Here do exist real evidences of astronauts visit on Moon. Why do some people still believe that no one has been there?
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For the same reason some people still believe in a flat Earth.
Or a young earth.
Or alien abduction.
Or JFK survived Oswald.
Or Bat Boy.
etc. etc.
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I think a lot of conspiracy beliefs arise out of a desire to stand out by possessing some kind of “hidden” knowledge that only a select few have what it takes to understand. After that, it’s a lot of confirmation bias and a resistance to critical thinking that keeps it going.
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I have no idea what drives people to reject us going to the moon. I can honestly say I’ve never cared. I just accepted it as being true. I know some argue things about something like the flag was moving as if wind was hitting it, and read things such as shadows being wrong or physics not supporting the way they moved. Without giving it a look, I simply rejected it Ad accepted that we have been there and there was no reason for them to lie.
It could well be that there is actually a smaller percentage of people believing lots of crazy stuff today than decades or centuries ago. But now that social media puts a megaphone to everybody’s mouth, and the nut jobs “rise to the top” because of their click-bait nature and algorithms that respond accordingly, just make it seem like there are a lot more lunatics today. When the reality may just be that, for the first time in history, they now get more platform than ever before in the marketplace of ideas.
And yes - everything said before about pride and gnostic arrogance (that oh-so-sweet taste of being part of a select few who’ve “seen through” all the lies everybody else has bought into) - that is spot on!
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This is a great question. Some think that conspiracy theories come from a need for putting blame where things are difficult to control. It is a natural human reaction… Hitting the Books: Why that one uncle of yours continually refuses to believe in climate change | Engadget
Various psychological theories have been offered, involving factors such as inflated self-confidence, narcissism, or low self-esteem. A more popular consensus seems to be that conspiracy theories are a coping mechanism that some people use to deal with feelings of anxiety and loss of control in the face of large, upsetting events. The human brain does not like random events, because we cannot learn from and therefore cannot plan for them. When we feel helpless (due to lack of understanding, the scale of an event, its personal impact on us, or our social position), we may feel drawn to explanations that identify an enemy we can confront. This is not a rational process, and researchers who have studied conspiracy theories note that those who tend to “go with their gut” are the most likely to indulge in conspiracy-based thinking. This is why ignorance is highly correlated with belief in conspiracy theories. When we are less able to understand something on the basis of our analytical faculties, we may feel more threatened by it.
There is also the fact that many are attracted to the idea of “hidden knowledge,” because it serves their ego to think that they are one of the few people to understand something that others don’t know. In one of the most fascinating studies of conspiracy-based thinking, Roland Imhoff invented a fictitious conspiracy theory, then measured how many subjects would believe it, depending on the epistemological context within which it was presented. Imhoff’s conspiracy was a doozy: he claimed that there was a German manufacturer of smoke alarms that emitted high-pitched sounds that made people feel nauseous and depressed. He alleged that the manufacturer knew about the problem but refused to fix it. When subjects thought that this was secret knowledge, they were much more likely to believe it. When Imhoff presented it as common knowledge, people were less likely to think that it was true.
Come to think of it, many times, we gravitate to fundamentalist religion for the same reason. Roger Scruton pointed out that religion is sometimes our desire to clarify uncertainty. The “just world hypothesis,” where everything that happens occurs because of our behavior, fits in here, too. It’s a caution to be careful, as we’re all at risk.
Thanks.
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