What Does It Mean for a Conspiracy Theory to Be a ‘Theory’?

ABSTRACT

The pejorative connotation often associated with the ordinary language meaning of “conspiracy theory” does not only stem from a conspiracy theory’s being about a conspiracy, but also from a conspiracy theory’s being regarded as a particular kind of theory. I propose to understand conspiracy theory-induced polarization in terms of disagreement about the correct epistemic evaluation of ‘theory’ in ‘conspiracy theory’. By framing the positions typical in conspiracy theory-induced polarization in this way, I aim to show that pejorative conceptions of ‘conspiracy theory’ are problematic for research open to the possibility of finding depolarization strategies. That is, because they preclude constructive engagement with the epistemic norms governing (the rationales foundational of) belief in conspiracy theories.

KEYWORDS:

• Conspiracy theory
• generalism and particularism
• epistemic evaluations
• depolarization

Acknowledgments

Thanks to M Dentith, Charles Pigden, and Melina Tsapos, as well as the participants and audience of The 1^st International Conference on the Philosophy of Conspiracy Theory at Pitzer College, Claremont (February 2022) and the participants of the online CTTSC EU Workshop (July 2022) for their helpful comments on elements of an earlier draft of this paper. This paper is dedicated to Ton Wijkhuizen, who I thank for his everlasting support and wisdom.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Throughout the paper, I use single quotation marks to denote the concept ‘conspiracy theory’, and double quotation marks to denote the ordinary language usage of “conspiracy theory”.

2. For discussions on these topics, see Pigden 1995, 6; Keeley 1999, 116; Dentith and Orr 2017, 446; Mandik 2007, 205; Harris 2018, 236–7; Basham 2003, 99, respectively.

3. This point is also made by M R. X. Dentith and Brian L. Keeley, who argue: ‘It is fair to say that many beliefs about the likeliness or unlikeliness of conspiracy theories hinge on the definition of what counts as conspiratorial. If you build into your definition of what counts as conspiratorial that such events are unlikely […], then that changes our understanding as to whether belief in theories about conspiracies […] can ever be considered rational’ (2018, 287).

4. For an example of the first line of reasoning see Cass R. Sunstein & Adrian Vermeule (2009, 208–9) and for discussions of the second line of reasoning see Juha Räikkä (2009, 193–4), David Coady (2012, 117–8), and Dentith (2014, 110–1).

5. A similar point is made by Lee Basham (2003, 95).

6. Obviously, there is more to particularism than claiming that generalism is wrong. For present purposes, however, a negative definition of particularism will do.

7. Throughout the paper, I use ‘conspiracy theorist’ and ‘conspiracy believer’ interchangeably as denoting someone who believes one or more conspiracy theories.

8. Quassim Cassam makes a similar point: ‘it’s in the nature of Conspiracy Theories to rely on circumstantial rather than direct evidence’ (2019, 30).

9. Although Keeley is not a generalist (i.e. his argument only pertains to mature unwarranted conspiracy theories), the argument may also work for a broader generalist account.

10. Other generalist-style arguments advance that the epistemic problems lying at the base of the pejorative connotation of “conspiracy theory” do not have to do with the explanations, but with the people believing such explanations. The argument is quite similar to the one above: because such explanations concern conspiracies, people who believe them are (i) overestimating the intentionality of social events and thereby the likelihood of successful conspiratorial activities (e.g. Clarke 2002; Mandik 2007), and/or (ii) irrationally paranoid and overly skeptical of epistemic authorities, leading them down a path of epistemic impairment (e.g. see Hofstadter 1965; Harris 2018; Sunstein and Vermeule 2009).

11. Dentith (2016) goes even further by arguing that not only do conspiracies occur, but the theories describing them are also not more unlikely than the alternative (often official) explanation of the same event.

12. Similarly minimal definitions are proposed by other particularists, for example, see Pigden (2007, 222) and Basham (2003, 91).

13. For example, Cassam argues that ‘[t]he story of Operation Northwoods isn’t a Conspiracy Theory; it’s conspiracy fact. Genuine Conspiracy Theories are speculative in a way that [a conspiracy fact] is not. That’s why they are theories’ (2019, 18).

14. These evaluations are clearly not agent-neutral as people who believe conspiracy theories do not evaluate their pet-theories in the same way as critics. I turn to different kinds of subjective evaluations of conspiracy theories in the next section.

15. Although this is not an exhaustive list of definitions, it does capture three of the most common senses in which we talk about theories. Another sense of ‘theory’ is: a field or mode of professional inquiry that is demarcated by specific methods or principles (e.g. decision theory or theory of knowledge). I do not address this sense of ‘theory’ in this paper as I assume that this is not how most people understand ‘theory’ in talking about conspiracy theories.

16. The properties I list here and in similar lists for hypothesis-making and hunch-making properties should be taken as a rough proposal. If one disagrees with the properties I list here, nothing hangs on this.

