Why People Believe Conspiracy Theories with David Aaronovitch

On today's episode of Timeless Wisdom, the role of the conspiracy theory in shaping modern history. The author is an award-winning journalist, David Aaronovitch, and he writes a regular column for the Times of London. Where are you right now, by the way, David?

I'm sitting in London, which is, as you might expect, rainy.

Yes, I studied for a year in England, and I truly understood why people went for holiday, as you folks call it, not vacation, went for holiday to anywhere that had sun. It could have been the Congo.

That's coming up on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. One nation under God. Here's Franklin Graham. I'm inviting you to join with us and to pray for America. Pray that we as individuals and as a nation turn to the God of our fathers, the God of the Bible. As we approach America's 250th, join Franklin in praying for our nation every day. A new prayer is posted daily at OneNationUnderGod.com. Invite your friends and family to pray too. OneNationUnderGod.com. Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs. And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to DennisPrager.com. Com.

You are listening to the best of the Dennis Prager Show. Welcome everybody to the Dennis Prager Show. I have said to you, my listeners, over the course of years now, 28 in broadcasting, that, uh, I am inordinately non-tempted by conspiracies. I don't think I ever believed in any, and I have also said that everyone that I have ever heard of turned out not to be true. And so I have always been puzzled, been fascinated— more than puzzled, just fascinated— by the question: why do some people believe? And more than some, apparently, uh, you know a substantial percentage of the population. I remember the, the line I used very often was that if 12%— and this I'd say 20 years ago— 12% of Americans at the time at least said that Elvis Presley was still living. And I said, so I always said 12% was my figure for what I just assume a certain percentage will believe anything. So that's my cutoff line. But of course, you know, the persistence, for example, in the belief that there were multiple shooters of John F. Kennedy— I never understood the appeal. And that's, that's being analyzed in a thoughtful book that has just come out called Voodoo Histories. It's a great title. The role of the conspiracy theory in shaping modern history. The author is an award-winning journalist, David Aaronovich. And he writes a regular column for the Times of London. Where are you right now, by the way, David?

I'm sitting in London, which is, as you might expect, rainy.

Yes. I studied for a year in England, and I truly understood why people went for holiday, as you folks call it, not vacation, went for holiday to anywhere that had sun. It could have been the Congo. I remember, you know, the only— isn't that true?

The ads were It's not only true, but the other thing is true, which is that the first sign any kind of sun peeps out from behind the clouds, and we strip our shirts off and go and sit in it, even if it's really cold.

That is— I just need to say this before we continue. I don't think I ever told this story to my listeners. I studied for a year at the University of Leeds, which I'm sure you're familiar with, and why I ended up there is not relevant, but I was there. And I remember one day, so help me God, the professor announced, "The sun is shining, class dismissed." And that's what happened. That's the— so I appreciate that. It's really ironic because of course I, in contrast to you, live in California. So our weather experience, our climatic experience is very, very different.

I'm feeling very warmly towards you at this moment.

Yes, thank you very kindly. Now listen, uh, this is a subject I know will offend some of my listeners. My listeners always know I have no intent on offending anybody, but I do believe that some analysis has been necessary of why people do this. So first, uh, do you deal with the why?

Yeah, very much so. Um, I had to deal with the what —because you, in order to be able to earn the right to deal with the why. In other words, I had to go through several sorts of conspiracy theory in order to show how they were made up and why they were wrong and the way in which they were wrong, in order to be able to deserve the right then to take the reader to the why. Why, in that case, would people want these particular types of stories more than what we would recognize to be reality? And that is a very big theme of the book. Good. So let's deal with—

I've never understood— see, I understand, for example, why people would want to believe that the United States government was behind 9/11. They were deeply hostile to George W. Bush. They hated his entire administration. And why not believe that he was responsible for that act? But I never understood why anybody had a vested interest in believing there was more than one shooter of John F. Kennedy. Sure.

