An Obama administrator (Cass Sunstein) and a Harvard law professor (Adrian Vermeule) want to actively propagandize the people and interfere with research organizations. Is their reasoning coherent?

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The analysis referred to in this critique can be found at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1084585

I don't remember the day my parents informed me that there was no Santa Claus. It seems to me that, like many childhood ideas, it gradually slipped away over time with experience. Each year there was one significant piece of evidence that Santa Claus was real: a present under the tree from him. However, each year also brought new difficulties as I thought over the other aspects of the story. Was it really possible that magic reindeer could enable a sleigh to fly so fast so as to cover the whole world? Was it possible that Santa Claus could demarcate the relative goodness and badness of every child throughout the year? And why did Herr Claus's handwriting so closely match that of Mom's?

Eventually, over time and with the accretion of evidence, the former idea passed into history and I came to terms with a world devoid of Santa Claus. Later on, a similar process led me to question religious institutions. Still later, that process led to a questioning of governmental institutions and indeed, as John Searle so aptly put it, the social construction of reality itself. At every stage, however, there was no place for revelation, but rather a continual comparison study between the ideas at hand and the empirical evidence of the world.

AN EPISTEMOLOGICAL PUZZLE

Cass Sunstein, a legal scholar from the University of Chicago and Barack Obama's Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, together with Adrian Vermeule, former University of Chicago law professor and current Harvard law professor, collaborated on a paper entitled "Conspiracy Theories," in which they attempt to identify several key features of conspiracies. They specifically invoke the Santa Claus conspiracy in reference to how parents provide information to children. Parents routinely lie to their children, of course, with the justification that either they cannot understand reality or because reality is too harsh for them to experience until they are older. Sunstein-Vermeule (as I will refer to them throughout) seem to view the state in this parental mold, albeit with an additional active element in that they propose the state try to actively crush the precocious questioning of its children.

As they declare in the abstract, their goals include identifying how conspiracy theories "prosper" and how best to "undermine" them. They further identify these conspiracy theorists as bearers of what they term a "crippled epistemology" and suggest groups that investigate such matters be infiltrated by the government for their own good.

The authors first admit that some conspiracies are true. They list Watergate, the use of LSD under the MK-ULTRA program (with "mind control" written in scare quotes), and Operation Northwoods, which they describe as a "rumored plan," despite the fact that the documentary evidence is a matter of public record. The rest of them, presumably, are false, and included in the "false" category are the JFK assassination, the MLK assassination, and several other incidents. They provide no rationale for this whatsoever.

Of course, here the authors engage, in a large-scale form, in the logical fallacy known as "begging the question.' That is, they assume the point which is to be first proven. In addition, their account also lacks any proposal for how one distinguishes a "true" conspiracy from a "false" conspiracy. One might counter that this lies outside the scope of their treatment, and of course one cannot generate such a program within the context of a 29-page academic paper. Unfortunately for the authors, their failure to address this basic question renders much of their paper useless. If I say Willie Mays was the greatest centerfielder in history because of his superb defensive ability, and you respond that Mickey Mantle was the greatest centerfielder ever because his teams won more pennants, we are using different criteria to evaluate the thing in question. Without working out specific criteria, our argument will never be anything other than a statement of preference precisely what Sunstein-Vermeule offer here.

Whether one is investigating the JFK assassination or 9/11 or any other such incident, this is essentially an epistemological journey; that is, the pursuit of these questions leads to broader questions about how we acquire knowledge and ultimately to the nature of reality itself. Unfortunately, after first correctly invoking the framework, Sunstein-Vermeule go on to reveal that they do not understand the implications of their own work. The first and most important element in any epistemological discussion is precisely what is true and what is false. The authors should have first given a proposal about how one comes to such conclusions. Failing to do this, they instead go on to a muddled description of justification and truth. Once again, they don't seem to understand how this process works. As an example, they state the following: "Justification and truth are different issues; a true belief may be unjustified, and a justified belief may be untrue. I may believe, correctly, that there are fires within the earth's core, but if I believe that because the god Vulcan revealed it to me in a dream, my belief is unwarranted." The authors here seem to think that mystical revelation is an improper means for discovering truth; in this respect, millions around the world would disagree with them, including George W. Bush, who talked openly about his daily discussions with the Lord. I am not arguing for or against mystical revelation, but only pointing out that since the authors have not given us a program for distinguishing what they think is true or false, all that is left for them is pronouncement. In this respect, the authors are Cartesians, declaring truth to be equivalent with all that they perceive clearly and distinctly. This is all well and good but ineffective for convincing others.

