'Many web workers, having tasted of the A/B apple, can no longer imagine operating in any other environment. Indeed, they begin to look with pity on the offline world, a terrifying place where each of us possesses only one life to live rather than two (or more) in parallel. “There’s this grilled cheese place down the street,” says Jim Kingsbury, marketing VP at One Kings Lane. “They can’t test anything. Should they price the sandwich at $6 or $6.50? What should be at the top of the menu? Those are purely intuitive choices that they have to make.” At one Silicon Valley office, I overheard an employee complain that dating can’t be A/B tested; an online profile can, to be sure, but once you’re in a relationship with a specific person, 100 percent of the “traffic” is on the line with every decision. The testable web is so much safer. No choices are hard, and no introspection is necessary. Why is B better than A? Who can say? At the end of the workday, we can only shrug: We went with B. We don’t know why. It just works.'

'The definition of the situation is a fundamental concept in symbolic interactionism advanced by the American sociologist W. I. Thomas. It is a kind of collective agreement between people on the characteristics of a situation, and from there, how to appropriately react and fit into it. "If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.” In other words, the interpretation of a situation causes the action. This interpretation is not objective. Actions are affected by subjective perceptions of situations. Whether there even is an objectively correct interpretation is not important for the purposes of helping guide individuals' behavior. "The situations that men define as true, become true for them."'

'It isn't just saying that the beliefs converge; it is saying that since the beliefs converge along with greater confidence in their "truthfulness", it becomes more difficult for any individual to not converge as well – and feel confident about it. Now consider the more general implications. "Well, I'm going to be an independent thinker and not be affected by the herd and make my own educated guess." No, you won't. The moment you have the other people's guesses, you cannot shake that information. Your "independent" guess necessarily includes that guess in some way, you can't unlearn it. Either your guess converges towards the herd, or your guess is characterized as against the herd. Either way, the herd affected your thinking in ways you don't realize. You're part of the dialectic and you didn't even want to be. That you don't want to be part of it ensures you are part of it. ...it makes a third independent idea highly unlikely (unless, again, it forms in opposition to ideas 1 or 2.)'

'...debates are more than opportunities to hear candidates present views and policy. They’re intellectual boxing matches. People like keeping score. There are, however, reasons to be suspicious of the graphs, known as “worms” in colloquial reference to their squiggling path across TV screens. Many studies describe how people are influenced by what others think, especially when they’ve yet to form an opinion of their own. It seems to be instinctive: Motivated to be accurate, we take others’ assessments of reality into account, whether we want to or not. (As an example, just think how much easier it is to laugh at a joke when it’s followed by laughter.) -- Manipulative effect could also be measured even in test subjects who said they didn’t pay attention to the worm, and couldn’t remember whom it tended to favor. “The worm’s influence may be quite difficult for viewers to discount,” wrote Davis and Memon.' -- How many fingers, Winston?

'Much of what passes for valid knowledge becomes simply the individual’s unconscious acceptance of the dominant view. Knowledge generated and indoctrinated into each individual now becomes the moral compass that guides their actions. In the age prior to the time of ubiquitous internet communication, the gate was tightly governed. It was like the eye of a needle that very few could get through to participate in unfolding perception. What those in power absolutely fear is a collapse of the projections that guard the system of expert knowledge, which has replaced individual capacity to listen to ones own conscience. They are afraid of people marching side by side with those individuals who refuse to carry the given script and instead create their own and walk through the gate of the future on their own terms. What WikiLeaks has done is lifted up the perception of the masses that up to now has been governed by illegitimate authority of ‘expert’ knowledge.'

'In the continuing saga of data security firm HBGary, a new caveat has come to light: not only did they plot to help destroy secrets outlet WikiLeaks and discredit progressive bloggers, they also crafted detailed proposals for software that manages online "personas," allowing a single human to assume the identities of as many fake people as they'd like. #Manufacturing consent. Though many questions remain about how the military would apply such technology, the reasonable fear should be perfectly clear. "Persona management software" can be used to manipulate public opinion on key information, such as news reports. An unlimited number of virtual "people" could be marshaled by only a few real individuals, empowering them to create the illusion of consensus.'