17. ‘Heliocentric theory’ is to be understood here as the claim that the Sun lies at or near the central point of the solar system while the Earth and the system’s other celestial bodies revolve around the Sun.

18. Even though Xiao believes the theory is well-evidenced, Robin does not agree. From Robin’s point of view, Xiao cannot have good evidence because it is either not the right kind of evidence (i.e. that would actually lend credence to this type of linguistic theory), or because the evidence is false.

19. A point also made by Räikkä (2018).

20. It must be clear that the Critics’ View maps onto generalism (as explicated in §2) in that it accommodates the epistemic deficiency generalists claim is a defining feature of conspiracy theories. However, the same does not hold for the Friends’ View and particularism, as I will explain in §4.2.

21. For a discussion of the more specific metaphysics of deep disagreements, see Chris Ranalli (2021). For simplicity, I only claim that conspiracy theory-disagreements as described above resemble deep disagreements.

22. For example, Kai is not responsive to Jessie’s arguments because they believe that all conspiracy theories are false. Kai holds this belief, for example, because they endorse the belief policy that says ‘believe p if and only if p is advanced by relevant authorities’. Jessie’s arguments, however, are not directed at those higher-order reasons, and therefore fail to convince Kai. Conversely, Jessie is not responsive to Kai’s arguments for disbelieving the conspiracy theory because those arguments similarly fail to address Jessie’s higher-order reasons. Jessie’s belief in the conspiracy theory may be the result of, for example, (rational) government distrust, in which case Kai’s reasons misfire in defeating Jessie’s belief. Does the fact that reasonable debate is obstructed by features of conspiracy theory-induced polarization mean that Kai and Jessie are not reason-responsive? I believe not: Kai and Jessie seem unresponsive to the reasons proposed by the other party because those are not the real (i.e. higher-order) reasons underlying their disagreement.

23. In cases where there is no obvious ‘official’ counterpart-theory, Critics might still believe that there are such official theories as located on the scalar representation, and that the conspiracy theories are typically located at the other end of the spectrum.

24. Cassam has gone as far as to include ‘being speculative’ as one of the characteristics of conspiracy theories (understood with the pejorative connotation in mind), by which he means: ‘based on conjecture rather than knowledge, educated (or not so educated) guesswork rather than solid evidence’ (16).

25. The Friends’ View illustrates the perspective of those who believe (or are open to believing) conspiracy theories and for which there is a rival official theory they hold is of the same epistemic status as said conspiracy theory. In contrast, the particularist maintains that we should investigate the epistemic status of particular theories (whether or not there is some rival official theory), instead of mapping all conspiracy theories on one of the sides of the spectrum. So, although it could be the case that, for some particular conspiracy theory, the particularist agrees with the Friends’ View as depicted above, this will not be true for conspiracy theories generally.

26. The Friends’ View accounts for the fact that we see conspiracy theories evolving over time, and see that the propositional content of the conspiracy theorists’ belief can be flexible—e.g. who exactly is ‘in’ on the plot, which events are brought about by the conspirators, different justifications for new implications of the theory, et cetera. Many conspiracy theorists are not deeply committed to one specific and detailed narrative of how the conspiracy went down, and belief in conspiracy theories may fluctuate over time (van Prooijen 2020). Instead, most conspiracy theorists seem deeply committed to suspicions like ‘something is being kept a secret’ and ‘things are not as they seem’, while it is the conspiracy entrepreneurs that promote a specific and detailed narrative that map onto those suspicions. These aspects of conspiracy theorizing or believing make sense if you think of conspiracy theories and their official counterparts as working hypotheses—i.e. as having suspicions in a certain direction, which need more elaboration and fleshing out to become a full-fledged, watertight theory.

27. A notion developed by Paul Helm (1994), meaning: standards for accepting and rejecting evidence as belief-worthy.

28. See, for another version of this kind of argument, Mittendorf’s paper in this issue (forthcoming).

29. See, in this issue, Dentith’s discussion of bridging problems in conspiracy theory theory (forthcoming).

30. For a more elaborate critical discussion of Napolitano’s account, see Duetz (2022).

31. A similar argument can be found in Räikkä (2018). Also, Shields, in this issue, addresses some of the conceptual concerns with this kind of project (forthcoming).

32. Though there might be room for a pejorative conception of ‘extreme conspiracy believer’ (see Duetz and Dentith 2022).

33. For a more elaborate discussion of different conceptions of ‘conspiracy theory’ and their interdisciplinary fruitfulness, see Melina Tsapos (forthcoming).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

J. C. M. Duetz

J. C. M. Duetz is a PhD candidate and junior lecturer at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam who studies the Social Epistemology of Conspiracy Theories (affiliated with the ERC-grant “Extreme Beliefs” project). Her work so far (see Duetz 2022; Duetz and Dentith 2022) has focused on developing conceptual foundations for fruitful (interdisciplinary) conspiracy theory-research. You may contact her at: [email protected].