The recognition of patterns in our daily lives is what gives humans the evolutionary advantage over all other animals on earth. From birth, humans are able to recognize patterns involved in feeding, sleeping, and activity. This pattern recognition allows us to make out potential dangers in situations. The ability to make out figures and objects that are otherwise difficult to see, has allowed us to expertly survive for the past hundred and fifty thousand years. Although, on the other hand, these fantastic pattern recognizing abilities can find patterns when random, and oftentimes downright creepy, events occur. This is one of the many causes of conspiracy theories.
During one of his 1963 interviews, Lee Harvey Oswald, the man solely responsible for the assassination of president John F. Kennedy in Dallas Texas, supposedly confessed to his plot in killing the president. In the interview, he states “The fact that I did, uh, live for a time in the Soviet Union gives me excellent qualifications to uh, repudiate charges that Cuba and the fair play for Cuba committee is communist controlled.” If you play this statement backwards, “And the fair play for Cuba.” It sounds a lot like, “I wish to kill president.” Our recognition of patterns in truly random occurrences might be one of the many reasons why we gravitate so heavily towards conspiracy theories.
Our pattern recognition skills can sometimes even find patterns in things that were made to feel random. Apples shuffle feature, when first introduced, used a random song generator. Apple started getting complaints that similar songs from similar artist were being played in a row, which would be expected of a truly random song generator. So apple introduced an non random generator that used algorithms to put songs in order that would make the playlist “Feel” random. Even though it’s actually the opposite.
When viewing patterns relating to conspiracy theories, selection bias is also something to consider. Selection Bias is a type of cognitive bias in which we favor information that confirms previously existing beliefs. We tend to find most of our selection bias in many of the topics that are heavily discussed and displayed in our mainstream media. Someone who might be a very strong republican supporter might have selection bias in regards to their presidential candidate choice, overlooking many of the mistakes their candidate may have made, but instead, choosing to follow information that further expands their reasoning behind their choice in the election. We can also find such bias in conspiracy theories, like those in favor of the Lee Harvey Oswald confession example. The selection bias, in some people, might toss out the fact that if absolutely anyone said the words “And the fair play for Cuba.” It would should like “I wish to kill president” backwards.
People also oftentimes look at the probability of an event happening, and dismiss that event with illogical conclusions. the average person, in any given year, has a one in one million chance of getting struck by lightning. Walter Summorford, who died in 1968, was struck not once, not twice, but three times by lightning. Him being an avid sportsman increases his chance slightly. But after his death, his tombstone was also struck by lightning. Are his bones made of some kind of lightning attracting metal? Did he rub Zeus the wrong way? Well, when you take a look at the Little Wood’s law, otherwise known as The Law Of Miracles, this example begins to make a little more sense.
Little Wood’s Law states, the odds, of any event happening, is one in a million. Now if we calculated the average amount of time each person spends awake each day, and assumed that the event that has a one in a million chance of happening takes about a second to take place, that single event should happen to every person once every thirty-five days. Diving a little deeper, since there are seven billion people on earth, the chance of an event with a on in a million chance of happening NOT happening is 1 in 103040. Like Greek statistical mathematician Persi Diaconis once said, “A truly unusual day would be a day when nothing unusual happens.”
In the world of conspiracy theories, we often find ourselves wondering if it’s a simple coincidence, or a very much probable conspiracy. Our primitive ability to detect patterns and danger has helped us survive as a species for so long. But sometimes, our pattern loving nature takes low probability events and we form them into drastic, and sometimes improbable conclusions. selection bias is also a major vehicle for conspiracy, taking and picking apart sources and facts to skew it, and further extend your argument or side. Like sociologist marshall McLuhan once said, “I wouldn’t have seen it if I hadn’t believed it”.