How are you doing, friends?
Do you want to hear the truth?
You will not be able to stand it!
Corona Virus...
Bill Gates...
The richest man of the world
Le me tell you a story
If the richest man of the world has enough money to buy a virus
an then use this virus as a weapon
(a virus) that has been manufactured in Wuhan, China
and it is spread across the world through 5G towers and then after that,
having bribed the all the governments across the world
get a lockdown imposed
After that, installation of microchips in our hands
Money makes everything possible!
The simplest way of world domination
The task would become easier when the other villain, George Soros, joins hands with Bill Gates
and use vaccines as a weapon
and use 5G towers as a weapon
and this is a conspiracy against all of us
This is an anti-national conspiracy
Beware all of you!
Okay, that was enough of malarkey: Let us now talk on a more serious note
A lot of people across the world today believe in the stories that I just you
One of them is that Bill Gates has invented the Coronavirus
There's another story that 5G towers cause cancer
and that vaccines are dangerous for us
Some stories in the media also spread the rumor that Bill Gates wants to install microchips inside us
and that he has plans of world domination
Misinformation like these are called "conspiracy theories"
Nowadays, conspiracy theories are extremely popular in the social media and are widely popular
On world social media day, which happens to be today, I'd like to make a special video on this topic-
Why do conspiracy theories spread and why do people share them?
And can their spread by stopped? How can we factually counter them?
Come, let us see
Conspiracy theories are not a modern phenomenon. They have been around for centuries
One of the earliest records of a conspiracy theory in history is from the year 64AD
In the era of Roman Empire, the emperor around that time was Emperor Nero
A fire broke out in Rome in 64AD
The fire was so devastating that it burned two thirds of Rome to ashes
By chance, Emperor Nero was out of Rome when the fire broke out
When he returned to Rome, he found out that everything had burned to ashes
He began the process of rebuilding and he got a majestic castle constructed for himself
And then rumors started amongst the people that the fire
was actually started by Nero to clear everything off
and destroy all the buildings in order to construct a palace according to his wishes
This is one of the oldest records of conspiracy theories
What's interesting is that this was not one sided
The people formulated a conspiracy theory against Nero and he retaliated by making another conspiracy theory
against the Christians
He alleged that the Christian community was responsible for the fire
And then Christians were executed and atrocities against them followed
Similarly, several conspiracies against the Jews were formulated in Germany in the 1940s
They were blamed for the things they were not even responsible for
And we all know what was the end result of that
So, you can see the extent to which these conspiracy theories can have negative consequences
First of all, this is spreading misinformation and feeding people lies
But most of the times, it is harmless
But what I am trying to tell you is that if these conspiracy theories target a specific community,
or if they target a specific person,
then its negative consequences can be felt to a very large extent
Therefore, it is very important for us to find out why these conspiracy theories originate
How do they spread? And can we stop them and logically counter them?
So the question is- Why do people believe in them?
What are the reasons behind this?
The reasons can be divided into two main categories
One is psychological reasons and another is social reasons
Talking about psychological reasons first,
several research papers have shown that conspiracy theories are a means
of understanding the complex world and organizing information for the humans
especially the extraordinary, earth shattering events that do not have a clear explanation
We do not know the exact causes behind them
So, we try to fill in the missing information with our curiosity
Humans have a tendency to do this
For example, everyone knows how many flights and ships have gone missing from there
But we do not know the explanation behind this
So, several people have come up with a conspiracy theory that aliens carry the flights and ships away
Similarly, in the case of the recently disappeared Malaysian Airlines
Nobody knows where it is and nothing was found either
So, several people have come up with a conspiracy theory that aliens carried the flight away
Or events that are extremely unique- that had very few chances of happening, but they did happen
Events like these give rise to the most number of conspiracy theories
9/11, moon landing, coronavirus
All of these are examples of extremely unique events that are extraordinary and do not happen normally
and they surprise us greatly
There is another reason which is called "illusionary pattern perception"
I will explain it to you with an example: Look at the number on the screen
Can you see a pattern in this number on the screen?
