What conspiracy theories do you believe in? - Put your tinfoil hats on

[liquid nitrogen]

oh yeah and pharma funding contaminating fields and forcing weird offshoots that aren't really reflective of the state of the field but make $$ is really annoying & I could write a book about how angry it makes me but unfortunately if I started I'd dox myself like three run-on sentences in. so I must keep my takes to myself. but know that I loathe it very much. no I'm not full crunchy. but [insert redacted paragraph here]

anyway... wear barefoot shoes. align your spine, decompress your cervical column, clear your sinuses, escape the underpinning ideological constriction etc.

 

[Larry David's Opera Cape]

As an example I'll give you the entire psychiatric genetics field, which is basically using statistics unacceptable to a statistician to analyze genetics in a way unacceptable to a geneticist to make claims about the models of the psyche unacceptable to a psychologist.

Tell me more about this.

 

[Fishmalk Observer]

Tell me more about this.

Sounds to me like basic noticing of patterns.

Gonna go out on a limb that if you combine ''people'' who are genetically predisposed to agression, mix it with almost no ability to long term plan and lower IQ, you end up with LaMar and Shaneequa

 

[Ewan McGregor]

Please lord not the miners strike or disco

Hah! As if there were any miners left to strike! The only things one can find in Yorkshire are fat, illiterate white women with three to five fatherless middle aged kids, gang-raping crowds of pakis, drunk, drug addict zombies that are a sad excuse of a white british man, scheming pajeets, feral niggers and british Ethan Ralph clones with a weird accent.

I sometimes wish Maggie was still alive to see her brainchild.

 

[Otterly]

Tell me more about this.

He’s right. There are entire fields that are utter bullshit. FMRI is one of them, but I look forward to expansion on the psychiatric genetics, because that also sounds like bullshit.

 

[Larry David's Opera Cape]

He’s right. There are entire fields that are utter bullshit. FMRI is one of them, but I look forward to expansion on the psychiatric genetics, because that also sounds like bullshit.

I was being brief, not skeptical. I want examples because it interests me. Even on these very boards, you hear a lot of armchair pontificating about people based on the DSM taxonomy, but very few people even know that these categories were created by essentially boardrooms full of "experts" spouting opinions, not anything like what most people would recognize as scientific research.

We all recognize certain sets of behaviors and traits that fit a pattern, and it's convenient enough to call it "narcissistic personality" or whatever. Sure. Granted. But as far as what constitutes "NPD" you can fairly and accurately say "well that's just like, your opinion, man."

 

[liquid nitrogen]

Tell me more about this.

This was specifically aimed at brain transcriptomics:
- using horrendous amounts of data manipulation and 'transformation' and 'cleaning' that would make a statistician cry from relatively small data sets
- to visualize already miniscule differences in epigenetic markers, which are notoriously finicky and hard to correlate to things, given they're shared even across species and different across different cell types (obviously)
- in order to make claims about genetic and epigenetic changes in mood disorders and similar mental illnesses, which are notoriously hard to align with actual specific brain effects that isn't related to any other mood disorder/mental illness, because as far as we know it's all a big cluster of socio-dev issues and may not be concretely affiliated to brain region genetic activity at all
- because the difference between transcriptomics and higher order cognition is equivalent the difference between machine code/hardware level programming and actual AI

yes fmri is also a good pot shot to take. the salmon study was good for it

I am also a pattern observer. However, there's a lot of layers of potential systemic failure of certain behaviors before you hit "pick a gene and try to blame it". we've got genetic networks, epigenetics, intercellular interaction networks, intracellular interaction networks, local brain systems, local network interactions, global interactions, whatever the fuck is going on with brain waves and mode networks, etc. If you like networks it's, for lack of a better term, a turkduken of like 10 network levels, each massive & beautiful and contributing both up and downstream.
That we've gotten to the point that we can manipulate/edit most of these things is fantastic news though. Shame China will get to it first since they don't hold themselves to ethics.

