Quote from bigdavediode:
Trash it all you want, you can verify the numbers against NASA's.
If you don't want to believe the numbers that's your problem, not NASA's. (Especially when you can verify the numbers against other sources.)
At that point it's more of a psychological issue.
Psychology today would say that you're pursuing a quest for metaphysical certainty and doing that through "epic struggle between good and evil. The divine principle is pitted against the satanic principle. While it may appear that the battle hangs in the balance, the ultimate victory of the divine is commonly assumed. Hence, the dialectical version of metaphysics reduces to the Panglossian one."
It's certainly simpler that way.
"The belief that a secret, almost all-powerful human elite conspires to subdue the human masses for the sake of own profit is a variation on the theme of Satanic corruption. Imagine that all, or most, of the terrible things happening in the world are part of a grand oppressive design. Do not only assume that someone profits now from war, famine, or mere economic recession, but assume that such tribulations are secretly engineered for the ultimate goal of world domination. Events that could also be interpreted in a positive light, such as the civil unrest in Iran, must also be part of the grand scheme. Even with a rudimentary understanding of the scientific way of thinking, such ideas are suspect. First, there is no prediction other than "some terrible things will eventually happen," but only after-the-fact "explanation" of the "We-know-who-is-behind-this" type. Second, there is no model connecting distal causes (e.g., the plot to dominate the world) to the effects via proximal causes (e.g., plausible machinations that could actually cause complex societal events to come about in exactly the way they do). Third, there is no positive linkage between the imaginability or credibility of the causes and the observed events. Instead-and this is, I believe, the most astonishing psychological feature of conspiracy theories-it is assumed that the most improbable claims are taken to be the most persuasive ones."