Religious, poetic and argumentative persuasion in the Helen of Gorgias

My contribution for the VU conference Inventive Theology: Rhetoric and the Politics of Believing on Wednesday 26 and Thursday 27 October at the Singelkerk in Amsterdam is here available.

Conspiracy theories and bad theology

Are conspiracy theories akin to evil deity theories? In the latter it’s not deceiving politicians, capitalists or scientists that have secret evil plans with the world, but a hidden evil deity that has such plans. If so, conspiracy theories are just secular forms of bad theology. Some forms of gnosticism are examples of evil deity theories. There’s a concealed evil deity (demiurge) that entrapped humanity. We need to be liberated by knowledge (gnosis) of the truth by awakened messengers that know the secret. Naturalized, we arrive at conspiracy theories.