I mean, I, I think it's— my chapter on John F. Kennedy actually is the same chapter as the chapter on Marilyn Monroe and Princess Diana, because they shared something in common, which was that they were young, uh, relatively young, iconic, and very popular figures who were taken from us, in one case by, uh, an, uh, what you might call a nudnik, Lee Harvey Oswald, an absolute nobody guy, tried to kill somebody before, very nearly succeeded, um, in the case of Marilyn Monroe, by an overdose. He was one of the most beautiful, most beautiful women in the world. In the case of Princess Diana, by a random car accident whilst being chased by photographers. In each case, the desire to believe that there was a much bigger story that explained it seemed to me to be an attempt to take, if you like, kind of accident and messiness out of life and have a much better, almost kind of fairy tale, even if it was a negative fairy tale explanation for what has happened. In other words, If you cast your mind back to November 1963, I was very young at the time, but reading around it, the shock of the assassination, of course, was a huge shock. And what a lot of people immediately started saying was, what kind of country are we that can have little guys like Lee Harvey Oswald going around, people like him shooting people? And what the conspiracy theory about Kennedy did was it took that anxiety away and it replaced it with an idea, well, maybe somebody is in charge after all, and they have been doing it all, and therefore it's a much bigger thing. Same with Diana, same with Marilyn Monroe. In other words, what I'm really saying is it's a more comforting story than the idea that you can lose a president in such ridiculous and almost random circumstances as the fact that it was bad chance that took the route of his motorcade past the place where a really inadequate guy who just had access to a gun was working.

I 100% agree with you. In fact, I forgot that I myself had thought in that direction. People rebel against the idea that a nothing can shape history.

Yeah, that an accident can.

An accident, right, in the case of Diana. Right, in the case of Diana, clearly did.

I mean, we British people, a lot of British people wanted to believe that she was murdered by our royal family. It has to be said that it's several centuries since our royal family had a kind of penchant for murdering people. or even indeed the capacity to do it. But you think, you know, you examine the circumstances of that evening. There's Diana in the hotel, the Ritz in Paris. Nobody knows where she's going to. Nobody knows the route she's going to take to get there. Nobody knows what car she's going to go into because they changed that at the last second. Nobody knows what driver she's going to take. And when they have the accident, had she been wearing her seat belt, she would have survived, or had the car hit the underpass at a slightly different angle. In other words, It is impossible, just about, for there to be any conspiracy about it, and yet people so badly wanted it. It was all, you know, they said it was all because she was pregnant, they didn't want a Muslim, um, uh, heir to the throne. Not that this person would have been heir to the throne anyway. Or, um, she was doing stuff on landmines, or she was very, uh, she was, uh, very sympathetic to the Palestinians. In other words, any reason that they could possibly think of why it is that somebody might have murdered her was a better story than she's been taken away from from us by a ridiculous car accident.

1-800-PRAGER-776. The reason I'm opening— I usually interview my guests and take just a couple or no calls, but in this case, if you do believe in one, please feel free to call in and bounce it off David Aronovich. The point is not so much to refute conspiracies as to delineate what they are and explain why they come about. Why people have a desire. I mean, because that— it emanates from a desire to believe X. I've never met anybody who believed in a conspiracy who didn't have a desire to believe in it. For sure. It's not like, you know, I reluctantly come to the conclusion that George Bush was behind 9/11. I really adore the man.

He was a great friend of mine. Yes. What gives sort of extra weight to it was there were all kinds of people who tended to believe conspiracy theories about Bill Clinton, but they weren't the same people who believe conspiracy theories about George Bush.

That's a good point, right?

Yeah, that, that's— yes, they had a slight tendency, but they really— but both of them who believe them believe them.

What I always ask people who believe in these things is, how is it possible in the age in which we live to keep anything secret? How do you think thousands of people have collaborated with such an ability to keep such a secret? I, I don't unders— just on that basis alone, I, I— it's impossible to believe in these conspiracies.

Sure. So the moon landing theory It was a real— oh, that's all right. Everybody in NASA either had to be duped or had to be involved, and they had to go on saying it for the whole of the rest of their lives. Can you imagine being those astronauts who apparently never landed on the moon, right? But in Arizona, they mustn't betray for one second. That's right. They never set foot there.

