Virgin Mirages, Mystery Drones and Other Cognitive Delusions

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Summary: Cognitive biases – boosted by social media algorithms and media frenzies – can create mass delusions. The current drone panic on the East Coast highlights how ambiguous stimuli — like lights in the sky — fuel conspiracy theories despite logical explanations. Powerful effects like confirmation bias and groupthink, combined with technological and social factors, can fracture shared reality and manipulate public perception.

Forty years ago on Christmas Eve, the Virgin Mary appeared in East Bakersfield, California.

Crowds flocked to 1224 Jefferson Street, where an image said to resemble the Virgin of Guadalupe appeared nightly on a stucco wall at the home of Rudy and Petra Zamora. A media frenzy ensued. The monsignor of Fresno promised to investigate. Police officers constructed roadblocks to manage crowds as public fervor over the mysterious “apparition” got out of hand.

I was eight years old in 1984 and lived in East Bakersfield. My family joined the growing crowd of pilgrims and spectators. The viral excitement had piqued our curiosity and our anxiety. Was Armageddon – always one button push away during the Cold War of the 1980s – now at hand? Maybe, maybe not. But one thing was certain: The Virgin apparition, with its roaming TV cameras and throngs of onlookers, provided the most entertainment East Bakersfield had seen in a long time.

People prayed and sang in front of the Zamora home. “Some visitors say Hail Marys and the Lord’s Prayer, while others watch from the distance,” reported the Associated Press. “A crowd begins gathering by nightfall and dwindles about 8 p.m.”

“I can’t explain it,” one 50-year-old woman told the AP as she knelt in prayer. “For me, it’s a miracle.”

The mystical circus ended in January 1985. That’s when Zamora took down his Christmas lights and, in a fantastic coincidence, the Virgin stopped appearing.

The Virgin Mary Apparition of East Bakersfield was neither a miracle nor a mystery. It was a trick of light, aided by the cascading dynamics of cognitive bias, media frenzy, and mass delusion.

New Jersey Drone Panic

This memory came to mind as I contemplated the current drone panic on the East Coast. Something is indeed happening in the airspace over New Jersey, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. It definitely involves lights in the sky. It may or may not involve drones. But it undoubtedly represents a troubling new phase in the fracturing of our common reality.

The back story: Supposed “mysterious drone” sightings on the East Coast have been causing a stir since mid-November. These have mainly turned out to be legally-operated drones, regular aircraft, or stars. Yet breathless news coverage of the issue has heightened public interest and anxiety. Unsurprisingly, as curious citizens have turned their eyes toward the heavens, the number of “sightings” has increased exponentially

The sky is full of lights. There are planes, satellites, stars, and – yes – drones. In fact, there are over one million registered drones in the United States today. The remote controlled flying machines have become cheap and widely accessible. With more people buying drones, we’ll see drones in the sky – and the more we’ll see people doing stupid things with drones.

“Dozens of witnesses have reported seeing them in the state since mid-November,” reported the Associated Press. “At first they were spotted flying along the scenic Raritan River, which feeds the Round Valley Reservoir, the state’s largest aquifer, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) west of New York City. But soon sightings were reported statewide, including near the Picatinny Arsenal, a military research and manufacturing facility, and over President-elect Donald Trump’s golf course in Bedminster.”

Terrifying conspiracy theories – wholly unsupported by facts – quickly emerged on social media. One guy made a viral TikTok video suggesting that the drones were searching for radioactive material (or so someone else had allegedly told him). A New Jersey congressman went on Fox to allege that the drones were being dispatched from an Iranian drone “mothership” (a claim he later admitted was false). Various nefarious theories sprang up, supercharged by social media algorithms and influencers like President-elect Donald Trump and former mixed martial arts fighter Joe Rogan. As a result, millions of Americans now believe the United States is possibly undergoing some secret, unexplained drone invasion.

“Any time large numbers of people begin thinking they’re seeing things in the sky, it’s only a matter of time before conspiracy theories start bubbling up,” wrote Bryan Walsh at Vox. “The drones were a foreign intelligence operation, spying on military bases and even President-elect Donald Trump’s golf club in New Jersey. Or they were part of a covert surveillance operation by our own military. Or they were a simulated alien invasion being staged by our own government to lay the groundwork for a world dictatorship. Or they were actual aliens.”

The fearful tales have reached such a feverish pitch that the US government has been repeatedly forced to address them.

“The White House has said a review of the reported sightings shows that many of them are actually manned aircraft being flown lawfully, echoing the opinion of officials and drone experts,” reported the AP. “The federal Homeland Security Department and FBI also said in a joint statement they have no evidence that the sightings pose 'a national security or public safety threat or have a foreign nexus.’”

But official denials have failed to quash the speculation. It’s hard to prove a negative. Besides, most conspiracy theories contain the built-in assumption that the government is lying.

Dynamics of conspiracy theory

Those who embrace conspiracy theories tend to avoid asking basic logical questions.

For example, if some sinister force is conducting secretive drone missions, why do the drones have bright lights? Why are these supposed mystery drones detectable by the human eye when stealth technologies exist and military-grade drone models can fly at high altitudes?

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg asked the most logical question of all: Why would an invasion – by aliens or anyone else – begin in suburban New Jersey?

But conspiracy embracers typically reject any rational explanations that contradict their preferred narrative. Most sightings have been explained convincingly as cases of mistaken identity. However, this has done little to end the furious speculation.

From The Guardian:

The FBI said it’s gotten more than 5,000 reports over the last few weeks; only about 100 required further investigation. The New York City police department said it received 120 calls just last weekend, more than in the whole month of November.

