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The Problem of Conspiracism (redux)
23 Plays4 years ago
Josh and M reach into the "can" to pull out a redo of "The Problem of Conspiracism."
—
Josh is @monkeyfluids and M is @conspiracism on Twitter
You can also contact us at: podcastconspiracy@gmail.com
You can learn more about M’s academic work at: http://mrxdentith.com
Why not support The Podcaster's Guide to the Conspiracy by donating to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/podcastersguidetotheconspiracy
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Transcript
Introduction and Douglas Adams Reference
00:00:00
Speaker
The podcast's Guide to the Conspiracy has the following to say about probability theory.
00:00:13
Speaker
In the course of a normal podcast, this process takes between three to five years. But the predicament one Josh Addison of Onihanga, Auckland, New Zealand find himself in is an unusual one. After all, his podcast is named after the eponymous guide, and thus he, and by extension the podcast itself, has resembled a Douglas Adams reference since the middle of 2014.
Petunias and Whales: A Metaphor
00:00:41
Speaker
Oh no, not again. Josh has turned into a bowl of petunias, which is currently in the process of descending inelegantly towards the surface of the planet Magrathia. In the distance, somehow able to sense despite having no sensory organs fit to the task, he can see one Dr. M.R.X. Denteth standing at the window of the ship, the Heart of Gold.
00:01:07
Speaker
To say that Josh is a seething mass of resentment over his predicament is to downplay his general disposition of resentment, seething or otherwise, that he feels generally. What he can't see is that somewhere in the distance a whale, also inelegantly placed in the gravity well surrounding the planet, is having a much better time of falling to its death.
00:01:32
Speaker
But the entry in the podcasters guide to the conspiracy on what happens to a set a session in a decaying orbit around the planet is a matter for another time. The podcasters guide to the conspiracy starring Dr.
Conspiracism: An Introduction
00:01:48
Speaker
M.R. Extenteth and featuring Josh Addison as the interlocutor.
00:01:55
Speaker
Hello, you're listening to the Podcaster's Guide to the Conspiracy. I'm Josh Addison, and sitting next to me there are low-down gangster set, trippin' banger, and their homies are down, so don't arouse their anger. It's Dr. M. R.X. Denteth. And I do like those classic intros. Hit me with your rhythm sticks. Both of them. Bit of Coolio. That's under special skills on my resume. It's can fold a fitted sheet and knows all the words to Gangster's Paradise by Coolio.
00:02:25
Speaker
including every time he says fool, which is important. Anyway, we're going back, back, back to the basics again. Indeed, back to actually a fairly early episode, one which is not as late in the history of the podcast as Guide to the Conspiracy as I initially thought, truth be told. I actually thought this occurred much later on.
00:02:48
Speaker
but actually it's kind of in the first 12 episodes or so, we are talking about the thesis of conspiracism. Right, now conspiracism as we all know is Dr. Dentist's Twitter handle, so I assume we're here to talk about Twitter for the next 30 minutes or so. I mean we could, we could talk about Twitter, and in fact probably at some point we should talk about Twitter, but not today Joshua! No, we're talking about
00:03:13
Speaker
a term which has an ambivalent meaning depending on who you're talking to. So, conspiracism is either just another term for generic belief in conspiracy theories or sometimes taken to be a generic term for conspiracy theorising.
00:03:32
Speaker
sometimes known as conspiracy ideation, and it's kind of associated with the term conspiracist playing the role of conspiracy theorists. So for some people, conspiracism and conspiracy theorists are exactly the same as talking about conspiracy theorizing and conspiracy theorists.
Rational vs. Irrational Conspiracy Theories
00:03:53
Speaker
But there's also a school of thought in amongst the conspiracy theory theorists, the people who study conspiracy theory, that conspiracism is a very special kind of belief in conspiracy theories, one which is by definition either prima facie irrational, so has no epistemic basis whatsoever,
00:04:17
Speaker
or is psychologically problematic indicates that the person has formed a belief about the existence of a conspiracy in a psychologically problematic fashion. So they suffer from paranoia or something close to it, or they have psychological factors that lead them to belief in the existence of conspiracies where none exist.
