  "I mean, what other explanation could there be?!"

There are a lot of mental problems that can lead to a belief in conspiracy theories - not because such defects are inherent to conspiracy theories, but because mental problems often mess with those basic mental processes (pattern matching, assignment of significance, determination of risk vs reward) that turn those three faces in the clouds into an imminent threat or indication of a wide-ranging nefarious plot.

And honestly most conspiracy theories aren't that dangerous, even.  Who cares if you believe we never landed on the Moon?  Unless you're a scientist or engineer working in a space-adjacent field it just doesn't matter.  It does mean that the person is more likely to believe other nonsense, but it's not inherently dangerous.

Some conspiracy theories, of course, ARE dangerous.  The "Biden stole the election" "vaccines don't work" and Qanon conspiracy theories come to mind; they are dangerous since conspiracists have used them to commit crimes, harm public health and threaten other people.

The solution to many conspiracy theories, of course, is simple critical thinking along with education and diversity (harder to maintain silly beliefs if you hear from a wider range of beliefs.)  That's one reason so many conspiracy theory fans are opposed to education and diversity; it threatens the very thing they feel makes them special and unique (i.e. a "wolf, not a sheep.")

[TriGirl 268]

2 hours ago, billvon said:

Believers of conspiracy theories tend to have specific personality markers:

paranoid or suspicious thinking
eccentricity
low trust in others
stronger need to feel special
belief in the world as a dangerous place
seeing meaningful patterns where none exist

Bill,

IMHO, all of what you wrote stems from the one I highlighted.  This characteristic seems to be necessary to make all the other influences possible.

T

[jakee 1,255]

4 hours ago, billvon said:

And honestly most conspiracy theories aren't that dangerous, even.  Who cares if you believe we never landed on the Moon?  Unless you're a scientist or engineer working in a space-adjacent field it just doesn't matter.  It does mean that the person is more likely to believe other nonsense, but it's not inherently dangerous.

Some conspiracy theories, of course, ARE dangerous.  The "Biden stole the election" "vaccines don't work" and Qanon conspiracy theories come to mind; they are dangerous since conspiracists have used them to commit crimes, harm public health and threaten other people.

I think a problem there is that a lot of these conpiracies start bleeding together and share a common ground of 'don't trust the MSM'. And once that cumulative effect of so many people from so many angles saying 'don't trust the MSM' starts taking hold in the wider public consciousness it opens the door to so many important and consequential lies. You even see it here where 'normal' right wingers will dismiss out of hand a report from WaPo, NYT or even the BBC because it comes from one of those outlets. And once you assume anything and everything from those outlets is a lie then where the hell does it leave you in understanding anything to do with current affairs?

[wolfriverjoe 1,340]

9 hours ago, wmw999 said:

Oh, those sound good to me. But then I'm afraid I find it hard even to use the word "theory" for that, as it widens its meaning hugely, and as far as I'm concerned, unacceptably.

Wendy P.

Thank you.

I've said a few times:

These are not conspiracy 'theories'. A theory is a scientifically tested and proven set of explanations for observed phenomena.
Gravity, evolution, relativity.

Crap like '9/11 truth', Covid Vaccine microchips, The Illuminati, all that shit are 'conspiracy fantasies'. 
A load of crap that ''true believers" spew in an attempt to sound smart. 

[billvon 2,400]

1 hour ago, jakee said:

 And once that cumulative effect of so many people from so many angles saying 'don't trust the MSM' starts taking hold in the wider public consciousness it opens the door to so many important and consequential lies. 

Including "you can't trust mainstream science."  "It's not science if you can't question it!"

Which leads to anti-vaxxing and racial superiority and the belief that the nation's blood is "poisoned" by immigrants (which is especially funny from a people who are 99% FROM immigrants.)  And that can lead to racial violence, like Charlottesville and the sort of whitelash that caused, in part, Jan 6th.

[lippy 771]

10 hours ago, billvon said:

Which leads to anti-vaxxing and racial superiority and the belief that the nation's blood is "poisoned" by immigrants (which is especially funny from a people who are 99% FROM immigrants.)  And that can lead to racial violence, like Charlottesville and the sort of whitelash that caused, in part, Jan 6th.

It can ultimately lead to Slim as well 

[jakee 1,255]

I think a lot of the malicious pushing of  conspiracy theories ties in with a point of view I saw recently about the Russian elections. It was arguing that the point of Putin still holding elections isn’t to trick the Russian people into thinking they still have democracy - it’s actually to beat them down into thinking that pushing for democracy is futile, elections will never work and there’s nothing they can do about it. 
 

And it seems to me that’s very much what the mainstream American Right is trying to do as well. Create an atmosphere where no one trusts any election results, so that when they actually succeed in overtly stealing one the majority of the population won’t think they’ve really lost anything because they didn’t think the election was real anyway. 

[Phil1111 911]

11 hours ago, billvon said:

Including "you can't trust mainstream science."  "It's not science if you can't question it!"

Which leads to anti-vaxxing and racial superiority and the belief that the nation's blood is "poisoned" by immigrants (which is especially funny from a people who are 99% FROM immigrants.)  And that can lead to racial violence, like Charlottesville and the sort of whitelash that caused, in part, Jan 6th.

Its all working because one of the latest polls shows that over 30% of republicans believe that Jan 6th insurrection was led by the FBI.

Yet some people believe dialogue and negation is possible with this tribe.

[wmw999 2,122]

3 minutes ago, Phil1111 said:

Yet some people believe dialogue and negation is possible with this tribe.

It has to be for some issues, because we live in the same communities with them. The thing is to either find common (other) ground so that they begin to see us as humans, and we see them as humans, or simply to wait until they die.

I prefer the first, as entering into community with someone is the best way to understand them.

Wendy P.