A random example is “select from the following, properties that apply to a liquid”
one answer will for example have a statement that it is incompressible
Having just taught this to my S1 class I can tell you that they are taught the liquids and gases are compressible, just liquids much less so. The simplification and use of imagery that is easily accessible is part of learning. Same as I teach atoms look more like fuzzy tennis balls than smooth spheres.
I'd a mate kept trying to convince everyone that aliens taught the Egyptians how to build the pyramids. Going on about each side was orientated to 10 points past the decimal point north or west or whatever.
I can just see how that went with the ancient Egyptian builders.
Alien - 'We're going to teach you to build a pyramid'
Builder - 'Do we get lasers and highly sophisticated otherworldly technology ?'
Alien - 'No'
Builder - 'So what do we get to build it with then'
Alien - 'We have these copper chisels'
......
I'm LOVING the science-conspiracy conspiracy on here. Art imitates life, or life imitates art?
Ahh my favourite, the moon landing being fake.
Given the Russians could track such, and any attempt to fake would be spotted by them pretty quickly, we know its totally legit because every Russian comedian since 1969 doesn’t start his act with ‘Hey, remember when the Americans landed on the moon ?’
There's also the weird thing that the US managed to fake a moon landing in 1969 and get away with it, but then faked it another 5 times! I'm assuming that any decent conspiracist would know why they did it so many times? (TV rights? Advertising during the show? Were the rockets heavily sponsored? 😀 )
“in the future bro, there’ll be no such thing as bricks”.
I’d like to know more about this. It’s the best conspiracy theory so far.
Well - the future's a very long time. At the point of the heat death of the universe there'll be no conscious observers to call one clump of matter 'a brick'. So he's right.
I’m LOVING the science-conspiracy conspiracy on here
Something to do with ironing.....
I’d a mate kept trying to convince everyone that aliens taught the Egyptians how to build the pyramids.
Theres just a mild whiff of racism in the whole ancient aliens thing isnt there 🙂
There's plenty of ammunition out there at the moment for those that way inclined.
At the moment, the world makes no sense at all regardless of where you're standing.
People can see some sort of economic crash coming. Everything in the news or press is downright depressing....housing is literally unaffordable unless you happen to be already wealthy....so can you see how the 'You'll own nothing and be happy' WEF quote has gathered momentum. A convenient baddy for all the worlds woes.
The government doesn't do a thing to promote any confidence at all. Cover ups, Boris etc. People see the government spending millions if not billions supporting Ukraine whilst their own people are in fear of putting the heating on and in fear of soaring food prices...and there's always money for war right? I do think after the last few years some people are close to despair and this is where all of a sudden your YouTube 'conspiracy theorist' starts to make sense.
Another example.....To get anywhere near the royal family Special Branch need to know everything about you, yet a bachelor radio DJ from Yorkshire is brought in to the inner sanctum to offer marriage guidance to Charles and Diana and he turns out to be one of the country's most prolific paedophile's! Then there is the whole Prince Andrew, Maxwell, Epstein saga....Rolf Harris - another paedophile that was close to the queen.....Either Special Branch aren't doing a terrific job or the royals have a terrible choice in friends....or there is indeed a secret cabal of paedo's that run the world?!? So again you can see how these people who are attracted to this conspiracy stuff can pull on a thread.
From the one's i've listened to, it seems that there is a loose base of some sort of fact and then things seems to go stratospheric with people whose imaginations take them there.
I think a couple on here have already said that social media doesn't help. I came off FB when everyone became a virologist overnight and haven't been back on since. DOn't miss it in the slightest as it was mostly just unnecessary noise anyway.
Maybe some of the things theorists are concerned about may come to fruition, maybe not....i suppose we'll have to wait and see, but you must agree that things don't seem quite right or rosy anymore! They may be on to something...or may be not! 🙂
Taxi drivers are well known to be the font of all knowledge regardless of topic!!! 😀
evolution was a myth because if it was real “all the monkeys would be people by now”
I work with a very highly qualified medical professional who is also a member of a creationist church; he believes this along with fossils seeming to be millions of years old as a test of faith.