One small step for an individual in Arizona, one great step for— I will be back in a moment. Voodoo Histories is up at DennisPrager.com. Happily take your calls. And I, I, I, I, I want to know if somebody ever changed their mind who believed in a conspiracy. I wonder, did evidence ever dissuade anybody? We'll be back in a moment. I'm Dennis Prager.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

Hey friends, it's Catherine from Christian Parent Crazy World. I wanted to tell you about a recent episode with Kristi Graham from Samaritan's Purse called "Stepping Outside the American Bubble to See God at Work." Kristi and I talked about raising kids with a bigger faith-filled perspective and share incredible stories from around the world. I truly believe this episode is going to encourage you, stretch your faith, and help you see God at work in ways you may never have imagined. So be sure to check out this recent episode of Christian Parent Crazy World.

Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.

Hi everybody, you're listening to The Dennis Prager Show, and it's a, uh, for, for many, not for me, but for many, this is a controversial subject, and I appreciate that. And I'm certainly prepared, and I'm sure my, uh, my guest is as well, to take the calls on this. After all, I have a colleague in, uh, at Salem Radio, Michael Medved, who has— what is it, doesn't he have a conspiracy hour each week? Conspiracy Day. Yes. So, uh, where he takes calls on it and tries to refute them. So I'm talking to David Aronovich. He's in London, and he's British, obviously, and he has written Voodoo Histories. He writes for the Times of London, and Voodoo Histories is the role of the conspiracy theory in shaping modern history. And the book is up at DennisPrager.com, and from what I have seen, it is written as interestingly as he speaks. So I was— I was— I posed this question, then I want to take some calls from around the United States for you. I Have you ever met anyone— and it's not a rhetorical question— have you met anyone or heard of people being dissuaded by evidence with regard to a conspiracy they believed in?

Uh, embarrassingly, the answer is yes, because it was me. Um, but in, in a kind of— most of the people that I knew, um, when I was growing up believed the John F. Kennedy conspiracy theory. You know, it was just a sort of default position for an entire generation. We were told this story about the magic bullet. You remember the magic bullet? Yep. The bullet that goes into Kennedy, goes into Connolly, and— Right. Lots of authors said, yeah, it was impossible, couldn't have happened. Right. Actually, since they've shown pretty conclusively through new computer modeling and so on exactly where people are, analysis of the Zapruder of the Zapruder tape, you can see pretty clearly it's not magic at all, it's a very rational, ordinary bullet, and so on. But for a while I didn't know that when I was younger, so I am an example of somebody who has been persuaded by the evidence that a conspiracy theory I kind of believed, um, wasn't true. But you're talking about something more than that, aren't you? You're talking about a real advocate of a conspiracy theory who then says, uh, a bit later, you know what, I seriously got that wrong. I know I wrote a book about it saying that this happened, but now I know that doesn't happen. I'll give you a really good example of a situation where it didn't happen, very briefly. There was an old lady killed in England in 1984, and a lot of people said that she was murdered by the security services, including an MP stood up in the House of Commons to say it. 20 years later, they got the DNA evidence. They found that she'd been killed by a 16-year-old criminal who was at a care home. Did The MP apologize? No. Wow.

Yep, that, that's pretty clear. Now, what would you, uh, argue— not even argue, just what would you enumerate as perhaps the 3, 4, 5 biggest conspiracy theories of this past century?

Uh, well, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is probably the biggest.

Um, by the way, is it true that, uh, the Tsar had that on his night table? Yes, yes, he did. Wow, wow.

Send out personal copies. The Kaiser, after his abdication, used to have it on his, um, in Holland just after the First World War. There were some pretty big people.

Henry Ford.

Henry Ford believed in it. Henry Ford circulated it as a pamphlet called The International Jew: The World's Foremost Problem, uh, paid for it to be circulated, uh, and then only repudiated it in the mid-'20s. And that only under a lot of pressure, really. So we still don't know.

Well, it's now very, very popular in Arabic. Hugely popular.