Comment: Anon: 'I think that while the Stand Alone Complex is an amazing phenomenon, the mechanism behind it might lead to a bleak future for society. The over-propagation of memes will lead to a stagnation of original thought. In fact, it is already happening. Have you noticed that many of the films and tv shows in the last few years have been based off of old movies, tv shows, comic books and other types of franchises? I feel that this stagnation of original thought will lead to a society of mindless drones that are easily manipulated by propaganda. In fact, that’s just what happens in 2nd Gig, when Gohda starts his own Stand Alone Complex to serve his own agenda. Jean Bauldrilard suspected this might be the case decades before the Internet, an event which he called the “Termination of History” in which the masses all become a “silent majority” due to a lack of oppositional elements in society.' -- Anon: “I thought what I’d do is pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes.” Or should I?'

'...if one subscribes (as we do) to the idea of an Anglo-American power elite that uses its tremendous, familial banking wealth to move society toward one-world government, then the evolution we are observing makes a good deal of sense. Money power makes all the difference; it provides a formidable incentive for self-censorship. Money determines fashion; wealthy donors fund museums and theatres that make "gate-keeper" decisions. The subtlety of money power—as brutal as it can be—is wondrous to behold. What was resisted in one generation is welcomed in the next. The beauty of money power is that once a theme, trend or cultural direction is set into place, it tends to propagate on its own. Only a relative few gatekeepers are needed. Establish a trend and the mimetic elements of human behavior take over. People are inevitably tribal. It is a survival instinct and a success-instinct. One sees what is successful and wishes to emulate it. Within this context almost anything can be nurtured.'

'Relativism is not sanity, just wandering with the lost herd...' -- "There's no way to fight irrational certainty with relativism."

'Researchers have found evidence that political campaigns and special-interest groups are using scores of fake Twitter accounts to create the impression of broad grass-roots political expression. A team at Indiana University used data-mining and network-analysis techniques to detect the activity. In one case, a network of nine Twitter accounts, all created within 13 minutes of one another, sent out 929 messages in about two hours as replies to real account holders in the hopes that these users would retweet the messages. The fake accounts were probably controlled by a script that randomly picked a Twitter user to reply to and a message and a Web link to include. Although Twitter shut the accounts down soon after, the messages still reached 61,732 users.' -- And a whole new reality was set into motion.

Pay-walled. Recommended. -- When a pyramid scheme nears its inevitable end... "...the public insist on being handed the empty bag because they think they're going to make money, they want in on the game, everyone else has been making money, they feel left out so they insist on buying these things at the peak, and they are the ones who lose everything."

'In logic, an argumentum ad populum (Latin: "appeal to the people") is a fallacious argument that concludes a proposition to be true because many or all people believe it; it alleges: "If many believe so, it is so." The argumentum ad populum is a red herring and genetic fallacy. It appeals on probabilistic terms... It is logically fallacious because the mere fact that a belief is widely-held is not necessarily a guarantee that the belief is correct; if the belief of any individual can be wrong, then the belief held by multiple persons can also be wrong. The argumentum ad populum can be a valid argument in inductive logic... However, it is unsuitable as an argument for deductive reasoning as proof... ad populum only proves that a belief is popular, not that it is true.'

'The “believers” have suddenly realized how uncool it is to talk about “beliefs” when it’s supposed to be about science. So the rush is on to post articles warning believers to hide their “faith” and to throw in token comments about evidence instead. Indeed the Real Deniers are scrambling to claim the “name” skeptic that they used to despise. It’s a measure of how far this debate has come. Such was the success of the PR campaign, some skeptics gave up on the term and opted to use “realist”. But the skeptics have been proved right time after time, and the unskeptical scientists have been embarrassed by their own conniving words, mistakes, tricks and lies. The resurgence of the word “skeptic” is rising like a rocket. As I’ve said many times, the opposite of skeptical is gullible. And an unskeptical scientist is an oxymoron. The believers are acknowledging we are right: Science is about the evidence.'

'Through competition (which also ends up expanding to cooperation), life produces increasingly more complex structures capable of controlling more resources. Better technology leads to better games. Better games (aka behavior templates and/or guides) lead to better technology. The two are intertwined and it can and should be argued that game patterns themselves are a form of technology. So I am now arguing that games are absolutely critical to the planetary phenomenon that futurists have come to call convergent accelerating change. If this is the case, then we can venture the prediction that games will proliferate in direct relationship to other accelerating vectors like computer processing, information, communication and perhaps even human intelligence. ...we’re ultimately building what IBM researcher Jim Spohrer has dubbed the World Board [Baudrillardian Hyper-Reality], a cohesive system that allows people to access data about anything and everything in the world around us.'

