Thank you for bringing this up; May I give you an actual case in point from personal experience.
My best friend at school was a guy called John. Nobody could have wished for a better friend, He was a natural all-round sportsman and gentleman at a young age. We were buddies that went swimming, played cricket, etc. and I always felt part of his family.
John was a Jehovah's Witness, his mom and sister were (his dad went down the pub a lot) but they were good people and so often were a place for me to be when my own family life was too much to bear.
Now if I ask members of this site what most pisses them off about JWs? The chances are that #1 would be door-knocking and #2 would be blood transfusions. The former is an arrogant intrusion, the latter a possible life-threatening delusion. We ask ourselves "How can someone watch their child die when the answer and life are so close at hand. How can they be so fucking cocksure in the face of preventable death?"

John and I lost touch after our school days. As close as we were in our childhood the further away we were in adulthood. I smoked, partied, fornicated, and took drugs like an archetypal atheist. He continued to play soccer till his 30s, never smoked, and was only a moderate drinker. A good clean living Christian man.
The last time I met John was in our late 30s. He still looked like the schoolboy friend that I remembered. Clear skinned and a fresh face smile ear to ear under his short-cut hair.
It was ten years after that, that I heard the news. John had contracted meningitis. He was not dead but he had locked-in syndrome. Trapped in a body that can hear, see, and feel but unable to move, speak, or react. For twenty years to my knowledge, my friend had been in a lock-down that makes this thing look like a walk in the park. Twenty years of sitting in his own piss and shite. Twenty years of not being able to communicate, of being all there but not here.

In situations like this, anyone with a modicum of imagination would ask why? Why as I sit here with all the self-inflicted wounds that my life-style has brought upon this poor excuse of a body I am left with, am I able to type this and he is not?
Call it irony, poetic justice, or karma?
Irony? I suppose if you belong to a belief system that will sacrifice another person's life for your religious ideals then maybe there is some irony there but forgive me if I see no humor.
Poetic justice? Not even DeSade could be that cruel.
Karma? John never did enough of any harm for it to come round that hard.

Meningitis should have gone the way of smallpox. A historical footnote, confined to the garbage bin of medicine and remembered only by oldtimers. So it would have been if not for arrogant, vain, we know better than the experts, anti-vaxxers. John sits there because someone thought they knew better than the doctors. It was not necessarily their family or friend's life that was on the line but it was someones! and the blame for John`s condition is on them. Remember my friend John when you receive that next FB post about how this all a hoax/conspiracy and respond with suitable venom

An apples to oranges comparison.

While its good to think critically for the most part, most people are just not good at it. I've noticed many people tend to go along ith any conspiracy that fits their world view. There is a critical component that is usually missing from their theories, however, They often forget to consider a motive. For example: does big wind or big solar or big climate science really want to destroy the oil and coal industry for the sake of profit? or is clean air and water the more likely motive?

Does not religious thinking lead to conspiratorial thinking?

I do not know that the two can be seperated from Christianity as the religion is dependent upon a great magic evil force that is conspiring against God and humans. CONSPIRACY IS A FOUNDATION OF THE RELIGION.

I would vote, ‘religion!’ The thinking/brain development sets the stage for the screwed up thinking!

He's got a Real Good...Has He Already Been Drinking Lysol?
[rawstory.com]

Unfortunately there is no pill, no injection, no vaccination against stupid. There is no pill they can take, though they claim that the red pill will work wonders, especially (and this is top secret knowledge inadvertently leaked by the "cabal" via an anonymous source) if one takes it by suppository. I take one of each just in case, better safe than sorry right. Religion overall has done more harm throughout the history of human civilization but it's not over quite yet. Both have the effect of making people make bad decisions based on inaccurate assessments of reality. If you think the social distancing is bad just think about how terrible it has been to not be able to go outside all of these years due to chem trails and the resulting aluminum oxide and other toxic fallout. Yesterday if found three birds fallen dead outside my giant plate glass window, likely due to the 5G router I'm using to type this message. Well, one was not techically dead when i found him so i tethered him to a perch and taught him to squawk Trumpisms, such as "fake news!!!" every time someone says anything remotely true.

Theologies spawn fanaticism to the greatest and most universal extent. Right behind them are political ideologies based on similar principles and functionally identical. Both are 'protection rackets' - the REAL 'oldest profession'.

