Can a Chatbot Convince Conspiracy Theorists of the Truth?
Question Everything
Brian Reed
4.6 • 707 Ratings
🗓️ 21 May 2026
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Like millions of others, Gordon Pennycook’s older brother has leapt down the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories, and Gordon says he’s tried to change his brother’s mind, without success. Which tracks, if you’ve ever debated a conspiracy theorist — it can feel impossible to pull them back to reality.
If anyone was qualified to convince his brother, though, it’s Gordon, who’s a psychology professor at Cornell University where he studies why people believe things that aren’t true. So Gordon wanted to put this question to the test: Is it actually the case that conspiracy theorists rarely change their minds? He and a team of researchers ran an experiment using an AI chatbot to rebut people’s theories. And the results were very surprising. In fact, they ended up changing Gordon’s mind about conspiracy theories, and the people who believe them.
Sign up for our newsletter and we’ll share the Debunkbot from Gordon’s study, where you can test out your own beliefs.
Question Everything is a production of KCRW and Placement Theory.
Guests:
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Gordon Pennycook, Cornell University, Associate Professor, Dorothy and Ariz Mehta Faculty Leadership Fellow
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Something I'm always thinking about is the way that algorithms are often self-reinforcing, giving us more of the content and news that we want to see, which isn't the most healthy way to take in information, which is why I'm excited to be partnering with Ground News. |
| 0:12.7 | Ground News shows you how the same story is being covered across the political spectrum, so you can actually get the full picture and not just the one version that's being given to you. |
| 0:27.1 | If you want to check it out, go to groundnews.com slash question to get 40% off their unlimited vantage plan. |
| 0:29.9 | Again, that's groundnews.com slash question. |
| 0:31.9 | Make sure you use our link so they know we sent you. |
| 0:45.3 | A few years ago, Gordon Penny Cook was having a conversation with his older brother that a lot of people would have tried to politely escape. |
| 0:51.8 | His brother had leaped down the rabbit hole of right-wing conspiracy theories like QAnon and become pretty consumed by them. |
| 0:54.6 | But Gordon's a psychologist and a good brother. |
| 0:55.9 | So he listened. |
| 0:58.7 | We were at a campground in rural Saskatchewan, |
| 1:02.9 | and he's telling me this story about how he thinks Republicans are going to take up arms. |
| 1:05.3 | He was pretty sure that during the Biden years, |
| 1:09.6 | what the government is doing is so egregious that eventually it'll be the last straw. And regular Republicans are going going to take up arms and it's going to be civil war in the streets. |
| 1:15.4 | He like very sincerely believed that. |
| 1:17.1 | He sincerely believed that. |
| 1:21.6 | When I first told him that I was moving to New York State, he thought I said meant New York City. |
| 1:26.6 | His eyes kind of big. And I was like, well, I'll be upstate. |
| 1:29.9 | I was like, that's good because you're not going to want to be in New York. |
| 1:33.6 | QAnon at the time included stories about some event called the Storm that was supposedly imminent |
| 1:38.2 | and how a majority of Americans would go through a great awakening |
| 1:41.5 | and realize a secret cabal was running things and determined that they have to go fight. |
| 1:46.8 | On this camping trip, Gordon says he tried to gingerly nudge his brother away from these kinds of conspiratorial beliefs. |
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