Making Sense of Things

Posts tagged with conspiracy theories

• 8 February 2011 - What is collapse? Conspiracy or a very real phenomenon?

  The concept of collapse of our civilisation is often heard among conspiracy theorists, causing many mainstreamers out there to ignore the concept altogether. But should they? Is it really a word that should be owned by the conspiracy theorists and disregarded accordingly?

  

  We believe we should not disregard it, but, rather than viewing ‘collapse’ through the lens of conspiracy theories, we could understand it in a historical and ecological sense. This then allows us to be realistic about future scenarios.

  Have you heard of the global collapse of fish species? If not, you need to watch The End of the Line (see our previous post to watch it easily). You will discover that Atlantic cod stocks were severely overfished in the 1970s and 80s, leading to their abrupt collapse in 1992. In Newfoundland, Canada, the devastating collapse of cod has impoverished entire communities, and the cod stocks have never recovered. … Read the rest

• 1 December 2010 - Is WikiLeaks the product of a global conspiracy instigated by the CIA?

  Yep, I know the title is really catchy – sorry!- but many believe that WikiLeaks is indeed the product of a global conspiracy instigated by the CIA. I personally don’t share that view. Having said that, I nevertheless believe that studying the arguments of such proponents is rather interesting (as do a number of sociologists and psychologists), so let’s together make sense of them.

  Let me first put the post into its wider context. As you know, the online whistleblower facilitating website WikiLeaks has released a number of documents – apparently only 200 out of 251 287 - that originate from the US State Department. I’m sure you’ve gone through (some of) these and are aware that they tackle a range of subjects including US diplomats’ views on Iran, North Korea, Russia, France, but also about the United Nations, the Hezbollah, the personality of several world leaders, etc. They offer nothing new … Read the rest