How do you help someone understand and stop adopting conspiracy theories in general?

Convert them to Bernie sanders

You don't

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people like that live very boring lives and need to believe in something wild to make it less monotonous

i'm having issues with that right now.

By my experience there is nothing much you can do verbally for most of these people. They wont change unless they experience or see for themselves the error of their ways. Like an antivaxxer seeing their kid get a vaccine preventable disease. Interestingly, I read somewhere that getting these people to see patients who have suffered these diseases also helps change their mind.

There is a small group of people can be convinced to change their minds. These are the ones that were baited in with "close enough" logic. They read an article or two from a website and think its true. There are lot of conspiracy websites that look very convincing on the surface. For example they provide research articles with misleading context. Some even have quotes by crackpot Doctors. If they were taught fact checking and how research works, they'll change their minds.

I think conspiracy theorist are an important part of society. We need to hear the outlandish things they come up with because it helps us to peice together actual possibilities. Seems far fetched but they've put together quite a few scandals that started as conspiracy theories. Also just having someone in your friend group who isnt afraid to think out side the box is always a benefit.

A good one to tell people which is just a good guideline is “does this also effect the rich” if so then it’s probably not true. Also there’s something to do with psychology and believing certain things based or general stimuli they talk about it with Nostradamus’ predictions, I forget what’s it’s called but look into that maybe

There are many obstacles to overcome, and in many cases they are context specific. It can be tough to help someone with because each person will have cultural, emotional, cognitive, and conceptual complexities informing their belief systems. A couple of them are crucial to understand:

1. Psychological predisposition. There is a lot of emerging literature demonstrating that people who were neglected emotionally as children are far more likely to develop a suspicion toward scientific knowledge. I can't qualify why on their behalf because I'm yet to dig into it properly. But the brief point here is that if this is indeed the case, counselling is needed to uproot and treat emotional issues that may catalyze fear or lack of trust in established knowledge, institutional processes, etc.

2. Quality of education + attitude. I encounter stories of conspiracies often in my work, and one of them common denominators is poor education along with a crummy attitude. Regarding education, I don't only mean public school vs high school, but rather what one does with, and how one responds to, what they learn. For example, you mentioned "understanding" as an issue. This is true, but is perhaps less important than "comprehension." While I don't necessarily believe that universities are the sole, legitimate avenue to higher education, I have taught in undergrad and graduate school for a long time. The difference between students who understand and comprehend are those that challenge themselves. University education means nothing if students don't try to unlearn logic errors, syntax problems, etc. It also doesn't work if students aren't willing to synthesize what they read in a way that isn't overtly normative, hostile, etc. Put it this way; understanding is a mental process, comprehending is an emotional one. The former is easier to do - sit, read, absorb. The latter is about attitude - what do I do with the knowledge? Will I accept it? What are the implications of learning about political science in terms of my daily role as a informed citizen? If your friends' attitudes suck, and their education sucks, you've got a double whammy.

If you can identify whether these issues factor in to your friends' problems, you may have more success. Good luck.

gunpoint

Don’t degrade them for believing the wrong thing, treat them as though their beliefs are valid but misguided