An Evolution Of Self (Call Me What You Like)

I don't make many threads on ATS anymore, nor post much here anymore...I'm sure the explanation will come up in this post. I'm not entirely sure where this topic fits honestly, whether it be in General Chit Chat, Members or Rant. So I just went with the safe in-between.

I first found ATS in 1999. Long before it had a message board, X-Files (the original series) was still on the air and the History Channel still had shows about history on it. I had a love-hate relationship with the Sci-Fi (SyFy sounds dumb) channel and shows like Stargate SG-1 and the various paranormal files. I mean come on, I was 9. I had already polished through an encyclopedia on aircraft from around the world - there surely had to be more. It was to a point where I started my own "spotting team" where a bunch of friends and I would go out late at night on the weekends into the field behind our houses and try to look for some unknown aircraft or even UFO's. We didn't really know what we were looking for. Again, we were 9 (through 14)...we were still in that time where our imaginations were good.

I remember all of the names and numbers still pretty well. We talked about things like the TR-3A and B (Black Manta), the CL-500 (Blackburn), the Aurora, Morpheus, The Switchblade. Yeah, I remember them all. I remember being especially fascinated by the Aurora - probably because I thought the Aurora in Ace Combat 3 was "so fricken cool."

I even headed a research project on ATS about it after I swore I saw one. I joined initially in January of 2004, but got bored of the username...so I chose another one in March after talking to some of the "then staff." (Kano, if you're still poking around ever - I still have K9 Kano, he turned 12 this year!) What can I say, I believed a lot of conspiracies when they had to do with some things, bought into the hype, didn't mind association...it was kind of like I knew that the world was scary and questioned it with great scrutiny. Ages 14 to 18 I spent a good deal of time on ATS (or battling it in some cases - though SO was very patient and very kind with me through those times).

Then I got a job. It was time to put money in my pocket to live. I was 18, I needed to get on. My time on ATS ceased as I tried to actually build an identity for myself, as those years I spent on ATS I was also grappling with some rough personal identity issues. You can probably even detect the immaturity in my posts and threads from about 2004 to 2008, I'm sure ATS chatters could speak up for that too.

I started school in 2012. How quaint.

2012...the year the world was supposed to end. I was attending my first year of school with my then-fiance. I spent a great deal of time discovering that I had what it took to make it in the academic world, and was doing my best to strip my mind of the idea that I'm an expert in ANYTHING. I can be a student, I can be a mentor or a teacher, but to be an expert would be to claim that I knew everything about something - and that was a status I was not prepared to accept. It is also a status I would never desire to accept or would accept. In March of 2012 I did momentarily jump back on ATS, but only to poke around to see if the 2012 hype had gotten swept away - boy was that an interesting read through.

Here I found myself assaulted with threads talking about a rogue planet, an asteroid, a random planetary alignment, an alignment with a black hole, a new-found level of consciousness, a collective singularity, a massive volcano, a huge earthquake and God is coming back to take us all away in the middle of it. Well! That's quite a mouthful. December 21, 2012 came and went without any disasters other than my ex freaking out over whether or not I'd make it to her house on Christmas Eve or Day. But perhaps it did trigger a revelation in me that totally shifted my mind from the ideology I had once about the world. That mystic veil that allowed me to entertain the fly-off-the-handle conspiracy theories was no longer there. I had totally lost any kind of scope that things like that, which were without proof could possibly stand.

It is worth nothing that I had read some gut-wrenching stories leading up to 2012 which I'd rather not go into. However, it was confirmed when I started my Mesoamerican Art class later that academic year. I did my semester long research project on the 2012-theorists legendary Dresden Codex. I made a point to highlight pages 24 and 71 of the codex and went on to elaborate their more probable depiction. Page 71 was supposedly the page that Dr. Coe had initially described as possibly being a depiction of the end of the world until it was better understood what the codex was.

