Can Conspiracy Theories be Explained?

Ross Douthat, something of a conspiracy believer himself, offers this attempt at rationalizing conspiracy theories:

Scientists studying the cosmos often speculate about hypothetical forces that might explain peculiar data or results. For instance, some astronomers have suggested that our solar system has an extra planet, way beyond the demoted Pluto, whose effects explain certain other celestial movements. And modern cosmology assumes a vast invisible substance, so-called dark matter, whose hypothesized existence makes sense out of gravitational effects that would be otherwise mysterious.

Conspiracy theories, lately so influential in American debates, can be understood as the political equivalent of dark-matter theories. They emerge in situations where some movement or action seems unlikely or bizarre — unless you can posit some unseen element in the story, some hidden force exerting influence. “Something is missing from the data” is not just a researcher’s reaction to a scientific mystery. It’s also a citizen’s response to developments that don’t seem to quite make sense. 

Ok, fine. The events surrounding the Kennedy assassination were certainly weird. Epstein's friendship with so many of the rich and powerful was pretty bizarre, and his prison "suicide" adds another layer of intrigue. But it strikes me that some of the most powerful and persistent conspiracy beliefs are not rational at all. Many of them purport to explain things that have already been explained, and others take aim at what I would consider the basic facts of animal life.

In the category of "already explained," consider the widespread suspicion of the vapor trails left behind by jet aircraft. The explanation is simple chemistry, in the form of this equation for the combustion of gasoline:

2 C8H18 + 25 02 = 16 C02 + 18 H2O

All that water vapor emerges from the engine hot, hits the cool air of the upper atmosphere, and liquifies, giving us water droplets visible as a long stream of cloud.

And yet thousands of people feel threatened by those clouds, a fear they justify by claims of "chemtrails" or weather control. This has lately morphed into people being afraid of perfectly normal weather, like the guy who wrote a widely circulated tweet saying, "Half an hour ago the sky was clear, and now it's covered with clouds. You can't tell me that's natural."

This is not a "response to developments that don't quite make sense." It is a determination to see the normal operations of the world as sinister.

Let's consider one of the oldest conspiracy theories: the domination of the world by a sinister cabal of Jewish bankers. What is this supposed to explain? 

I would say that it explains why regular folks can work their whole lives and never feel like they are getting ahead, whereas certain smart/lucky financiers can become overnight millionaires. 

But that has already been explained, at least to my satisfaction, by: the Second Law of Thermodynamics (creating order requries work) plus the hierarchical tendency present in all human societies plus Malthusian demographics plus capitalism plus Parkinson's Second Law (expenditures rise to meet income) plus general human foolishness and short-sightedness, which leads most people to fritter away any windfalls that come their way.

We struggle because struggle is the reality of animal life. And we generally find that when people manage to escape economic struggle they find other things to struggle over, with the result that rich people are only marginally happier than the average struggling worker.

We were not put here to be happy and satisfied.

Which brings me to the oldest explanation for conspiracy theories, that they are a substitute for religion. For whatever reason, our species likes for things to have explanations. There must be a reason why a hail storm ruined your crop while leaving your neighbor's untouched. Lacking any clear understanding of weather – and we still can't answer that question about hail storms – you look to the spirit world. You might blame witches, but for most of our history most people have looked to God or the gods. Many people find "God's will" to be a much more satisfactory account of weird phenomena than "we have no idea." As religious belief has faded in the modern world, conspiracy theories have surged into the explanatory void left by the departing gods.