Conspiracy?
DUAL has been around since I can remember (V4), and probably before, it's use was, and probably still is deeply embedded in virtually every Oracle application both overtly and covertly. Originally there wasn't much you could do with DUAL, apart from SELECT 1 FROM DUAL, the whole point being that it's a table with one empty row, was very useful when doing procedural stuff in early versions of Oracle Forms and SQL*PLUS, before the advent of PL/SQL. (I seem to remember some PL/SQL actually compiled to SELECT FROM DUAL) You did not insert into it, update it or delete from it, unless you wanted to crash your application, it was something every developer knew, not to touch.
I suspect that, in these enlightened days, no one actually uses it, and that it remains only for compatibility, quietly forgotten about, and not maintained by anyone.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
