Conspiracies v. Conspiracy Theories
I've covered this before, but that was five months ago and I've been really bad at making updates. Don't blame me, well, blame me, but I have a course on this stuff to teach and sometimes just making the lectures work takes far more work than I anticipated. However, I'm beginning a "Plan B'' in pursuit of my PhD and that's forced me to delve into the academic literature surrounding this topic...more than I had to before.
One of the problems is that there is scarce literature on the topic. Sure there's enough but the debate is just beginning, and that means going backward to the years before conspiracy theories were not uttered out of the mouth of the president of the United States...at least publicly. The problem lies not necessarily with the scarcity of material but that within that set there is good and bad. So far the standard piece to work with is Brian Keeley's "Of Conspiracy Theories" (99). This work deals with laying out a strong definition of the topic, though it is weak in parts; Hofstadter's "The Paranoid Style in American Politics" (71) which may be the first piece of literature on conspiracy theories propter se; and possibly Clarke's "Conspiracy Theories and Conspiracy Theorizing" (02). If I was teaching this course as a proper Philosophy course I wouldn't even accept a paper that didn't include at least two of those works. However with the good there's also the bad, and that leads us to what I am currently reading: Pigden's "Popper Revisited, or What is Wrong with Conspiracy Theories" (95).
Pigden's issue is that famous philosopher of science Karl Popper's focus is largely on the delineation line between science and pseudoscience, it is he that came up with the concept of falsifiability that we spoke of back in the summer. In short, a concept can be considered scientific if there exists the possibility that the concept could be proven wrong. Not that it is proven wrong but that it could be. Alchemy doesn't count as scientific because it requires magic to work, Intelligent Design isn't scientific because it requires faith as its central locus, etc. Evolution is scientific because if we found a colony of snakes thriving in Ireland it would disprove the notion of adaptability to the surrounding environment.
Popper's work is easily adaptable to our subject. CTs typically aren't falsifiable, this is because any counter evidence is incorporated by the theorist into the theory itself. In an argument with a Flat Earther, if you point out that the curve is indicated by the length of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge and the difference in height of its towers, in NY, they merely argue that if this were true you would see more of these types of bridges in the world. It's obviously a decoy meant to further the lie. Thus there's no point by which the argument can continue, because you aren't debating the real world you're debating a belief. Popper, in short, disapproves of conspiracy theorizing for a wide variety of reasoning. He lays this out most notably in "The Open Society and Its Enemies" but in short everything that he says is wrong with it is based around the reasoning that totalitarianism is the result of conspiracism. To a point he's correct, Hitler doesn't win without a vast conspiracy of Jews seeking to crush the German people, various Middle Eastern theocracies maintain their power by pointing to a conspiracy against them by a US-Israel coalition, and N. Korea's sole focus in preventing the conspiracy of the US and S. Korea from winning. These imagined plots drive the leaders of totalitarian regimes to greater and greater control as they are the only ones that can protect the people. Stalin's imaginary plots were the foundation of his repeated purges.
Pigden's paper's problem is that it repeatedly conflates the term "conspiracy" with the "conspiracy theory." Popper allows that historical conspiracies have happened but that they are few and far between. Within that category there are even fewer that were successful so we not concern ourselves with the idea that we might be making a mistake in discounting them. Pigden's reply is that this shouldn't dissuade us from conspiracy theorizing since it doesn't matter whether or not they are successful. The unsuccessful ones result in, what he calls, "cock-ups." These are when accident is the chief motivator of history. The assassination of Franz Ferdinand was a conspiracy that resulted in cock-up (the story of that assassination is ridiculous) that resulted in WWI (then by extension--the Bolshevik Revolution and European WWII).
The problem is that Pigden is missing the point. Popper's issue is with CTs not conspiracies, the latter of which is not based on a single historical narrative by which a hidden enemy exists. It's rather based on historical fact and Popper can accommodate the cock-ups of history provided those mistakes are documented to a matter of fact.
His historical example (every academic writing a paper on this needs one (apparently)) regarding George II, Caroline of Ansbach, and the person who would eventually be prime minister due to the King's delay in choosing isn't an example where Popper gets tripped up. The theory is that Caroline was really pulling the strings and was instrumental in getting Robert Walpole the position as Prime Minister. That or George II really just waited a long time and Walpole took the position after his opposition just kind of forgot. Or some combination of the two. Now Pigden's theory has Popper unable to make a connection between Caroline's influence and Walpole's appointment because that would be conspiracy theorizing. However, this isn't the case, provided some sort of proof could be laid at the feet of Caroline proving her influence as her relationship with Walpole is a fact.
It's the driving force of historicism that Popper disagrees with, not historical theories itself. While it is rare that a bonafide CT is actually proven in historical records (successful or otherwise), that the focus of Popper's work.
