Transcript [00:00] So, once they think that, they're going [00:01] to go around looking for facts that'll [00:03] support it. Well, you know, yeah, Israel [00:05] probably did 9/11. If I wouldn't put it [00:07] past them, that is one more [music] [00:09] thing that people can kind of put in [00:10] their knapsack of arguments why Israel [00:13] is a uniquely evil country in the world. [00:15] And I And I'm just not sure how we're [00:17] going to argue these people out of it. [00:24] >> 25 years ago, the story was that the [00:27] government did it. Today, increasingly, [00:29] [music] the story is that Israel did it. [00:31] >> The rocks in the stream are those [00:33] anomalies. They focus on those. They [00:35] don't want you to think about the river [00:36] [music] of of well-supported, persuasive [00:39] facts. You know, the fact that there are [00:41] thousands and thousands [music] of [00:43] eyewitnesses to the 9/11 collapse. They [00:46] always find just the one person here, [00:48] the one person there who reported [00:50] something a little different. [00:53] >> Uh we call [music] this the [00:54] proportionality bias. That is, the size [00:56] of the event should be matched by a [00:58] cause that's equally big. You know, JFK [01:01] cannot have been taken out by this lone [01:02] nut. It has to be the CIA and the FBI [01:05] and the KGB. [01:07] >> People who consider themselves extremely [01:10] liberal, progressive, open-minded, [01:12] tolerant people [music] are recycling [01:14] claims made by professional racists. [01:17] Conspiracy theory is a little bit like a [01:18] mind virus. Once once it gets in there, [01:20] it makes you more likely to believe [01:23] other exotic claims. And all of these [01:26] theories that there's some vast entity [01:28] [music] [01:28] really controlling events. I mean, you [01:30] know, I feel like so many of them just [01:32] come back to the the protocols of the [01:33] elders of Zion. [01:36] I always wanted to sit down and just [01:37] say, "Okay, you know, have you ever met [01:39] anybody who works on a magazine or works [01:42] at [music] any kind of job? Imagine I [01:43] come in as editor of a magazine. I hire [01:45] a bunch of people that I've never met [01:46] before. [01:46] >> [music] [01:46] >> And then, what do I do? I get them all [01:48] in a room and I say, 'Hey guys, I've got [01:50] a project. We're all going to work [01:51] together to cover [music] up one of the [01:54] the greatest crime in American history, [01:56] and we all have to keep the secret for [01:57] the rest of our lives. Like is that how [02:00] you think the world works? I mean this [02:02] isn't [music] a Dan Brown novel. How [02:04] would I do it? How would I make these [02:06] young magazine editors and fact-checkers [02:08] and photo editors all go along with [02:10] this? Why wouldn't somebody go [02:11] immediately running in terror from the [02:13] building and and turn us in? [02:16] >> Yeah, I have a quote in my conspiracy [02:17] book about um [02:19] the fear that people have not that it's [02:22] the you know lizard aliens running the [02:24] world or the Illuminati. [02:27] It's that nobody's in charge. [02:35] >> [music]
Twenty-five years after 9/11, the conspiracy theories are back, and they have swapped villains. "The government did it" has become "Israel did it." Same claims, same non-evidence, new target.
James B. Meigs ran the 2005 Popular Mechanics investigation that took the truther claims apart point by point, and spent the next two decades being told he was part of the cover-up. Michael Shermer, founder of Skeptic magazine, has spent thirty years studying why intelligent people believe things that are not true.
They both join the Honest Take to break down how conspiracy theories work: proportionality bias, anomaly hunting, the Gish Gallop, and what happens when people who consider themselves liberal and open-minded end up recycling material that originated with professional antisemites.
Listen to the full episode here: https://buff.ly/ZCTaaWK