I found— I came across a copy in the airport in Brunei, a very modern airport in Brunei, where it was sitting next to the Dan Browns on the top of the— and had a kind of Jewish guy with his nose over a wall, you know, kind of. Right.

I saw it in Cairo many years ago, and it was a Jewish octopus with its tentacles over the globe.

Oh, that one, yes, that's a very, very famous design, and you could probably find it still. So you're absolutely right. So that would be number— that would be number one. I think it's quite possible that I'd say that 9/11 conspiracy theory, as understood in other countries than America, probably now would be number two, because it's so widely believed in Pakistan and places like this, and actually impedes the fight against the Taliban, because a large section of the Pakistani intelligentsia and educated classes, and including in the army and the intelligence, fundamentally believe that it was America that was responsible for the origins, the attack that led to the War on Terror. And that really is a problem. So 9/11, I would probably—

now, those who say that say— what are— I'd like to know the details there. They, they hired people to bring these planes into buildings?

What, what are the details? Oh, right, okay. I mean, this, this, you can only describe this as a really complex theory, but I suppose If you put it all together, what they say is this: that the planes were either guided, remote-guided, into the Twin Towers at the same time as the Twin Towers had been rigged with explosives to go off when the planes went into them. That for some other reason World Trade Center 7 was also rigged with explosives, despite the fact that they didn't send a plane into that. That no plane went into the Pentagon, but it was a missile, despite the fact that lots of people saw it. But we don't know what happened to the passengers in Flight 77. That Flight 93 wasn't brought down by passenger, uh, the, the passenger action and what the terrorists then did, but was shot down by the United States, uh, Air Force, uh, and so on. And that—

why would the United States Air Force shoot down a plane sent by the US government?

Um, that one wasn't, uh, that one, that in this one, the— because the passengers had learned what had happened to the others and rushed the cockpit they were in danger of learning the truth about how the— there were no hijackers there, and therefore they couldn't let them do that and land the plane, so they shot it down. That's how the, uh—

All right, so this is, this is believed abroad, or this is believed in the U.S.? And I believe in the U.S.

This is what— All right, but you were telling us that David Ray Griffin, who's a professor emeritus of theology, who's now written 8 books on 9/11—

what do you, what do you, what do you believe? I mean, we can never know what animates, uh, others. It's often, often impossible to know what animates ourselves, but to the to the extent that you can, do you have a theory about him? Yeah, I do.

I, I do have a theory about him. I have a theory that he deeply wants to believe that there was a huge organizing force which organized everything, that he— I think he deeply wants to believe that the universe is under control. And even if that control is bad, it is better in a sense psychologically for him than there being no control at all. That's what I believe about him. It helps that he hates hates Bush so much, and that Bush is such a demon figure. And he says at several points in his book effectively that what Bush stands for is so disgusting, there's nothing that he— that Bush would not do, and there's nothing that he would put past him. But fundamentally, right at the bottom, is this desire that the world should be under control. And if you think about it, a theology— a theologian often to believe that kind of—

right, right. That's why I am a religious person, but I do believe that luck plays a very big role in life, and I don't think that the two are at all in conflict. But many other religious people do. We will be back in a moment. This is just fascinating. Voodoo Histories is the book, the role of the conspiracy theory in shaping modern history. David Aaronovich is the author. It is up at DennisPrager.com. We continue.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

Hey friends, it's Katherine from Christian Parent Crazy World. I wanted to tell you about a recent episode with Kristi Graham from Samaritan's Purse called "Stepping Outside the American Bubble to See God at Work." Kristi and I talked about raising kids with a bigger, faith-filled perspective and share incredible stories from around the world. Around the world. I truly believe this episode is going to encourage you, stretch your faith, and help you see God at work in ways you may never have imagined. So be sure to check out this recent episode of Christian Parent Crazy World.

Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

Dennis Prager here, president of Prager University. The chancellor is in the room with me, and so is the athletic director. Anyway, I do invite you all to visit Prager University. This is our answer to to the lack of wisdom that permeates many of our universities, producing people who do often believe in conspiracies. To make it related to our subject, Voodoo Histories by David Aronovich, absolutely mesmerizing stuff. I, I have— I, I will come back to you with my questions, but there are so many calls, including those who do have some conspiratorial views, and I'd like to take them. Is that okay with you? Oh, that's great. Alrighty, again, the book is up at DennisPrager.com. We'll begin in Texas, Fort Worth, Texas, and Lance. Lance, you're on with Dennis Prager and David Aronovich. I have a question.

I was wondering, why is it that you focus so much on things like the 9/11, the, the truthers as they call themselves, and, uh, the JFK conspiracy buffs, when no one is dead because of their conspiracy theories? However, when you have people claiming that Saddam Hussein was behind the September 11 bombing—

who claimed— who claims that, Lance? George W.

Bush did, in his official statement to Congress when he announced the invasion of Iraq. Well, all I can say is to get back at those who attacked us on 9/11. Okay, fine.

Uh, did he make another comment in that regard? Because I lived through it and you lived through it, and I have to say that the only conspiracy theorists are people like you who, who believe that there was a conspiracy to blame Saddam Hussein for 9/11 when it— there was no conspiracy. Everybody knows we went into— we went into Iraq.

I promise on your part, I didn't— I didn't say that there was a conspiracy to start the war. No, no, no, no, that there was a belief.

I know what you said, and I'm saying that what you are charging is wildly exaggerating of the history that we both lived.

It's not wildly—

Yes, it is. 9/11 was not blamed on Saddam Hussein and given as the reason for attacking Iraq. WMD— No, it was a—

it was a— led to large numbers of people. Okay, all right. No one's dead because people believe the moon landing was faked.

No, no, you're right, and we're not talking about the moon landing, but, uh, there are a lot of people dead because of people believing that 9/11 was in fact an American conspiracy because it's so widespread believed as David Aronovich pointed out, in the Muslim world, that it is part of the reason for the anger at America. And the invasion of Iraq isn't? No, I don't believe—

that's not the reason they're upset with us.

That is correct, it is not. It is not. That is correct. Lance, you and I have a different read of history, and I would invite you to call me on Friday when we have open lines, and I mean it, call me back, but I don't want to take time from David Aronovich. It was a minuscule facet of the invasion of Iraq. You may differ with the invasion of Iraq. Good people are on both sides of that issue. But we did not invade Iraq because Saddam Hussein was blamed for 9/11. We did for WMD, and that turned out not to be a factor. I fully acknowledge that. That's why in Mr. Aronovich's land, they just had all these hearings again with Tony Blair. But they had reason to believe from, from their intelligence agencies that he had weapons of mass destruction because he had in fact had them. You don't— you can or cannot, it's up to you to comment on that. I'm happy to go to another call, it's your call.

I would just say this, it is true that some conspiracy theories have no casualties. It is, although Buzz Aldrin may quite like to kill people who think that he didn't land on the moon, and rumor has it in Britain that he has actually thumped about somebody who said it to him, but I'm sure it's not true. Other conspiracy theories, I mean, we think about the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. That was described by a senior historian as a warrant for genocide. In other words, sometimes the target of conspiracy theories, if they are an unpopular minority or if they're widely believed, as you quite rightly say, Dennis, I mean, in places like Pakistan or elsewhere, it actually And, you know, believing conspiracy theory, the notion that Iranian demonstrators are acting on the behest of foreign powers has actually led to the execution of some of them during the course of the last couple of weeks. So it isn't the case that conspiracy theories, a lot of conspiracy theories don't have casualties. Some of them really do.

