The label is factually accurate. The sub is even called "/r/conspiracy." Thinking that the "conspiracy theorist" term has negative connotations doesn't make the term any less factually accurate. It's like a politician not wanting to be called a politician because that word has negative connotations in the public... Sorry but if you're holding a political office, you're factually a politician.

I cant speak for everyone but i would consider myself just a theorist and/or a skeptic. I analyze everything, including my own, my friend's, and just about everyone's belied systems, goals, motives, etc. I question everything whether that be politics, mainstream news, science religion, or alternative news. I would consider my thought processes to be open and based on the scientific method. I theorize about alien civilizations, how to be organize my living room, how to increase efficiency at my job, whether religions may be simply twisting's of the truth, and in recent years: what the dudes in charge up to to to stay in charge. Conspiracy is only one of the things i theorize about, and anyone who looks into this stuff can tell that a significant portion of it isnt much a theory (or its at least a very well supported theory).

Of course, its very important to note that a lot of people who are considered "conspiracy theorists" dont actually do any theorizing or even thinking. These are the fundamentalist Christians who believe Obama in the Anti Christ, or the people we believe for a fact that our world is ruled by lizard people, etc etc. these people dont think and they dont theorize. They just regurgitate what goes in to their eyes and ears out of their mouth (or fingers). They could easily be "mainstream sheep" if only what went in through their senses was that of the mainstream. The people who cant think and decide for themselves what is true, are the people that reinforce the propaganda against 'us' (however for some reason accepting the mainstream view without question is what makes you sane?)

Also politicans didnt have a propaganda campaign pushed on them by the CIA to give them a bad name--they did that all to themselves. Of course people like Alex Jones arent doing much to shake that stigma (however infowars does have connections to the CIA), but at least you can be a politican without everyone thinking youre a crazy idiot. People just assume politicians are greedy self serving bastards because most of them are--when people like Ron Paul or Elizabeth Warren (not so sure about her) come up and fight for the people, people realize they are an exception. 'Conspiracy theorists', however, are all psycho as a matter of fact and its not up for debate.

Three towers all with different types of asymmetrical structural damage. All three steel towers collapse symmetrically the same day. Even though it was the first time in history for this to happen and people might want to investigate a collapse, all the evidence was promptly gathered up and shipped to asia to be melted down within a few weeks. That is what you call building a solid case against your suspects.

Even though the biggest and best military on the planet was training for the exact same scenario at the exact same time, they did not intercept one plane. Maybe they just needed a little more money, resources and training. If the attack came the very next day, they probably would have stopped it due to the previous day's training, for sure.

We must forget about the deep business connections between the Bush family and the Bin Laden family and why they were meeting that morning. We must also forget about both families deep connections to the intelligence community and the formation of OBL's little group. It's all very political, I don't watch much CNN so I don't really understand it.

We must remember how shocking it was for the public and we must forget how convenient it was for others. We must remember how it was all about protecting freedom and we must forget how freedom somehow got conveniently taken away in the process.

few things bother me more than being grouped in with alien believers. They discredit this whole sub.

If you look at enough, it's not hard to see why people think aliens are the answer

I've looked more thoroughly than most, and I've seen nothing but rampant and widely reaching speculation. Zero empirical evidence.

If you're looking for hard evidence, you're the wrong MF'in subreddit!

I disagree. Most of the posters here refer their hypotheses to at least a modicum of empirical evidence, except the alien believers, which is why they discredit us.

It's not that I think you guys are necessarily wrong about aliens. I've taken the time to study the statistics about probabilities of life elsewhere in the universe; the extrapolated estimates of the total number of galaxies, stars, and planets, based on the number so far observed. I've kept a close eye on how many planets astronomers are finding in the 'habitable zone' where liquid water can exist on a planet's surface, and there are indeed quite a few of them. Unfortunately, their number is dwarfed by the total number of galaxies, stars, and planets, and even more so by the distances between them. Given the span of time that has passed since we first began transmitting radio signals into space, very few planets could have even received our signals at this point (only a few dozen), and the likelihood that one of them is populated with intelligent life, at or beyond our level of technology, is vanishingly remote. The chances that someone in range, who is not only capable of detecting us, but of traveling here, is so miniscule that it can be regarded as practically non-existent.

I do think there's other life out there. But I think it has no idea we exist, and has never been anywhere near us. And there simply is no evidence to cast doubt on that postulation. A few ancient inscriptions that may or may not be flying objects, crop circles that can be explained by modern technological capabilities, and fuzzy photos of dots of light that could just as easily be unmanned aerial drones - those things are not sufficient evidence to the contrary.

Unless, a) they don't need water and b)they've been here before, long before radio

It has indeed been speculated that water may not be necessary for life, so that's not a bad point. But there's a good reason that water is probably essential to life. It is the most excellent catalyst in existence for chemical reactions. Without water, chemical reactions occur at an immensely slower rate, or not at all. There are, however, some other compounds which can act as chemical catalysts, which is why it's possible that life could arise without water. Unfortunately, those substances tend to be vanishingly rare in the universe, and they aren't nearly as diverse a catalyst as water. Far fewer reactions can take plae in other liquids than can take place in water. And water is, by far, the most abundent substance of that type. So even if we extend the 'habitable zone' to planets where other types of liquids or catalytic gases can exist, the number of habitable planets would not be greatly expanded.

