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The quest for The Truth

BY BEN VAN ZEE

In print | April 24, 2008

I’ve been writing this column on conspiracy theories all semester and have had excellent results. The conspiracies I’ve addressed have ranged from the 9/11 conspiracy to theories that were rejected from publication because they “seemed too unrealistic.” You might be wondering what prompted me to write this column and or why anyone should give a damn about conspiracies in general.

The-price-of-ignorance

THE PRICE OF IGNORANCE

I am a firm believer in not so much conspiring, but what I like to call constructive skepticism. Skepticism is an essential part of what makes us human beings; by denying skeptical notions we only set ourselves up to be deceived. Some may argue that in regard to government, society and religion, skepticism does more harm than good.

I personally would completely disagree with this statement, but I can understand why people subscribe to it. Some people would just prefer to turn a blind eye than to have to deal with the truth. And why do people prefer to believe than doubt? I would say largely because it is more comfortable to believe one knows the Truth than to consider the possibility that what we think the Truth is is really fallacious.

Skepticism is really considering the possibility that we don’t really know, or have not been told the truth. Maybe we are right, but shouldn’t we be open to the possibility that we aren’t? And that is really why I wanted to write this column. I wanted to turn people on to the world of conspiracies. But even the world of conspiracy theories can be dangerous. Conspiracy theorists are almost always declared “crazy” by the mainstream media and political figures, and in some cases they should be.

The major problem with conspiracy theories today is that the illegitimate, unfounded conspiracies have perverted society’s opinion of conspiracies so much that real conspiracy theories are grouped and dismissed with the illegitimate ones. So why should you pay heed to a conspiracy when it may be bogus?

It is true that many conspiracy theories are indeed bogus, but what about the ones that are not? Conspiracy theories should be read as conspiracy theories, meaning that the reader should keep an open mind and logically analyze the idea until they have either sufficiently decided that it is cannot be true, or is probably true, or that they cannot be sure that it isn’t true. Then one must accept the possibility that it could be true.

But what good could come out of this? The Truth. And not only the Truth, but consider this: What if the events that took place on 9/11 really didn’t happen the way we’ve been told they happened? What if our doubts led us to further investigation that revealed what did really happen? Justice could be sought.

But whether you choose to subscribe to conspiracy theories or you choose to send me more hate mail, the next time you’re confronted with a conspiracy theory, don’t jump to any conclusions, take a moment and think, “I suppose that could be a possibility.” And my mission will be accomplished.

Thank you all for reading my conspiracy column and be thinking of me in seven years when I won’t be able to get a job.

Ben is a first-year. He can be reached at bvanzee1@swarthmore.edu.

Discussion

Ben Zhang
5 months ago

I can’t agree more. I am very pissed off by people who ridicule any conspiracy theoires without truly examining the issue themselves. Truth can sometimes be painful, shocking and uncomfortable but that should not be the reason for people to have presuppositions about possible alternative explanations of things.

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