Yes, thank you for noting that. We'll take a quick break here. Uh, is that correct, Sean? Yes. Uh, okay. And, uh, the book is, uh, Voodoo Histories: The Role of Conspiracy Theory in Shaping Modern History. It is up at DennisPrager.com. We return in a moment.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

Dennis Prager here with David Aronovich. Voodoo Histories: The Role of Conspiracy Theory in Shaping Modern History. I don't cover conspiracy issues much, uh, but, uh, this book does, and it does it in a terrific way from what I have read and certainly listening to and speaking to David Aaronovitch, who writes for the Times of London. I'll ask you a question which we may or we may have a difference of opinion on because we've been in utter unanimity Thus far, do you feel that conspiracies, or at least in, in modern history, conspiracy belief— there are conspiracy beliefs that are politically motivated and others that are psychologically motivated. I think the ones with John F. Kennedy are psychologically motivated, motivated, but some are politically motivated, like 9/11 caused by George Bush. Do you believe that the scope and number of theories, of conspiracy theories, are greater among the— those politically inspired are greater among people on the left, people on the right are equal?

What a— I think that's a really terrific question. I spent a lot of time trying to puzzle this one out, and I had to end up by saying that I couldn't really see a difference, really, between the desires of people on the political left. Now, it was certainly true that the more extreme people tended to be, then the more likelihood was that they would believe in conspiracy theories. And it may be because these people were more likely to group together because they were more activist, and therefore to confirm each other's views of the world, if you see what I mean, so that they became like a kind of little group who would say the same things to each other and that would strengthen their opinion. It's very funny, one of the things I've had to deal with is those people, particularly in Britain, who are on the political left who say this: the political— the conspiracy theories that we on the left believe in, those are good conspiracy theories. The political— the conspiracy theories that those on the right believe in those are rubbish and those are wrong conspiracy theories. And one of the things that's been really, I think, wonderful about writing the book is watching some of those people realize that actually their motivations for wanting to believe in conspiracy theories were pretty similar to those of the people they most hated in the world. And I've had some fun with that. But I know, I don't think there is a significant difference.

Well, tell me what would be a mirror image in terms in terms of seriousness, scope, of believers and so on, to the left-wing belief that George Bush was behind 9/11? What would be a right-wing example?

I guess that people would say, I mean, you remember one of the great essays on conspiracy theories was written in the mid-'60s by Richard Hofstadter, and it was all about paranoia. And he was thinking about essentially the McCarthy era. You remember McCarthy's continuous suggestion that there were hundreds of communists in the administrations both of Truman and then of Eisenhower, and that they had consciously skewed American policy in the direction of the interests of communist China leading up to 1949. And there were legions of right-wingers— you remember the John Birch Society and people like this and so on— who firmly believed that this was indeed the case. And not only was there a communist outside in Russia and one or two rather weedy ones inside America who didn't have much influence, but actually the government was full of communists. So I guess that would be the equivalent of the 9/11 belief, which is of course over a half century ago.

But yeah, I mean, I, I—

exactly. So, so we're a whole lot about Bill Clinton if you remember, circulated, um, the Vince Foster conspiracy theories, right? They weren't, they weren't quite as large. Well, that's my point.

That's what I think. The scope is larger, at least in my, in my adult lifetime. The, the McCarthy, for whom I have no respect, end of issue. But the— it's— there's a slight nuance there in that there really did exist not Communist Party members as such But there really was, I mean Arthur Kessler pointed this out a decade before that, there really was in the arts, for example, tremendous sympathy for Stalin and Mao later on. I mean, it was a tragic fact of Western life that there was a romanticization of communist totalitarianism.

You're absolutely right. Honestly, you're absolutely right, and since this is going to be partly the subject of the next book I plan to write, I completely agree agree with that. There were major delusions, and it may be that the mantle of conspiracism was held by the right up until about 1963 and then taken on in general by the left. That would— that might be a fair characterization.

Okay, let's go to some calls here in Hollywood, California. Matt, you're on with Dennis Prager and David Aronovich. Hey gentlemen, how are you? Good, thanks. Well, um, I answered— I answered on, on my guest's behalf. He's doing fine. No, no, he's doing fine, I could Uh, Dennis, you're like a father figure to me. Thank you, that's very sweet of you. It's an honor to be. Great, great.

