Faith And Conspiracy Theories

When I woke up this morning, I read an interesting piece on Neurologica about a meta-analysis of some of the interesting research that has gone on with regards to conspiracy theories. I then read the analysis (The Truth Is Out There by Viren Swami and Rebecca Coles) and couldn’t help but see interesting ties between the topics of conspiracy theories and faith. So naturally, I thought I’d provide my thoughts. But please, take a moment and read both the Neurologica article and the analysis it was based on. They’re both exceptionally interesting reads.

Of course, it’s easy to see the relationship between the nuttier faith groups like Al-Qaeda and The Westboro Baptist Church. Their faiths are essentially a marriage of faith and conspiracy theory. For Al-Qaeda, the evil infidels are an international conspiracy trying to destroy the word of Allah and bring pain and suffering to the faithful. For the Westboros, it’s the American government’s pollution by homosexuals, abortionists, et al that is devastating the country. In examples such as these, it’s easy to see the marriage between the two.

But what about the not-crazies? That’s where my mind has been bouncing based on a few of the statements in the analysis article, so let’s go through them one at a time.

…suggesting that a belief in conspiracy theories was more likely to emerge among those who felt powerless, disadvantaged or voiceless, especially in the face of catastrophe.

…

A conspiracy theory, in this sense, helps explain those ambiguities and ‘provides a convenient alternative to living with uncertainty’ (Zarefsky, 1984, p.72). Or as Young and colleagues (1990, p.104) have put it, ‘[T]he human desire for explanations of all natural phenomena – a drive that spurs inquiry on many levels – aids the conspiracist in the quest for public acceptance.’

Many people find or reaffirm their faith under those circumstances, and use that faith for a convenient alternative to living with uncertainty or a means to explain away natural phenomena. I’ve written about this before, and the fact that people use faith, be it in God, Gods, superstitions etc., as a way to feel a sense of confidence when things are out of their control. When the going gets tough, the faithful turn to God, knowing that he can help them by giving them the strength to persevere or by pulling the strings behind the scenes to make everything okay again.

Sunstein and Vermeule (2009) apply a similar perspective to conspiracy theories: those who believe in conspiracy theories may be responding rationally and logically to what little information they receive, even if that information appears absurd in relation to wider, publicly available knowledge.

When I was a child, I was a Christian. What’s more, everyone I knew was a Christian. The idea that there was a Garden of Eden or a great flood never seemed ridiculous to me because everyone I knew felt the same way. The only information I had access to showed that the world was as the Bible told it. Flaws in these stories that I found as I learned more and more about the world were among the first chinks in the armour of my faith. In a more recent example, I made a flippant remark on Pharyngula not that long ago about how stupid it was to imagine that Jesus was anything but Arabic given the location of Judea. I was raised by parents who told me that Jesus was most likely Arabic simply because that was who lived there at the time. Now, the nature of Pharyngula is such that stupid and poorly thought out comments get you slapped in the ass, and I was quickly first accused of racism (“What, Italians aren’t people to you, you racist!”) and later corrected. Yes, there were lots of Arabs in Judea, but it was also a part of the Roman Empire. As such, any number of races would have been present at the time. My argument was absurd in relation to a wider, publicly available knowledge.

For example, some early work suggested that conspiracy theories emerged because of ‘an irrational need to explain big and important events with proportionately big and important causes’ McCauley & Jacques, 1979, p.637; see also Leman, 2007).

The biggest thing one can explain is how it all came to be, and science doesn’t answer that question and may never do so. The Big Bang Theory explains the creation of the Universe as we know it, but does not speculate on what existed or occurred prior to the explosion. Evolution explains the way that life came to be in it’s current states (note: I am not saying anything about the origin of life) in a fashion that Creationists consider to be too crude and small-scale to be possible, preferring the idea that a creator had to have been involved. It certainly seems to me that the statement applies.

Sunstein and Vermeule (2009) have suggested that the emotional content of many conspiracy theories plays an important role in their dissemination and acceptance. They cite studies showing that ‘urban legends’ that are devised to trigger strong emotions are more likely to be spread among populations (e.g. Heath et al., 2001). Applying this to conspiracy theories, they postulate that conspiracy theories create intense emotions that help spread similar beliefs, while also providing a justification for affective states produced by some traumatic event.

Now, imagine you’re a slave. Being a slave pretty much sucks. At night, after having been tormented by your master all day, you get together with your fellow slaves, people who share a certain religious affiliation, and while you discuss your common experiences, the same words keep flowing through the conversation. God has a plan. We are his chosen people, and one day he’s going to make sure the master gets his comeuppance. Endure the short term pain, so much more awaits us either in this world or the next. Have faith. We are being tested. All of this explains away the current torments and lifts the spirits, giving a bit of hope to face the next day and the next and the next. Salvation is around the corner! Hope is an intense emotion too, and an infectious one.

In the first instance, when opposing sides were presented with the same evidence, McHoskey (1995) showed that there was a tendency to uncritically accept evidence that was supportive of one’s own argument, while scrutinising and discrediting contrary evidence. When participants were presented with mixed evidence, there were signs of attitude polarisation, with participants reporting that they were more in favour of their initial viewpoint, rather than reporting a reversal of their beliefs. In a similar vein, Leman and Cinnirella (2007) found that conspiracy believers judged fictitious accounts of an assassination more plausible if it was consistent with their beliefs, a tendency called ‘confirmation bias’.

Confirmation bias is everywhere in the world of the faithful. When the see a baby, it is proof of God. When they see a rainbow, it is a reminder of God’s love. When they see anything good, it’s because of God. The same things shown to someone who is not faithful remain wonderful, but are in no way a proof of anything. Atheists still love babies, they just don’t see how they confirm the presence of a creator. And when a believer is presented with written history that discounts the idea of the great flood or proves that the world is older than the Bible says, the reaction is one of three possible outcomes: First, to explain that God can do anything, even fudge the evidence to cast doubt and test the faithful; second, to explain that the stories in the Bible were stories, and the specific details are possibly open to interpretation; and third, to state that your evidence is wrong because the Bible is accurate.

Of course, all this isn’t me being scientific. I’m talking about my own interpretations, and not basing this on any active testing or research. The analysis that I am citing is not on the faithful, and thus I am essentially doing a bit of off-label prescribing, which hardly counts as safe. Essentially, this is just me rambling about a correlation I saw. But if anyone reading this is a practitioner or student in a related field, it would certainly be an interesting theory to evaluate further.

Jim