Crank magnetism an Psychoceramics

 

The term crank magnetism was coined by physiologist and blogger Mark Hoofnagle on the Denialism Blog in 2007 to describe the propensity of cranks to hold multiple irrational, unsupported or ludicrous beliefs that are often unrelated to one another, referring to his claims that William Dembski endorses both a Holocaust denier and a conspiracy theory put forward by Peter Duesberg.^[10] Crank magnetism may be considered to operate wherever a single person propounds a number of unrelated denialist conjectures, poorly supported conspiracy theories, or pseudoscientific claims. Thus, some of the common crank characteristics—such as the lack of technical ability, ignorance of scientific terminology, and claims that alternative ideas are being suppressed by the mainstream—may be operating on and manifested in multiple orthogonal assertions.

Hoofnagle's fellow blogger Orac has discussed crank magnetism in relation to the writings of British columnist Melanie Phillips, whom he alleges denies anthropogenic global warming while promoting intelligent design and the discredited view that the MMR vaccine causes autism in children.^[11] Blogger Luke Scientiæ has commented on the relationship between the number of unrelated claims that magnetic cranks make and the extent of their open hostility to science.^[12] He has also coined the phrase "magnetic hoax" in relation to hoax claims that attract multiple crank interpretations.[

 

 

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Another study titled Dead and Alive: Beliefs in Contradictory Conspiracy Theories managed to show that, not only will cranks be attracted to and believe in numerous conspiracy theories all at once, but will continue to do so even if the theories in question are completely and utterly incompatible with one another.^[15] For instance, the study showed that: "... the more participants believed that Princess Diana faked her own death, the more they believed that she was murdered [and that] ... the more participants believed that Osama Bin Laden was already dead when U.S. special forces raided his compound in Pakistan, the more they believed he is still alive," and that "Hierarchical regression models showed that mutually incompatible conspiracy theories are positively associated because both are associated with the view that the authorities are engaged in a cover-up".^[15]

 

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^{Dunning–Kruger effect / Illusory superiority} 

 

 

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^{Psychoceramics - the study of cracked pots}