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nfe wrote:
Folklore is famously difficult to define in anthropological terms (just like religion and myth). Put simply, some definitions of folklore will overlap with some definitions of conspiracy theory, but on a case-by-case basis there are probably few narratives that can be categorised as both.

I would agree with this, though I also wonder if in a way conspiarcy theories have become the 'new folklore'. There really isn't room in modern society for urban and local legend like in earlier eras. Especially in modern cities and suburbs. We don't get stories like the Bell Witch anymore. While the two seem to me to be distinct things that sometimes overlap, I do think folklore and conspiracy theories fulfill a similar need in people to personalize the world a bit more and structure it into something that is personally understandable. Folklore also has an element of community identification. People could know where other people came from by what they knew about the area around them, and it enhanced a community's sense of ownership of their space. CT can be kind of like that too, but without the space component and we do live in a time when communities are far less defined by spaces.

endlesswaltz123 wrote:
I feel like a lot of abduction stories are the combination of peoples lack of understanding of a deep sleep state (and the process your brain goes through, be they logical or not) and a lack of ability to critique their own experiences, essentially removing themselves from the experience to be objective about it - elements of this are also linked to the mandela effect.

Sleep paralysis is a big factor in abduction stories. Also with lots of old folktales about demons (esp. succubi & incubi), 'night hags', etc.

It's WILD if you've ever experienced it. Fortunately I didn't have the horrific hallucinations some people get. I just saw a dark mass and sensed malevolence the first time. After that one, no hallucinations but the paralysis was real. Even the most skeptical inquirer could think he/she had a paranormal experience. Trust me, it's really something.

 gorgon wrote:
Sleep paralysis is a big factor in abduction stories. Also with lots of old folktales about demons (esp. succubi & incubi), 'night hags', etc.

It's WILD if you've ever experienced it. Fortunately I didn't have the horrific hallucinations some people get. I just saw a dark mass and sensed malevolence the first time. After that one, no hallucinations but the paralysis was real. Even the most skeptical inquirer could think he/she had a paranormal experience. Trust me, it's really something.

I feel like while I've never had this particular experience, I've definitely had dreams that in the moment seemed extremely real and caused a real sense of distress while they were occurring. I didn't use to take good care of my teeth for example, so I had lots of cavities. Around that time I had a pretty damn vivid dream about all my teeth falling out and the following panic felt really damn real. It's one way to get into the habit of brushing and flossing XD

The "teeth falling out" is a common one along with the "dark shape looming over you". Sleep paralysis is a nasty one that I've had a few times - really scary to wake up too. Though I find that once I realise I know what's going on I'm reasonably (as far as I can tell) good at going "ok its just sleep paralysis; just go back to sleep and it will all be over"

Huh. I just assumed it was because I had poor dental hygiene XD Didn't know it was something more common.

 Overread wrote:
The "teeth falling out" is a common one along with the "dark shape looming over you". Sleep paralysis is a nasty one that I've had a few times - really scary to wake up too. Though I find that once I realise I know what's going on I'm reasonably (as far as I can tell) good at going "ok its just sleep paralysis; just go back to sleep and it will all be over"

Yep, once you learn to relax the paralysis passes quickly. I haven't had it in many years though. Think it's most common in the late teens and early 20s IIRC, and that's when I had it. Sleep disorders are no joke.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LordofHats wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
Sleep paralysis is a big factor in abduction stories. Also with lots of old folktales about demons (esp. succubi & incubi), 'night hags', etc.

It's WILD if you've ever experienced it. Fortunately I didn't have the horrific hallucinations some people get. I just saw a dark mass and sensed malevolence the first time. After that one, no hallucinations but the paralysis was real. Even the most skeptical inquirer could think he/she had a paranormal experience. Trust me, it's really something.

I feel like while I've never had this particular experience, I've definitely had dreams that in the moment seemed extremely real and caused a real sense of distress while they were occurring. I didn't use to take good care of my teeth for example, so I had lots of cavities. Around that time I had a pretty damn vivid dream about all my teeth falling out and the following panic felt really damn real. It's one way to get into the habit of brushing and flossing XD

First time it happened, I was trying to yell to my mom, whom I could hear eating breakfast in the kitchen. But all that came out was a little squeak. As the dark malevolent mass seemingly 'sat' on my chest, mind you. Then after a bit the paralysis and hallucination faded. Those were some long moments, though. It's crazy gak. Some people get much more vivid (and terrifying) hallucinations, and that has to be bananas.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
OK doke. Totes subtle change of direction away, away from the religious edge. I know it’s genuinely hard to keep away from it with certain CTs, but I think we need a breather.

