2 ms·
A lot of people here are writing this off as hysteria. I don't know if this is anything nefarious or not, but I would note that being suspicious of these thing
by cynicalpeace 2y ago
A lot of people here are writing this off as hysteria.
I don't know if this is anything nefarious or not, but I would note that being suspicious of these things is often a good thing, not a bad thing.
Even Michael Shermer, the famed skeptic, wrote a book on how suspecting conspiracy is often a valid default stance. Abstract from his book:
"One reason that people believe these conspiracies, Shermer argues, is that enough of them are real that we should be constructively conspiratorial: elections have been rigged (LBJ's 1948 Senate race); medical professionals have intentionally harmed patients in their care (Tuskegee); your government does lie to you (Watergate, Iran-Contra, and Afghanistan)"
There are obviously people that always suspect conspiracy, and that's not good. But it's equally not good to always suspect a benign explanation, which is the majority of this thread.
Just adding a different perspective to this community.
- aliasxneo 2y agoI do find it rather hard to make sense of the antagonism here. My only guess is people feel the need to distance themselves from the "sheep" and do so by ridiculing them from their ivory tower. In some cases it's the same thing, but there's a political bent added to it ("some people" from "that side"). Sad to see what HN is slowly devolving into.
- binary132 2y agoIt’s probably an organized group of shills / bots trying to discredit and downplay the concerns so it doesn’t get out of hand. ;)
- gg2222 2y agoAgreed. If it is mass hysteria why doesn't the government just say so instead of saying "they don't know". Some people just can't accept not "knowing it all".
- IAmGraydon 2y agoThey more or less did say that. They said that people are reporting these things but they haven’t detected anything. If you read between the lines, I think they’re insinuating this is mass hysteria but need to continue investigating to be sure.