The timing of the sightings coincides with air traffic delays at nearby Newark airport, which can lead to longer in-air holding patterns, and a bustling holiday season in a region packed with airports. What many people in New Jersey are actually seeing are those airplane holding patterns, said Will Austin, president of Warren County Community College, which specializes in drone training programs.

In one particularly absurd case, former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan shared a picture of alleged mystery lights that turned out to be stars in the Orion’s Belt constellation.

How cognitive biases warp reality

Unfortunately, logical arguments rarely succeed at debunking conspiracy theories once they have taken root in a brain. When a person embraces a conspiracy frame, it can become part of their identity. Efforts to negate that frame will bounce off. The conspiracy embracer is not just defending the conspiracy narrative. At a certain point, they are also defending their own self-perception and reputation.

A suite of cognitive biases and effects – amplified and supercharged by social media algorithms – helps to convince people that false narratives are real. Here’s a brief example of some of the cognitive biases at work in the drone panic:

Anchoring Bias

People’s judgments are heavily influenced by how issues get framed, and the first frame always has the advantage. Suppose the first thing a person hears about lights in the sky is that they are “mystery drones” with possibly secretive and threatening origins. Well, that information becomes their “anchor.” They tend to interpret all future information through the frame or lens imposed by the first piece of information.

Confirmation Bias

People tend to seek and interpret evidence in ways that confirm their pre-existing beliefs or theories. Someone who already believes in UFOs or scary government conspiracies may interpret lights in the sky as alien spacecraft or evil drones, dismissing mundane explanations. Confirmation bias works hand-in-hand with anchoring bias. If you can get people to accept your frame first, you win. Many will then seek out information that confirms that original frame.

Pattern Recognition Bias

Humans can find patterns in random or ambiguous stimuli (pareidolia). People see faces in trees, clouds, burnt pieces of toast – or, as in the East Bakersfield case, they see the Virgin Mary on a stucco wall. Similarly, lights in the sky get interpreted as structured formations (e.g., a spacecraft or drones) when they are more likely to be airplanes or stars. The brain looks for patterns and can find them where they don’t actually exist.

Agent Detection Bias

Humans are prone to assume that ambiguous or unexplained phenomena are caused by intentional agents. A person who hears the creaking bones of an old house may believe it is haunted. A person who survives a harrowing, life-threatening situation may attribute it to divine intervention. And people who see lights in the sky may attribute them to aliens or secretive conspiracies without considering more logical explanations.

Overconfidence Bias

People overestimate their ability to understand or interpret phenomena, leading them to dismiss expert explanations and trust their own assumptions. Some witnesses of supposed drone sightings have reported flying objects the size of cars. But it's notoriously difficult to gauge the distance or size of objects in the sky.

Social Proof (Groupthink)

This is the most dangerous cognitive bias, especially in the social media age. People’s beliefs are heavily influenced by the opinions or interpretations of others, particularly in groups. Whoever has the power to create a popular or trending explanation – or, at least, one that appears to be favored by a mass of people – can manipulate the public discourse in devious ways. Algorithms that herd people into group mentalities can generate considerable impact, creating alternate realities and mass delusions.

Protecting our brains from themselves

Our brains are wired in ways that can sometimes trick us. All these cognitive biases – and more – are at work in the current panic over drones. Mass delusions and panics have occurred throughout human history, but technology makes them easier to produce. AI-generated video and images will give rise to an unprecedented capacity to create fear, delusion, and panic on a massive scale.

This poses clear dangers, as we have already seen. Debunked conspiracy theories about the 2020 election led to the violent insurrection on January 6, 2021. False claims about vaccines have caused a spike in vaccine hesitancy and a surge in preventable diseases.

Luckily, no one has gotten physically hurt because of the drone panic – yet. There has, however, been a massive increase in reported incidents of people pointing laser lights at aircraft, which is quite dangerous.

But I worry about the psychological damage being done as people become more detached from objective facts and shared reality, thus becoming more susceptible to mass delusions. When people react strongly to false or unclear information, they are easier to manipulate.

Trump was happy to add to the public anxiety over drones. What might he do as president, when he can declare martial law or otherwise use public fear to claim more power for himself? The next 9/11 won't need to be a real attack of any kind. It can just as easily be an information attack, with people becoming convinced of threats or realities that don't actually exist. Imagine a "War of The Worlds" type situation, but with the leader of the nation stoking panic instead of trying to calm it down.

How can we defend ourselves? First, it helps to be aware of how our cognitive biases work. We should also maintain a healthy skepticism of any unusual stories that originate from unverified sources and spread mainly on social media. Instead, seek out information from reputable and trusted sources with a long track record of factual reporting. Make sure your information "anchors" are solid.

Conspiracy theories and mass delusions work, in part, by forcing people to accept a narrative frame before they have time to consider fact-based and logical alternatives. So, caution and patience may be our best defenses.

Keep your cognitive biases in check. Hold the line against the lies. Stay curious, not convinced. Insist on reality. Keep calm and think critically.

More information:

• In this 2018 episode of the FrameLab podcast, Dr. George Lakoff and I discuss some well-known cognitive biases and persuasion techniques:
• In the New York Times, columnist Zeynep Tufecki looks at the drone panic through the lens of other mass delusions and public panic, like the "mysterious windshield pits of 1954."
• This excellent story in the Guardian expertly debunks many of the scary tales of drones.
• The Gatwick Drone Incident of 2018, which may have been a mass panic, provides interesting context for the current situation.
• Here's a list of cognitive biases from Wikipedia.
• The Notorious Bakersfield podcast has a short episode on the Virgin Mary incident.