Cables, cuts and conspiracies

Illuminati-jacket Coincidences happen. Synchronicity is a function of the inherent human propensity for seeing patterns in an essentially random world.

Seriously, I got over the whole conspiracy theory thing years ago (and, funnily enough, it was reading The Illuminatus! Trilogy that inoculated me against it), but I’m still kind of fascinated by the process of conspiracy theories – the inevitability of how they appear wherever there is a chain of events and a vacuum of facts surrounding them. Where we can’t see causality, we create it – from whole cloth if necessary. [Image by Ford – or should that be Fnord?]

Point in case – undersea optical fibre internet cables being severed or malfunctioning in the Asia and Middle East regions. Four have gone down in a very compressed time-frame; the entirety of Iran has been without internet connectivity for a couple of days (and you can check the internet traffic report for the Asia region to see of that’s still the case).

So, what’s going on? Official story – shipping anchors and power failures. Obvious conspiracist conclusion – ZOMFG clandestine operations!!1! I think we can all agree that the latter is unlikely (though sadly all too easy to believe), and that the former seems too simple to be true – even if it actually is*.

Now, leaving aside the question of what’s actually happening (which no amount of internet debate is going to determine), let’s try to answer another question – are conspiracy theories an inevitability in complex societies where it’s impossible for everyone to know everything? Or will the increasingly connected nature of the world slowly shine a light into all the dark corners where these ambiguities hide?

[* So don’t call Occam’s Razor on me, I’m not claiming anything either way; just highlighting ambiguity for the sake of debate. Play nice.]

7 thoughts on “Cables, cuts and conspiracies”

  1. Y’know, I’m not the conspiracy theorist type — but I’m not sure why you’d think clandestine activity is unlikely after it’s documented that AT&T really *does* have a little room where all the Internet traffic gets copied to the NSA.

    I mean, I never believed that one. I always said, “But do you *know* how much bandwidth that would have to be?” But they really do. I still don’t believe they can use it effectively — but they can try now.

    So … why is it unlikely that they’re installing little rooms for the Middle East? I’d say it’s nearly obvious.

  2. Do some serious study on the Iranian Oil bourse. Whether it is a conspiracy or not, the bourse has some VERY serious implications for US economic, and military powers.

  3. 1) Please, excuse my poor English. It’s neither my first OR secondary language.
    2) The existence of 99 idiotic conspiracy theories does not prove the idiocy of the 100th. It’s own flaws have to do this. Lack of information is not a good reason to dismiss explanation.

    3) As for the flood of CTs, it can be just human nature, OR plot to make smart people ignore CT. No one can go and take then seriously now, they are just dumb. The problem is, no one can go and even investigate without being ignored or ridiculed. Making anonymous dumb CTs is just one of the ways to say “nothing to see here, move along” in a way that convinces people to do so.

    4) This said , i do agree the cloverfield monster is to blame. Man the nukes! It’s alive!

  4. Ha ha, that jacket is brilliant. I’m sure if the illuminati really exist (or, if they’re really as hectic as they’re claimed to be) they wouldn’t be too happy with that jacket. So much for ‘secret society’ – that’s what I say. Although there are definitely some weird secret societies out there, I have my questions as to whether they are as influential as claimed (or, at least, whether they are still as influential as they once were). Conspiracy theories are certainly still fun to read and think about, though.

Comments are closed.