conspiracy theories

Elvis is still alive. Osama bin Laden is still alive. Paul McCartney is dead. These are just a handful of the conspiracy theories involving the alive/dead status of various famous people. Now, we can add Steve Jobs to the list.

Sam Telford, Tufts University

One of the perks of being a science writer is that, during the weekends when you're trying to relax and unplug from the world, crazy people harass you on social media.

Facebook just announced that it tossed off screwball Mike Adams for "violating our policies against spam [and] us[ing] misleading or inaccurate information to collect likes, followers, or shares."

There's simply no way of knowing what anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. will say on any given day.

One of the problems with science communication is that we are always a day or two behind the mass media. The general pattern is this:

Imagine going into the office or wherever your place of employment happens to be.

Here at ACSH, we're used to conspiracy theories. There are very few that we have neither heard nor debunked.

It's impossible to keep up with every "alternative fact" or crazy conspiracy theory on the Internet. By the time a lie has circled the globe, the Truth has just put its shoes on1.

Today, it seems that honest disagreement just isn't possible. Social media, which has become a sewage pipe of political hyper-partisanship and unscientific propaganda, magnifies this disturbing trend.