Yesterday, I wrote about those who propounded conspiracy theories and those who propounded end-times predictions. I commented that they shared in common a confusion between a casual and a causal relationship. What do I mean? I pointed to something that was very popular several years ago called Six Degrees of Separation. Or, perhaps another way to help you to understand what I am saying is to think of shows such as, Law and Order, or CSI, in their various popular incarnations. So, what is Six Degrees of Separation?
Six degrees of separation refers to the idea that everyone is on average approximately six steps away, by way of introduction, from any other person on Earth, so that a chain of, “a friend of a friend” statements can be made, on average, to connect any two people in six steps or fewer. It was originally set out by Frigyes Karinthy and popularized by a play written by John Guare. … Mathematicians use an analogous notion of collaboration distance: two persons are linked if they are coauthors of an article. The collaboration distance with mathematician Paul Erd?s is called the Erd?s number. Erd?s-Bacon numbers are a further extension of the same thinking. Watts and Strogatz showed that: Average Path Length = (ln N / ln K) where N = total nodes and K = acquaintances per node. Thus if N = 300,000,000 (90% US pop.) and K = 30 then Degrees of Separation = 19.5 / 3.4 = 5.7 and if N = 6,000,000,000 (90% World pop.) and K = 30 then Degrees of Separation = 22.5 / 3.4 = 6.6. (Assume 10% of population is too young to participate.)
Now, for those of you who are not mathematicians, this means that within seven people (using the 6.6 world number) on average, I can show a connection between you and any person who is part of the “connected” world. I say it this way because there have been some arguments about isolated Brazilian tribes, etc. But, that means that within 7 people, on average, I can either connect you to Mother Theresa’s order or to the current President of Syria, Bashar al-Assad. In my case, I can hook myself to the President of Syria in just one step. I know Metropolitan PHILIP because I am an Antiochian priest. He has met President al-Assad more than once because the Patriarch of Antioch and All the East is in Damascus, and our Metropolitan has paid protocol visits to President Assad when necessary. And, I bet I could find a link from me to Mother Theresa within 7 to 10 people.
These links, however, would not be “serious” links. Rather, they are the type of links that only say that an acquaintance of an acquaintance of an acquaintance of an acquaintance of an acquaintance of an acquaintance knows a person with whom I wish a connection. As you can see that connection neither implies that I really know the person, nor that I agree with the person, nor that the person would listen to my opinion were I to give it to him/her, nor that the person and I are fellow-travellers, nor that the person would give me any type of special treatment were I to meet that person. All it says is that most people have multiple linkages. It is akin to finding out that you are a distant cousin of some famous person, or that finding out that President Obama can claim a kinship to the Irish (true). They are casual connection but there is no causal connection.
Nevertheless, it is this type of thinking that predominates in conspiracy theory thinking. The people involved in either end-times scenarios or conspiracy scenarios see everything through this casual lens, but think that is is causal. So, forty years ago, when the European Union looked like it would be composed of exactly 10 member nations, end-times devotees were suddenly convinced that this was “the” 10 nation confederacy that appears to be named in the Book of Revelation, the Apocalypse. And so, the final alliance was about to be forged and the Anti-Christ must already have been born. Now 40 years later, with more than 10 nations, this does not seem like such a sure thing. It was purely casual that the number of nations was 10. It had no relationship to anything more profound. And, it was an ephemeral number 10 because it quickly became more than 10 nations. But 40 years ago, end-times devotees were sure that behind that number 10 was the hand of the Great Serpent.
I could go on. The threat of the Illuminati coming from the idea that the Rothschilds and very few other families owned the major banks of Europe. The idea that the United Nations had/has secret plans to impose one world government and has specially trained troops from each country which are ready to spring into action and betray the nations of the world when the time is right, etc. All of these are ideas mostly based on casual relationships and on secret knowledge that the rest of the world does not know, even though mysteriously the true few can see the connections forming. If nothing else, conspiracy theories and end-times theories rely on the unflinching belief that somehow your group has come to knowledge that no one else has been able to piece together. Or, they rely on an insider, who has left the conspiracy in order to reveal all.
However, in order for there to be a cause and effect relationship, one must show more than simply an apparent connection. For instance, it is not sufficient to say 10 nations means the final confederacy. One must show some reasonable logical argumentation. Think of shows like CSI and Law and Order. How often do they start out with one suspect, only to go to another, and maybe finally to a third. Why do they do that? Because there is often a casual relationship between the facts and the suspect. However, as more in depth investigations are done, it is seen that what appeared to point to one suspect actually exonerates that suspect. In other words, even trained investigators can initially mis-connect the facts to end up with an invalid wrong conclusion. Conspiracy theorists and end-times devotees seem to have the special capability to make wrong connections on a regular basis without the ability to do the more in depth study that is required in order to see whether the connection is casual or causal. This is where they stumble greatly.
===MORE TO COME===
What of the causal relationships that can be seen, documented and presented in numerous quotes, writings, and policy-papers of leaders, organizations, etc. yet are still denied by the main-stream Media? What of the current NDAA FY 2012 and Executive Orders, particularly President Obama’s most recent Executive Order: The National Defense Resources Preparedness Act, which according to numerous Constitutional attorneys, like Dr. Jonathan Turley, gives the Administration “sweeping powers over the affairs of all things necessary for daily life in the United States and allows for the President to be considered judge, jury and executioner in the matter of who should be subject to extra-judicial rendition to a military-tribunal, without being charged; which one should be assassinated, or what should be seized to aid the Nation and why?”
The “Trespass Bill” (or what I like to call ‘How to destroy the First Amendment to the Bill of Rights within the Constitution of the United States with one pen swipe’) or the “Drone Bill” which authorizes the use of predator-drones (a weapon of war-fare, not of police-protection) to use against American Citizens for “surveillance.” Don’t get me wrong, this all started with the Neo-con takeover under GW Bush, 9-11 and the so-called Patriot Act…and has carried over into the new Administration, and is being ramped up daily.
What of President Obama’s lackey, Attorney General Eric Holder saying that “all things not prohibited to the President in the Constitution, are granted to him?” This is, of course, not the case at all. The President (and all of the Federal government) is ONLY allowed to execute the powers given EXPLICITLY to them. All powers not expressly granted are retained by the States, or the People; a paraphrase of the U.S. Constitution on the matter.
Remember, a friend and I can conspire to go to the store. Two people working together for an agenda (particularly if it is set against the goals/desires of others) are conspiring to accomplish a thing. Conspiracy is rampant, and it is the animal of history. I am an Historian, and all of history consists of the tales of groups in power conspiring to keep it, by any means necessary; predominantly market-manipulation, resource consolidation, and war-fare. We haven’t moved far from that at all (I would argue that we have embraced it in the name of Empire). In fact, it could be argued with the increased access to information by an uninformed, lazy public, who prefers to be told what to think, as opposed to doing their own research, so it doesn’t interfere with their television, the government can, with the right propaganda (see Edward Bernays), find it easier to use misinformation to cover their true agenda, and keep people in the dark, and strive to illicit their passions over their reason.
I believe that the Prophet Daniel put it best as simply reading the writing on the wall. We all need to get to reading, because they are running out of room on the wall.
While “post modernism” is usually identified with a certain kind of “left wing” nihilism, much of its approach to things is now often echoed on the right, perhaps moreso these days than elsewhere:
http://www.pathguy.com/postmod.htm
If nothing else, conspiracy theories and end-times theories rely on the unflinching belief that somehow your group has come to knowledge that no one else has been able to piece together.
The Essence of Gnosticism — Secret (Occult) Knowledge (Gnosis) known only to Us Speshul Few.