'Hideo Kuze is one of the members of the terrorist group known as the "Individual Eleven". During a mass suicide by the Individual Eleven, Kuze alone survived, leaving and hiding out in the Refugee Residential District. He spearheads a revolutionary socialist independence movement by the refugees in Japan. The entire "Individual Eleven" movement was actually a new Stand Alone Complex created by Gouda. The infamous earlier SAC, The Laughing Man, was a meme that compelled people to become copycats and commit acts of corporate vandalism. The Individual Eleven virus compelled people to commit suicide; when it infected people with strong political beliefs, it made them commit suicide terrorists attacks and bombings. However, Gouda predicted the rise of one "Hero" which would serve as the center of the "hub" of the spreading virus.'

'Kazundo Gouda is head of a data manipulation division within the Cabinet Intelligence Service... -- Motoko Kusanagi hacks into the Cabinet Intelligence Agency database to try and determine what Gouda's motives are. She learns that Gouda has given up dreams of power and instead works to facilitate the emergence of a hero for the masses in order to produce a conflict situation that will force a change in direction for Japan, a change that Gouda believes will return it to its glory days. To that end, Gouda masterminds the formation of the Individual Eleven terrorist group and the emergence of Hideo Kuze as the leader of alienated refugees. Part of Gouda's plan is to harness the stand-alone complex social phenomenon in order to produce revolutionaries based on the refugee issue. Gouda anticipated the emergence of one "hero", by the rules of the social variation of the stand-alone complex would go on to further exacerbate the refugee situation.'

'Physicist Dr. Denis Rancourt is a former professor and environmental science researcher at the University of Ottawa (as green as they come), and has officially bailed out of the man-made global warming movement. Climate Depot has released a video of Dr. Rancourt: Man-made global warming is nothing more than a “corrupt social phenomenon.” “It is as much psychological and social phenomenon as anything else. Global warming is strictly an imaginary problem of the First World middleclass.” Rancourt is scathing of universities (and rightly so): “They are all virtually all service intellectuals. They will not truly critique, in a way that could threaten the power interests that keep them in their jobs. The tenure track is just a process to make docile and obedient intellectuals that will then train other intellectuals.” Climate Depot has <choice excerpts> and a list of other greens who have jumped ship.'

'In the language of economic sociology, options are performative; they create what they putatively just describe. In other words, the models have agency (that’s market models we’re talking about, not the fashion models, heaven’s no!). Options enable investors to anticipate other investors’ actions, which spurs herding behavior, where actors decide to disregard their own information (i.e., “That Coco Rocha, urgh!”) and imitate instead the decisions taken by others before them (but Russell Marsh optioned her). Herding and cascades are rather problematic to financial markets; they leads investors to artificially bid up asset values... because investors, like fashionistas, react to each other as well as to the aggregate traces of fellow investors’ actions (captured well in signaling instruments like options), they exacerbate systemic risk. Essentially, valuing financial goods is a matter of trying to be in fashion, which is a gamble.'

'...one can gain much understanding of current events by paying attention to Western power-elite rhetoric in all its varied manifestations. Anyone can perform the kind of analysis the Bell attempts to provide. Simply accept (a terrible and fearful thing to be sure) that there is a power elite – a group of extraordinarily wealthy and powerful families and individuals engaged in an intergenerational conspiracy to create world governance – and then begin to track the dominant social themes that they utilize to shove a hitherto-unsuspecting public in the desired direction. -- ...the Internet has ravaged elite memes. Suffice it to say that what is happening now is a kind of huge and unstoppable tidal wave, one that is sweeping all before its path. Cultures and belief-systems will be reconfigured before all this is over. We believe the elite may have finally recognized this – certainly we see rhetorical indications that it has. (Perhaps elements read the Bell?)'

"There is a pattern to the way these scares develop." -- FORCED MEMES ARE FORCED

'We always knew Climategate would the test the cohesion of the “team”. The reputations of good greens, good journalists, and decent politicians (there are a few) are on the line. They have to draw a line somewhere, and six months later, a few more cracks in the wall are showing. Even people who think we need action against CO2 are not convinced by the whitewashes. And for many of them, it’s not the ClimateGate emails themselves which pushed them over the edge, but the blatantly surreal nature of the so-called inquiries which don’t ask the basic questions or invite the key people. Of course, in order to attack any part of the great facade, it’s important to recite the incantation against bullies. Phrases about how the science is still settled (even though the scientists themselves might cheat) are like a pass-code that allow commentators to say something pointed against the tribal witchdoctors without getting too many nasty spells cast on them by the disciples.'