00:04:41
Speaker
Right, so this sounds like a useful distinction to make if you believe that some conspiracy theories are warranted and some are not, and some types of conspiracy theorising are good and some are not, but a less useful one if you are of the opinion that all conspiracy theories are nonsense and conspiracy theorising in general is bunk.
00:05:02
Speaker
So yeah, I guess it's only an issue in that second case where you're wanting to draw a distinction. Is it a useful distinction to draw? Well, yes and no. So it kind of all depends on definitions.
00:05:19
Speaker
If you are someone like myself or like ourselves who believes that conspiracy theorising can be rational, and indeed in a variety of different situations, belief in a conspiracy theory turns out to be rational, and using Charles Pigton's adage here, if you are politically or historically literate, you kind of have to be a conspiracy theorist because conspiracy theories are, sorry, conspiracies are littered through history,
00:05:46
Speaker
And theories about those conspiracies are littered through history as well, many of which were warranted or justified according to the evidence at the time. So you've got your Watergate, you've got your Moscow show trials, you've got your assassination of Caesar, you've got your Elizabethan court intrigues. These are all examples of conspiracies which occurred that people theorized at the time.
00:06:10
Speaker
Then if you're working with a pejorative definition of conspiracism, the worry here is you might be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Influence of Definitions on Perception
00:06:21
Speaker
And it kind of all depends once again, how are you defining conspiracy theory? Because that kind of tells you your opinion on conspiracism and conspiracists.
00:06:34
Speaker
So, yeah, so if you think conspiracism just means belief in conspiracy theory, then there's nothing for us to talk about, I suppose. But in the case where you want to say that there's a difference between conspiracy theories that are inherently irrational and ones that are
00:06:55
Speaker
not necessarily inherently rational, I suppose, but not inherently irrational, then it could be a useful distinction to draw. It sounds a little bit like just sort of a way of giving people an out, though. It sounds a little bit like
00:07:14
Speaker
if people people who don't want to sorry making this up on the fly and i have a point i'm just i'm sorry we will let you get there we will let you get there you have people who want to draw distinctions you have people who don't want to draw distinctions and i wonder if this is
00:07:32
Speaker
a way that people can say, oh yes, there is a, like the particular views wants to say conspiracy theories need to be evaluated on their merits. And this seems like it's going possibly for a halfway point saying there's a certain kind of conspiracy theory or conspiracy theorizing that doesn't need to be evaluated on its methods because this one kind of it is irrational and therefore can be disregarded, but there's this other kind that isn't and that's okay. It kind of sounds like it's trying to have its cake and eat it.
00:08:02
Speaker
Yes, so there are kind of two points to make here. The first is there's a notion of what Yuhar Reicher calls the fantastical conspiracy a position which is actually talked about by both Yuhar and Lee Basham in a recent work.
00:08:21
Speaker
And the fantastical conspiracy theory is kind of your David Icke alien shapeshifting reptile conspiracy theory. It's so obviously fantastical that we can kind of discard it and go, this is unlikely to be true. We can treat it as being fantastical. Don't treat these particular conspiracy theories seriously.
00:08:42
Speaker
And so you might go, well, conspiracism describes that kind of fantastical belief in conspiracy theories. Now, it's debatable as to whether there is any mark of the fantastic to any particular conspiracy theory. I personally don't think that alien shapeshifting reptiles are likely in control of the human population.
00:09:05
Speaker
I also think we should probably investigate that claim just to make sure, because it could be true. It's very unlikely, but it could be true. And I don't think that just because it mentions alien shapeshifting lizards, we should immediately dismiss it without there being at least one or two people doing the hard graph to go, yeah, let's just check the evidence for this. Because if it turns out to be true, we should probably know about it.