The second point is also a good one. It is not at all unlikely that we were seeded by some other race, imo. I arrive at this conclusion by observing our own nature. Once we gain proficiency over a physical process we revel in recreating it, especially if it is complex and interresting, as creating life certainly would be. I fully expect that, some day, we will venture to other habitable planets that have no life and seed them with DNA. My problem with that possibility is this: if we were seeded by other life, it obviously doesn't want us to know it, or we would know. People seem to think that some government officials could hide aliens from us, but that prospect is completely irrational. If an interstellar life wanted its presence to be known, no one on earth could stop it from making itself known. It's technology would be so advanced, by comparison to ours, that it would seem like magic or divinity. We would be as effective at enforcing our will against it as the proverbial ants on ant-hills in africa are at enforcing their wills on us.

And if they don't want to be noticed, then what's the point in speculating about them? We could not possibly acquire any information that didn't want us to have, which is apparently none, so we may as well continue with our lives as if they don't exist.

http://translate.google.com/translate_p?hl=pt-BR&ie=UTF8&prev=_t&sl=es&tl=en&u=http://conspiraciones1040.blogspot.com/2013/07/el-derretimiento-de-los-glaciares-en-la.html%3Futm_source%3Dfeedburner%26utm_medium%3Dfeed%26utm_campaign%3DFeed:%2Bblogspot/Qoqct%2B(Conspiraciones%2B1040%2B-%2BFeed)%23.UeWWM0GfhuJ&depth=1&nv=1&usg=ALkJrhjWa-HWNWiSaHRIjSBznTlG8JLnvw

Very cool, but ancient civilizations does not equate to aliens. Very little is known about human evolution for several hundred thousand years in which our brains were mostly the same as they are now. There's no reason that civilizations could not have previously arisen to great levels of complexity, then fallen and arisen again. Very little survives the wear and tear of great spans of time, even massive civilizations are swiftly reduced to a few shards of clay pots and building foundations that can go unnoticed for millenia, or forever. We are still regularly discovering traces of ancient civilizations.

Even if modern civilization were to collapse, most evidence of it would be completely eradicated within ten thousand years, and the remainder of surviving evidence would quickly be buried under a ceaseless cycle of growth, death, decomposition, regrowth, death, etc, piling up on top of it layers after layer.

Excellent article though. Thanks for the link.

Refusing to accept any fact that disagrees with your beliefs, no matter how well-founded, does not make you a "skeptic".

Reading the first sentence of an article from source X, finding the article probably disagrees with you, and then declaring "nothing from source X is credible", or "source X must be part of the conspiracy", does not make you a "skeptic".

I'm not sure if this has made it's rounds through here yet, but it's some surface research that is intriguing. If interested, google the name of the title of the article, you can find it and read the whole study.

The day you stop grouping everyone else as a "shill" is the day people just might stop grouping you all together. That would be a great start, actually.

There is a significant portion of this community who agree that people screaming shill all the time are not conducive to anything other than making this sub look bad.

Fair enough. I think the biggest issue is all the noise in r/conspiracy. It's almost like you need a NWO/Illuminati/Reptilian-shape-shifters/False-Flag-EVERYTHING type subreddit to separate most of the crazies and leave this as a place to intelligently discuss questions.

Theyre not crazy.

Some people who come upon this information dont have the critical thinking facilities required to be skeptical until the evidence is overwhelming (note: neither do most of the world; people here just go against the grain), and in the case of things like space lizards, ancient astronaut theory, etc, it becomes very problematic due to the evidence being sparse and inconclusive. I fully support people looking into these and anything and being open to anything, but claiming definitively that things are fact which cant really be proven, seems like jumping the gun to me.

Other's believe what they want to believe, regardless of the facts. However seeing as 51% of American scientists are religious (arguably the easiest thing to debunk), i again would say that there is nothing new or different or crazy about this.

Other's are quite skeptical however the only news source they really use is one of the poorer ones (like Natural News or Info Wars). Same deal--a lot of people who watch CNN can tell something is up but believe it anyway because they have no other sources available.

However, there is a significant portion of people here (many of whom you probably include in your 'crazy lunatic' category) who are critical thinking, skeptical individuals.

