Scientific Study Reveals Conspiracy Theorists The Most Sane Of All!

a reply to: theultimatebelgianjoke

a reply to: OrionsGem

Hats off to the OP for postng this thred.
I looked at the Psychology Today article and I would have dismissed it. It is so full of academic language that I would not have found the relevent sections.Like the Bible conflicting conclusions could be made. I think the OP is correct in his writeup of the article.
As several conspiracy theries were referenced, the posts I have seen about Ebola(tm) amplify the OP's statements. People buying the government line in this matter are rare. Those defending the governments actions are angry. I assume because their paradime of reality is being shaken. And a common thread in this discussion is the government. Why would anyone trust them when the lies are so easy to prove?
So I am a conspiracy theorist because I seek the truth in all things.

a reply to: freeenergymobile

There's no truth in the article, they made up their own conclusions from the study..

www.abovetopsecret.com...

originally posted by: freeenergymobile
a reply to: OrionsGem

Hats off to the OP for postng this thred.
I looked at the Psychology Today article and I would have dismissed it. It is so full of academic language that I would not have found the relevent sections.Like the Bible conflicting conclusions could be made. I think the OP is correct in his writeup of the article.
As several conspiracy theries were referenced, the posts I have seen about Ebola(tm) amplify the OP's statements. People buying the government line in this matter are rare. Those defending the governments actions are angry. I assume because their paradime of reality is being shaken. And a common thread in this discussion is the government. Why would anyone trust them when the lies are so easy to prove?
So I am a conspiracy theorist because I seek the truth in all things.

thanks. Looks like your one of the few who bothered to read the whole thread before posting.

i don't think the average person realizes how amazing it is that we haven't had a real 'nuclear' incident despite humans making pretty much every other mistake and grievance ( to err is human ) - also in this amazingness is the possibility and perhaps probability that 'conspiracy' like 'confidential' technologies and procedures are in place to hold this delicate balance - for better or worse the authors of the constitution and many of its scholars did not expect the possibility of zero-sum nuclear or biological war scenarios - it would be nice to see more truth telling in this regard to help affirm the sanity and perhaps a progression of society of those who may perceive a catch-22 scenario - maybe even a revised constitution could be in order

originally posted by: delgado101
i don't think the average person realizes how amazing it is that we haven't had a real 'nuclear'

incident despite humans making pretty much every other mistake and grievance ( to err is human ) - also in this amazingness is the possibility and perhaps probability that 'conspiracy' like 'confidential' technologies and procedures are in place to hold this delicate balance - for better or worse the authors of the constitution and many of its scholars did not expect the possibility of zero-sum nuclear or biological war scenarios - it would be nice to see more truth telling in this regard to help affirm the sanity and perhaps a progression of society of those who may perceive a catch-22 scenario - maybe even a revised constitution could be in order

Id like to keep our constitution just the way it is thank you very much.

OG

originally posted by: pl3bscheese
a reply to: OrionsGem

Surely you're not talking about my link? No assumption. It is the study referenced.

The words are taken out of context, in order to convey a message not given in the actual study.

In other words, this is sensationalism, and not journalism.

The actual study makes no conclusion that conspiracy theorists are more sane, or thinking more critically.

It talks of their locus of control being externalized, and their belief system having to do with their flavor of conspiracy theories they tend to favor.

I disagree

" Indeed, Wood et al. (2012) demonstrated that even beliefs in directly contradictory conspiracy theories were positively correlated with one another, indicating that conspiracy beliefs may be held together not by direct agreement with one another, but by mutual agreement with higher-order beliefs about the world."

You can probably be quite sure that in terms of the deeper truths, pretty much nothing out there is accurate, whether it's mainstream or alternative.

I have a hypothesis about why all of the alternative truth movement media probably is at best half-truths. There is a very tight power matrix of all the information landscape, all the media. The Internet is probably not all that different. And the real power in society is by nature "in the shadows", that's just a natural consequence of how the world works. My hypothesis is that anyone who reaches a critical mass of people and simultaneously is at a higher level of awareness than people in the alternative media, except perhaps knowing gatekeepers, is silenced in one way or another. It probably serves a purpose. The masses have to become enlightened on their own. This is probably the reason that at least I have such a strong feeling that there is a very sharp line between what is revealed to the masses and what is concealed. So I can with this pretty much give up hope of finding any truth in the media. You have to do your own research into all kinds of material and draw lines between the dots yourself, nobody is going to help you.

The elite might not be directly involved in much of the alternative media, but they probably keep an eye on it. And were they to start spreading too much enlightenment they'd be silenced and they'd probably be working in the shadows from there onward.

Jesus, murdered, Martin Luther King, murdered, Malcolm X, murdered, Gandhi, murdered, John Lennon, murdered, Reagan... wounded.