The Role of Academics in Conspiracy Perception
00:09:35
Speaker
So on that level, I think we can kind of push it to one side. But the real worry is many of the academics working in the conspiracy theory theory literature treat conspiracism in the pejorative sense of completely irrational or psychologically problematic as being the greatest set of belief in conspiracy theories. So they kind of turn the tables and go, well,
00:10:05
Speaker
Most conspiracy theorizing is conspiracist in nature. Conspiricism is bad, ipso facto. Conspiracy theorizing is largely bad. That gives us a reason to dismiss conspiracy theory. Right, yeah, I suppose that is a point, isn't it? If you're gonna draw the distinction, then there comes the question of where do you draw the line? Yeah, what is the balance? And that's why definitions are important here. Because if you take the kind of definition we work with,
00:10:34
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in this podcast and in my academic work that conspiracies are common and it's relatively common to find examples of conspiracy theories which are warranted, then conspiracism is a small subset
00:10:50
Speaker
if it exists at all, we'll get on to that in a minute, of belief in conspiracy theories generally. And that flows from the definition that because conspiracies are common, conspiracy theories are going to be relatively common given the kind of society we live in. But if you take it that actual conspiracies are rare,
00:11:11
Speaker
because your definition of conspiracy theory is so restrictive it doesn't admit things like surprise parties and the like, then you're going to go, well, conspiracism is more common, ipso facto, most belief in conspiracy theories is, by definition, irrational.
00:11:28
Speaker
So you mentioned David Icke a minute ago. Is that sort of thing the template, if we're going to buy this conspiracy theorising distinction, is David Icke the sort of person people are thinking
The Complexity of Icke and Jones
00:11:42
Speaker
of then? David Icke, if you're from the UK, Alex Jones, if you're from the US, Lauren Fortuna, if you're from Romania,
00:11:50
Speaker
Victor Orban, if you're from Hungary, basically there's going to be, I mean, Ian Wishart would probably be our example in Aotearoa, New Zealand. There are lots of examples of people that people claim are irrational believers in conspiracy theories, who they then associate with belief in conspiracy theories generally. Is there a fair thing to say, do you think?
00:12:16
Speaker
I think not, actually. I mean, it seems an odd thing to now be defending David Icke and Alex Jones. But I think there are two points to make here. One, if you actually start looking at Alex Jones' beliefs or David Icke's beliefs, it turns out that actually they have fairly sophisticated arguments for their particular claims of conspiracy.
00:12:39
Speaker
Now, the arguments often operate on very interesting assumptions that aren't shared by the likes of you or me. And the kind of evidence they use is the kind of thing which we might think collectively doesn't strongly point in a conspiratorial direction. But it's not clear that they have a prima facie irrational or psychological disposition to believe in these conspiracy theories. They at least act in a way
00:13:09
Speaker
where they're presenting reasons and arguments for their conclusions. And as listeners to this podcast know, I've been to multiple David Icke talks now. And these are eight hour sessions where he very slowly and methodically lays out his rationale.
00:13:28
Speaker
for the existence of an alien shape-shifting reptile or iconic virus conspiracy. And even he pokes fun at the, you know, initially it sounds ridiculous but follow the evidence and it seems sensible way that he approaches things. So it's not clear that they are
00:13:48
Speaker
irrational epistemically or irrational psychologically. They are presenting very strong arguments. They're just presenting arguments in a fashion that many, and I'm putting in scare quotes, sensible people find to be a bit weird. The other thing, of course, is that many of the critics of people like David Icke and Alex Jones will then argue that they do it for the money.
00:14:10
Speaker
Yes, so their beliefs aren't actually genuine in the first place.
00:14:40
Speaker
I mean, of course, in that case, you could then just go on and say, well, OK, they don't believe it, but plenty of the people who listen to them do. So there's your conspiracists then in the first place. Well, yeah. But yeah, I think in some of the... And you can sort of see a progression of developing beliefs over the time. You can kind of see that with Ian Wishart, too. I don't really know a lot of his history, but I know he did start... The wine box.
