“Conspiracy theories are for losers”

[Lihu]

https://apple.news/A-QhzI0y2Q5eHspPZafeJFA

Comments or theories?

[JonMA1]

Either you believe the Tuskegee Syphilis Study really happened or you believe the US Public Health Service would never participate in something so horrible.

[Pretzel]

I'll just say that I enjoyed watching Buzz Aldrin punching the moon landing conspiracy theorist. I think theories without evidence are dumb, though they can be fun to briefly think about the "what if's" if they were true.

It's just a problem when too many people start to drink the kool-aid and you end up with millions of people who believe that the earth is flat despite the fact that people as early as Pythagoras and the circumference of the planet was estimated way back in 240 BC by Eratosthenes with an error of less than 15%. 

[mcanadiens]

There's all kinds of things that people want to believe and latch on to it, but there is also a lot of stuff people don't want people to know and attempt to shut down as "conspiracy theories".

It's a case by case basis.

 

[Lihu]

1 hour ago, Pretzel said:

I'll just say that I enjoyed watching Buzz Aldrin punching the moon landing conspiracy theorist. I think theories without evidence are dumb, though they can be fun to briefly think about the "what if's" if they were true.

I've often liked all the hollow earth theories. That would be neat. To enjoy it thoroughly, I'd have to be high and drunk enough to numb what few "engineering brain cells" I happen to have. 

 

1 hour ago, Pretzel said:

It's just a problem when too many people start to drink the kool-aid and you end up with millions of people who believe that the earth is flat despite the fact that people as early as Pythagoras and the circumference of the planet was estimated way back in 240 BC by Eratosthenes with an error of less than 15%. 

Or that there's a horizon. 

[Pretzel]

46 minutes ago, Lihu said:

I've often liked all the hollow earth theories. That would be neat. To enjoy it thoroughly, I'd have to be high and drunk enough to numb what few "engineering brain cells" I happen to have. 

The hollow Earth stuff is actually a pretty fun thought experiment, since from a gravity point of view we wouldn't notice a huge difference so long as the mass worked out correctly. It makes the "falling through the center of the planet" ideas so much more fun to imagine when you picture being on the inside of a giant sphere with cities dotted all over the inside surface.

 

As for the horizon, who knows how they try to explain away that one. 

Edited October 23, 2017 by Pretzel

[Kalnoky]

For the most part I don't see any harm in indulging a few "second shooter" or Area 51 conversations. As long as people don't wind up like Tim McVeigh.

People are way too uptight. You have to have a little bit of imagination in this life. Almost all children have wonderful imaginations, and adults unfortunately lose it somewhere along the way. 

I have the original hollow earth book from the 1960s (the one that launched the hollow earth cult). I found it in a used bookstore for a couple bucks. It was so poorly written I couldn't finish it. But I'm happy to display it on my bookshelf as an oddity and conversation piece.

[Patch]

I actually like conspiracy theories. I don't have any myself, except maybe for "Murphy's Law" and "Johnson Rods", both of which may not actually be CTs. However, for a bland entertainment value, nothing beats a good conspiracy thought, as long as no one gets hurt. 

As for CTs only being for the lost souls in the world, that's a stretch, since alot of smart folks have their own CTs. 

Also conspiracy theories should never get mixed up with the term "coconspiritor(s)" .  Learned that one the hard way after 16 days of deliberation on a jury. 

Yeah, just give me a good old CT to work with, and usually after I consume a 12 pack I can solve it, one way or another. 

[Buckeyebowman]

Well, there are conspiracy theories of the "tin foil hat" brigade variety, and others that are more reasonable.

I find it interesting that this thread pops up just when the news comes out that President Trump is going to allow the rest of the classified files on the JFK assassination to be declassified. I've been laboring under a misconception that Congress had decreed that all documents would be declassified 50 years later. As it turns out, it was 25 years, but there were "outs". If certain intelligence and national security agencies objected, certain documents would remain classified.

My question is this. Why would they object?

Could these documents prove complicity or negligence? There are some large questions out there.

For instance, why was the motorcade route changed at the last minute without Kennedy's knowledge or assent? Did LBJ have a hand in this? It's well known that he and Kennedy couldn't stand each other. Was it the Cubans? Or the mob?

I was in the 5th grade when this happened. I can remember our teacher being called out of the classroom, and then returning to tell us what had happened. My parents bought the Warren Commission report as a Christmas gift and I read it cover to cover! Even at that tender age, I thought it was a load of BS!

[NJpatbee]

There are many fringe conspiracy theories that most people ignore but we do know that conspiracies have taken place throughout history.  I happen to believe that there is a chance that the assassination of JFK was the result of more than 1 deranged person.  I do not believe that G.W. Bush orchestrated the 9/11 attacks.  I do wonder why it took so long to notify the Navy at Pearl Harbor of the pending Japanese attack and have read quite a bit on the topic.   I do not believe that Paul McCartney died in the late 1960's.  It depends on the conspiracy theory but some do exist that are quite intriguing.   And as far as education or income impacting the tendency to believe in certain conspiracy theories it is not a far reach to propose that people with less access to good education and information may buy into theories that others could refute based on their knowledge of the facts. 

[Lihu]

26 minutes ago, NJpatbee said:

There are many fringe conspiracy theories that most people ignore but we do know that conspiracies have taken place throughout history.  I happen to believe that there is a chance that the assassination of JFK was the result of more than 1 deranged person.  I do not believe that G.W. Bush orchestrated the 9/11 attacks.  I do wonder why it took so long to notify the Navy at Pearl Harbor of the pending Japanese attack and have read quite a bit on the topic.   I do not believe that Paul McCartney died in the late 1960's.  It depends on the conspiracy theory but some do exist that are quite intriguing.   And as far as education or income impacting the tendency to believe in certain conspiracy theories it is not a far reach to propose that people with less access to good education and information may buy into theories that others could refute based on their knowledge of the facts. 

In fact, most of the time it's very smart people who start these things, which is why they get an immediately large following. 

As far as the US Government being involved in any conspiracy, an old boss and mentor once told me that "The government is too stupid to orchestrate any conspiracy. As individuals, they can be very smart and bright people who went to the best schools secured a great government job, did one great thing, then don't work another day in their lives. But the government as an entity is the stupidest thing that ever existed." -Dr. Richard P. McClellan

Nothing has changed my mind on the topic of Government run conspiracies, and everything I read reinforces this idea. This also holds for every foreign one. Governments are too stupid.

[Groucho Valentine]

I think alot of the big government things people tie conspiracy theories to (Pearl Harbor, JFK, 9/11 etc.) are founded in the spaces created by gross negligence, rather them being some kind of massive machiavellian conspiracy. 

[Lihu]

1 minute ago, Groucho Valentine said:

I think alot of the big government things people tie conspiracy theories to (Pearl Harbor, JFK, 9/11 etc.) are founded in the spaces created by gross negligence, rather them being some kind of massive machiavellian conspiracy. 

I think that's the main concern from many of the agencies who object to making the information regarding JFK public. They're more afraid of this than being found doing something "evil".

[Groucho Valentine]

Just now, Lihu said:

I think that's the main concern from many of the agencies who object to making the information regarding JFK public. They're more afraid of this than being found doing something "evil".

Wouldn't surprise me at all. But i figure alot of the individuals damaged by things like that are probably long dead. 

[Buckeyebowman]

Yes. It was 54 years ago! But the current occupants of positions of power in the law enforcement and intelligence communities will feel slighted if their agencies are found to be negligent or complicit, even though it happened so far in the past.

[colin007]

I love love love JFK stuff. Just recently found out about the Dallas mayor connection, whatever that might mean.