Here’s a corker I don’t think has come up yet....Mud Flood...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW_RjfMVXX8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf4IlAs1WDE

Oh yeah. This is hilarious, and completely mental (the CT, not the videos!)

So many questions.... Even the debunking videos left me feeling like they lowered my IQ just by watching them(I could only make it half way through both). Really what the ?

Oh yeah!

MUD FLOOD, BABY!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gorgon wrote:

 Overread wrote:
The "teeth falling out" is a common one along with the "dark shape looming over you". Sleep paralysis is a nasty one that I've had a few times - really scary to wake up too. Though I find that once I realise I know what's going on I'm reasonably (as far as I can tell) good at going "ok its just sleep paralysis; just go back to sleep and it will all be over"

Yep, once you learn to relax the paralysis passes quickly. I haven't had it in many years though. Think it's most common in the late teens and early 20s IIRC, and that's when I had it. Sleep disorders are no joke.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LordofHats wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
Sleep paralysis is a big factor in abduction stories. Also with lots of old folktales about demons (esp. succubi & incubi), 'night hags', etc.

It's WILD if you've ever experienced it. Fortunately I didn't have the horrific hallucinations some people get. I just saw a dark mass and sensed malevolence the first time. After that one, no hallucinations but the paralysis was real. Even the most skeptical inquirer could think he/she had a paranormal experience. Trust me, it's really something.

I feel like while I've never had this particular experience, I've definitely had dreams that in the moment seemed extremely real and caused a real sense of distress while they were occurring. I didn't use to take good care of my teeth for example, so I had lots of cavities. Around that time I had a pretty damn vivid dream about all my teeth falling out and the following panic felt really damn real. It's one way to get into the habit of brushing and flossing XD

First time it happened, I was trying to yell to my mom, whom I could hear eating breakfast in the kitchen. But all that came out was a little squeak. As the dark malevolent mass seemingly 'sat' on my chest, mind you. Then after a bit the paralysis and hallucination faded. Those were some long moments, though. It's crazy gak. Some people get much more vivid (and terrifying) hallucinations, and that has to be bananas.

In terms of Hallucintions, I’ve thankfully never experience sleep paralysis. But, when I’m ill with a fever? Horrible, horrible hallucination.

And that’s why I steer entirely clear of psychotropic drugs. Don’t care their billing, it’s not worth the bad trip.

GoatboyBeta wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
OK doke. Totes subtle change of direction away, away from the religious edge. I know it’s genuinely hard to keep away from it with certain CTs, but I think we need a breather.

Here’s a corker I don’t think has come up yet....Mud Flood...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW_RjfMVXX8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf4IlAs1WDE

Oh yeah. This is hilarious, and completely mental (the CT, not the videos!)

So many questions.... Even the debunking videos left me feeling like they lowered my IQ just by watching them(I could only make it half way through both). Really what the ?

Yeah just.... I mean I - what? At least Flat Earthers have SOME sanity to them; but this Mud Flood - please someone tell me its just made up !
Edit - wait the other video says its not justa belief but a "Church". So I'm going to say totally made up in an attempt to avoid tax.

 Overread wrote:

GoatboyBeta wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
OK doke. Totes subtle change of direction away, away from the religious edge. I know it’s genuinely hard to keep away from it with certain CTs, but I think we need a breather.

Here’s a corker I don’t think has come up yet....Mud Flood...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW_RjfMVXX8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf4IlAs1WDE

Oh yeah. This is hilarious, and completely mental (the CT, not the videos!)

So many questions.... Even the debunking videos left me feeling like they lowered my IQ just by watching them(I could only make it half way through both). Really what the ?

Yeah just.... I mean I - what? At least Flat Earthers have SOME sanity to them; but this Mud Flood - please someone tell me its just made up !
Edit - wait the other video says its not justa belief but a "Church". So I'm going to say totally made up in an attempt to avoid tax.

Do Churches avoid tax that well?

I guess i have found a potential future calling if so

Mud Flood could very well be a massive Poe.