Um, throughout high school, I was a— I was obsessed with the JFK assassination, and I read every book, and I, and I was convinced that there was a conspiracy. And because of you, Dennis, and because of like Medved's show and stuff, I, I'm— and my ideology and everybody on, on the the conservative side, I'm starting to question whether or not, uh, the conspiracy actually exists. And I'm just curious, other than your book, is there any other paths that, that I can explore to kind of open up?

Oh, I can really recommend something to you. Um, you remember Vincent Bugliosi, who—

we had him on, on this.

Yes. Oh, well, exactly. His book, Reclaiming History, sure, it's the biggest book you'll ever buy. I mean, it's, it's like the Bible and War and Peace combined. The weight of it. And it has— it's, it's, it's so big that its bibliography and its index is on a CD which they give, which they give alongside it. But it's absolutely compendious. It takes you through every— it starts.

And if you want a shorter one, there was another excellent one, Gerald Posner. Posner, yes, that's right.

We had him on too.

Yes, exactly. All right, good. I'm glad you mentioned those. And, and Matt, I'm glad you asked about that. All right, we have another segment here with David Aaronovich. Voodoo Histories is the book. Try to take another call or two. I, I, uh, I do believe the whole subject is truly worth serious investigation because it gives an insight into why people do believe what they want and is, is reason a powerful thing in the world. We'll be back in a moment. Hi everybody, Dennis Prager here. I've been, uh, frankly mesmerized, uh, this hour by David Aronovich, Voodoo Histories. My theory is that Britain unfortunately is in decline, but their historians are still the best. I do, I have I have to tell you, your newspapers are great. Every British guest I have had has been spectacular. And you continue that trend, I might add.

Very kind of you. Yours is a really good show, if I may return the compliment.

Well, that's very kind too. But it's really something for another time. I'd like to have a panel of you folks to discuss the future of Britain, because I am worried. But it's truly beyond the scope of this. Let me try to get one more call at least. This is an interesting— well, let me just say what we have. From Texas: Is global warming concern a conspiracy theory? If one believes that there is, it's not a conspiracy theory. I don't believe it's a conspiracy theory. Forgive me for answering this, David, though you are certainly free to add, but I don't know your view on this and I don't want to put you on the spot. Because it's not the point of your book, but for something to be wrong doesn't mean that people sat down and conspired.

I think that's, I think that's exactly right. I mean, whatever view you take about whether or not you think, and the level of threat that you think global warming represents and so on, I think the idea that it's a conspiracy cooked up by people so they can tax you and do stuff to you, I think that's far-fetched. I think I think the truth is that the people who have been arguing for global warming, including the scientists, really and genuinely and passionately believe it. Some people might almost say that they believe it too much, but they're not conspiring, they're just telling you what they think they see.

Right. People could believe something that isn't true but there not be a conspiracy.

Yeah, and that happens all the time.

Well, exactly. It's— look, we know the emails of one East Anglia professor. You can't keep secrets in the modern age. All right, whether it's 9/11 or it is, or is global warming or whatever it might be. Uh, let's see here. Uh, my 60— Emily in Minneapolis, Minnesota. My 65-year-old father is an Illuminati conspiracy theorist. Any hope for these people? Absolutely none whatsoever.

I mean, this is a recreational conspiracy theorist. You know, the Illuminati were believed to have been responsible for the French Revolution. And I think that if you believe conspiracy theories about groups that have been around for hundreds of, uh, and hundreds of years, it's a bit like the Dan Brown conspiracy theory. You're believing it because it's fun for you to believe rather than it has an impact on your life.

Well, I have a feeling you will have a lot of readers as a result of this hour, and I certainly hope that that's the case. Thank you so much, David Aronovich.

Thank you for having me.

Tomorrow on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.

The Declaration of Independence statement that we are all endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, and that includes life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The pursuit of happiness. There are two arguments made against the pursuit of happiness, at least two, and you may have some, and you can call in immediately if you don't like the phrase pursuit of happiness. So I'm going to defend it and tell you how to do it. One argument is happiness is a byproduct of other things, so if you have to pursue other things in order to get happiness.

Join us tomorrow to hear more on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. This has been Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Visit DennisPrager.com for thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs, and to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles.

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