Yet will happily slate patients who are anti-science as regards covid vaccinations.
Nowt as strange as folk.
Theres just a mild whiff of racism in the whole ancient aliens thing isnt there 🙂
I know what you mean, but at the same time most of the conspiracists I've ever met couldn't explain how a greenhouse was built, never mind the pyramids.
I work with a very highly qualified medical professional who is also a member of a creationist church
My A-level physics teacher was often spotted in town, preaching on street corners with his church. Thinking about it now, he's probably the reason that I failed A-level physics. Actually no, it wasn't just him, it was his church. Makes you think, eh?
Few years ago we had a bathroom fitter in, recommended by a friend who neglected to tell us he was actually a lunatic.
Got making small talk whilst he was working away and he started by telling me about contrails affecting the weather. That developed into it actually being aluminium oxide being released, which is absorbed into your brain, you can then be controlled via the electricity pylon network.
He then went on to tell me about the images presented to kids in games like call of duty, you know the soldier/police officer in full riot gear, the goggles, the gun etc. That actually is numbing the population into accepting that image, so that when the day comes and martial law is introduced we'll be more passive.
He's clearly a nutter by this point, but he's half way through the bathroom job, so I just nod and say well it seems a bit far fetched but yeah, I'll look into it!
Then he says "well I've already had them in my house, broke my door down in the middle of the night and dragged me out into the street."
I said "bloody hell, sounds awful, must've been scary. They don't just do that shit to random people do they!? Blimey." (Thinking it's clearly made up story but let it slide, he's got the tiling to finish.)
He said "I know, all I did was leave a few death threats on the local MP's answer phone coz he hasn't done anything about the contrails."
😬 Bathroom is nice though 👌
Thankfully, this was well before COVID. I see him driving around the local area from time to time with a young lad (apprentice I guess) in his passenger seat, poor bastard.
I teach atoms look more like fuzzy tennis balls than smooth spheres.
Nah, they're tiny footballs with marbles wizzing round!
This may well have changed since my distant day but there's something about finding at successive stages that what you'd learned hitherto was just was a partial, simplified, and possibly contested version is actually a pretty good grounding in being scheptical about stuff. Until around doctorate level you're actually having to find out new stuff and add to the mix of what's known or debate about this.
Sympathise with the OP though. I used to get shit for arguing with the RE teacher.
I know what you mean, but at the same time most of the conspiracists I’ve ever met couldn’t explain how a greenhouse was built, never mind the pyramids.
If you draw straight lines between any three greenhouses any where in the world you'll always get a perfect triangle. Makes you think.
bachelor radio DJ from Yorkshire is brought in to the inner sanctum to offer marriage guidance to Charles and Diana and he turns out to be one of the country’s most prolific paedophile’s!
They probably knew. Some of that sort are protected.
Cyril Smith, case in point.
" In April 2014, it was reported that there had been 144 complaints against Smith from victims as young as eight years of age. Attempts to prosecute Smith had been blocked"
This may well have changed since my distant day but there’s something about finding at successive stages that what you’d learned hitherto was just was a partial, simplified, and possibly contested version is actually a pretty good grounding in being scheptical about stuff
Well yeah, I quite liked it, as a marker of my development. Like learning how much 'the speed of sound' varies. And I'd think, oh good, I never needed to know that before, I've moved on a step. I probably wouldn't have concluded that there was a secret government conspiracy to make a generation of liars because some previous teacher had told me it was 330m/s.
Nah, they’re tiny footballs with marbles wizzing round!
Marbles? Are you certain?
I work with a very highly qualified medical professional who is also a member of a creationist church; he believes this along with fossils seeming to be millions of years old as a test of faith.
I can beat that. I did a geology degree with one of my fellow students being a creationist. The whole foundation of geology: deep time, evolution...he didn't believe a word of it, just wrote essays on what the lecturers wanted to hear. He was literally living a lie.