Bill Hicks





I have written about this before. I think it is for our good, it is a necessary evil. It has to do with the only purpose of the material plane being correction of sin. When you have become so corrected of sin, so enlightened, that you no longer need to be in the material plane, you will pass away from it. I said before that if it wasn't for the burning down of forests we wouldn't be able to read in newspapers about the burning down of forests. Exertion of power is synonymous with enlightenment.

a reply to: OneManArmy, introspectionist

This study shows that conspiracy theorists are the majority and hence more "sane". Less aggressive, more rational.

You're not a heretic anymore if your views are in majority.

They aren't in the majority. You didn't read the paper carefully enough.

We also found that hostility was higher in persuasive arguments made by conventionalists than in those by conspiracists. As 9/11 conspiracism is by and large a minority viewpoint in the West (WorldPublicOpinion.org, 2008), this makes sense: conventionalists, rather than focusing on presenting novel information, instead attempt to enforce conformity to the majority viewpoint (Latané, 1981).

Conspiracy theorists just leave more 'persuasive' conspiracy-related comments on news sites than 'conventionalists' do. This is probably because most 'conventionalists' don't have an urgent need to explain their beliefs or try to convert others to them. Why should they? Their belief is the most widely accepted one.

And far from showing conspiracy theorists to be 'saner' than conventionalists, the authors of the paper point out that

Conspiracy beliefs have been shown to be positively correlated with mistrust of other people (Goertzel, 1994) and authorities (Swami et al., 2010); feelings of powerlessness and low self-esteem (Abalakina-Paap et al., 1999); superstition, beliefs in the paranormal, and schizotypy (Darwin et al., 2011); a perceived lack of control (Hamsher et al., 1968; Whitson and Galinsky, 2008); a Machiavellian approach to social interaction (Douglas and Sutton, 2011); and openness to experience (Swami et al., 2010; but see Swami et al., 2011).

They find no evidence in their study to show that the above conclusions are wrong.

The researchers only studied 9/11 conspiracy theories, but taken all in all, their findings are consistent with my experience of talking with conspiracy theorists of all kinds here on ATS and elsewhere.

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a reply to: MrPlow

The researchers didn't write that anywhere in the study.

Actually, the article does say that.

Moreover, the paper by Swami et al. to which you linked is quoted and acknowledged in the paper we are discussing — though not in that lying 'news' article, obviously.

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To the OP
A flag for bringing to our attention an interesting piece of research, even by way of a tendentious 'news item' that completely misrepresents it. No star for the OP, but a star for admitting you'd misunderstood earlier, even if you seem to have gone back on that now. To put this argument to rest once and for all, here is a comment by the lead author of the study we are discussing. I encourage you to read all of it. It's short.

Setting the record straight on Wood & Douglas, 2013

it’s totally baseless to conclude that conspiracist comments outnumber conventionalist comments – I did the data collection for this study and am positive that this is not the case.

And that, I'm very much afraid, is that.

a reply to: Astyanax

No star for me? Nooooooo!

OG

I do believe in conspiracies just not the outlandish ones without evidence.

To demonstrate the type of conspiracies I believe in the article this thread is based on seems to be one perpetrated by those at Natural News on the conspiracy community by misrepresenting a study purposely or maybe the author and editor is just stupid.

originally posted by: Astyanax
a reply to: OneManArmy, introspectionist
They aren't in the majority. You didn't read the paper carefully enough.

You are right. Actually I didn't read the paper at all, just the article. Sitting here now just a bit because I can't sleep, will soon have to go to work. I might not have read your post very carefully either, so sorry then. I think it's probably harmful to get emotionally attached to any position which is why I don't really care. Besides I already know I'm considered mad and I'm comfortable with it. But some posts have sparked my interest to maybe later look at this subject more.

a reply to: OrionsGem

I did give you a star.

'OP' stands for 'opening post' as well as 'opening poster'.

Did you read Dr Wood's comment?

originally posted by: Astyanax
a reply to: OrionsGem

I did give you a star.

'OP' stands for 'opening post' as well as 'opening poster'.

Did you read Dr Wood's comment?

I did get a star? Yaay!!

OG

a reply to: OrionsGem

Did you read Dr Wood's comment?

originally posted by: Astyanax
a reply to: OrionsGem

Did you read Dr Wood's comment?

No, i apologize, i was busy achieving things offline, in real life. Who is this doctor you squeak of?

OG

a reply to: OrionsGem

Who is this doctor you squeak of?

Ha ha.

Dr Michael Wood is the lead author of the study that, according to you, reveals conspiracy theorists to be the most sane of all. Except that, according to him, it doesn't.