But, the trouble with Poe is one can genuinely never tell.

I’d follow the rabbit hole of watching the films made by those being debunked.....except my job requires my brain, so I’d rather not dunk it in acidic drivel.

Sometimes the conspiracy theorists get a shot in the arm, and I have to say the people who claim corona is a "conspiracy" have just gotten one.

You-know-who has just announced he's suspending immigration as a result of the corona crisis via executive order.

He wanted to drastically impede immigration from some countries since he undulated into the white house. Now, suddenly, the corona crisis comes along and POOF! He has the excuse to do what he wanted to.

Now this is how conspiracy theories grow. When a situation is exploited by people in power to further their agenda, it lends a certain credence to those who say "See? I told ya! It was done to further (whatever person or group.) agenda! You can see them using it that way! That proves they created it!"

I do not in any way believe this, but I can see how a lot of people might have been on the fence about believing covid was a conspiracy and might see it as one now.

It's not iron clad logic or serious consideration by any means, gut at least on the surface it looks suspicious. And that's more than enough for a conspiracy theory to feed and grow on.

Are there any conspiracy theories out there that are actually saying that the US response to corona virus is tailored to aid Trump's re-election campaign? Sure he gets to do what he wants, and it may end up helping him, but I'm not aware of any theories being touted that it's a conspiracy that has been manufactured to do that. Be interested if there are groups out there spreading that sort of thing.

If anything we see the exact opposite - conspiracy theory nutters claiming the covid response is a deliberate political ploy to undermine Trump's chances. (just look at all the fruit cakes calling Fauci a traitor, etc.).

Just because the conditions are right so that something "could" become a conspiracy theory doesn't necessarily mean it will become a conspiracy. It needs numbers, support and visibility for it to be a conspiracy theory. Can't say I've seen that in this scenario.

 Henry wrote:
Are there any conspiracy theories out there that are actually saying that the US response to corona virus is tailored to aid Trump's re-election campaign? Sure he gets to do what he wants, and it may end up helping him, but I'm not aware of any theories being touted that it's a conspiracy that has been manufactured to do that. Be interested if there are groups out there spreading that sort of thing.

If anything we see the exact opposite - conspiracy theory nutters claiming the covid response is a deliberate political ploy to undermine Trump's chances. (just look at all the fruit cakes calling Fauci a traitor, etc.).

Just because the conditions are right so that something "could" become a conspiracy theory doesn't necessarily mean it will become a conspiracy. It needs numbers, support and visibility for it to be a conspiracy theory. Can't say I've seen that in this scenario.

i guess the issue is with corona for trump re-election, is the fact that the states have in their realm more power then the central government and that is final, making any possible option for trump to distinguish himself in the crisis quite dificult in the first place.
Most conspiracy theories need atleast a grain of "legitimate" possibility and i guess that is in this case simply not given.

Comparatively to that the version were it is an attack on trump is more likely therefore more probable and therefore the dominant theory.

Mind you that is just how i'd explain that, but i am certain if you go searching deep enough you will find a theory of your first suggestion.

 Henry wrote:
Are there any conspiracy theories out there that are actually saying that the US response to corona virus is tailored to aid Trump's re-election campaign?

It's probably out there somewhere (literally anything you can think of is probably a conspiracy theory somewhere, conspiracy theories at like Rule 34). I don't think it'll ever be very prominent though. Most people who would believe such things of Trump view him as ignorant and incompetent. While that's what conspiracy theories themselves are generally made of, it's not the assumption they usually make about their subject matter.

Be interested if there are groups out there spreading that sort of thing.

The kind of people who would as a group try and push that kind of thing know their audience too well (and in this we're going way to close to the political range maybe).

If there is a conspiracy theory being pushed on that front, it's focused on the controversy around Hydroxychloroquine with some variations now targeting the aid rollout. I've seen a pretty big push on some places (Reddit and Twitter) to try and directly tie Trump/Trump's Family/High Level Republicans financially to Hydroxychloroquine. The sources for the claims are sketchy and don't seem to have any real evidence to back them up, but they're pretty prominent in some places and seem to just pop up no matter how much twisting needs to be made to squeeze them into looking relevant to whatever is being talked about with a ludicrous number of upvotes relative to replies (which on Reddit at least is the most obvious sign of bots earning their paychecks). It's something that would be more readily believed by people inclined to such than anything election related. There's already a ready and waiting audience willing to believe any number of financial sins on the part of the targets.