I probably wouldn’t have concluded that there was a secret government conspiracy to make a generation of liars because some previous teacher had told me it was 330m/s.
Just wait til you find out about that famous liar Newton.
I teach atoms look more like fuzzy tennis balls than smooth spheres.
Best thing to compare it to, in my view, is the ripples on a pond when you throw a stone in. If you look closely the actual ripples are rippling quite quickly, but the ring itself is moving much more slowly. The ripples are like the quantum waves, they clump together to represent the ring. The ring is composed of waves but is itself not a wave itself and isn't moving at their speed.
I did a geology degree with one of my fellow students being a creationist. The whole foundation of geology: deep time, evolution…he didn’t believe a word of it, just wrote essays on what the lecturers wanted to hear.
er, any idea why he choose to dedicate 3 years of his life to it??
I teach atoms look more like fuzzy tennis balls than smooth spheres.
My lecture is bit more lengthy 🙂
It seems dear old Kanye has bought into a few conspiracies. I think this one will finally be his undoing though:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-63198991
Going 'full defcon 3 on Jewish people' isn't a good look. Ask Mel Gibson.
What I find disturbing though, is the fact that he has so much influence on many young people. A number of whom will take his words to feed into their own fears. I fully expect a spike in anti-Semitic abuse online globally, over the next few days, as this all unravels. I think it inevitable that his many lucrative commercial collaborations will cease quite suddenly, and this may well lead to a backlash against certain companies etc. But at least he won't be tweeting about it.
Kanye needs help. He was such a talented and smart guy, it's depressing to see how much of a mess he's becoming 😐
I did a geology degree with one of my fellow students being a creationist. The whole foundation of geology: deep time, evolution…he didn’t believe a word of it, just wrote essays on what the lecturers wanted to hear.
er, any idea why he choose to dedicate 3 years of his life to it??
He was probably stoned.
Theres just a mild whiff of racism in the whole ancient aliens thing isnt there
Indeed, Angkor Watt gets the same sort of treatment, You can point out to people that most of it was built contemporaneously to Early medieval castles in places like Wales and France, and no -one thinks those are either supposedly built by or are landing site for aliens, but for some folks the lure of the Von Daniken is too strong. That man has an awful lot to answer for.
It's no accident that conspiracy theories and "easyliving" go hand in hand.
America is the home of Conspiracy because it's the home of easy living, ie its population has more time to come up with stupid stuff in an attempt to add some form of interest and meaning to their lives!
Back in the day, you spent 18 hours a day foraging for nuts and trying not to get chomped on by an angry Tiger or Wolf, and the other 6 hours you spent asleep. Today, your food comes in quick and easy to eat packets, your house provides everything you need at a push of a button, and your job is increasingly automated and mindless. No suprise then that idle minds have time to come up with this rubbish to fill its voids!
People now get into this stuff because it gives them something to do. As religion falls by the wayside, alternative beliefs take its place, and people love to think they know something others don't. You can't debunk a conspiracy theorist because they are not listening and because they themselves cannot allow themselves to be debunked, because then what would they fill their days with? Add in the ability of modern global social media to add a commercial aspect, ie to monitise through advertising etc and its clear to see why today Conspiracy Theories are so popular.
America is the home of Conspiracy because it’s the home of easy living,
It really isn't!
BTW: the one thing i say to these misguideds is "ok, lets say you are right and Man didn't walk on the moon/elvis isn't dead/the earth is flat" (*delete as appropriate) what are YOU going to do about it?
The painful answer is nothing, nothing what so ever because tomorrow the sun will come up, you'll still go to work in your dead end job, your "friends" will still not ask you to join them in the pub for a pint, your ex wife will remain firmly ex, and your pathetic, inconsiquential existance on this planet of 8 Billion equally un-unique people (or lizards if you prefer) will simply be one day longer.
But why would you allow yourself to get so worked up?
