Talk:Philosophy of conspiracy theories

Is this a real thing?

My original research alarm bells are ringing. To start us off... could we get a citation to support the opening paragraph? Which journals actually call the study of conspiracy theories a “philosophy”? Blueboar (talk) 23:33, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

I don't see an original research issue here. Perhaps the use of boldface font in philosophy of conspiracy theories misled you, but it's no more than an obvious pointer to the well-established fact that many philosophers have taken a serious interest in conspiracy theories, and consider it an important field of philosophical study. In the arguments that attempted to delete this entry, people over and over again made the error (perhaps like you) of supposing that, IF the phrase "The philosophy of X" has really been established, and is not a phrase of original research, THEN it means perforce that some authoritative academic body has declared that "The philosophy of X" exists. But this is a fallacy, both regarding the practice of philosophers, and regarding the meaning of "original research." The author of this page has overwhelmingly established that it is a bona fide field of philosophy. Since the comments have been closed on the discussion about deleting, I want to hereby declare my vote that this article should be KEPT. Joseph Rowe (talk) 23:35, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

The Philosophy of Conspiracy Theories is the title of a book by Dentith (ISBN 9781137363169; Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), and a headline on JSTOR Daily. It's not a phrase made up for Wikipedia. (Synonymous phrases in the peer-reviewed literature include "philosophical treatment of conspiracy theories".) XOR'easter (talk) 15:46, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

For those who still wonder whether philosophers really do have a distinctive take on how to think about conspiracy theories, it may be useful to take a look at this: https://reason.com/2015/03/18/what-i-saw-at-the-conspiracy-theory-conf/ It addresses, from the very first sentence, the general perspective of philosophers on this issue, in contrast to other disciplines. (Not all relevant philosophers were present, so I don’t mean to suggest that there isn’t any diversity among philosophers on this issue.) It also addresses the lack of a standard definition and touches a bit on the history of the phrase. Knuteson (talk) 21:54, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

"The philosophy of conspiracy theories has been debated in books and journals..."

ORLY? I don't see any sources which indicate that this is the case. jps (talk) 14:41, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

That is ... the topic of the entire article. Every source it cites is about the philosophical issues regarding the topic of conspiracy theories. I do not understand your complaint. XOR'easter (talk) 15:22, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

I have been wrestling with this myself... and perhaps the problem is that some of us are using the phrase “philosophy of conspiracy theories” DESCRIPTIVELY ... while others of us are looking for sources that use that phrase as a NAME for a recognized branch of philosophical study. I am wondering if renaming this article would resolve the issue (but I don’t know the topic well enough to suggest an alternative). Just a thought. Blueboar (talk) 15:52, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

Yes, I was thinking that there had been a divergence of perceived meaning like that. XOR'easter (talk) 16:23, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

I think it's also very easy to see philosophers batting around an idea and arguing over what they see as shortcomings in the lay or folk definition of "conspiracy theory" and to conclude that they want to legitimize the idea that the reptoids did 9/11. Maybe some of them would; I've known some pretty kooky philosophy enthusiasts in my day, and as a physicist, I'm heir to a great tradition of disparaging the philosophical profession. But the main current seems to be doing something much more reasonable than that. To paraphrase the Cohnitz article linked above: the term "conspiracy theory" seems, the way people generally use it, to imply that the conspiracy is malicious. But then, does the Paul Is Dead theory qualify, if as the story goes, the surviving Beatles were just trying to save the world from collective grief, and the fake Paul was actually a better musician than the original? For those of us who grew up on The X-Files, a "conspiracy theory" is about something nefarious the government is doing, and the "official narrative" (about Area 51 or whatever) is just a cover-up. But surely it's still a conspiracy theory even when it's endorsed by the party in power and becomes their official narrative. We might say that conspiracy theories explain something large-scale, like how in Gravity's Rainbow, Shell Oil was the mastermind behind World War II. But the tangible evidence "explained" by the Pizzagate conspiracy theory is a few mentions of a pizza restaurant in John Podesta's emails. Trying to find a definition that covers all these cases, one might end up concluding that "my friends are planning to hire a band for my birthday party" is a conspiracy theory, which seems unsatisfactory. So, the philosophers argue about it, as philosophers will. XOR'easter (talk) 17:04, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

Ostensibly, we have an article about the "philosophy of conspiracy theories". While there can be a "philosophy of" essentially any topic at all, there isn't a decent identification of what aspects of philosophy vis-a-vis conspiracy theories this article is supposed to encapsulate. Until there is, any categorical statement like this one simply serves to confuse rather than elucidate. For example, is this statement intending to communicate that conspiracy theorists have anything resembling a coherent philosophical approach? There is a way one can read the statement to such an effect. jps (talk) 17:30, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

For example, is this statement intending to communicate that conspiracy theorists have anything resembling a coherent philosophical approach? No. It was a summary of the challenge of constructing an adequate descriptivist definition of "conspiracy theory", as the more intelligible philosophy papers have presented it. XOR'easter (talk) 17:55, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

