To be precise, Bell's inequality rules out a local hidden variable theory. Pilot wave theories/Bohmian mechanics is an attempt to describe a nonlocal hidden variable theory of quantum mechanics.
Superdeterminism and retrocausality both allow for local hidden variables - it’s just that they don’t satisfy Bell’s assumptions.
Similarly, superdeterminism is simply the application of the determinism that was believed to apply to physics before QM, to QM itself. In a way, one might have expected it to be the default interpretation.
Laplace expressed this in "A Philosophical Essay on Probabilities" in 1814: "We ought then to regard the present state of the universe as the effect of its anterior state and as the cause of that which is to follow. [...] For [an intelligence that has sufficient information] nothing would be uncertain, and the future, as the past, would be present to its eyes."
Superdeterminism essentially extends this idea of deterministic physical evolution to quantum mechanics. It could be considered an appropriate default simply because it was previously considered to be, not only the default, but the strongly believed truth.
> Superdeterminism says that there’s no way to pick your experimental choices in a way that reveals things because any possible random number sources you could use have contrived correlations that prevent that
You're arguing against a consequence of superdeterminism, not its motivation. Its motivation is as I've described.
The word "contrived" is doing some heavy lifting in your statement. Nothing needs to be contrived in superdeterminism, even if it seems that way to an observer within the universe.
The explanatory problem you've alluded to only arises because we're trying to understand the universe from within the universe. The universe is under no obligation to make itself sensible to us.
Essentially, you're saying little more than that you don't like the idea of superdeterminism.
(And yeah, preference for any of these interpretations will essentially boil down to what idea you like the most, or more likely what idea you dislike the least. With QM you pick your reasonable base assumptions and then take the uncomfortable conclusions that result)
Right, but we're talking about alternative interpretations here - something that is not MWI, Bohmian, or a collapse theory like Copenhagen, GRW, CSL. So without many worlds or pilot waves, we want to explain how measurement outcomes could be deterministic.
Conceptually, superdeterminism does that simply by positing that as part of a deterministic universe themselves, measurement settings are not independent of the systems being measured.
Actual models of superdeterminism (e.g. Donadi–Hossenfelder (2022)) seem inelegant and mathematically more complex than MWI. Which doesn't mean it's physically wrong or "weirder than MWI".
A theory that says that unicorns exist but only go places where no one will discover them (even though they aren’t invisible), is dumb.
A scientific theory should be compatible with experimentation.
It doesn't require a contrivance or a conspiracy. It simply requires determinism, which before QM, is something that was assumed to be true.
If superdeterminism is true, we'll have difficulty demonstrating that scientifically. Searching under a streetlight for the truth, because that's the only place you can see, isn't going to save you from that.