 

[melty]

Semi-schizopost inbound. Nothing makes sense. NOTHING. It honestly drives me a little crazier everytime I think about it. No matter what you look up, you get drastically different responses to even the most trivial things. Whether it's the benefits of supplements, effectiveness of sleep schedules, animal facts, history, laws, even basic fucking math sometimes. It's impossible to trust even the most basic facts anymore. Everybody contradicts everyone else, and not even definitively. I know there's the whole "Evidence suggests..." / "Experts claim..." / "Research may reveal..." meme, but it's really starting to drive me nuts. The concept itself, as well as the uncertainty I've been feeling the past few years. I always saw myself as somewhat more self-aware or whatever than 99% of the people around me, but now I feel like I'm the only one I know that feels so confused on pretty much everything. Why is it that every single thing online these days is so contradictory these days? I haven't really ever seen anybody speculate much on there being an agenda of any kind to drive people to a breakdown of their perceptions of the fundamental way things are. I don't know. Maybe it's just a me thing. But it's not just from the -Steins, or the -Bergs, or even the -Shekelheimerwitzes. It seems like every single place you can get information from makes an effort to be contrarian to what is generally understood to be acceptable proof. Whether it be the newest scientific advancement towards understanding the universe, or if vitamin C does much of anything to prevent you getting sick. It's fucking maddening. I'm not proposing any real question here, but I wanna hear some thoughts on this. What do you guys think?

I have some thoughts on this. I've experienced this too, but I thought it was more of a personal thing that I'd come to this conclusion, after slowly realizing how many "trusted sources" are based on mostly fiction and that we can't really know much of anything. Once you start looking for it, you can disprove pretty much anything. I also thought part of it is just the condition of simply getting older whilst not being a fucking moron. It's hard not to notice patterns over time, like every decade having some fucking group of experts claiming they are revolutionizing everything in (field) only for it to turn out to be a huge scam, and not much changing long term. Or everyone jumping on the Current Thing or Current Belief. Or the government lying to everyone and bungling some huge thing, creating a scandal which makes a lot of people not trust them. The rhymes of history. After awhile, you notice this thing is just like that other thing, that nothing really changes, and that nobody really knows what they're talking about.

There's also an increasing amount of polarization in the US especially where topics that were previously politically neutral are now becoming weirdly political, like nutrition, in which case you will find a ton of opposing information with unusually incendiary language.

But I'm not above speculating that it's something more targeted. it doesn't escape my notice that 95% of the information I receive comes from a phone screen in my hand. Maybe it's targeted at certain people or groups of people. I like to think this forum is "safe" because it's such a small group with closed registration and usernames that you can recognize that I don't think it's a target for manipulation by government/whoever else, like 4chan and reddit are, but you never know. Any part of the internet being manipulated would leak out into wider culture anyway. It's a classic brainwashing technique to break down someone's perceptions so that they're ready to be reprogrammed with the new, true & honest beliefs. All I can say is be wary and focus on what you know works that's been proven through history.

 

[Ewan McGregor]

I don't think it's a target for manipulation by government/whoever else, like 4chan and reddit are, but you never know

You might want to have a word with @Glowie

 

[AnOminous]

I think our conception of knowledge is just kind of broken.

Always has been really. If you look at the basic epistemological debates these days, they're almost exactly the same as the ancient Greeks were arguing about. We've come no closer to knowing what knowledge is than we were then.

 

[Screamer_2]

The new Star Wars series being so shit is to distract males from paying attention to how shit Joe Biden is. That makes more sense than they actually made something so shit.

 

[Chromeo]

The new Star Wars series being so shit is to distract males from paying attention to how shit Joe Biden is. That makes more sense than they actually made something so shit.

The new Star Wars series being so shit is to radicalize my dad specifically

 

[Ron Jeremy Stan Account]

The new Star Wars series being so shit is to distract males from paying attention to how shit Joe Biden is. That makes more sense than they actually made something so shit.

To be fair, shitty Star Wars prequels/sequels have been a thing since the Clinton Administration. So by that logic, every piece of awful Star Wars content – from Jar Jar Binks in 1999 to lesbian nonbinary witches in 2024 – are a distraction from each president, regardless of party affiliation. I'd rather go with Hanlon's Razor here: Hollywood is bankrupt and running on fumes, and Star Wars is a dead horse that's been beaten into subatomic particles – but somehow still attracts an audience of midwits with poor taste.

 

[liquid nitrogen]

re: science in general being confusing

Spoiler: yapping about the nature of science

if I had to impress anything on the general public is that all of science is like ~10000 of the most debatebro autistic people you have ever met, each with a specific bone to pick that they think is the Actual Answer, locked in a room, carefully and methodically trying to explain to everyone else in the room why they're right, with chapters and subheadings and diagrams. Imagine the politest shouting match you have ever seen. We have to use the passive voice because if we made "I believe" statements the average university and conference would make the UFC look like kindergardeners hugging.

Scientific fact is what happens when someone makes a point strong enough that everyone who isn't directly in the line of fire finds that it works in their models and theories, and therefore accepts it.

Scientific consensus is what happens when the old generation dies out and the younger generation tries to bridge the gap between the previous generation's slap fight.