S1 are a touch young for quantum mechanics. Fries their mind when I explain that they don't exist.
Here’s a good Scientific American 30 minute discussion or a 20 minute read on conspiracy theories with Michael Marshall of the Good Thinkers Society, it’s rather sad and pathetic (although very telling) that the “protocols of the elders of Zion” gets a mention from the conspiracy freaks.
Flat Earthers : What they believe and why, with Michael Marshall
Behind the curve is a documentary well worth a watch for an insight into some of the different types of flat earthers.
All sentient creatures are intrigued by anomalies.
So, to a greater or lesser degree, we’re fascinated by conspiracy theories.
Saying that, i love it when people apply science to the conspiracy theories, if only for the science lesson. Very edifying.
Though, there’s something deeper going on with conspiracy theories.
On an intuitive level, their adherents might be on to something profound, but they’re clinging to fairly superficial and rudimentary theories.
For example, I’d guess that the flat-earthers, although wrong, may subconsciously suspect that reality is some kind of simulation.
We can’t scientifically prove/ disprove that yet.
No sh*t😜
I don't believe in conspiracies. People just aren't that organised or agreeable.
I think Steve has a point, the whole thing about light simultaneously being a wave and a particle is perfect Orwellian doublethink.
I gave up watching Behind the Curve as I couldn't stand weaponised stupidity. It was like that Jam sketch at the impound lot, just longer and much less funny.
don't you know that the bonkers conspiracies like flat earth and Finland not being real are just started to take away focus on the ones that are actually real .
a conspiracy conspiracy. i like it...
a conspiracy conspiracy.
That's what they want you to think
Conspiracy theories that are actually true...
Here’s Thompson’s first story, published Monday:
"
At an invitation-only conference in August at a secret location southeast of Phoenix, a group of election deniers unspooled a new conspiracy theory about the 2020 presidential outcome.
Using threadbare evidence, or none at all, the group suggested that a small American election software company, Konnech, had secret ties to the Chinese Communist Party and had given the Chinese government backdoor access to personal data about two million poll workers in the United States, according to online accounts from several people at the conference."
One day later, the Los Angles County DA announced the arrest of Konnech’s CEO.
Kanye needs help. He was such a talented and smart guy, it’s depressing to see how much of a mess he’s becoming
The 'talented and smart' things are surely pretty subjective. What he is, is a person with some pretty abhorrent views. Whilst he may indeed suffer from mental health issues, this does not excuse such views imo. Plenty of people suffering with Bipolar disorder and other conditions, who aren't anti-Semitic misogynists. He's rich enough to get help. Maybe he doesn't feel he needs it. But ultimately, the power to change is in his hands, and he's not doing anything to change. 'Silencing' him on social media is a good step. Starve him of the oxygen of publicity.
*I notice Adidas seem to have amended their Yeezy product pages both here and in the USA; page now limited to simply displaying a range of trainers. There is now no mention of Kayne West at all. Yesterday, the USA Adidas site had more promotional content. The UK site was limited to one page of a small range of trainers.
That chart on page one…
Ted Cruz is the zodiac killer😂😂😂😂
That one I can get behind..
Theres just a mild whiff of racism in the whole ancient aliens thing isnt there
Indeed, Angkor Watt gets the same sort of treatment, You can point out to people that most of it was built contemporaneously to Early medieval castles in places like Wales and France, and no -one thinks those are either supposedly built by or are landing site for aliens,
Of course the real reason these mega structures exist in countries like Egypt, Cambodia, Peru and so on is because they are too big for us to have dragged them back to the British Museum. 🙂
Conspiracy theories that are actually true…
No idea about that particular case, but some are true of course. If you've never heard of it, google "mk ultra" for instance.
But the danger here is extrapolating "see, we told you so!" into being 'proof' that all the others have equal merit. "If they're lying about that, what else are they lying about?" Everything? Nothing? Most likely, somewhere in between. If all you have is a hammer then everything looks like a nail.