Write down in the comments below
If you've written down the comment, I'll tell you an interesting thing:
50% of you will see a pattern, 50% of you will see none
The reality is that it is a randomly generated number
There exists no pattern in this
I will give you another example- Look at this photo which has been captured in Iceland
Can you spot an elephant's face here?
Look at this photo of a drawer- Can you spot a face here: two eyes and a mouth?
Humans have a tendency to look for a pattern always- to connect the dots
We try and relate different events with one another
So, basically, we try and look for a pattern even when there is none!
No matter how completely random the things are, we still try and look for an explanation or pattern there
Some people have a higher tendency to do this, when compared to others
But if you take this to an extreme level and apply this to every aspect in your life,
then it might change your thinking
This type of thinking is called "teleological thinking"
Let me explain with the help of another example
If you ask a 3 year old child- Why does it rain?
He might answer that it rains because the plants and the trees get thirsty
and it rains so that their thirst is quenched
Or you can ask him why are there leaves on a tree?
He might answer that the trees grow leaves to give shade to the animals
What is the basic characteristic in such a way of thinking?
The children think that there is a purpose/intention behind everything
It rains because of a purpose
Similarly, conspiracy theorists try and accord purpose and intentions to extraordinary events
when there might not be any
Why is corona virus spreading these days?
Someone must have engineered it for sure. It must've been made as a bio-weapon. Someone is behind this
and this is why it is so widespread in the world today
These people are not satisfied with random explanations
that corona virus is spreading because it originated randomly
and that no one is behind this
Random events happen constantly all across the world
Talking about the social category of events, then "seeking validation " comes first
Those people that are more isolated and feel more left out by the society
if they have not achieved much or if they are uneducated,
such people, in an attempt to feel validated and special and to show that they are well informed as well,
and to stand out more in their social circles
spread conspiracy theories
Basically, they want to show that they are more informed than the rest on political and social events
This conclusion was put forward by a research
The links to all the researches that I am talking about have been provided in the description below
You can read the abstracts of these researches yourself and see what conclusions have been arrived at
as to why people share conspiracy theories
I am talking about sharing and not origin. Because more often than not,
conspiracy theories originate due to political intention
as we saw in the case of Emperor Nero
He formulated a conspiracy theory to save himself
He formulated a conspiracy theory to salvage and improve his political image
So, this could be the reason behind spreading them
And the reason why they actually spread have been provided
I'd like to mention another research that tells us
what type of people are more vulnerable to believing in conspiracy theories?
A research tells us that the people who are going through a crisis or are seeing disasters happening
then there are higher possibilities of the spread of conspiracy theories
For example, the conspiracy theory about the illuminati spread during the time of Yellow fever
And you already know that a lot of conspiracy theories spread after the 9/11 attacks
A lot of conspiracy theories were formulated about the moon landing
It has also been told that the people who feel powerless
or are suffering from anxiety or some sort of existential crisis,
They believe more in conspiracy theories because they want to make someone a scapegoat
they want to hold someone/something responsible for their problems
So, how can we recognize that something is a conspiracy theory?
How can we tell that its possible something might have actually happened in one case
but be able to say that it is conspiracy theory in another case?
There are some characteristics of all conspiracy theories
First: every conspiracy theory has one evil mastermind
There is one great villain that runs the entire conspiracy theory
who is extremely wicket and formulates all the plans as he is the mastermind behind every thing
For example, Bill Gates is this villain in the corona virus conspiracy
It is George Soros in some conspiracies
It is the Illuminati in some conspiracies
It is the government who is the evil mastermind in 9/11 or moon landing conspiracy
Another characteristic is that there is an attempt to relate unrelated things in every conspiracy theory
And it showed how things happen because of other things happening
They say "Co relation is not causation"
For the conspiracy theorists, co-relation is always causation
(they think that) this unrelated event surely happened because of some other event
Third: Most conspiracies involve a very large group of people who keep it concealed
For example: If you take the example of moon landing, some people say that
Moon landing never happened and that it is a perpetual lie
But if you point out that there are so many astronauts of NASA
and that they can ask anyone of them- they have all been to space
and that they can tell them the truth
Then they would say that the NASA people are involved in it as well
All of the astronauts are in on the conspiracy
which is extremely unrealistic to think about
That thousands of astronauts are all keeping quiet in a conspiracy
Can it realistically happen that no one says anything to anyone and all are part of the conspiracy?
