My favorite way to cut apart those two is to ask: How many people need to keep a secret, how long and how perfectly would they need to succeed, and what motive do they have to do a good job?
That's a fair question, but we do live in a surprisingly secretive society. I think that shifted over a lot during the Cold War period. It became acceptable to hide large sections of public spending from the public.
We also live in a corrupt society and occasionally that emerges as a scandal.
Certain secrets are kept better than others. Now and then real conspiracies do become public knowledge like the Tuskegee Experiment or Scientology's infiltration of parts of the US government.
We also live in a corrupt society and occasionally that emerges as a scandal.
Certain secrets are kept better than others. Now and then real conspiracies do become public knowledge like the Tuskegee Experiment or Scientology's infiltration of parts of the US government.