'If we lose the ability to project our negative traits onto some other person or entity, we actually experience the anxiety, fear and rage within ourselves. The growth of psychological and emotional maturity is the slow and often painful process of withdrawing your projections from the world so that you can see what the world actually is. Most people wander around the world with highly reflective sunglasses on – but pointing the wrong way – so that they are only seeing a distorted reflection of themselves, rather than the world itself. When a man hears that taxation is force, his unconscious hears all of the implications contained in that statement immediately, at light speed, and leaps into action to protect him from being tortured and killed. The hostility that he feels will arise in him as if out of nowhere. You have also provoked a feeling of humiliation in him, by creating fear and anxiety within him that he has to avoid.'

Gisted -- It's important to remember that people don't necessarily understand what you mean when you talk about the State. People don't think of the State as separate from society, they think society and the State are synonymous because everything that's in the media is almost entirely derived from State sources or to do with State activities. So when you talk to people about getting rid of the State they really can't imagine any kind of aggregate collective or society or country as anything other than the State because that's how the collective is continually portrayed to them. There are two kinds of relationship that people have with the State: #1. Those involved in the direct cover-up of abuse who praise and spread information about the government's activities so that other people can profit financially or just involve themselves in fruitless debates about how well the government is doing. #2. Everyone else who averts their eyes from the abuse and pretends there's no problem.

'Men go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.' – Charles Mackay

'In the 20th century, when a promotion was launched, the mainstream media reported on it like an echo chamber, each major newspaper and television station reporting the same thing in different ways, until eventually it sunk in. People began to believe it. But the power elite doesn't have that sort of power in the 21st century, thanks to the widespread debunking by the Internet. It's not just the sour economy, for there have been sour economies before. It's the information that is being spread by electronic communications. It's a kind of meme itself – or anti-meme. People are waking up, as if from a bad dream. Many elite promotions are unraveling or at least becoming less convincing. The EU has been built on lies, as those behind it never admitted the final destination was a United States of Europe. Now, thanks to the Internet and the economic crisis, such lies are unraveling and patience is running out. That's what the German leaders are seeing. That's the reason for the desperation.'

Watts on the sheeple: "They wouldn't even know they were helpless, but they would be very 'happy'. Most people cannot think for themselves, they live in Plato's Cave, they can only parrot what each one parrots from the media. And because they can parrot all the same things, they think they're sane."

'Here are issues that we would argue ARE politically correct: [*A long list*] -- We've listed the above areas of "political correctness" only to prove what regular readers of the Bell already have guessed: that our impression of political correctness (in the 21st century anyway) has to do with being careful not to contradict the dominant social themes of the power elite! Throughout the 20th century, and into the 21st, power elite promotions were so powerful, threatening and effective, that people - businesses, too, and, of course, government - carefully self censored, even when they could not explain how and why they came to their self-censoring determinations. This was the ultimate triumph of elite promotional memes - they exercised an iron-clad hold over people's imaginations and internal life. Yet of course it would be the Bell's argument that all of that may be changing now as the Internet-driven conversation continues to rapidly expand.'

'After the election—and anyone who didn't vote for Obama will know exactly what I'm talking about—you didn't dare say a negative thing about Obama in public. Certainly not a flippant slander, the kind that are common when discussing Presidents. If you were in a restaurant, before you said anything about Obama you took a serious look around to see who else was near you, and only if it was safe (read: white) could you quickly whisper some veiled comment. You weren't even allowed to be pessimistic about Obama. That was the climate. Again, if you didn't vote for Obama you will know what I mean, if you did you'll think I'm exaggerating. I'm not. Fast forward to last week. This is what I heard a guy announce in a crowded downtown restaurant, and I'm quoting: "Fuck him. Fuck Obama, fuck him, and fuck his horsefaced wife. I'm sick of his shit." That man doesn't hate Obama, he hates Obama supporters.' -- Corollary: He hates self-pwning idiocy, Obama supporters being the most depressing example.

'...what the recent climate-science scandals reveal is that such dodgy science becomes more likely the more that science is politicised and used to motor social policy and social-control initiatives. The politicians and green activists desperately calling for the IPCC to get its house in order, to get rid of the crap science and only keep the allegedly good stuff, know which side their bread is buttered. They know that the IPCC is the emperor’s last shred of clothing, providing otherwise denuded rulers and campaigners with a form of unquestionable authority for their backward, killjoy, misanthropic agendas. They are really demanding the preservation of the IPCC by any means necessary because they value the way it provides them with a God-like authority for Orwellian action at a time when serious democratic debate is noteable by its absence. And perhaps we should call for the abolition of the IPCC, not because some of its science is daft, but for precisely those same reasons.'