No matter how secretive an organization is
I'd say CIA is one of the most secretive organizations
there are whistleblowers even there
So if it were something like that, then there would be whistle blowers who would raise their voice and tell everyone
So, therefore this doesn't make sense
Fourth: Most conspiracy theories have contradictions
A conspiracy theory would say that something happened. But if you try and dig up facts and research
that the facts contradict their beliefs
Several times, conspiracy theories are self contradictory
For example, the George Soros is popular in many countries across the world
Turkish President Erdogan says that that George Soros is a formulating a Jewish conspiracy against
their Islamic country- Turkey
In UK it is said that George Soros is formulating a liberal and communist conspiracy against western countries
That he wants to open up their borders and invite Africans and Arabs to their country
that is, George Soros is supporting the Islamists
In America, it is said that he is a formulating a Jewish conspiracy against Christians
In India, it is said that George Soros is a formulating a conspiracy
 against Hindus after aligning with Islamists and Christians
All these conspiracies are self contradictory
How can it be that a Jewish man
aligns with Christians in one place and goes against them in another place
and aligns with islamists in one place and goes against them in another place
You will find such contradictions in every conspiracy theory
Fifth and most important: It is next to impossible to disprove any conspiracy theory
No matter what fact you put up against it
those facts will become a part of the conspiracy for the conspiracy theorists
Consider this video that I am making right now
Some people would say that since I am saving the images of Bill Gates, George Soros and the US government
as I am disproving the conspiracy theories against them
So I must be a part of this conspiracy theory as well
So I must be a part of this conspiracy theory as well and they must have paid me to say this
No matter what you say or which media source you quote
no matter what fact you place before them
everything would become a part of that conspiracy
that everyone is in on it and that's how it is happening
So now the question is: How can we counter conspiracy theories?
How can we curb their spread?
The first and the easiest method which is valid for any kind of misinformation
Pause before you share anything
Before you share anything- think. Think about whether what you are just about to share is correct or not
Google it once
Most of the times, the most common conspiracy theories and the misinformation
have already been fact checked
Google it once and you will get the results of the fact checking websites
You will get the results of the conspiracy theory websites
and you can see the truth for yourself
For example, take the moon landing conspiracy theory
It is often questioned as to why the flag was waving on the moon
or why the shadows were crooked
The reasons for all of these are already available
The Flag was waving due to the movement caused in it when Neil Armstrong was placing the flag
We all know that there is no atmosphere on the moon. The flag was waving because of his motions
Similarly, the reason behind crooked shadows is that wide angle cameras were used
You will get the facts easily. All you have to do is pause once
But what will you do when there is no fact check available?
I would say, think critically
Whenever you see something on the internet, 
first of all, check whether they have the characteristics of conspiracy theories
that we talked about in the previous section
If you see them, then look for contradictions within the conspiracy theory
and after that, think scientifically
Consider any statement or theory that you have heard like a hypothesis
Just like you did in Chemistry in Class 8 or 9
or while doing any thesis
In science, you consider a hypothesis
and then you look for arguments in favour and against it
Compare both and see which arguments make more sense and are more logical
And finally, remember that co relation is not equal to causation
For example, a very famous conspiracy theory that has been widespread for a long time
is that the EVMs have been hacked
and that Narendra Modi has hacked the EVMs to win the elections
I do concede that it is possible to hack EVMs, in my opinion
There also have been isolated cases of incorrect results in a couple of machines
So these are the arguments in favour
The argument against it is that why are there only a couple of proofs in lakhs of machines?
There have been no other proofs barring these stray cases
So, I would put this in the category of conspiracy theory because
I do concede that EVMs can be hacked
But there is a huge difference between- they have been hacked and they can be hacked
Co relation is not equal to causation
Therefore, I would conclude that most probably, this has not happened
because most of the proof is against it
So, this is how you should analyze everything
I hope you would have learnt new things from this video. Share it
Help the information reach more and more people so that we can curb the spread of misinformation
and always pause before you spread the misinformation
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We will meet again in the next video
Thank you
