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I don't think there is anyone who believes there are no conspiracies. The terms "conspiracy" and "conspiracy theory" have very different meanings. This is esse

by arp242 1y ago

I don't think there is anyone who believes there are no conspiracies. The terms "conspiracy" and "conspiracy theory" have very different meanings. This is essentially just a linguistic sleight of hand, not too different from when creationists say "evolution is just a theory". "Conspiracy theory" is somewhat unfortunate term.

mike_hearn 1y ago
Maybe not zero conspiracies in total, but academic social science does take it as axiomatic that public sector organizations never engage in conspiracies. That's why their papers always assume any belief that they might do so is automatically false and must be explained via other factors. Occasionally you see recognition that private sector actors might genuinely conspire, but never public sector. Invariably, such papers use an ad-hoc set of beliefs that are labelled as false with no explanation or investigation. The authors just assume that because everyone they know believes something, it must be true. Ironically that's the same sort of faulty belief system they claim to be investigating.
clickety_clack 1y ago
Isn’t it the “deep state” and “government coverup” type of theories that are conspiracy theories? The flat earth thing is an example of that, where the theory is that “they” (the government or big globe or whoever) are trying to convince you that the world is round when it’s actually flat. Note that the article we’re discussing specifically mentions “people who believe in conspiracies” in the first line.
- arp242 1y ago
  > Note that the article we’re discussing specifically mentions “people who believe in conspiracies” in the first line. Which obviously refers to conspiracy theories in this context. Words can have more than one meaning (again: see "theory", among others). Watergate was a government cover-up. No one denies that happened. Or Iran-Contra, or the Snowden leaks. Or the WMDs in Iraq.

by arp242 1y ago

mike_hearn 1y ago

Maybe not zero conspiracies in total, but academic social science does take it as axiomatic that public sector organizations never engage in conspiracies. That's why their papers always assume any belief that they might do so is automatically false and must be explained via other factors. Occasionally you see recognition that private sector actors might genuinely conspire, but never public sector. Invariably, such papers use an ad-hoc set of beliefs that are labelled as false with no explanation or investigation. The authors just assume that because everyone they know believes something, it must be true. Ironically that's the same sort of faulty belief system they claim to be investigating.

clickety_clack 1y ago

Isn’t it the “deep state” and “government coverup” type of theories that are conspiracy theories? The flat earth thing is an example of that, where the theory is that “they” (the government or big globe or whoever) are trying to convince you that the world is round when it’s actually flat. Note that the article we’re discussing specifically mentions “people who believe in conspiracies” in the first line.

arp242 1y ago
> Note that the article we’re discussing specifically mentions “people who believe in conspiracies” in the first line. Which obviously refers to conspiracy theories in this context. Words can have more than one meaning (again: see "theory", among others). Watergate was a government cover-up. No one denies that happened. Or Iran-Contra, or the Snowden leaks. Or the WMDs in Iraq.