Fiction better than Fact!: Conspiracy Theories.

[Robh (Rob)]

Hi all,

Today's Sydney Morning Herald had an article called "Loony landing". Glen Nagle, education manager of the Canberra Deep Space Communications Complex, says he is confronted every other day with people who still believe that the lunar landing was all staged. Some of the article's reasons for conspiracy theories were ... real life is boring; feelings of manipulation; distrust of authority and published information; inability of people to differentiate fact from fiction; proliferation of hoaxes makes people unduly skeptical.

Conspiracy theories never seem to die out and they are re-cycled regularly. One being the supposed cover up of UFO activity by various defense departments e.g. Roswell UFO incident.

Anyone like to add to this plethora of conspiracies!

Regards Rob.

[jjjnettie (Jeanette)]

Conspiracy theorists and hoax mongers. Both as bad as each other, they're only in it for the money.
The followers, those who buy their books and treat the text as gospel, are just plain gullible folk looking for some excitement in their lives.

[Enchilada]

Yeah, you are absolutely right in your comments here.
By the way, the article is on the SMH Site at; http://www.smh.com.au/world/loony-la...j.html?page=-1

[badchap]

Originally Posted by jjjnettie

Conspiracy theorists and hoax mongers. Both as bad as each other, they're only in it for the money.
The followers, those who buy their books and treat the text as gospel, are just plain gullible folk looking for some excitement in their lives.

Aye, a means to keep a renewable audience to sell books and tv shows to .... there's your real conspiracy..

I think another problem is that the more vocal the conspiracy believers are, the harder it is for them to admit their mistaken beliefs if and when they do come to realise their folly.
To save face, perhaps it is easier to cling to those conspiracy ideas ?

[Campus Dweller]

I think it's so funny that the Roswell followers believe that, in 1947, just after the WWII when the best Earth rocket technology was the German V2, when humans had not even ventured beyond Earth's atmosphere, beings with technology that enabled them to undertake interstellar travel came to our planet - and got shot down and captured by the Americans.

As for the Moon landings -and there were SIX of them, the guy from the Tidbinbilla base summed it up in the last sentence of the SMH article - would the Russians really have let the Americans get away with it?

[jjjnettie (Jeanette)]

I have a friend who visited Auschwitz, someone there told him that it was all a lie. That only a couple of hundred Jews were killed in the concentration camps, not the millions that the Americans say.
So now of course he denies that the Holocaust ever happened.
The thing is, the Germans kept records of everyone who went through their gas chambers, they recorded it on film and on photos. How can you deny this evidence?

[leinad (Dan)]

I believe that some are valid arguments, some are not, and both require a spoon of intelligent, logical approach.

One random example in particular is the plane that crashed into the pentagon.
There was a piece of plane that was found on the lawn and an engine lodged within the building. Why didnt we see any other video camera footage from the perimeter areas around the complex, apart from the questionable video supported.. Where is the lawn damage, luggage, the rest of the plane? The mind needs more supportive evidence to come to a solid, truthful conclusion. Any comments?

Most conspiracy theories stay alive due to counter-scientific evidence that contradicts the supposed truth and/or evidence that has been provided.
Wouldn't the most logical thing to do is equally fight science with science, evidence against evidence, instead of bickering, name calling, stereotyping; then the case could be closed with empirical evidence and the conspiracy theory would be dismissed, and the common person without a high IQ could easily dismiss it.

Another example; religious belief cements something in our minds that cannot be changed. We can compare this strong personal belief to a conspiracy theory?
It can be proven to be real, and proven to not be real.

I hope I've worded this from a philosophical standpoint, rather than argumentative.

[MrB (Simon)]

Hmmm, yeah but I've never seen anything about plane debri and luggage being removed from the towers rubble, but we've all seen the footage of them going in.
I recall seeing some footage of the plane going into the Pentagon, from a security camera mounted on a nearby petrol station or something like that.... dodgy memory tho.
Besides, if the plane didn't go into the Pentagon, where is it?

[Nesti (Mark)]

Originally Posted by leinad

I believe that some are valid arguments, some are not.