As an aside, social media is a pretty good litmus test for conspiracy theories in general. If you see something coming up with frequency in that area but has no mention/almost no mention on TV news, it's the first warning sign that the whole thing might be full of gak cause TV news will report just about anything so long as there's some vain thread to stake their credibility on. Something is a crock of something when even Fox News and MSNBC won't put it on the air.

i guess the issue is with corona for trump re-election, is the fact that the states have in their realm more power then the central government and that is final, making any possible option for trump to distinguish himself in the crisis quite dificult in the first place.

I must have missed that day in civics where they talked about the power of the states to bank $2,000,000,000,000+ in aid, direct FEMA and the CDC to action, manage (or mismanage) SNS, and declare national emergencies. It's not even worth it to go through all the reasons this makes zero sense. This is not how it works in the US. The states and the federal government share crisis management responsibilities, but many of the major statutes require overt executive approval to get anything started. There is no 'final' power between them in the current set up but it seems really asinine to me to ever swing that pendulum more toward the states than the federal government. FEMA and SNS can't even get out of bed in the morning without the President saying go ahead, regardless of what the states want and there shouldn't be any need to point out the disparity in financial capacity at this point.

Let’s be careful when discussing political angle CT’s.

We can only go so far into them without breaking the No Politics rule General terms, with the odd example properly fine, but be careful not to be partisan.

I must have missed that day in civics where they talked about the power of the states to bank $2,000,000,000,000+ in aid, direct FEMA and the CDC to action, manage (or mismanage) SNS, and declare national emergencies. It's not even worth it to go through all the reasons this makes zero sense. This is not how it works in the US. The states and the federal government share crisis management responsibilities, but many of the major statutes require overt executive approval to get anything started. There is no 'final' power between them in the current set up but it seems really asinine to me to ever swing that pendulum more toward the states than the federal government. FEMA and SNS can't even get out of bed in the morning without the President saying go ahead, regardless of what the states want and there shouldn't be any need to point out the disparity in financial capacity at this point.

I meant more in regards to Curfew , Closing schools, shops, etc. the baseline core options all Nations sofar used to somewhat decent efect overall, luckily. Considering this has been the issue in regards to the reaction and made news.

The whole financial aspect comes only after the crises and one could probably spin a conspiracy theory out of that but i guess that also depends on the future election in which direction it goes no?

Not Online!!! wrote:
I meant more in regards to Curfew , Closing schools, shops, etc. the baseline core options all Nations sofar used to somewhat decent efect overall, luckily. Considering this has been the issue in regards to the reaction and made news.

If that's what you mean then yeah, that's fair.

The whole financial aspect comes only after the crises and one could probably spin a conspiracy theory out of that but i guess that also depends on the future election in which direction it goes no?

I would say the primary reason to spin a conspiracy about it now is to influence the election. It's a brave new world (ha!) and tracking bot activities has become its own past time on some subreddits. And even that sometimes raises my suspicious hackles. It's a complete fog of war and honestly even speculating about motivations and methods probably skitters really close to conspiracy theory itself! Maybe a good reason why it's not a strong topic for this thread actually, aside from the politics. It's too fresh. We can't really talk about it with the same conciseness as say, the moon landing or sovriegn citizens.

 LordofHats wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
I meant more in regards to Curfew , Closing schools, shops, etc. the baseline core options all Nations sofar used to somewhat decent efect overall, luckily. Considering this has been the issue in regards to the reaction and made news.

If that's what you mean then yeah, that's fair.

It's also those level of executive which now can make or break their careers. Which is why i incidentally regarded it as non beneficial, however in many ways i can see that it indeed could be regarded as beneficial considering that Trump states to fight against the deep state. In many ways if he can spin it (the not cooperation of governors) as resistance of said deep state that would mobilize some of his voteing blocks i'd assume. Could however also backfire depending on the results and the handling.

Still i feel like the economic downturn is too bad for him as to really support him.

The whole financial aspect comes only after the crises and one could probably spin a conspiracy theory out of that but i guess that also depends on the future election in which direction it goes no?

