Part 2 of a 2-part podcast series, based on the article: "Conspiracy Theorists and Monological Belief Systems" (Argumenta 2018), by Kurtis Hagen  https://www.argumenta.org/article/conspiracy-theorists-monological-belief-systems-special-issue/  ABSTRACT of Article: Recent scholarship has claimed to show that conspiracy theorists are prone to simultaneously believe mutually contradictory conspiracy theories, as well as believe entirely made up conspiracy theories. The authors of those studies suggest that this supports the notion that conspiracy theories operate within “monological bel ..read more

This podcast episode is a modified portion of an article entitled, “Conspiracy Theorists and Monological Belief Systems,” published in an open-access online academic philosophy journal called Argumenta, in 2018, by Kurtis Hagen. This podcast episode focuses on the claim that conspiracy theorists believe obviously mutually inconsistent theories and also the notion that they readily believe competely made up theories. https://www.argumenta.org/article/conspiracy-theorists-monological-belief-systems-special-issue/  ABSTRACT of article: Recent scholarship has claimed to show that conspiracy t ..read more

This podcast episode is a modified excerpt from the Appendix, “9/11 and Epistemic Authorities,” taken from the book Conspiracy Theories and the Failure of Intellectual Critique, published in 2022, by Kurtis Hagen. This excerpt focuses on the reliability of the National Institute of Standards and Technology regarding the destruction of the Twin Towers and Building 7 of the World Trade Center on 9/11 2001 ..read more

This podcast episode is the third part of a three-part series on the reliability of the media regarding conspiracy theories. It is mostly an excerpt from the Appendix, “9/11 and Epistemic Authorities,” taken from the book Conspiracy Theories and the Failure of Intellectual Critique, published in 2022, by Kurtis Hagen ..read more

This is the second part of a three-part series on the reliability of the media regarding conspiracy theories. This episode is based on material taken from an article entitled, “Is Conspiracy Theorizing Really Epistemically Problematic?” published in the journal Episteme in 2020, by Kurtis Hagen, which is a response to an article by philosopher Keith Harris. The discussion of the media’s reliability is somewhat tangential to the main argument of the article, having been included there in order to address the concerns of a reviewer who seemed to share Harris’s optimistic view. In this podcast ve ..read more

This podcast episode is the first of a three-part series on the reliability of the media regarding conspiracy theories. This episode is based on material taken from an article entitled, “Is Conspiracy Theorizing Really Epistemically Problematic?” published in the journal Episteme in 2020, by Kurtis Hagen, which is a response to an article by philosopher Keith Harris. While discussion of the media’s reliability is tangential to the main argument of the article, it was included there in order to address the concerns of a reviewer who seemed to share Harris’s optimistic view. Is Conspiracy Theori ..read more

This is a modified portion of an article entitled, “Is Conspiracy Theorizing Really Epistemically Problematic?” published in the journal Episteme in 2020, by Kurtis Hagen. That article is a response to a set of critiques of conspiracy theorizing put forward by philosopher Keith Harris. This podcast episode focuses on just one of those critiques. Namely, Harris argues that conspiracy theorizing problematically relies on a probabilistic version of a formal argument structure known as “modus tollens.” Hagen argues that Harris's critique fails to show that there is anything epistemically problemat ..read more

This is a modified portion of an article titled “Mencius and Xunzi on the Legitimate Use of Offensive Force: A Pacifistic Critique of Recent Just War Interpretations,” which was published in the journal Philosophy Compass, in 2022, by Kurtis Hagen. A more complete argument can be found in the middle four chapters of Hagen’s book Lead Them with Virtue: A Confucian Alternative to War, published in 2021, by Lexington Books. This summary focuses on Xinzhong Yao’s pacifistic interpretation of Mencius and Xunzi as well as the concept of “just war pacifism.” It argues that there is strong textua ..read more

This is a modified portion of an article titled “Do Conspiracies Tend to Fail? Philosophical Reflections on a Poorly Supported Academic Meme,” which was published in the journal Episteme, in 2022, by Kurtis Hagen. This is part two of a two-part series, this part focusing on an article by David Grimes entitled, “On the Viability of Conspiratorial Beliefs.” Abstract of the article: Critics of conspiracy theories often charge that such theories are implausible because conspiracies of the kind they allege tend to fail. Thus, according to these critics, conspiracy theories that have been around for ..read more

This two-part series is a modified reading of parts of an article titled, “Do Conspiracies Tend to Fail? Philosophical Reflections on a Poorly Supported Academic Meme,” which was published in the journal Episteme, in 2022, by Kurtis Hagen. Abstract of the article: Critics of conspiracy theories often charge that such theories are implausible because conspiracies of the kind they allege tend to fail. Thus, according to these critics, conspiracy theories that have been around for a while would have been, in all likelihood, already exposed if they had been real. So, they reason, they probably are ..read more