...
I probably use the word "chungus" waaaay too much when I'm looking at pictures of animals, along with "chonkster", "fuzzbutt", "booper-dooper", "dooter-paws", and "thicc-boi/girle". Cute animals make me lose my composure.
@Invisible_Touch: Wait, who were you directing that at? Was it me? @squeakytoy? @LyleLuvsHuggles? You didn't tag anyone—you could be addressing anyone, or even multiple people. That's so.... Dude, that's so passive-aggressive. I'm in awe.
Consider also, for some people there may be a
5) Need to have something to be afraid of
I was brought up during the Cold War. If you wanted something to be afraid of, it was easy - just be afraid of the Soviets/Americans/Commies depending on which side of the Iron Curtain you lived. Most of us weren't afraid, of course. Concerned, yes, but not afraid.
Fundamentalist terrorists of whatever persuasion tickles your fancy can fill that slot nowadays, but they are all a bit fringe and obvious and unconvincing. No good at all if Uncle Sam can save you. Need something a bit more mysterious.
I'm just hypothesising, I don't know if this is really true.
Regrettably, the Mirriam Webster definition 1. Theory is not quite right.
An hypothesis is a conjecture. You can make it up in the bath. "I wonder if ....."
The essence of a scientific theory is that it takes an hypothesis and develops into a testable prediction. The "wave theory of light" for example, is a comprehensive term for a bundle of sub-theories. Such a theory might be, "If a monochromatic point light source is directed towards a pair of slits such-and-such width and distance apart, then a particular diffraction pattern will be seen on a screen placed behind the slits." When such a pattern is indeed observed by several independent experimenters, we can say that this is indeed evidence that light has a wave-like nature in that particular circumstance.
For a consiracy (or any) theory to be a true theory in the scientific sense, therefore, it must make a testable prediction. Conspiracy hypotheses would be a more accurate name for them.
The distinguishing feature of a conspiracy theory is that it promotes an hypothesis directly to the elevation of indisputable fact without passing through the intermediate stages of [true] theory, experiment, observation, analysis, and refinement of the theory by repeated passes through these stages.
One of the ironies of the whole 'Conspiracy' thing is that a considerable minority of them are initiated or encouraged by the CIA (and other government agencies around the world) for one reason or another. For example, we now know that the CIA promoted the Roswell incident as being connected to aliens as a cover up for technology research.
The irony of all this being that the people who claim that this, that or the other is being done to control us, are in fact the people being controlled.
Uh oh... my spidey senses are telling me that this thread might close soon.
@CuddleDuncan: Now, there's a thought. Needing something to be afraid of? I hadn't considered that possibility, and it's an intriguing one. You'd think there'd be enough real things to be frightened of.
But, come to think of it, maybe that's the key.
Conspiracy hypothesizers typically know virtually everything about their pet conspiracy hypotheses—and knowledge removes the fear of the unknown.
They need something to fear that they understand completely, or near-completely: a fear that's graspable, manageable.
@UltimateChungus You've got it backwards in your difference of conspiracies and conspiracy theories.
A conspiracy is an established, known, substantiated or proven conspiracy, such as ones documented like Watergate or militia plots or traceable hacking plots by governments or corporations.
A conspiracy theory is one that has not been established or substantiated or proven, it can be based on facts, though is more often these days based on twisting of evidence, lies by omission, and things just made up out of whole cloth.
Way too many people now believe the latter and reject the former. It's due to the 5th estate, people feeling more economic suppression, and propaganda being more easily spread through things like Facebook and YouTube and Twitter etc. You can basically choose your own reality now and provide any meme, video, or link to "prove" your fierce hardened feelings. Those turn into conspiracy theories.
The upside with more exposure from more people is that more lies and abuses from authority are exposed, but the downside of that is people become more distrustful of the establishment and the system and authority, feeding into belief in made-up conspiracy theories on youtube and such. It's a virtuous spiral of exposure that's created a vicious spiral of bullcrap, and when people keep getting let down by the system, they'll tend to pick the bullcrap if it pokes the eye of the establishment.
This is how the US Capital Trump Q-Anon riots happened, with people beating police with blue-line flags, to get into Congress to try to force them to overthrow an election for someone they liked, likely against their own values of voting being a Constitutional part of the democratic and republic process... the whole thing is insane.
So it's important to distinguish properly when a conspiracy isn't actually one, as in being just a theory: when it isn't established based on proof or the preponderance of substantive evidence, or at least admitted to by the accused where the evidence does line up... and I've heard "conspiracy theory" used in media of all sizes far more as "it's just a theory" whereas "conspiracy" is used as "there's actual proof for this" than the other way around.
@davebutton: Fair point. But I still don't think they deserve the name "theory"—they haven't earned it.
"Conspiracy hypothesis" is far more accurate. I'll probably go with that.
Seriously though, I hope this thread doesn't get closed! I'm really enjoying reading the serious responses to the original question, regardless of whether the people responding disagree with each other, think the post was started in bad faith, etc.
@TheMidnightOwl, @DarrenWalker, @CuddleDuncan, and @DaveButton, thank you guys: I particularly enjoyed all of your responses and appreciated the thought and effort behind them.