One in particular is the plane that crashed into the pentagon.
There was a piece of plane that was found on the lawn and an engine lodged within the building. But where is the lawn damage, luggage, the rest of the plane? any comments?

leinad; I cannot remember where, it was a US Government site which documents aviation issues, but there are hundreds of photos of the Pentagon crash. I'll try to get the URL, but it's not a nice site, lots of bodies and wreckage. Not what the hoaxers claim.

[Robh (Rob)]

The thing is that some of these supposed conspiracies are doing real damage. For example, whether you believe in all the evidence for climate change or not, we now have the supposed conspiracy that the Green Movement is hotting up the figures to profit in the change over to green industry. A few decades ago, the oil industry was supposedly conspiring against advancements in engine technology e.g. hydrogen fuel or electric cars.

Rob

[leinad (Dan)]

I re-worded my post. Please see again... :/

[leinad (Dan)]

Originally Posted by Nesti

leinad; I cannot remember where, it was a US Government site which documents aviation issues, but there are hundreds of photos of the Pentagon crash. I'll try to get the URL, but it's not a nice site, lots of bodies and wreckage. Not what the hoaxers claim.

Maybe best to PM me that one.

[Nesti (Mark)]

Sorry, I think it might have been taken down. It was 5 years ago that I saw it on the FAA site. Surprised it was up in the first place.

A myth buster pointed to it.

You can get the information (videos, images data), you just need to go through FOI, and be a US citizen of course.

[leinad (Dan)]

I know it may not be supported by some, but without trying to cross a border line of argument on this thread, here is one video I saw that has good scientific argument for/against a conspiracy theory situation.
Comments welcome
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO2yT0uBQbM

[DJDD]

Originally Posted by leinad

Maybe best to PM me that one.

the black hats might be reading the IIS forum...

[leinad (Dan)]

Originally Posted by DJDD

the black hats might be reading the IIS forum...

[Robh (Rob)]

Originally Posted by leinad

I know it may not be supported by some, but without trying to cross a border line of argument on this thread, here is one video I saw that has good scientific argument for/against a conspiracy theory situation.
Comments welcome
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO2yT0uBQbM

So we have a new conspiracy. An expert, which we have to take the desk's word on, states a feasible point of view which most of us can't verify. The only way it can be resolved is that if more experts come out in support and it is then investigated scientifically. If there has been no follow up research, it must be assumed no-one took it seriously. Being an architect, is he just trying to defend his colleagues in the design of the buildings? He definitely underplayed the role of the airplane fuel but is that accurate- this is outside his expertise. The weight of the collapsing floors above just might be sufficient to collapse the heat weakened structures below. If you were going to demolish the buildings why bother with the planes?

My view, Rob

[Robh (Rob)]

Originally Posted by jjjnettie

I have a friend who visited Auschwitz, someone there told him that it was all a lie. That only a couple of hundred Jews were killed in the concentration camps, not the millions that the Americans say.
So now of course he denies that the Holocaust ever happened.
The thing is, the Germans kept records of everyone who went through their gas chambers, they recorded it on film and on photos. How can you deny this evidence?

Yes, there are still those who deny it ever happened. People are just too willing to believe what so-and-so said, supposedly with such-and-such authority, without subsequently researching the vast evidence available. Maybe they just can't accept the truth of this darkest perpretation of inhumanity.

Rob

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Originally Posted by Campus Dweller

I think it's so funny that the Roswell followers believe that, in 1947, just after the WWII when the best Earth rocket technology was the German V2, when humans had not even ventured beyond Earth's atmosphere, beings with technology that enabled them to undertake interstellar travel came to our planet - and got shot down and captured by the Americans.

That UFO was not shot down by US troops. It crashed. Big difference.

Dave

[leinad (Dan)]

Originally Posted by Robh

So we have a new conspiracy. An expert, which we have to take the desk's word on, states a feasible point of view which most of us can't verify. The only way it can be resolved is that if more experts come out in support and it is then investigated scientifically. If there has been no follow up research, it must be assumed no-one took it seriously. Being an architect, is he just trying to defend his colleagues in the design of the buildings? He definitely underplayed the role of the airplane fuel but is that accurate- this is outside his expertise. The weight of the collapsing floors above just might be sufficient to collapse the heat weakened structures below. If you were going to demolish the buildings why bother with the planes?

My view, Rob

My point being, why do you see dismiss it immediately as a CT.