I like Shermer. Why people think that 666 (the number of man, or the number of a man) is the number of the Devil is beyond me. Book of Revelation barely made it into the Christian bible. Even so, a Mormon girl once asked me "how do you think it is all going to play out?" Yes, she was talking about "end times." IDK? Jesus told his followers that we were in the end times already.

People believe pseudoscience, false conspiracies and superstition for the same reason they believe the world was created in 6 days, that a virgin gave birth or that Jeebus even existed.