Why Conspiracy Theories?

[craner]

It was quite dramatic. My memory is patchy, but I recall Luke begging Matt to ban him from Dissensus before it got any nastier.

And these were the pre-Padraig days, when we were all still relatively polite and well-behaved.

 

[luka]

I've gotta see this.

Or maybe the version I'm imagining is impossible to top.

Even nice John eden was steaming in. It was like royal rumble.

 

[craner]

This is how human agency works:

 

[vimothy]

I suspect Gray would agree with you, at least about ideologies that try to remove agency from the picture completely. The theme of the book is really the (all too human) desire to escape from human choice and limitation. One unfortunate limitation is that events are always somewhat beyond us (as individuals). This was well understood in the Ancient World (and by its students, like Shakespeare), but is antithetical to the modern mindset whose ideology is the conquest of the world and its history by reason.

 

[vimothy]

Of which communism and it's "obscene twin", Nazism, are exemplars.

 

[craner]

Yeah, but I don't give a shit about John Gray, I think he's a spurious peddler of ideas, a sort of highbrow Brendan O'Neill. I think you're probably more serious than he is, and I want to know if you agree with me?

 

[vimothy]

About what, sorry?

 

[vimothy]

a sort of highbrow Brendan O'Neill

Ouch!

 

[craner]

Events beyond us = religion

 

[craner]

That human agency is a driving force in historical and global events.

 

[vimothy]

I agree that agency is a driving force in human relations. But history is not goal-oriented in the same way that a human is. And individuals cannot control it. (Most people can barely control or understand themselves). They are caught up in it. That's the tragedy of the human condition.

 

[craner]

But what do you mean by "history" in that sense? Dialectical materialism?

 

[craner]

History as a force not driven by human decisions, choice, desire, greed, etc.?

 

[vimothy]

Nothing so fancy.

 

[vimothy]

I certainly agree that history is driven by human choices, greed, desire, conspiracies, agency, etc, etc.

 

[vimothy]

For that reason, it has a momentum we cannot fully control.

 

[vimothy]

Or even comprehend.

 

[craner]

But that we can certainly analyse, after the dust has settled. Which is what conspiracy theories deny, they say that the archives, the interviews, the records, are all a false smokescreen for a deeper, hidden truth. Archival evidence is irrelevant. What people who were involved in events say about them is always a line to disguise the real motivations and ploys to direct said events.

The reason I posted that video about 2008 is to point out that, in fact, reality is chaos driven by human greed and desire, the foundations that erect flawed systems and structures, rather than covert, almost supernatural, certainly omniscient global directors with a world-historical Grand Plan.

 

[craner]

The conspiracy mindset, on that scale, is a fantasy. Which is why I am on Eden's side more than Luke's.

 

[luka]

You're mischaracterising my position but that's understandable given I maybe haven't explained it fully. I'm not going to do so tonight either. But I will say I think conspiracies exist, have existed, will exist in the future and are a regular part of how the world works. You all accept they are part of everyday life in Russia for example so it's hardly like I'm asking you to make a huge stretch.