ANY protection racket making protection or salvation promises with a price tag of abdicating personal authority and reasoning; surrendering them to overseers who claim superior knowledge and judgment is a recipe for tyranny.

Great question. Interestingly, they go hand in hand. Most flat earthers are religious people, for example. But I'd say given that there's more religious people, that's more damaging. But if a conspiracy theorist gets into power, now we have something to worry about.

Religion per se is not damaging at all. Some religious groups tout doctrines that arouse fear and guilt, and those emotions can be damaging if left unchecked. Also damaging is mental domination of members by church leaders through a continuous stream of propaganda.

You don’t have to be a church leader to arouse fear and guilt, and or to exercise mind control by constantly harping on some subject and using trickery.Those behaviors are rampant throughout society—just read “news” articles and analyze them critically.

That behavior is rampant right here on this forum. By consciously making critical analyses we can inoculate ourselves against controlling people.

con·spir·a·cy
/kənˈspirəsē/
noun: conspiracy; plural noun: conspiracies

a secret plan by a group to do something unlawful or harmful.

"a conspiracy to destroy the government"

Similar:

plot

scheme

stratagem

plan

machination

cabal

intrigue

palace intrigue

deception

ploy

trick

ruse

dodge

subterfuge

sharp practice

frame-up

fit-up

racket

put-up job

complot

covin

the action of plotting or conspiring.

"they were cleared of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice"

Similar:

plotting

collusion

Based on the definition, people who discuss and expose conspiracies are doing us all a favor. How many conspiracies turn out be true? Lots!

Its people who blindly trust entities such as govt and officials who do us all a disservice. Worshippers of govt and false "authority" who lick their masters boots to our enslavement.

I think i should have qualified this to modern western societies, thats what i meant. Ive noticed on social media in work place i encounter way more people who take CT more seriously tahn religion which has just become an identity thing

I think the most damaging thing is tyranny, oppression. And very often, religion is a tool, a pilar used by tyrants to dominante people.

Both are dangerous.

I see this quite often on this site. Someone posts a comment or in this case a question and then takes no further part in the debate. Why bother Daniel ??

Religion, hands down. Conspiratorial thinking is just having thoughts and maybe propagating them to the public. But religion also has the added power of governmental acceptance and favor, ceremonies, responsibilities to the group and built in social programming. IMO, they aren't even remotely comparable.

Both

What is the body count on conspiratorial thinking, compared to that from religion? Now add in other forms of harm, what's the answer?

Certainly none of the religions are true, but just as certainly, a tiny fraction of the conspiracy theories are true.

So far "conspiratorial thinking" hasn't burnt that many at the stake, clocked up millions of dead with wars or bankrupted too many civilisations! So I suppose the jury is still out.

People telling other people how to and how not to live.

Most conspiracy are not true, yet some have turned out to be true. Like marijanna, the Government has locked up more marijuana users than all the violence criminals combined. It has ruined their lives and harmed millions of people's families.

Where Religion, they will never come out with good enough evidences and do more harm than good.

I agree with posters above the two are not equivalent and therefore should not be pitted against one another. That said.... 15-20 years ago conspiratorial thinking would have lost, easily. I am concerned about the rise of CT in the public discourse. That it is not confined to any political party or group is also concerning. There does not seem to be a way to "laugh them off the stage" anymore. CT voices are loud and growing. On the other side: It seems from the data that "the nones" are on the rise. People are leaving their birth religion in greater numbers. While I don't think we will ever be free of the influence of religions, I am hopeful that our next generations seem to be shrugging it off.

Government is the worst of all. You can refuse to be ruled by a higher power callrd God, but you can't refuse to be ruled by a higher power called government without dire consequences. Government was created in the minds of men for the same reason as religion; to control people. Neither one has worked very well but you can escape religion but not government. The made-up God can burn you in hell and you made a government can put you in jail. For more information you can read the book: The Most Dangerous Superstition by Larken Rose. You can download it for free on the Internet at [mensenrechten.org]

This book explains why the government can do things that are immoral and what you can do about it.

Interesting question. One lighthearted theory is that we have unwittingly all turned into Richard Nixon. We record everything and believe that there is an elitist plot against us