Schneier on Security

KCNA • January 5, 2016 1:26 PM

on p. 23:

A final remark relative to the frailties of human information processing; a reading of the literature suggests the hypothesis that 'actors tend to dismiss unlikely events as impossible events'. Such a concept favors bold and imaginative strategies such as Hannibal crossing the Alps or the landing at Inchon.

KCNA • January 5, 2016 2:27 PM

@WHCA

In to the document linked by Bruce that is referred to as "M-deception":-)

The document talks about two forms of deception (from p.30), as they say were suggested by a discussion with Donald Daniel, Katherine Herbig et al at the Naval Postgraduate School (reference #36).

1. A (for ambiquity) deception. The intent of this is to increase the ambiguity in the victim's mind and lower the probability of a correct perception by "dilution" or multiplication of alternatives.

2. M (for misdirection) deception. The intent of this is to reduce the ambiguity in the victim's mind by having him become convinced of a particular falsehood. As to this they quote (on p.34) Barton Whaley (reference #4) who wrote that "the ultimate goal of stratagem is to make the enemy quite certain, very decisive, and wrong".

(Although IMHO the rabbit hole is even deeper and there were no planes. Just bombs in those two buildings. Don't expect anyone to come out and say it out loud however. A few of the people who knew have died, and others have roles they don't want to get out of.)

KCNA • January 5, 2016 2:33 PM

With 911 being an "inside job" it was "M-deception" in the sense that the "enemy" is of course "the public".

Although admittedly the truth is harder to determine when there are actors (some from the government) who sow "A-deception" about the event.

What this means is just that the government can in fact use a mixture of the two types of deception.

KCNA • January 6, 2016 4:16 PM

@WHCA
There's another level of deception in abstracting 'conspiracy theories' away from the evidence and pathologizing them in general, or lately, characterizing them as innate logical debilities (Brotherton's Suspicious Minds).

you are correct.

That's why those who do not trust the official 9/11 story are typically grouped together with:
- those who do not trust the official story of the moon landing
- those who propose that earth was/is visited by aliens
- those who claim earth is flat
- etc

Sort of interesting, considering that pathologizing conspiracy theories is like claiming that the government is entirely pure and innocent.

Or maybe it's a side effect of the strength of the 9/11 conspiracy theory.

Here's a much easier-to-accept conspiracy theory for 9/11; this is from an alternate universe:

The day 9/11/2001 was mostly like any other day in New York, and at the end of the day the twin towers (and 7 World Trade Center) were still standing. However there was a persistent rumor on the street that the New York City Police Department on this day secretly executed 3 men after they stumbled upon some information about Rudy Giuliani's business dealings.

The "rumor" in this story is still a "conspiracy theory" but would probably be easier for the public to accept. And someone accepting this kind of conspiracy would probably not even be grouped with any lunatics (except by friends of Mr. Giuliani).

Not just that there's a line somewhere where the story gets so big that beliefs in it get classified as outrageous.

That, and the fact that everyone who would know something has someone managing them through whom the individual can be pressured into shutting up. In the few cases where that does not work there is always "assisted suicide"...