Then that's what the sentence should be rewritten to say instead of this easily misinterpreted statement. jps (talk) 18:06, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

I do not understand this "like whom?" tag. The sentence has four citations, and the one immediately following gives an example in detail. XOR'easter (talk) 18:07, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

I am not sure what this sentence is intending to say. Is it intending to say that all philosophers share this approach? If not, can we simply say that there are four examples? jps (talk) 18:25, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

When the subject of a sentence is "Philosophers", I don't take it to mean "All philosophers". If four philosophers have done a thing, then it's a true statement to say that philosophers have done that thing. It seems odd to insert a tag asking "like whom?" when the text immediately following answers that question. There is almost certainly a better phrasing that would bypass this confusion, but I'm almost out of time for WP today, so someone else will have to find it. XOR'easter (talk) 18:40, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

POV fork

This looks like a POV fork of conspiracy theory. Tom Harrison ^Talk 12:01, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

Please see central discussion at Talk:Conspiracy theory. --mikeu ^talk 19:10, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

Here was the original intent (the lead of the first revision): "This page describes the philosophical literature on conspiracy theories. A central question has been: Can general reasons be given by virtue of which a dismissive attitude toward conspiracy theories is justified? Those that answer “yes” are referred to as “generalists,” while those who answer “no” are referred to as “particularists.” Particularists argue that each individual theory ought to be judged on its own particular merits." This was already starting from the flawed premise that ideas commonly called conspiracy theories must only be so because their merits have not been evaluated. This contradicts the fact that when called as such, it is because of their unsubstantiated nature, the lack of evidence other than the often cherry picked points linked together to justify them. The current article is very different, but the original POV fork concern was legitimate. I'll try to put the time when possible to evaluate if it should be merged... —PaleoNeonate – 15:27, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

External links

I just removed the external links to blogs, podcasts, and other personal websites per WP:LINKSTOAVOID #11. Please find external sites that meet the criteria. --mikeu ^talk 19:20, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

cognitive infiltration

This entire long entire section gives WP:UNDUE weight to the importance of a single event to the article topic. "If you had told me that this obscure paper would ever become such a publicly visible and objectionable thing, I would have thought it more likely that Martians had just landed in Times Square." --mikeu ^talk 21:09, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

The facts are these: (1) Cass Sunstein is an extremely prominent scholar, who became the Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Obama administration around the time of publication of the article. (2) There have been three articles by philosophers that respond exclusively to that paper, and a forth that devotes considerable attention to it. And, (3) Sunstein later revised and republished the paper in a book whose title highlights it. In addition, though not mentioned in the section, (4) David Ray Griffin wrote a whole book responding to it, and there was (5) quite a buzz about it for a while. Glenn Greenwald, and even, tangentially, Paul Krugman were involved in the discussion. Contrast this with the conspiracy theory page which, for example, includes a section, the viability of conspiracy theories, devoted to a single paper that has received comparatively little attention. It likewise contains a section on Barkun's three types, which also has not generated much scholarly or popular interest. (If you are concerned about the length, I wouldn't object if you moved the block quotation to a section for notes. Other than that, a sentence or two per article discussed does not seem unreasonable to me.) Knuteson (talk) 15:05, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

Move

As this seems to mainly be about what the definition of conspiracy theories are i would suggest renaming it something like "Debate over the nature of conspiracy theories".Slatersteven (talk) 14:15, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

I would be more inclined to move it to Draft: until we can reach some consensus on the multiple issues that have been raised and clarify the appropriate scope of the article. --mikeu ^talk 17:42, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

Yep, I can see a reason for that.Slatersteven (talk) 11:56, 24 November 2019 (UTC)

Requested move 24 November 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: procedural close; not moved to the proposed title at this time, per the discussion below. Please reuse AfD if necessary. Dekimasuよ! 16:49, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

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Philosophy of conspiracy theories → Draft:Philosophy of conspiracy theories – Controversial page creation of suspected WP:POVFORK[1] with potential WP:COI[2] contributions. Should go through formal Wikipedia:Articles for creation review process before publication. There are multiple issues with the current content including WP:NPOV, WP:OR, and WP:PRIMARY. Consensus is needed to determine the specific title of the page and to define the appropriate scope of the article. mikeu ^talk 12:29, 24 November 2019 (UTC)

I'm willing to withdraw this. I don't see a chance of reaching consensus. --mikeu ^talk 20:49, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Notification left at Talk:Conspiracy theory#Philosophy of conspiracy theories

Notification left at Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard#Philosophy of conspiracy theories

Notification left at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard#User:Knuteson