I was told several stories about people, including children that had killed themselves ahead of 2012, including some in the region of places like Teotihuacan and Palanque. Some of these stories came from first witness accounts, others from archaeologists who were working in the area. That sickened me. These were human beings taking their lives for a superstition, an unfounded one at that. One that was being sensationalized by the media and Hollywood, politicians and fear mongers.

That's about the end of the stories I can tell you in relation to my personal or academic life...

However, from that point my thoughts on conspiracy theories have shifted from a mindset of accepting anything on the faith of a word (unless it just didn't fit in my mind), to one where I accept what has fact association, consider that which has coincidence, and reject that which has nothing to offer. I don't see Elvis in my refrigerator, there is bacon and eggs. I don't see a life message in my alphabet soup, just letters and broth - though the letters may happen to make up a word.

I do understand there are things we don't know, and that we can't explain. I don't question that. But I think that which is supernatural is something that requires a lot of research and a lot of investigation before it can be classified as such. The Dyatlov Pass thread is a good representation of this. I do also understand there are things out there that are hid from people, but I don't automatically assume ill intent by these things. I chuckle at the hypocrisy of some people on ATS who speak of "love and peace" and "expect the good in people", yet they will sit there are criticize a secret being held by the men holding the strings to the curtain.

I do have an automatic reaction to reject a theory which does not have evidence to support it when the claim is contradictory to common knowledge and mechanics. Why? Because I am an academic, I am someone who works in a profession. The world we know today was not created by someone making claims without evidence to support those claims. The people who did put the foundations in the ground to support their theory and prove it. There was explanation using real world causes and effects, or real world accountability of historical facts. It wasn't a short handed message on a discussion board referencing an obscure blurry or low-cost YouTube video. It wasn't to a website that a 14 year old drew up. It was work. Hard work. Work that person did on their own.

I'm 25 now. I've moved on from the dark world of conspiracies. I live outside of the distortion of prediction, and I work with the people of reason. Conformist or shill...this world is brighter than that which I used to live.

Well okay. Thanks.

Prediction is logical and many things've been predicted mathematically. Saying it's distortion is entirely false.

I'm delighted to see you are doing well.

a reply to: Blissful

Prediction within the foundations of a hypothesis is fine. For that matter many to all things have a prediction. A prediction centered around science with the inclusion thereof is something entirely different from a simple prediction on its own.

For example: predicting it will be a little bit warmer tomorrow because the winds will be out of the south is a good prediction.

Predicting that an asteroid will fall on us tomorrow because "we're overdue" is not.

Thanks for pointing that out though - I supposed I wasn't clear on that.

Hanging in there like a true soldier.
Always remember...Life is Good.
"Yea, though I walk through the Valley of Death, Bob gives me Kung Fu in the face of my enemies."
Book of Johnboy 23:5

You are completely correct and I agree wholeheartedly.

I do not think for myself so that is all I have to offer here....

originally posted by: notmyrealname
...do not think for myself so that is all I have to offer here....

Ah, this seems to be the favorite go to for many of the conspiracy theorists on ATS. I appreciate your insight...but I don't agree that simply thinking of matters in the realm of logic means that I can't think for myself.

I think by using the definition that most provide of those who "can not think for themselves" - the conspiracy theorist is just as prone to the "drone" factor as any other individual. They too are relying what other people say in order to generate their ideas and theories. The big difference in this is that on the one hand, there's something that has known real world mechanics, and evidence involved. On the other hand, there's a really fuzzy looking video or pseudo-science or non-scientific rationalization...

www.sunfell.com...

See if this doesn't 'fit'..

I have "just enough"...

namaste

a reply to: JimNasium

I appreciate the link, but that's almost a reverse of what I dealt with (haha). Especially the psycho-sociological affiliations and religious attributes.

I'm kind of interested though to see if any other members went through the phase of being a "child in the wonders" to someone who "won't drink the conspiracy cool aid."