00:15:03
Speaker
Yeah, he was a respected journalist, and there was the wine box inquiry, and sort of the impression one gets is that he stumbled on a genuine conspiracy and then started seeing them everywhere, but then stuff, I think that a lot of his views are informed by his religious beliefs and other things like that and so on, but it did sort of seem, to outwardize it, it kind of seemed like he went crazy, quote unquote, that he certainly, there was a gradual sort of movement from what we would consider
00:15:32
Speaker
Yeah, more logical conspiracy theorizing to your more conspiracies. Well yeah, so Wishart is a classic case of he was right once about the wine box inquiry and now believes he's right about everything. So he hid upon the right way to investigate the wine box inquiry
00:15:49
Speaker
for non-New Zealanders. That was a massive tax rort being operated through the Cook Islands by our millionaire class back in the 80s and 90s. There were a whole bunch of tax documents leaked to MP Winston Peters in a wine box, thus the name.
00:16:10
Speaker
When it was investigated it was discovered there were these loopholes in taxation law which allowed people to basically funnel money out of the country to the Cook Islands, a tax haven, to avoid paying tax here. It was a big scandal, things were tightened up because of it and Winston Peters and Ian Wishart were tarred as conspiracy theorists
00:16:33
Speaker
at the time for promoting this particular story, despite the fact it turns out they were completely right.
Ian Wishart: A Case Study
00:16:40
Speaker
And Wishart seems to have taken the, I was called a conspiracy theorist for believing that the wine box inquiry was actually real and it turned out I was right. I'm also correct in thinking that Helen Clark's a lesbian and intelligent design is true. Because they're saying the same things about me now. Yes.
00:16:58
Speaker
So okay, so we have your wish arts and your joinses and your ikes and if you don't want to call them conspiracists because they do seem to have a rational framework behind their beliefs even if maybe it's one of those cases of starting with a wonky premise but then sort of quote-unquote rationally following it to conclusions. Are there any people who would legitimately be called as conspiracists then? Possibly. So
00:17:26
Speaker
Clinical paranoia, in a psychological sense, people who think they're being conspired against by members of the public and their families, probably actually do qualify as being conspiracists, because these are people who do not have a sound, evidential basis for their particular clinical paranoia. So that's obviously an issue, and that seems to dovetail quite nicely with conspiracism.
00:17:56
Speaker
But that's probably it. That's probably as close as we get. Is that like the targeted individuals that we've looked at in the past? I would say so, yes. I mean, unless you believe there is a large-scale state conspiracy against these people and these particular individuals in particular, then yes, it's very likely.
00:18:15
Speaker
that actually they are suffering from paranoia. And their paranoia seems to be a perfect match for what people call conspiracism. But that's an incredibly rare thing in the human population generally. So if these people qualify, they are a tiny subset of people who believe in conspiracies against them. And it's certainly not normal belief in conspiracy theory as we find elsewhere.
00:18:43
Speaker
Okay, so if we have the distinction between conspiracist and conspiracy theorists, for starters, taking it as read that we do want to draw that distinction, and yet it seems like what really anything you could legitimately describe as being conspiracist thinking is fairly rare, is it then a useful distinction to make in the first place?
Conspiracism vs. General Belief
00:19:05
Speaker
On one hand, no, because on one hand, basically the problem of conspiracism, as I see it, and I've got an article with that exact name, the problem of conspiracism, not as I see it, that would be a silly title, is that people conflate conspiracism with belief in conspiracy theories generally. So it's unhelpful as a term,
00:19:28
Speaker
because people assume it means the same thing and then act as they do. And I've written several pieces now which have pointed out that people use the term interchangeably and it's a problem.
00:19:40
Speaker
On the other hand, it does explain or at least describe a particular kind of really hard to talk about belief in conspiracy theory, the belief in conspiracy theories that some people have, which appears to be not at all evidence-based.
00:20:00
Speaker
And if you want to talk about conspiracy theories under the terms of particularism, then you kind of have to talk about the fact there are some people out there who do seem to believe in conspiracy theories without being concerned about the particulars of evidence.