@DarrenWalker You're probably referring to general scientific usage of the word "theory" rather than journalistic, though not all of those require evidence either... they can be based on math, or a hunch, or somebody's feelings. I know because I've seen them,many in crank science, though some cranky-looking stuff has been proven to be true.
Here's some useful definitions I found on the internet (because I don't have my own Pocket God):
a supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something, especially one based on general principles independent of the thing to be explained.
a set of principles on which the practice of an activity is based.
an idea used to account for a situation or justify a course of action. of ideas intended to explain something, especially one based on general principles independent of the thing to be explained.
In everyday use, the word "theory" often means an untested hunch, or a guess without supporting evidence. But for scientists, a theory has nearly the opposite meaning. A theory is a well-substantiated explanation of an aspect of the natural world that can incorporate laws, hypotheses and facts.
A hypotheses generally requires more evidence:
a supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation.
A hypothesis is a proposed explanation for a phenomenon. For a hypothesis to be a scientific hypothesis, the scientific method requires that one can test it. Scientists generally base scientific hypotheses on previous observations that cannot satisfactorily be explained with the available scientific theories.
To me, popular current political conspiracy theories, especially the ones that cause violence, are generally based on crap, and require little critical thinking or much evidence. Memes and videos and tweets are easy, and are conspiracy theory factories. Real conspiracies however generally are long in the making, have a ton of evidence, and only become more undeniable over time.
@davebutton, @DarrenWalker I propose "Conspiracy Hunch", LOL
I'm having coffee before I come back and deal with this thread and the multiple flags.
Cuddle on.
Aw. My thread is going to get put down because of trolls, isn't it?
Maybe I can save it by turning all of my posts into images of random things!
Thanks, @Sideon.
@squeakytoy: Ha! Conspiracy hunch. "I've got a hunch that there's a conspiracy here—my muffins keep going stale far earlier than I expect them to!"
I think that, in many ways, it's easier for the human brain to invent connections than to look at what's actually there. I mean, the human brain is great at that! It's how we get constellations from unconnected stars, and pictures in clouds.
No, @UltimateChungus - I'm not closing it.
@Sideon
...crap. Well. Thank you.
@UltimateChungus Don't get me wrong, I'm laughing my ass off at your shenanigans, but @Sideon gonna whup yo ass when he finishes his coffee You better get out those images quick.
@DarrenWalker It's a conspiracy to get you to buy more muffins! Your hunch was correct!
@squeakytoy: He didn't save any of his stuff. Because he's a dweeb. So. It's all Pikachu now. Hail the giant lightning monster conspiracy. Maybe there'll be muffins.
@DarrenWalker
Please stop hitting me. I've realized that I goofed.
@UltimateChungus: No.
But I apologized!
Okay, so, to anyone who's confused by the swarms of Pikachu:
I thought the thread was going to be shut down, and I believed that I may have been able to salvage things by changing my posts into images of everyone's favorite electric mouse.
But then I was informed that the thread would not be shut down. At least not yet. So now I look like a doofus.
Be assured, all of my posts were well-worded, insightful, and exceedingly clever—as you've all come to expect of your friendly neighborhood chungus.
I apologize for depriving you all of much entertainment. I am going to go sulk, as soon as Darren stops hitting me.
This...
...is absolutely hilarious. Attack of the Pikachus.
I almost had coffee out my nose.
I do need to respond to some of the flags. Gimme a sec.
@DarrenWalker you've taken me one step further. I've always wondered if conpiracy hypthesisers/hunchers/theorists truly believe the things they purport to believe. My hunch is that they don't. That is why they sometimes get angry when their beliefs are challenged - in their hearts they know that the 'theory' will not survive a thorough examination, and thus the theorist (themselves) will be humiliated.
This whole process then becomes one of safety. The huncher feels uncertain and afraid in the world: they latch on to an uncertain danger and place all their fears into that. Then they learn as much as they can about that danger, which reduces the fear. Indeed it can convert the fear into contempt, perhaps more of others who do not share the fear than the thing itself, but nonetheless.
And the fear is reduced further because they know that truly it doesn't exist. In other words all their unconscious fear is located a thing which their conscious mind is not afraid of because it has knowledge; and their semiconscious mind is not afraid of because it knows that there is no actual danger.
Again, I've no idea if this is right I'm just hypothesising.
I've only ever knowingly met one such person. It was at a dinner party or something. He claimed that the Moon landings were faked and we had never been. I was intrigued by this, and asked which bit he thought was faked. I started with the launch of the Saturn V rocket. Broadcast live on TV and witnessed by thousands of people. He was happy to concede that that part was probably real.
He was uncomfortable with my questioning but I persisted, politely, in between filling his glass. Eventually he admitted that only the landing itself was faked: a spaceship with men in it really did go to the Moon, orbit it and come back safely. At that point I changed the subject, I had no desire to ruin his evening.
You bastards I was writing an intelligent and thoughtful post and all the time you were turning the place into a, a, a, grrrrr!!
Did you plan this? Have you been PM'ing each other just to humiliate and embarrass me? This is a conspiracy, isn't it??! 🙄
Edit: emphasis
@CuddleDuncan
No, I assure you, I'm just a moron.