To think conspiracy theorists are an infuriating mix of arrogance, stupidity and lazy thinking

[EmperorTomatoRetchup]

Having thought I'll leave it, I'll leave it, I found myself arguing with a conspiracy theorist.

Christ alight these people are utterly lacking in any sort of critical thought. This tool was trotting out one of the most popular of the conspiracy theories - 911 as an inside job, Madelline McCann was murdered by her parents, moon landings were faked, Diana was bumped off by Mi5 etc. and they seemed to be impervious to any of the logical flaws in their argument, that researching a matter didn't mean watching YouTube videos made by fellow conspiricists spouting unsourced, unreferenced nonsense and claiming that non adherents were 'sheeple' buying 'the official line'.

To take the example jokingly referenced on another thread, the Paul McCartney is dead conspiracy theory, how many people coroners, doctors ambulance staff, Paul's family and friends, would have had to be bought off in order to allow him to be replaced by a lookalike who could be trained to speak, act, play musical instruments left handed and pass for one of the world's most famous men in the full glare of the media . In 50 years not a single person involved in this dastardly plan, not a single one of this vast army of people cooped into it has blown the whistle despite their being unparalleled financial rewards for doing so.

No musicologists have detected a change in composition or playing or singing style. No one asking what happened to the bloke who became fake Paul', might their family not be curious as to why their son/brother disappeared off the face of the earth in the late 60s.After going to such extraordinary lengths the Beatles so desperate to cover up this audacious act, left a series of clues in their songs as a signal to their fans.

AIBU to think that this combination of scepticism, lack of critical thought, logic, probability twinned with overwhelming arrogance is infuriating and wonder how I should deal with these fuckers in future? Especially when any attempts to point out the flaws in their arguments are taken as signs you are one of the sheeple or a Co conspirator.

[theendofeverything]

Yes, I accept that Occam's razor probably applies here, nevertheless that detail has always bugged me.

[megletthesecond]

Jill Dandos murder is dodgy. I suspect she was going to blow the lid on Saville. But he seemed to have friends in high places so we'll probably never know.

[Yourenotericlove]

The thing is..if people want to, they can find potential anomalies and it seems to them, to add up.

I've seen sites on the internet claiming someone other than Peter Sutcliffe committed the Yorkshire Ripper murders. They went to incredible detail about the person they thought had done it and came up with loads of anomalies.

Yet ignored all the evidence against Peter Sutcliffe, including his own confession.

For decades there were supporters of Anna Anderson (who claimed to be Grand Duchess Anastasia of Russia) Even after her death, people devoting time to books and websites supporting her despite the overwhelming evidence she wasn't her.

Even after the remains of the rest of the Imperial family were found so all accounted for, all related and all sharing DNA with the Imperial family closest relatives, there are still people insisting she was telling the truth and going to extraordinary lengths to say stuff like 'but there were 15 points of similarity in their handwriting'. Instead of thinking well, all the bodies were found in the same place including all the Duchesses, she looked nothing like the Duchess, couldn't speak Russian and was indentified as being a Polish woman with MH problems.

But no, narrowing in on tiny details that they think confirm their irrational beliefs.

[Valanice1989]

I have never understood how anyone could believe that Anna Anderson was actually Anastasia. There was no resemblance whatsoever. Faces don't change that^ much, even as you age!

[Yourenotericlove]

I know! Yet they're still at it.

[SerenDippitty]

I don’t think Pope John Paul I died of natural causes. He was a liberation theologist and the wrong sort of pope for many.

[ChicagoLil]

Apparently the Romanovs didn't speak Russian as that was the peasants' language. They only spoke French.

[Lweji]

It's well known that Royals can't die in car crashes unless someone plots to kill them.

[ChicagoLil]

Are you referring to Princess Grace?

[Lweji]

I had forgotten about Princess Grace.

Clearly her DD was hypnotised and either caused the accident or was made to forget the real reason.

I blame lizzard aliens.

[SpeverendRooner]

@ChicagoLil asked: Who was the cameraman who was the first man on the moon who was there to set up and film Neil Armstrong walking down the steps?

Good question. Let's consider the options. Option 1 - the moon landings were faked in a studio. America somehow managed to secure the silence of all of their staff, the cooperation of the Soviet Union at the height of the cold war, and of foreign civilians such as the Parkes observatory staff. And they managed to get a mirror on to the moon and rocks (clearly non-terrestrial) back, and churned up the lunar surface enough that it can be directly imaged nowadays, but didn't go to the moon while doing all of this. Option 2 - they bolted a camera to the outside of the spacecraft.