'This is One Spectacular Poster of ClimateGate Covering 3 Decades. You have to see this up close to believe it. Look up close and admire the detail while you despair at how long science has been going off the rails. To better appreciate the past and what was exposed by the CRU emails, the Timeline chart consolidates and chronologically organizes the information uncovered and published about the CRU emails by many researchers along with some related contextual events. That the chart exists at all is yet another example of how skilled experts are flocking in to the skeptics’ position and dedicating hours of time pro bono because they are passionately motivated to fight against those who try to deceive us.'

'Bankers are destroying Capitalism. Unfortunately, most Westerners won’t realize this until five years from now, when the middle class has been forcibly relegated to the ranks of the poor. -- The monetary system today, as it has been structured by Central Bankers, is immoral. The current monetary system stifles, not encourages free markets. If a free market system facilitated capitalism in the world’s major markets today, the middle class would be healthy and robust, the poor would be transitioning into the middle class, and the rich, while still a healthy component of society, would not increase their proportion of wealth relative to everyone else every year. Instead, in the absence of free markets and capitalism, the rich seize more and more resources every year, the middle class shrinks every year, and the poor become poorer.'

'Closed Shell Syndrome is a form of cyberbrain-induced autism, occurring when users of cyberbrain technology shut themselves off from the outside world to avoid harming others or themselves. It can also be a psychological barrier induced by the subconscious to protect the ego from being overwhelmed by the depth and connective nature of the internet.'

Steady-State Stasis --> Ultimate Statist Solution (06:12)

'Seizing on climate change as an issue around which they can create the appearance of purposeful activity, it is political elites who are the most zealous campaigners, ...the government urges us to urge them to act. At the same time, it also berates us for our apathy. Such is the bizarre relationship between the elite and the electorate today. ...putting pressure on world leaders is really an elite wish-fulfilment fantasy, in which child-citizens across the globe put their faith in parent-politicians engaged in an heroic, planet-saving mission. Climate activists may think they are critics of officialdom, but they are simply fuelling the fantasy. -- It seems unlikely that, in the long run, the elite’s search for meaning in green politics will be successful. The vision it offers – of caution and constraint, low ambition and no progress – is a negative, dystopian one which may evoke fear and conformity, but which will never inspire. It is the ideology of a demoralised society...'

'Science isn't done by consensus. It's done by rigorous testing. -- What matters right here and now is that it is time for the world's scientists to apostatize from the Church of Global Warming. It is a false religion. It is based on lies, and its leading prophets know that it is because they're the ones faking the data or stretching it to ridiculous lengths to pretend that the real world hasn't already ruled against their claims. It is time for us to laugh at the ideologues who try to pretend that any criticism of Global Warming alarmism is idiotic and unscientific. They are the ones who ignore the data; they are the ones who believe on faith alone, without evidence; and, most important, they are the ones who are trying to stifle the opposition without answering it. The Global Warming alarmists are the anti-science religion that is trying to forcibly indoctrinate and convert everyone while suppressing dissent. And the news media are their patsies, their stooges, their puppets.'

'What seems to have lulled ... many ... clever people ... into their dangerous complacency is the belief that given the majority of world scientific opinion is backing AGW theory, it would be irresponsible for us non-scientists to disagree. What the Climategate scandal does is prove just how murky and unreliable this supposed scientific “consensus” really is. “Peer-reviewed”: it’s the magic phrase which – in their eyes – guarantees the reliability and credibility of their favoured scientists... -- Dr Tim Ball: "..he identified 42 people who were publishing together and also peer-reviewing each other’s literature."' -- 42. The answer to the universe and everything! I really wonder how people can have such disrespect for science. It is the ultimate philosophic 'crime against humanity'. No, never in my name. If science is a thought crime then I choose thoughtcrime!

Discuss -- #More access to information doesn’t bring people together, often it isolates us. -- Elizabeth Kolbert: "People’s tendency to become more extreme after speaking with like-minded others has become known as “group polarization,” and it has been documented in dozens of other experiments. In one, feminists who spoke with other feminists became more adamant in their feminism. In a second, opponents of same-sex marriage became even more opposed to the idea, while proponents shifted further in favor. In a third, doves who were grouped with other doves became more dovish still." -- The Internet is becoming a vast petri dish for the group polarization phenomena. As Sunstein puts it “The most striking power provided by emerging technologies,” is the “growing power of consumers to ‘filter’ what they see.” -- Birds of a feather...