I would say the primary reason to spin a conspiracy about it now is to influence the election. It's a brave new world (ha!) and tracking bot activities has become its own past time on some subreddits. And even that sometimes raises my suspicious hackles. It's a complete fog of war and honestly even speculating about motivations and methods probably skitters really close to conspiracy theory itself! Maybe a good reason why it's not a strong topic for this thread actually, aside from the politics. It's too fresh. We can't really talk about it with the same conciseness as say, the moon landing or sovriegn citizens.

I agree, however we can talk about bots, boting and bot tracking.

Most imffamous probably twitter

Twitter is definitely a battleground for it but I’m less than familiar. Maybe my age is showing but I find Twitter difficult to follow. I’m more familiar with events on reddit as a result especially because of subs like redditsecurity where battling malicious bots has become a major topic the last few years so it’s a bit easier to track information imo.

One of the big issues is the diffusion of "sources of truth". In the olden days pre-internet we had the big 4 broadcasters whose had journalism built off the back of some big city Newspapers. All of them wanted to be seen as credible as that was the path to readership and getting material out there.

This model no longer exists. There are a number of reasons why, but the fact is that a lay person has no "Source of Truth" anymore. The absence of truth means there is a vacuum, and that vacuum will be filled.

 LordofHats wrote:
Twitter is definitely a battleground for it but I’m less than familiar. Maybe my age is showing but I find Twitter difficult to follow. I’m more familiar with events on reddit as a result especially because of subs like redditsecurity where battling malicious bots has become a major topic the last few years so it’s a bit easier to track information imo.

It is estimated that about 24 % off all twitter messages are from bots.

And there have been multiple incidents of it beeing used for propaganda actions and spamming conspiracy theories.

Then there's Twitter itself, what with the whole paradise papers thingy.

 Easy E wrote:
One of the big issues is the diffusion of "sources of truth". In the olden days pre-internet we had the big 4 broadcasters whose had journalism built off the back of some big city Newspapers. All of them wanted to be seen as credible as that was the path to readership and getting material out there.

This model no longer exists. There are a number of reasons why, but the fact is that a lay person has no "Source of Truth" anymore. The absence of truth means there is a vacuum, and that vacuum will be filled.

There’s also the advent of 24 hour news.

That’s.....that’s a lot of air to fill. Sure, it started off innocuously enough. Rolling news, the same articles being repeated each hour. So far, so good. Meant we as the consumer could tune in anytime, watch for a chosen period or article, and then be about our day. No longer were we tied to specific bulletin times.

Then? Oh it went down hill. Stuff that’s barely news gets overblown. Ridiculous, often poorly informed ‘analysis’ is simply wild speculation.

We kinda see the same thing (at least in the U.K. with 24 hour TV. You need to fill you schedule, but not break the bank. Enter “Reality TV”, which I blame for dumbing us down as a species. But that’s purely my opinion!

Then there’s the birth of the Internet. Can’t remember if I touched on this before, but I’ll set out my thoughts.

Nobody really saw the ubiquity of the Internet coming. And I’m probably one of the oldest people (40 in a few weeks, no I don’t know when that happened either) to complete their secondary school education (high school equivalent) without the Internet. We were aware of it, but at the time it was A) Expensive and B) not really practical for a campus of 1,000+ kids.

And it took people a while to learn how to teach others the art of parsing huge, huge amounts of information. The knack to be reading something and stopping to think “well, this all seems a bit too rosey”. I mean, confirmation bias wasn’t something I learned of until my 20’s (YMMV, depending on education etc)

This has left us with a very savvy generation, and older generations not at all prepared for the sheer onslaught of mischief the internet can bring,

Think back to FB a few years ago. “One Like, One Prayer, LoL” type stuff. Pictures yoinked from stock, and presented as someone’s family member.

Wasn’t too long until the political potential was recognised, and realised. No, I’m not singling out any wing, party or politician here. But the old adage about a Lie running around the world before the truth has got its socks on is write large.

Eventually you lead yourself to echo chambers. Man. I’ve seen more than a few on FB, and they can be pretty terrifying, regardless of political alignment,

And it took people a while to learn how to teach others the art of parsing huge, huge amounts of information. The knack to be reading something and stopping to think “well, this all seems a bit too rosey”. I mean, confirmation bias wasn’t something I learned of until my 20’s (YMMV, depending on education etc)

This has left us with a very savvy generation, and older generations not at all prepared for the sheer onslaught of mischief the internet can bring,

Think back to FB a few years ago. “One Like, One Prayer, LoL” type stuff. Pictures yoinked from stock, and presented as someone’s family member.

