it seen like now a day more and more people are turning to conspiracy theory, as evident by many post in the forum on stuff like 9/11, moon landing, federal reserve, the NWA, the illuminati and etc

conspiracism have become a interesting topic in sociology and psychology on why does so many people will believe sometime without hard evidence.

Michael Barkun have group conspiracy into three group

1. Event conspiracy theories. The conspiracy is held to be responsible for a limited, discrete event or set of events. The conspiratorial forces are alleged to have focused their energies on a limited, well-defined objective. The best-known example in the recent past is the Kennedy assassination conspiracy literature.

2. Systemic conspiracy theories. The conspiracy is believed to have broad goals, usually conceived as securing control of a country, a region, or even the entire world. While the goals are sweeping, the conspiratorial machinery is generally simple: a single, evil organization implements a plan to infiltrate and subvert existing institutions. This is a common scenario in conspiracy theories that focus on the alleged machinations of Jews, Freemasons, and the Illuminati, as well as theories centered on international communism or international capitalists.

3. Superconspiracy theories. Conspiratorial constructs in which multiple conspiracies are believed to be linked together hierarchically. Event and systemic are joined in complex ways, so that conspiracies come to be nested together. At the summit of the conspiratorial hierarchy is a distant but all-powerful evil force manipulating lesser conspiratorial actors.

because there is so many different conspiracy theory and different version of the same theory and also the mix and match of different theory. a large number of people will have believe in certain conspiracy theory.

site like abovetopsecret is a virtual supermarket for conspiracy theory, all sort of conspiracy imaginable are available for discussion.

while many of the conspiracy theory are harmless to people that believe them, other like the AIDS conspiracy, or the vaccine conspiracy will actually cost danger to the person and its community.

there are plenty of people that have started thread about conspiracy theory, but no thread have been open to discuss the phenomena of the conspiracy theory itself and why people believe in it depict no having solid proof.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conspiracy_theories

http://www.2spare.com/item_43133.aspx

http://endrtimes.blogspot.com/2010/01/stud...y-theories.html

http://www.trutv.com/shows/conspiracy_theory/index.html

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/...70116093354.htm

There are gaps that with our modern exposure to information, is likely to be filled with 'alternatives'. Its fascinating that they can make it as if its real. But looking deeper with an open mind, one can see the truth not far from the surface.

E.g. The Roswell incident werent revived until the 70s i think. And after 30 yrs being fed with pop imagery of flying saucers, unlikely witnesses came forward.

To make things more mysterious with conspiracies, most gaps are only filled with just that, when actual explaination is actually just that - unexplained.

Since you still wanna argue over this, I'll just move this post of yours back to your first one and reopen it again.

And consider yourself unofficially warned over personal attacks too.

i blame the x-files generation.

in the 90s, we were bombarded with 10 years worth of conspiracy theories, 24 episodes per season. no other tv-series before that had ever successfully pulled off a show based on a simple emotion: fear of the unknown.

and right at that moment, the internet became available to the masses. this amplifies the effect of conspiracy theories by reinforcing themselves. one guy comes up with scenario A. another guy across the world proposed scenario B. then a conspiracy theorist would put A and B together, which on its own were totally legit and independent, to create a very believable theory.

conspiracy theorists have wild imaginations. but they often missed on a very famous saying called Hanlon's Razor (Grey's Law):

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

this have going on since ancient time, human like to hear a good story, some myth and falklore started with a true story but then as the story been pass down through generation more and more magical detail was added to make it more interesting.

i agree that internet have made conspiracy more wide spread even though the official explanation is also available on the net. i think internet also encourage the creation of more and more variation of one conspiracy theory, before the internet, only the more popular version of the theory will get mention but now everyone can post their own theory on the net and its available to the entire world.

So does Occam's Razor. Simplest explaination is always the best. Yes theorists always label something unexplainable as paranormal or extraterrestrial.

Its a fallacy. U said its unexplained yet in the same breath provides explaination.

The stories are juicy and thought provoking

1. because people love gossiping. thats human nature.
2. they want to believe in something new. see things from different perspective. moreover, there are always people who love provoking and kind of brainwash them.

You speak in such a way that conspiracy theories are all fallacious and as though as the official stories are truth. 90% of the laymen in this century has been brainwashed to believe the authority without any doubts. Never have the fascists been so successful before, thanks to the education for salve and intricate social engineering. These people do not only lose their instrinsic freedom but also willing to dedicate their life to these false authorities.

There are always people who think they are really crystal clear and know what's happening which in fact they know nothing and these people are the ones who are the easiest to be brainwashed and controlled. Even when it's pretty obvious, the analytical mind of these people will still believe in the authority without any suspicions. These sleep-walking people will never wake up unless they start to think. There is no need to wake up these people as it's useless to wake someone who is pretending to be asleep.

Truth is just too much for the stomach. Well, I believe thinking is too difficult for you and so perhaps ignorance is your only resort.

If you think you have known a great deal of truth, you can read www.whale.to and point out every contradictions you can find and if possible, provide evidence to counter every statements that does not support the authorities. Thank you.

conspiracy theory always there....no one media in the world have 100% freedom ...there will be tons of coverups going on each day...

conpiracy theory often offer a version of the story is much more exciting, with sinister evil mastermind like the nwo, illuminati and etc, and there is always a sensational story of plot of government and powerfull organization work to kill large amount of people but then have you think why they can gather these information and why are they not dead? those promoting conspiracy theory on the internet, their death can be easily arranged without causing any suspicion from the public unlike the killing the conspiracy accused them of comminting, like 9/11, killer vaccine and etc.

Actually, a lot of (real) alternative energy researchers are dead - often they died in mysterious circumstances. Either that, or they were bought out/silenced. If you do a bit of digging, you will find out.

Which makes sense, because all these are threats to the oil industry (the most sensitive issue). No need to look at others. Oil > blood, if you go by many governments thinking. Oil is a stranglehold which will not be released no matter what (even if it kills the oceans or people).....like now in the Mexican Gulf.

But one case which you can see a lot of people getting silenced is the JFK assassination. All the ones connected to the case died under mysterious circumstances. So you still think there is nothing strange about that?

Abovetopsecret is supposed to be disinformation site. Many conspiracy theorists are really whackos or shills/trolls, and they give other conspiracy theorists a bad name. If you want to study conspiracy theories, you also need a good deal of intelligence, otherwise you will end up believing all kinds of rubbish. Which is not good as well.

This post has been edited by Xepz: May 8 2010, 10:30 AM

----

This post has been edited by marsalee: Nov 14 2010, 12:02 AM

It's collective behavior. A transitory and passing behavior by people. They just tend not to check the validity of the story and believe it blindly. You know the story of War of the World? It is aired in USA many years ago on radio and during the time it was aired, some even took it as a real story go went to the extent of phoning their friends and relatives by calling them to flee or saying the final words. It sounds funny but it shows that humans are very irrational when subjected to any collective behavior.

I'm going to make a generalization is that less educated are more prone to believing in conspiracy theory as compared to more educated folks.