I was listening to Dennis Prager's first hour yesterday, and he spent some time discussing the various false beliefs certain groups hold. Among things he cited, a speaker who called the LAPD "the biggest gang in LA City", others who say blacks "fear the police as much as they fear gangs", and an article in The Guardian on Feb. 5 with some disturbing statistics regarding beliefs about AIDS.
According to a study carried out in the United States, 15% of black Americans believe that Aids is being used by the government as a form of genocide against black people. Almost half of them are convinced that the HIV virus is man-made, more than one quarter that it has been produced in a government laboratory, and 12% that it has been created and spread by the CIA.
Other theories about AIDS include the belief that the HIV virus is not the cause (Robert Mugabe famously believes this one); that the government is withholding a cure from the poor, and that the drugs used to treat HIV are actually part of a plot to use Blacks as guinea pigs.
The African-Americans who like to think that Aids is a government conspiracy against them have reason to hope this is the case. They must long for a comforting explanation, other than poverty, as to why it is that the disease affects them so disproportionately. They represent 13% of the American population, yet account for 50% of new HIV infections.
That's all well and good, but what is the result of believing a bad theory?
Remember, a theory is not a guess, or an unproven fact. A theory is a structure which purports to organize and account for observed facts. A good theory will account for lots of facts in one neat structure, and will accurately predict other facts. A bad theory will predict things that are not factual. The alternative to a good theory which predicts true things is not a blank slate, it's a bad theory, which predicts falsehoods.
What's more, what theories you believe affect how you will behave and what choices you will make.
If you believe that the police are as dangerous to you as the local gangs are, you will not call the police in to deal with gangs or other criminals. You will either sit there and let yourself be victimized by gangs, in the belief that at least that way, you're only being set upon by one group of thugs, or you will take matters into your own hands and try to deal with the situation yourself. This puts your own safety at risk, and you may endanger some innocent third party.
If you believe that AIDS is spread by the CIA, or that the government has a secret cure, or that it's not caused by HIV at all, you will not change those behaviors that put you at risk for contracting the virus.
If you believe poverty is due to a racist society and not due to how much you work, you will be poor all your life.
Lots of people believe, or disbelieve, particular theories because it makes them feel better. This leads them to act as if certain things are true, which are, in fact, false. At best, this will do them no good; at worst, it can kill them.
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