Also, its important to note, because of the stigma and other things, we have very very few professionally trained researchers and scientists on our side. For those who say "show me the evidence" its a very difficult request because there is no central hub of information. In reality, You only get a few little puzzle pieces each day and you need to try and put them together into your big picture--if 2 contradict eachother you need to figure out if one is wrong or both or wrong or maybe they arent really contradictory at all. Its about constantly finding new puzzle pieces, replacing old ones, seeing if anecdotal or unsupported evidence fits, etc etc. its about thinking with your own brain and coming to your own conclusions--not letting the media, government, religion, or sometimes (more often than most scientifically literate people realize) even the scientific establishment be your mind for you. Everyone takes a different path and everyone believes different things with different levels of evidence at different times (for example: i was fairly convinced of the ancient astronaut theory for a decent while--im still open to it but it is not way conclusive), but as long as you keep researching, (and thats not just in 'conspiracy', thats everywhere--i get some of my best realiziations/new ideas/dot connectings when i read science fiction or learn about psychology) you will more or less come to a fairly accurate picture. I have spent something like 2000 hours in the past few years look into 'conspiracy' stuff alone and i still couldnt tell you definitively what the 'truth' is (however its much different than most people believe, to say the least) and my time spent researching has only increased in recent months.

Anyways, i have some resources that you may find useful and may help to illuminate how not-crazy and not-ridiculous it is to do what we do here.

Http://www.wikispooks.com/ISGP/

Http://www.thepeopleshistory.net/

Tragedy And Hope by Carroll Quigley

Http://www.stormcloudsgathering.com/

Http://www.corbettreport.com/

If you check out these, especially the first two, while refraining judgement--just while youre reading them being open to the possibility that there are very powerful and wealthy people in the world with unparalleled influence who wish to maintain that influence--the way this sub operates may start to make more sense.

Cheers.

Now, I know your points. But when I say 'you guys' it just mean's that that part of the message I am typing is not for the person that I am replying to, but the whole crowd

Me thinx you doth protest too much.

(it had to be said)

It makes me lulz how conspiracy theorists don't like to be called conspiracy theorists...

do u even lulz bro?

[deleted]

Nobody said the bad guys in the cockpits didn't also lace the buildings up. Unfortunately, we will never know because those in charge of the investigation decided to immediately ship the evidence overseas to be melted down.

[deleted]

Not only got it wrong......wanted it wrong.

This all seems like silly semantics. Conspiracy theories---as yet unproven ideas that 2 or more people plotted something---also encompass not just who, but how, why, when, and where.

The "official" conspiracy theory of 9/11 (19 hijackers led by a man on dialysis in a cave) posits that the planes crashing into the twin towers caused them to fall. You yourself state that you are wondering how the buildings fell. This all falls under part of the "conspiracy", as well as the "theory" heading.

You state that

Theorizing before ascertaining the facts is the problem.

but damn near all scientific questioning---unless it's like the accidental discovery of penicillin---starts with a basic theory of some sort. My kids' science lab homework always asks, "What do you think will happen when you do this?"

"Our" media has attempted to corrupt the term by equating it with tin-foil hats and Elvis sightings. The talking heads twirl their fingers at their temples, and roll their eyes, and linguistically dismiss acceptable theories as "crazy". But the term "conspiracy theory" regarding theories that certain conspiracies exist is still a solid and definable term.

You're confusing hypothesis with theory.

There really is not much difference when we're speaking of "conspiracy theory".

theory: A supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something

hypothesis: A supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation.

I'm just saying, conspiracy theory is actually what we are delving into, not just in supposing whodunnit, but also how it was done, when the buildings were rigged to fall, what was the ultimate goal, and all the other questions re 9/11. We shouldn't let the msm's newspeak make us afraid of the term. I theorize that a conspiracy took place. I am a conspiracy theorist. I'm also a critical thinker and a skeptic. And a proud 9/11 truther, as opposed to the many 9/11 liars in our government and media.

It has indeed been speculated that water may not be necessary for life, so that's not a bad point. But there's a good reason that water is probably essential to life. It is the most excellent catalyst in existence for chemical reactions. Without water, chemical reactions occur at an immensely slower rate, or not at all. There are, however, some other compounds which can act as chemical catalysts, which is why it's possible that life could arise without water. Unfortunately, those substances tend to be vanishingly rare in the universe, and they aren't nearly as diverse a catalyst as water. Far fewer reactions can take plae in other liquids than can take place in water. And water is, by far, the most abundent substance of that type. So even if we extend the 'habitable zone' to planets where other types of liquids or catalytic gases can exist, the number of habitable planets would not be greatly expanded.

The second point is also a good one. It is not at all unlikely that we were seeded by some other race, imo. I arrive at this conclusion by observing our own nature. Once we gain proficiency over a physical process we revel in recreating it, especially if it is complex and interresting, as creating life certainly would be. I fully expect that, some day, we will venture to other habitable planets that have no life and seed them with DNA. My problem with that possibility is this: if we were seeded by other life, it obviously doesn't want us to know it, or we would know. People seem to think that some government officials could hide aliens from us, but that prospect is completely irrational. If an interstellar life wanted its presence to be known, no one on earth could stop it from making itself known. It's technology would be so advanced, by comparison to ours, that it would seem like magic or divinity. We would be as effective at enforcing our will against it as the proverbial ants on ant-hills in africa are at enforcing their wills on us.

And if they don't want to be noticed, then what's the point in speculating about them? We could not possibly acquire any information that didn't want us to have, which is apparently none, so we may as well continue with our lives as if they don't exist.