Conspiracy theorists and how to deal with them
Firstly, this is not an academic paper, it's merely some preliminary ideas. Secondly, it's not meant to be persuasive. It's just a few considerations which may clarify. What causes conspiratorial thinking? In order to believe a proposition or statement, like "London is in England", you have to either take the statement on faith or on evidence; just as one takes, for example, the question of the existence of God on faith or on evidence. In the case of conspiracy theorists, they seem to be initially taking things on evidence, because they cite evidence in support of their claims. However, and what is particularly interesting about conspiracy theorists, is that they seem to have unshakeable faith in their chosen conspiracies, once they have settled upon them. That is, they become immune to evidence thereafter, specifically counter-evidence, and thus, we can argue, they become more faith-based once they have selected the theory that in their view, best accounts for th