Of course, you're welcome to insist that Dr Wood is wrong about his own scientific work.

originally posted by: Grimpachi
I do believe in conspiracies just not the outlandish ones without evidence.

To demonstrate the type of conspiracies I believe in the article this thread is based on seems to be one perpetrated by those at Natural News on the conspiracy community by misrepresenting a study purposely or maybe the author and editor is just stupid.

Yes the idea that there are NO conspiracies in the world is ridiculous. There certainly are plots and schemes taking place behind closed doors to benefit a select few, but the difference between reality and conspiracy insanity is that they aren't all an interconnected web of evil. EVERYONE is scheming behind EVERYONE'S back. While someone is busying having his back scratched by some guy, that same someone is scratching someone else's back in an effort to undermine the first guy.

This why I think that skeptics are more suited to being saner than conspiracy theorists, because they distrust everything.

a reply to: Astyanax

Conspiracy theorists just leave more 'persuasive' conspiracy-related comments on news sites than 'conventionalists' do. This is probably because most 'conventionalists' don't have an urgent need to explain their beliefs or try to convert others to them. Why should they? Their belief is the most widely accepted one.

yeah god forbid someone should actually think for themselves.....just because a belief is widely accepted does not mean it is correct....

a reply to: Krazysh0t

The opposite of 'conspiracy theorist' isn't 'sceptic'. The opposite of 'conspiracy theorist' is 'normal person'.

You may be an exception, Krazysh0t, but I don't believe non-conspiracy theorists habitually adopt an attitude of scepticism to every proposition they are faced with. Many of us believe in completely fallacious things — that gods exist, that all men are created equal, that the odds on red improve every time the wheel turns up black — but our grasp of everyday reality is no less firm for that. We judge what we are told by how well it fits in with what we already know (or think we know) and accept or reject it accordingly.

Even throughgoing materialists take most of what they are told on trust. I accept that Elvis Presley sang That's Alright Mama and do not doubt that the tea in my cup comes from Sri Lanka, as it says on the tin. I have not rigorously tested either belief and certainly do not plan to.

You don't have to be a sceptic to reject conspiracy theories; you just have to be grounded in the real world.

What we interpret as reality, a conspiracy theorist takes to be an elaborate mask or disguise in which the world has been dressed in order to deceive him. The study we've been discussing is not the first to indicate that believers in one conspiracy are likely to believe in others, even when the beliefs contradict one another. You see examples of this all the time on Above Top Secret. As the authors point out, this lability of belief suggests that what makes a conspiracy theorist is not the theory or theories he believes in but what he disbelieves in: namely, the world as it presents itself to us in everyday experience and common knowledge.

Try as I might, I cannot see a weakness for conspiracy theories as anything but a pathology. Conspiracy theorists, to me, are folk who have lost touch with reality. They are mad, and often dangerous to others as well as to themselves. We see plenty of examples of such madness on this site: people who refuse to have their children vaccinated, endangering us all; people who embrace false and useless remedies for the ills that plague them and sometimes die or cripple themselves as a result; poor souls who go digging in their own flesh to find 'mind control transceivers' and 'Morgellons fibres'; maniacs who live for the day 'TSHTF' and they can break out their cans of beans and their assault rifles and go feral, they way they've always wanted to do.

Most ATSers are conspiracy tourists for whom this forum is mainly a place to entertain themselves by arguing for or against propositions that really mean very little to them. They haven't really bought into the confabulatory mindset, and they will mostly soon lose interest and move on. But there are plenty of members who believe devoutly that the world as it seems is a work of prestidigitation. They are not the opposite of sceptics, Krazysh0t. They are the opposite of normal.

Despite its unpromising start, this has been a very interesting and perhaps even useful thread, because it has alerted many of us to research into conspiracy theories and theorists that we did not previously know existed. It's an ill wind that blows no-one any good.

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a reply to: hopenotfeariswhatweneed

yeah god forbid someone should actually think for themselves....

I assure you that people who reject conspiracy theories do think for themselves. Thinking for myself, I have concluded that conspiracy theories are false and that conspiracy theorists are deluded.

just because a belief is widely accepted does not mean it is correct...

Indeed. I give some examples above, in my reply to Krazysh0t. But a belief that is confined to a minority is no more likely to be true; indeed, it has a far greater chance of being false. The way to tell the difference is to do what none of you conspiracy types will do, and that is to take the trouble to examine the evidence in detail. But, as I suggest in my reply to Krazysh0t, if you really need to do that you're probably in trouble already. A sane person, with common sense and slightly better than average general knowledge, doesn't really need to submit evey proposition put to him to an evidential test to judge it true or false; it is usually immediately obvious from the character of the proposition itself. Obvious, that is, to people who have not lost their grip on reality.