AD HOMINEM REMARKS

As is frequently the case in such discussions, the authors also smear political researchers by comparing them with Holocaust deniers. They also equate JFK research with UFO research and the like. This is the rhetorical equivalent of saying that all science is invalid because of Piltdown Man. Scientific research is a continuing process that involves the examination of evidence in specific cases, not generalizing from a list of tenuous assumptions.

In extending this argument they also describe Karl Popper's work on conspiracies, which is essentially a psychological discussion. People like to attribute purpose to the world, goes this line, and therefore people make mistakes by attributing every effect to an intentional cause. Sometimes things just happen, such as the Great Depression, and people feel that someone must be responsible. However, note again how weak these statements are precisely because they do not deal in factual reference. I could just as easily define into existence a mental disorder that involves the pathological denial of obvious conspiracies, regardless of evidence. (Indeed, one might propose John McAdams as a key example.) In a world that recognizes such dubious notions as "generalized anxiety disorder" simply due to the imprimatur of a doctor's assessment, this hardly seems an outrageous notion. But this is all bloviating without details, and so leads us to our next point.

EVIDENCE

Absent in all of this psychological discussion is one very important point: what is the evidence? Sunstein-Vermeule do not at any point actually address the evidence, or lack thereof, for one "conspiracy theory" or another. Instead, they suggest that these theorists mistakenly attribute immense power to institutions, and distrust what they call "knowledge-producing institutions," once again begging the question, since whether these institutions produce knowledge is precisely what is in question here. In systematically avoiding any discussion of the evidence for any specific case, the authors can produce what might be superficially plausible statements (not arguments, because in each case the authors simply assert what is "true" or "false"). They then advise us that while people might be justified in their paranoia if they lived in a closed state, this is irrational and indicative of pathology in an open state such as our own. Needless to say, whether our society is all that open or not is in question. The authors also fail to realize that in an open society, propaganda is more important, because the state lacks the ability (at least theoretically) to simply imprison or kill its internal dissenters. Noam Chomsky has made this critical point many times over the years in noting that the American population is actually exposed to more propaganda than several other countries around the world:[i]

So the British had the Ministry of Information. The U.S. had the Committee on Public Information, which was known as the Creel Commission - the propaganda was very effective. It should be expected that it's in the democracies that these ideas should develop. Because in a democracy you have to control people's minds. You can't control them by force.[ii]

Michael Parenti observes that corporate advertisers also exercise degrees of control that find their way onto television programming. He describes how, in 1973 and 1974, the automobile industry induced the New York Times' publisher Arthur Ochs Schulzberger, into publishing articles promoting the repeal of seatbelt and airbag laws, because of the advertising revenue generated by the industry.[iii] Indeed, advertisers would not spend billions of dollars a year if they did not think television to be an effective means of pushing people in one direction or another.

In addition to this, it is a matter of public record that the government and its entities such as the CIA have generated propaganda aimed at the American people through Operation Mockingbird, among other things. The CIA promoted Gloria Steinem,[iv] which she has openly admitted, and to this day the incestuous crossing over of government representatives and the media continues; one only has to note that Fox News has employed Oliver North and Sarah Palin. Jim DiEugenio has made the same point in discussing the various connections of those who contribute to online journals and the like in the present.[v]

Besides the stream of propaganda, it is a matter of public record that the U.S. government has engaged in a constant flow of clandestine assassination and the overthrow of governments since the Second World War. The list of such incidents is stunning when one sees them all lined up together - U.S. involvement in the coups and murders of Mossadeq, Diem, Patrice Lumumba, Salvador Allende, and countless others around the world.[vi] The U.S. has also invaded numerous countries on little or no public justification, such as Grenada and most recently Iraq and Afghanistan, during the latter of which it is common knowledge that virtually every important public official in the Bush administration publicly lied.[vii]

Given this information, should we then assume that the State Department has qualms about treating U.S. soil differently from that of other countries? Should we assume that although the government may be perfectly willing to assassinate foreign leaders, our own public officials are immune? Why would this be the case? Isn't what happens in the United States considerably more important to such entities than what goes on, for example, in the Congo?

The most easily demonstrable of targeted assassination, in my view, is the Fred Hampton case, because of the overwhelming facts and the lack of even a remotely plausible cover story.[viii] I will not repeat the details here, but this is only one example in a host of others; as with their other claims, Sunstein-Vermeule can only be believed in this point if one totally ignores the easily discernible facts.