Scientific fields is what happens when the previous generation's slap fight cannot be reconciled, so a schism happens depending on who thinks whose method is better. Because obviously you can't make it a *war*, you just have to be polite and systematic and they'll understand why they're being retarded eventually. Or people will stop listening to them until they die, which is good enough.

We're not meant to agree. We're meant to disagree passionately on every little detail, but show our work. And then disagree on that work, ad nauseum. Eventually your work is either accepted as "well no shit" or completely forgotten, or forgotten right up until someone re-demonstrates your point, and then it's pulled back into the fight.

Unfortunately all of it only makes sense if you understand the relationship between fields and specific arguments. So if all these eggs cause dont cause maybe cause death studies don't make sense, you're supposed to look at the methods, find the part you disagree with the most, and look at what the field not using that method is saying. my bet is if you look at those studies, you'll find some shit like "30 male mice were force fed only eggs for their entire life".

30? shit number -> whats the more statistically-minded field?

force fed only eggs? unrealistic consumption patterns and unreasonable expectations on the metabolism -> who's looking at specific subcompounds at natural occurance rates?

mice? prey animals tangentially related to humans -> who's focusing on human data?

etc. on loop.

if it's written by a journalist and takes two paragraphs to explain it's a cherry picking schizophrenic on the bus yelling about the bees being spartan souls reincarnate and you probably should go read about how to best analyze bee political infighting instead. Or if you think this entire thing is stupid because orcas are the obvious bet for spartans, look at whatever schism generated the bees take. and if you think the spartans couldnt possibly be animals, or if you think reincarnation is stupid, or if you think all of this is stupid and we should be focusing on math, etc.

 

[Rich Evans Simp]

In 2009, Washington Post (((journalist))) Gene Weingarten wrote an extremely influential article called “Fatal Distraction,” an apologia for parents who, in a perfect storm moment, left their children to die in a hot car. You’ll see it repeated like a catechism in online parenting resources that neuroscience explains why ANYONE can forget a child in the backseat and go about their day as if nothing was wrong.

People get BIG MAD if you say this is hogwash, that a parent could never forget that they didn’t drop off a child at day care, or set about to do their shopping completely ignorant that they left the house with a baby strapped in a car seat.

I think this is one of those cultural phenomena that humans affirm and repeat in order to meet a psychological need - that they, too, could divest themselves of a child if they felt like it. We’re too good at catching the moms of dumpster babies using DNA, too good at investigating SIDS, too good at detecting poison and physical abuse. It’s a steam valve for parental regret; or, for those who love their children and would never harm them, a way to virtue signal their compassion.

I hate that all hot car deaths are now excused with “science says it’s okay!”. It’s not. If you’ve ever had a child in the car with you while you were driving - you know deep down it’s absolute bullshit.

 

[Kapros]

In 2009, Washington Post (((journalist))) Gene Weingarten wrote an extremely influential article called “Fatal Distraction,” an apologia for parents who, in a perfect storm moment, left their children to die in a hot car. You’ll see it repeated like a catechism in online parenting resources that neuroscience explains why ANYONE can forget a child in the backseat and go about their day as if nothing was wrong.

People get BIG MAD if you say this is hogwash, that a parent could never forget that they didn’t drop off a child at day care, or set about to do their shopping completely ignorant that they left the house with a baby strapped in a car seat.

I think this is one of those cultural phenomena that humans affirm and repeat in order to meet a psychological need - that they, too, could divest themselves of a child if they felt like it. We’re too good at catching the moms of dumpster babies using DNA, too good at investigating SIDS, too good at detecting poison and physical abuse. It’s a steam valve for parental regret; or, for those who love their children and would never harm them, a way to virtue signal their compassion.

I hate that all hot car deaths are now excused with “science says it’s okay!”. It’s not. If you’ve ever had a child in the car with you while you were driving - you know deep down it’s absolute bullshit.

Jews constantly do this, and it's almost only them doing it. It's not any kind of orchestrated conspiracy among them; they don't get together at the synagogue and plan anything. It's just instinct - and, honestly, that's worse. An entire people's reflexive instinct, at the individual level, is to support whatever harms the community they've joined. We can see the Civil Rights, BLM, mass migration, etc stuff and correlate that for another conclusion: harming the people around them is more important to them - again, at an individual level, for pretty much all of them - than protecting themselves and their own.