The perception IS the reality. That's the inherent danger of the immediate consenus-making ability of twitter and other realtime platforms. -- Brendan O'Neill: "Illiberal liberalism" "Emotional incontinence" Righteous indignation/enthusiasm. That's the inherent danger of immediate action/reaction/gratification as opposed to taking the time to think things through – "Boring, hard work," as Nick Cohen puts it. (As a #moralmaze tweeter said, links to in-depth resources provide the best alibi for "shallow" twitterhappy tweetstormers.) Nick Cohen: "There's a lot of utopianism. It's very shallow and very transient. A lot of it is apathetic. It's people affirming themselves." -- RE #moralmaze. It's not surprising to see tweeters so overly keen to defend any and every perceived threat to twitter, though it's not like its going away—calm down. Defending both their newly-felt right to be heard and the social/cultural capital they've built up over the years... TWITTER IS SERIOUS BUSINESS.

BELIEF / STANCE / CLAIM / ASSERTION / PROPOSITION / PREMISE / THEORY / CONVICTION / FAITH / THOUGHT / FEELING / UNWARRANTED SELF IMPORTANCE! -- 'An executive has won the right to sue his employer on the basis that he was unfairly dismissed for his green views after a judge ruled that environmentalism had the same weight in law as religious and philosophical beliefs. -- The ruling could open the door for employees to sue their companies for failing to account for their green lifestyles, such as providing recycling facilities or offering low-carbon travel.' -- UK: Anti-carbon fundamentalist snitching state.

'Dr. Lindzen disputes some of the claims made by global warming alarmists, presents real climate facts, and questions the purpose of the bill.' -- Quoting Mike Hume: "The idea of climate change should be seen as an intellectual resource around which our collective and personal identities and projects can form and take shape. We need to ask not what we can do for climate change, but to ask what climate change can do for us. Because the idea of climate change is so plastic, it can be deployed across many of our human projects and can serve many of our psychological, ethical, and spiritual needs. We will continue to create and tell new stories about climate change and mobilize them in support of our projects. These myths transcend the scientific categories of ‘true' and ‘false'"

'Al Gore's views on climate change are advancing as rapidly as the phenomenon itself. [Because the science is running up after him and kicking his ass.] Gore hopes laypeople [middle class useful idiots who've been given the chance to make their numbed lives 'meaningful' by contributing to 'something larger'] will exert political pressure for what he calls "large solutions." [Rents] Our Choice reflects the experience of someone who knows that it is lawmakers and business leaders who can implement the "laws and policies we really need, including getting a global climate treaty." [We? Psychopaths always invoke the royal 'we'.] "Despite suffering one of history's worst political fates..." [What do you think fueled this latest psychopathic campaign for world capture and adultation? Power by any means, even your end if necessary.] Gore imagines a future generation asking how we averted catastrophic climate change "...we lifted our eyes to the Heavens and saw what we had to do."' -- Nutjob

'...reality is either what exists, or what we can agree by consensus seems to exist; the process has been (perhaps loosely and a bit imprecisely) characterised as "[w]hen enough people think something is true, it... takes on a life of its own." The term is usually used disparagingly as by implication it may mean little more than "what a group or culture chooses to believe," and may bear little or no relationship to any "true reality", and, indeed, challenges the notion of "true reality"'

75mins Channel 4 documentary on the cult of environmentalism and the politically-motivated supression of scientific method/skepticism. Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Global_Warming_Swindle

'What separates the Stand Alone Complex from normal copycat behavior is that the originator of the copied action is not even a real person, but merely a rumored figure that performed the copied action. Even without instruction or leadership a certain type of person will spring into action to imitate the rumored action and move toward the same goal even if only subconsciously. The result is an epidemic of copied behavior–with no originator. ...mass hysteria-with purpose. ... an emergent phenomenon catalyzed by parallelization of the human psyche through the cyberbrain networks. ...by exploiting the mechanism of information transmission in society, one could achieve a very efficient and subtle thought control. Indeed, since people tend to modify slightly the information (and forget where it came from) in the processes of consumption (or appropriation), it becomes difficult to sort genuine ideas from modified, implanted ones.' -- And a whole new reality was set into motion.