00:20:17
Speaker
So on one hand, it's an awful term, it's a hindrance to how we talk about things. On the other hand, it's very useful for describing a very small subsection of the population. We just have to be cautious that we then don't use that to describe all conspiracy theorists. And I've been taken to task by other people in the conspiracy theory discipline for using conspiracism as a handle and title for things.
00:20:46
Speaker
So the fact that I call my Twitter handle Conspiracism is because, oh, you're just aiding and abetting people who do that particular type of analysis.
Humor and Criticism in Conspiracism
00:20:54
Speaker
Despite the fact that it's quite obvious, I'm using that as a joke. And indeed, this very podcast is hosted at Conspiracism.podbean.com. Indeed. Wackiness. Where, if you wanted to give us a few bucks a month, you get access to patron bonus content.
Supporting the Podcast
00:21:11
Speaker
Yes, sorry, ignore my no-hang-on, I was...
00:21:14
Speaker
I actually thought we were recording another Patreon episode. No, no, we're not. But we know we're recording a real episode. We are. Although... I thought you had suddenly gone mad, and yet it was I. You've been mad into... Josh, we have never, ever actually recorded a podcast at all. We just sit in this room, because Anna gets concerned that you just don't talk to enough people during the course of the week, so... I just provide you with some human company. Oh, well, there we go. It's a good, important social service.
00:21:43
Speaker
Bless you. Why do we keep buying lights though? I don't know. You keep buying lights. But that's because I have to make you feel happy. Okay, well that's all right then. Are you happy Josh? Me. That's better than last week. I'm of the MTV generation. I feel neither highs nor lows. It's true. Then again that's also during New Zealander you expressed neither highs nor lows. Well there's a bit of that as well.
00:22:10
Speaker
Yeah, so anyway, that's an interesting, another one of the foundational, I suppose, bits of your philosophy of conspiracy theories. Indeed. It's always nice to come back and revisit these things.
00:22:21
Speaker
So there we go, that's another one of these episodes in the can. Indeed, now of course there'll be a patron bonus episode associated in this particular episode which exists out of time. Josh, what will we be discussing in that patron bonus episode? Could be anything at all. Give me a concrete example of something we will definitely be discussing.
00:22:41
Speaker
Well, I mean, given that Patreon episodes are generally news episodes, I expect we'll be discussing the news that, oh, I don't know, it turns out Mars is actually made out of jam and that's the colour and the powers that be don't want you to know because the abundance of free jam in the solar system would cause the jam markets to collapse. And of course, the shocking revelation that Dame Judi Dench and Vin Diesel share the same child. And in fact, are the same person.
00:23:10
Speaker
from the time of Julius Caesar's Republic. It's a very massive conspiracy theory, that one. Yeah, so I assume that's what we'll be talking about. I can't imagine anything else would come up in between now and then.
00:23:23
Speaker
So you don't think there's going to be an update on the whole Andy Bichago travels through time to defeat Space Hitler at the dawn of history? Probably not. No, probably not. Actually, we should be checking in to see whether the Andy 2020 campaign is actually going to be live and a while, although that does rather date the spare episode, although we are kind of burning through these at a rate of knots anyway.
00:23:45
Speaker
Well, we're recording this before the Christmas break of 2019, so chances are we have plenty of excuse to not put up any episodes whatsoever for a while, so we shouldn't need this bonus episode. We shouldn't need to take this episode out of the can for a wee while yet. Although there's a potential complication that may cause issue, but we'll talk about that after the podcast.
00:24:11
Speaker
Well, so, episode in the can. The dark gods are pleased once more. The rusty can, which I must thrust my hand into, remove the episodes from, is once again, filled.
00:24:24
Speaker
and full of episodes. So I guess all it remains then to say is goodbye in some fashion, and then stop recording and then go about our lives. I'm going to say Twitley Lumps. Right, well I'm just going to say goodbye. Twitley Lumps. You've been listening to the podcast's Guide to the Conspiracy, hosted by Josh Addison and M. Denter. If you'd like to help support us, please find details of our pledge drive at either Patreon or Podbean.
00:24:50
Speaker
If you'd like to get in contact with us, email us at podcastconspiracy at gmail.com.