Wait a minute. Don’t just believe in conspiracy theories. What if it turns out to be a hoax? Conspiracy theories… oh conspiracy theories. Starting from Mamarika, Wahyudi, Remason, to Illuminati. But why do some people believe in conspiracy theories?
What exactly is a conspiracy theory?
In short, conspiracy theory is the assumption that there is a mastermind behind an event. Especially when it involves dangerous, illegal, and secret things. Usually, these puppeteers are powerful people who are members of a secret society. Whether to hide extraterrestrial aliens or to rule the world…
Every time there is an incident whose explanation is difficult for our common sense to digest, little by little we immediately believe in any conspiracy theory. Even though there are many conspiracy theories that cannot be guaranteed to be true, aka HOAX! How can you?
According to neuroscientist Paul Whalen, the amygdala in our brain automatically tries to find patterns when we encounter situations that are chaotic and too difficult to digest. Especially in this day and age, where all kinds of information – whether it’s true, or what’s ridiculous – are only as far as clicks on Google.
This is also supported by Ramsey’s Theory which states: When faced with abundant random data, humans have a tendency to relate one data to another to form a pattern. The original goal, of course, is so that we can distinguish which information is useful, and which is just spamming our brains.
Why Do Some People Believe in Conspiracy Theories?
The problem is, not infrequently this tendency actually makes us carelessly connect information, when in fact it is not related at all. What matters is that it makes sense to us.
For example, look at the road in front of our house which is straight and flat. For those of us who have never been to outer space, it’s certainly easier to imagine that the earth is flat, right?
Maybe so. However, the physicist David Robert Grimes of the University of Oxford has scientifically proven that real large-scale conspiracies are in fact difficult to realize.
You see, a group of 2500 people can only maintain confidentiality for a maximum of 5 years. While the Moon landings took place 50 years ago and involved more than 400 thousand people, you know.
It’s not your fault if you’re still a fan of the NASA conspiracy theory. Basically, we humans are creatures who are very prone to be subject to ‘proportional bias’, namely the tendency to not believe that something big can be caused by things that we consider small.
In addition, we also tend to immediately reject ideas that conflict with our beliefs. This phenomenon is called the ‘backfire effect’.