WHAT IS A "CONSPIRACY THEORIST"?

We have noted that the authors appear not to understand what is meant by epistemology and that they fail to deal with evidence in making their pronouncements about conspiracies. At this juncture, I would like to also point out another logical error made in their paper, because this error is widespread and underlies virtually every discussion of these matters in the public media. It is this question of the "conspiracy theorist." What does that mean? How does one become one?

The conspiracy theorist, in their view, is a person who due to crippled analytical faculties, believes that the government is responsible for certain actions in the past. Obviously, the conspiracists are wrong about this, but they fail to recognize reality because they ignore evidence. They also distrust official statements and view these as part of the cover-up, so it is impossible to convince them otherwise once they've made their judgment.

The problems with this assessment should be clear. If the conspiracy theorist is truly impervious to evidence, how did the person become a conspiracy theorist in the first place? As anyone who ever attended school in the United States can attest, students are not routinely taught that the U.S. is, as Dr. King put it, "the greatest purveyor of violence around the world." In order to find alternative views of history, a student has to actively seek out the information, not the other way around. People who have one religious belief or another generally copy their parents, so that religious affiliation is well correlated with geography around the world. The same is often true for political affiliation. However, what we might call the "begat" model does not function for conspiracy theorists; that is, no one proposes that conspiracists are the way they are, due to their parents. Conspiracy theorists are therefore made, not born. Since their reasoning does not derive from parental authority, or inducement in school (quite the opposite!), or via peer pressure (what would that even mean in this context?) we are left to observe that most, or all, conspiracy theorists are reacting to the empirical world. It is often observed as an ironic truth that one feature distinguishing atheists from religious people is that atheists have actually read the Bible. The same is true for conspiracy theorists; they have arrived at their conclusions via a detailed study of the world, and not from some kind of revelation. If anything, it is the other side that exhibits characteristics of irrationality. As noted, Sunstein-Vermeule avoid talking about real evidence, and the documentarian Robert Stone revealed on Black Op Radio that he realized Oswald shot Kennedy during an intuitive moment looking out a window of the School Book Depository.[ix]

What all of this tells us is that the term "conspiracy theorist" is a sidebar, a magician's hand waving on the left while the right displays the trick. It is a term for marginalizing opinions at odds with the State, a declaration of heresy no different from the Church's adjure of Galileo. The failure to deal with the relevant evidence reveals the true intention is not epistemology but rather a defense of the established order.

THE FINAL RECOMMENDATION

Having made their various pronouncements about conspiracies and their believers, the authors have a plan to deal with them. They make several recommendations, but their main proposal is to infiltrate "conspiracy" groups. For those who belong to political organizations, this is a bad joke. Such organizations have been infiltrated and continue to be so to this day by all manner of agents and provocateurs. Bobby Kennedy observed that without the FBI's participation, there wouldn't have been a Communist Party in the United States! However, there is an additional irony here in that, to defeat conspiratorial thinking, the authors propose a conspiracy of government agents whose purpose is to promote "beneficial cognitive diversity." Please note that this "beneficial cognitive diversity" consists of trying to make sure everyone comes to the same opinion as held by the state; a more Orwellian choice of words could hardly be designed.

Alexis de Tocqueville once observed that Americans love their generalities, and Sunstein-Vermeule follow this description to perfection. Filled with broad indefensible statements, empty rhetoric, and a paranoid refusal to deal with evidence, the esteemed authors reveal their own cognitive deficits to an extent that the universities they represent should sue for defamation.

They reference the "sensible heuristic" of a child near the start of the article, "that if my parents say it, it is probably true." However, some of us find, as we grow up, that the heuristic so described becomes less and less reliable as we encounter the world. In fact, it is a part of growing up to let go of that particular line of reasoning, as the world we face becomes enormously complex and not subject to parental authority. The authors, by refusing to grapple with the realities of the epistemology they themselves evoke, and relying on the government infiltration to attack ideas they are opposed with, literally evince the mentality of children. In this scenario, they are still clinging to Santa Claus on the grounds that their parents would never lie to them. To this I say: Grow up.

Authors Website: http://www.dissentingview.net

Authors Bio:
Joseph E. Green is currently a story and research consultant to an upcoming film Dallas in Wonderland. He has been a private investigator, an independent researcher, a writer, an editor, and a film critic.

He is the author of the books Dissenting Views, A Slew of Unfortunates, Clowntime is Over, and The Very Wrath of Love. He is a member of the Coalition on Political Assassinations (COPA). He also sings in the electropop band Fanfic.