"Of Conspiracy Theories" Keeley, Brian 1999
"Conspiracy Theories and Conspiracy Theorizing" Clarke, Steve
"The Paranoid Style in American Politics" Hofstadter, Richard 1971
"Popper Revisited, or What is Wrong With Conspiracy Theories" Pigden, Charles 1995
One of the problems is that there is scarce literature on the topic. Sure there's enough but the debate is just beginning, and that means going backward to the years before conspiracy theories were not uttered out of the mouth of the president of the United States...at least publicly. The problem lies not necessarily with the scarcity of material but that within that set there is good and bad. So far the standard piece to work with is Brian Keeley's "Of Conspiracy Theories" (99). This work deals with laying out a strong definition of the topic, though it is weak in parts; Hofstadter's "The Paranoid Style in American Politics" (71) which may be the first piece of literature on conspiracy theories propter se; and possibly Clarke's "Conspiracy Theories and Conspiracy Theorizing" (02). If I was teaching this course as a proper Philosophy course I wouldn't even accept a paper that didn't include at least two of those works. However with the good there's also the bad, and that leads us to what I am currently reading: Pigden's "Popper Revisited, or What is Wrong with Conspiracy Theories" (95).
Pigden's issue is that famous philosopher of science Karl Popper's focus is largely on the delineation line between science and pseudoscience, it is he that came up with the concept of falsifiability that we spoke of back in the summer. In short, a concept can be considered scientific if there exists the possibility that the concept could be proven wrong. Not that it is proven wrong but that it could be. Alchemy doesn't count as scientific because it requires magic to work, Intelligent Design isn't scientific because it requires faith as its central locus, etc. Evolution is scientific because if we found a colony of snakes thriving in Ireland it would disprove the notion of adaptability to the surrounding environment.
Popper's work is easily adaptable to our subject. CTs typically aren't falsifiable, this is because any counter evidence is incorporated by the theorist into the theory itself. In an argument with a Flat Earther, if you point out that the curve is indicated by the length of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge and the difference in height of its towers, in NY, they merely argue that if this were true you would see more of these types of bridges in the world. It's obviously a decoy meant to further the lie. Thus there's no point by which the argument can continue, because you aren't debating the real world you're debating a belief. Popper, in short, disapproves of conspiracy theorizing for a wide variety of reasoning. He lays this out most notably in "The Open Society and Its Enemies" but in short everything that he says is wrong with it is based around the reasoning that totalitarianism is the result of conspiracism. To a point he's correct, Hitler doesn't win without a vast conspiracy of Jews seeking to crush the German people, various Middle Eastern theocracies maintain their power by pointing to a conspiracy against them by a US-Israel coalition, and N. Korea's sole focus in preventing the conspiracy of the US and S. Korea from winning. These imagined plots drive the leaders of totalitarian regimes to greater and greater control as they are the only ones that can protect the people. Stalin's imaginary plots were the foundation of his repeated purges.
Pigden's paper's problem is that it repeatedly conflates the term "conspiracy" with the "conspiracy theory." Popper allows that historical conspiracies have happened but that they are few and far between. Within that category there are even fewer that were successful so we not concern ourselves with the idea that we might be making a mistake in discounting them. Pigden's reply is that this shouldn't dissuade us from conspiracy theorizing since it doesn't matter whether or not they are successful. The unsuccessful ones result in, what he calls, "cock-ups." These are when accident is the chief motivator of history. The assassination of Franz Ferdinand was a conspiracy that resulted in cock-up (the story of that assassination is ridiculous) that resulted in WWI (then by extension--the Bolshevik Revolution and European WWII).
The problem is that Pigden is missing the point. Popper's issue is with CTs not conspiracies, the latter of which is not based on a single historical narrative by which a hidden enemy exists. It's rather based on historical fact and Popper can accommodate the cock-ups of history provided those mistakes are documented to a matter of fact.
His historical example (every academic writing a paper on this needs one (apparently)) regarding George II, Caroline of Ansbach, and the person who would eventually be prime minister due to the King's delay in choosing isn't an example where Popper gets tripped up. The theory is that Caroline was really pulling the strings and was instrumental in getting Robert Walpole the position as Prime Minister. That or George II really just waited a long time and Walpole took the position after his opposition just kind of forgot. Or some combination of the two. Now Pigden's theory has Popper unable to make a connection between Caroline's influence and Walpole's appointment because that would be conspiracy theorizing. However, this isn't the case, provided some sort of proof could be laid at the feet of Caroline proving her influence as her relationship with Walpole is a fact.
It's the driving force of historicism that Popper disagrees with, not historical theories itself. While it is rare that a bonafide CT is actually proven in historical records (successful or otherwise), that the focus of Popper's work.
"Of Conspiracy Theories" Keeley, Brian 1999
"Conspiracy Theories and Conspiracy Theorizing" Clarke, Steve
"The Paranoid Style in American Politics" Hofstadter, Richard 1971
"Popper Revisited, or What is Wrong With Conspiracy Theories" Pigden, Charles 1995
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