It says quite something about conspiracy theorists' mindsets that option 1 is even in the running.

@TheMythicalChicken said that If you speed the footage up, they are walking normally. As Lweji points out, this simply isn't true. There's plenty of slow motion video to be found, and it looks nothing like the way people move on the moon. The underlying reason is that apparent acceleration and apparent speed are affected differently by slowing the tapes, and not the same way body mechanics are affected by different gravity. The moon films look strange - the astronauts get way too much movement out of way too little kick off, and move in weird low curves. It looks nothing like an action hero diving for a McGuffin in dramatic slow motion. Because it's not slow motion - it's low gravity.

Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy blog has a thorough demolition job of moon hoaxer claims: www.badastronomy.com/bad/tv/foxapollo.html

And one comment on Princess Diana. A friend of mine who's a nuclear safety engineer commented once that when accidents happen you can always see a chain of mistakes, opportunities to stop it that all got missed. Because we're good at safety systems these days, one mistake is rarely fatal - you have to do several things wrong to get a catastrophe. But still it happens. No matter how careful you are about the seatbelt, you can be distracted - maybe by swarms of paparazzi ramming flashguns in your face. Drink-driving isn't usually fatal, so you might accept a risk to get away from them - if you even notice your driver's tipsy.

That one's easily explained as a bit of inattention and a bad or missed judgement call.

[Gersemi]

It's pretty clear that Diana and Dodi were concentrating on each other and on getting away and evading the paparazzi, and probably barely noticed Henri Paul, let alone what state he was in.

[Yourenotericlove]

The Romanovs spoke English, Russian, French and German and some Italian.

Here is a letter from Anastasia to her Father in Russian when she was aged 11.

[Brahumbug]

''They didn't have the computer technology to go to the moon in 1969"
Why do people think that you need advanced computers to go to the moon? Isaac Newton could have calculated the orbit 300 years ago. Modern planes are computer controlled, therefore by that logic the Wright Brothers where fake as they had no computers at all.

[Ifailed]

Quite Brahumbug, plus fly by wire technology was already available by 1969, it was used it Concorde. The Astronauts were trained test pilots, and navigation to the moon and back was controlled from the earth, the actual flights were relatively straight forward.
Anyone with an A level in mathematics could calculate the trajectories, and when and for how long to fire various rockets, boosters etc, on pencil and paper.

[Lweji]

Anyone with an A level in mathematics could calculate the trajectories, and when and for how long to fire various rockets, boosters etc, on pencil and paper.

That's an alien concept in 2018. Alien. As in only aliens make calculations on paper.

[Ifailed]

Lweji Luckily there are still some of us oldies who can use one of these (I used one in my Maths A level).

[bellinisurge]

@Yourenotericlove , interesting thanks. I didn't know that Anastasia called her Dad "Shura" - which is a nickname for Alexander, I think.

[Yourenotericlove]

Shura was the nickname for one of her favourite nurses so maybe it isn't a letter to her Father and was incorrectly listed as such. I haven't tried to read Russian for 20 years!

Possibly still could be for Father though, I know the family had numerous and ever changing nicknames for each other going on a huge tome of their personal letters that I have read.

[NameChanger22]

Why do you care so much what other people think?

I come up with new conspiracy theories all the time as I don't believe everything I'm told and it makes life interesting to think about different possible reasons for things. I don't believe the official line on most things, there is always a slant on the truth. I'm proud of that fact. However, I do believe the earth is round as I've been around it a few times.

[NameChanger22]

IBrexit has proved we don't have enough free thinkers in this country.

[ChicagoLil]

Mumsnet is a conspiracy theory and Justine is part of the illuminati who is gathering information on us to turn us into slaves.

[SpeverendRooner]

I don't think the computers were much used for calculating orbits, so much as for precise timing of rocket burns and for controlling the attitude of the craft during course corrections.

The code from them is actually available for download off github, if anyone feels like planning their own space mission.

[ManicUnicorn]

This thread has been fascinating. I don't believe Diana was murdered, I do think her death was very convenient for the Royal family as she would have continued to be a thorn in their side had she lived, but no I don't think they had her killed. I don't think they even have that power, they are only a constitutional monarchy after all.

One thing that's always irked me was Paul Burrell trial where the Queen suddenly remembered she'd given him permission to keep hold of all those items just as he as about to take the witnesses stand. That was odd.

[KevinTheYuccaPlant]

It's amazing what we did in the 50s and 60s, when you think about it. My FIL was an engineer who built one of the UK's first nuclear power stations in the 50s; they were working with slide rules and log tables, but they did it.