• Support as nom. (edit conflict) --mikeu ^talk 12:34, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
• support This page needs a hell of a lot of work, preferably by fresh hands.Slatersteven (talk) 12:33, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose Starting an RM "to draft" is not a vehicle for relitigating an AfD where you didn't like the result. If you want to page to go through formal AfC review before publication, then fine, I'm an AfC reviewer, and I'll approve it and move it back to main space. The entire point of AfC is trying to determine whether an article is likely to survive AfD. This one already has, and so there is no reason according to policy to let it remain at AfC.
  This bit of bending-over-backwards, along with a COIN discussion based on all of nothing, along with tag bombing the article itself, is all starting to be an openly disruptive bit of throwing policy at the wall to see if anything sticks. GMG^talk 13:06, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
• Opposed - Given that we just had an AfD closed as keep, this seems inappropriate. Does this article need major work? Absolutely. Does it need to be moved to Draftspace for editors to do that work? No. Just fix the problems... right here. Blueboar (talk) 15:09, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
• Please note that about half of the page has recently been deleted. The reason given for removing the section on cognitive infiltration is this: “conspiracy theory has a separate meaning in law.” That proves that they have not even looked at the relevant article and thus don’t have any idea what they are talking about. I would think that one should not make an edit, especially such a major one, based only on one’s own ignorance. They could at least ask for clarification and justification. Although written by legal scholars, the central article was absolutely about the common understanding of conspiracy theories: 9/11 conspiracy theories were their running example. Publishing this in a philosophy journal, they took themselves as making a philosophical case. And three of the philosophers who responded to the article were among those writing on the philosophy of conspiracy theories more generally. So, it does seem properly placed, and the reason given to think otherwise is entirely inapplicable. (See my comment in the cognitive infiltration section for more details.) Knuteson (talk) 01:26, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
• Support - Clear POVFORK to get around the fact that material was rejected from the main Conspiracy Theory article. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 15:53, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose This is not a POVFORK. CT has become such an ubiquitous meme in current American culture that just one approach to it cannot sufficiently encompass it anymore. Help from Philosophy into a key political concept for society these days is a welcome and much needed breath of fresh air. If the article still needs work, this work can be accomplished from what there is in it now, as per User:GreenMeansGo and User talk:Blueboar above. Thank you, warshy ^(¥¥) 18:20, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. Wrong process. Hyperbolick (talk) 19:31, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Article could be summarized in one paragraph

Some observations:

• The opening two sentences of Conspiracy Theories: The Philosophical Debate are: “Over the past decade, a small group of philosophers distributed widely around the globe have begun a debate about conspiracy theories. This book includes all the published contributions to that debate”.Since it was written in 2006, the author has not updated this introductory text for the 2018 and 2019 editions, so it appears that within the overall field of philosophy, the debate has not substantially expanded beyond this “small group”.
• This article, at least as originally written, inferred by how the text was written in an “A says X, but B says Y” format, that there is a 50/50 split in philosophical opinion re conspiracy theories. But except for one source (‘’Conspiracy Theories: The Philosophical Debate’’) there is no WP:RS overview given that characterizes the scale and scope of the debate, i.e. number of adherents on one side or another, except to describe it as occurring within a “small group”. (Yes, I'm aware of this, but it only applies to a limited sample attending one conference.)
• Since this article doesn’t represent an overview of the consensus of philosophical opinion regarding all aspects of conspiracy theories (e.g. a “philosophy of conspiracy theories”), but instead a debate among small subset about one or two aspects, the article title (or article section header) needs to better reflect what the topic actually is.
• The level of detail the article indulges in seems indicative of having been originally written by someone who is involved in the debate, and wishes to describe it in a detailed, chronological, blow-by-blow progression. But this perspective isn't necessarily required or helpful for Wikipedia's purposes, and it gives WP:UNDUE weight to a small conflict within a larger discipline.

I think the topic (what is essentially a kerfluffle among a subset of philosphers) could be summarized in a few sentences. Since the main conspiracy theory article does a good job of establishing the mainstream viewpoint, perhaps a section there, or even a paragraph added to a section describing the fringe/dissenting viewpoint would be a good solution. Something like: "A small number of philosophers disagree that conspiracy theories are characterized by insufficient evidence and feel that the term should not have a pejorative connotation....(followed by two or three well-sourced examples)". Of course, there could be a more appropriate target article, but none comes to mind at the moment. - LuckyLouie (talk) 20:02, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

The academic nature of Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective

Hi. This is not just a book review on a blog, but a review article on a highly-professional, peer-reviewed, open access forum for intellectual inquiry. Please see who is behind it: https://social-epistemology.com/who-we-are/ and also - what is this forum: https://social-epistemology.com/about/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 185.175.33.164 (talk) 10:14, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Copying this here from my talk, see edit anon reverted in article history. --mikeu ^talk 14:53, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Responding to Primary Source Complaint Capnote

Capnote says This article relies too much on references to primary sources. (November 2019); in other words, replace specific arguments with generalizing conclusions from popular books. This can be done, as many public libraries now stock Thomas Milan Konda, Conspiracies of conspiracies : how delusions have overrun America (2019, University of Chicago Press). For the benefit of those who are interested in the specific arguments (fewer and fewer of which will appear in the Wikipedia article, as the capnote gets acted upon), I added an Further Reading link to Conspiracy Theories article in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Vagabond nanoda (talk) 23:25, 3 July 2021 (UTC)