 

[Flan Handler]

In 2009, Washington Post (((journalist))) Gene Weingarten wrote an extremely influential article called “Fatal Distraction,” an apologia for parents who, in a perfect storm moment, left their children to die in a hot car. You’ll see it repeated like a catechism in online parenting resources that neuroscience explains why ANYONE can forget a child in the backseat and go about their day as if nothing was wrong.

People get BIG MAD if you say this is hogwash, that a parent could never forget that they didn’t drop off a child at day care, or set about to do their shopping completely ignorant that they left the house with a baby strapped in a car seat.

I think this is one of those cultural phenomena that humans affirm and repeat in order to meet a psychological need - that they, too, could divest themselves of a child if they felt like it. We’re too good at catching the moms of dumpster babies using DNA, too good at investigating SIDS, too good at detecting poison and physical abuse. It’s a steam valve for parental regret; or, for those who love their children and would never harm them, a way to virtue signal their compassion.

I hate that all hot car deaths are now excused with “science says it’s okay!”. It’s not. If you’ve ever had a child in the car with you while you were driving - you know deep down it’s absolute bullshit.

I have never forgotten that article. I was worried I would do that with my baby and tried obsessively to think of ways I could stop myself from forgetting him. I bought little mirrors and other geegaws.

Which was retarded, of course I never forgot about him, I was hardwired to obsess over him like nothing before or after. Hormones are insanely powerful for mothers and babies. And I was basically exhausted and sleep deprived for years.

What was that article about exactly? Very interesting.

 

[Larry David's Opera Cape]

In 2009, Washington Post (((journalist))) Gene Weingarten wrote an extremely influential article called “Fatal Distraction,” an apologia for parents who, in a perfect storm moment, left their children to die in a hot car. You’ll see it repeated like a catechism in online parenting resources that neuroscience explains why ANYONE can forget a child in the backseat and go about their day as if nothing was wrong.

People get BIG MAD if you say this is hogwash, that a parent could never forget that they didn’t drop off a child at day care, or set about to do their shopping completely ignorant that they left the house with a baby strapped in a car seat.

I think this is one of those cultural phenomena that humans affirm and repeat in order to meet a psychological need - that they, too, could divest themselves of a child if they felt like it. We’re too good at catching the moms of dumpster babies using DNA, too good at investigating SIDS, too good at detecting poison and physical abuse. It’s a steam valve for parental regret; or, for those who love their children and would never harm them, a way to virtue signal their compassion.

I hate that all hot car deaths are now excused with “science says it’s okay!”. It’s not. If you’ve ever had a child in the car with you while you were driving - you know deep down it’s absolute bullshit.

FUCKING FINALLY. I am no longer alone in my schizoid beliefs about that stupid fucking article.

I don't even think all the hot car deaths are homicide in the sense of premeditated or intentional murder. I think more than anyone is comfortable to contemplate involve some amount of "functional" and or legal substance misuse, for one thing. And there are some people who are so selfish and self-absorbed, it might not reach a clinical level of mental illness, but there's definitely something wrong with them. Fixated on muh career or muh affair or whatever, such a person could possibly forget a kid.

But normal adult human beings who love their families and aren't hopped up on any substances? Nigh unto impossible.

But the Redditors of the world insist everyone is equally "at risk" to make this fatal error. It reminds me of the cope that anyone is equally at risk to get AIDS. Which of course was a fiction made up to protect people who knew very well that what they were doing was risky and depraved, but who wanted a free pass to keep doing it anyways.

So the question is who is being protected, in this case?

 

[AnOminous]

So the question is who is being protected, in this case?

Conceivably children, because if people believe that they're at risk of doing this, they may put more effort into ensuring absolutely that they never, ever do it, because of the absolute horror that even the possibility of doing it gives them.

Or more realistically people who actually do it and want an excuse, possibly a legal excuse, for why it wasn't just depraved heart murder.

Theory tax: After getting caught in MK-Ultra (NOT a conspiracy theory but a conspiracy fact exposed by the Congressional Church Committee with thousands of documents proving it), the CIA couldn't directly participate in mind control experiments any more, so they infiltrated cults that used such techniques so as to have plausible deniability and continued the basic thrust of MK-Ultra using these groups.

Then whenever they were close to getting caught doing this, they'd trigger a mass suicide or otherwise destroy the group.

 

[Rich Evans Simp]

What was that article about exactly? Very interesting.

I’m not going to go back and read it, for my own sanity. But I definitely recall the “main character” of the article was a mother, a military veteran, who killed her child in a hot car. Despite Weingarten’s obvious bias in her favor, she definitely did not come across as a normal person, like, at all. And I first read it when I was a much more naive and trusting person.