Wasn’t too long until the political potential was recognised, and realised. No, I’m not singling out any wing, party or politician here. But the old adage about a Lie running around the world before the truth has got its socks on is write large.

Eventually you lead yourself to echo chambers. Man. I’ve seen more than a few on FB, and they can be pretty terrifying, regardless of political alignment,

Actually the savy generation isn't that much better in regards to verifying information.

Key exemple are the aftermentioned twitterbots which are often regarded as a credible source for information.
And often many are especially those run by police, firewatch, etc. Then there is however the slew of non visible as bot marked bots that increase range of tweets, etc.

Heck the basic reccomendation for finding bot verification is the following:

"Periodic and regular timing" of tweets;
Whether the tweet content contains known spam; and
The ratio of tweets from mobile versus desktop, as compared to an average human Twitter user.

That is by no means an easy feat to accomplish to just verify if it is a bot.

And i am sure Lordofhats has some prime exemple of bots from reddit aswell.

It's also relatively easy to hide a bot amongst textbased social media.

It is very weird to accept just how dumb we are as a species

Yes, including myself. I’m just as guilty of not fact checking favourable reports as the next person.

Which possibly explains my interest in the Conspirasphere, and it’s regular debunks. When you can see ostensibly plausible initial arguments taken apart, it is a reminder to be somewhat more sceptical in general.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
It is very weird to accept just how dumb we are as a species

Yes, including myself. I’m just as guilty of not fact checking favourable reports as the next person.

Which possibly explains my interest in the Conspirasphere, and it’s regular debunks. When you can see ostensibly plausible initial arguments taken apart, it is a reminder to be somewhat more sceptical in general.

i think stupidity is only one of the key ingredients, the other beeing time and the last beeing as you stated confirmation bias, allbeit indoctrination or ideologicalisation might be a better term in some fields.

Time i regard as the most critical element.
And i guess especially for news, time is off importance considering your own 24 h/ news channel exemple.

Another aspect is time. Today we are bombarded with information from a vast wealth of subjects and backgrounds. Even very studious people with time on their hands can only fact check so many sources in a given day.

I'd argue that a large number of people are not well versed in conducting proper self learning and research and we are still in an age where many research documents are held behind pay walls. Plus those that are out there are not often readily known; they are academia known to those in their subject, but not really marketed and advertised to the lay person.


So its very hard to fact check because the facts that google will show are more likely to to be popular than factual. Popularity can be raised by so many things, even by being totally off the wall nuts and people come for a laugh can raise popularity of a site. Ken Rockwell a few years back was really famous in the online photography groups because his viewpoints were very "out there". Such as never using a tripod EVER. And he pitched his site to newbies. Now a lot was tongue in cheek and also not so much "this is how it is" but "this is how I do it". He gained infamy and also had sensible stuff on his site too - but by and large it was a good show of how personal opinion and a bit of sarcasm could easily make you popular and rank high even if the viewpoint went against the common views and advise.


The internet is a vast store of information, sadly few have the skill to sift the truth from the lies and using search engines often requires you to know most of the answer in order to phrase the question so that you find the rest of the answer.

Beginning to understand why the Library of Alexandria was left to rot

“Look, if you can control your knowledge, you shan’t have any!”

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Beginning to understand why the Library of Alexandria was left to rot

“Look, if you can control your knowledge, you shan’t have any!”

i find that still less bad, then, let's say the whole grievance studies incident.

Not Online!!! wrote:


i think stupidity is only one of the key ingredients, the other beeing time and the last beeing as you stated confirmation bias, allbeit indoctrination or ideologicalisation might be a better term in some fields.

Time i regard as the most critical element.
And i guess especially for news, time is off importance considering your own 24 h/ news channel exemple.

I don't know that stupidity is is necessarily an ingredient. I know some otherwise quite intelligent people who believe in (some) conspiracy theories. The most prominent of these is anti-vaxxers, who are by and large (when not religiously motivated) fairly well-educated. In addition, a colleague of mine who is otherwise extremely intelligent believes the moonlandings were faked.
I think it's more confirmation bias and not knowing your own blind spots when it comes to knowledge, which is not just applicable to the lower end of the intelligence spectrum.