Misinfo Wars

[P3nT4gR4m]

Which I think, while not unreasonable, causes a problem because human beings are not really rational most of the time. Decisions are made in a split second based on gut feelings. The extra energy and time required to vet every piece of incoming information for accuracy is too demanding. 

Personally I view the whole truth thing a lot like DNS propagation. Someone advances an argument that is met with consensus. Takes a while for this to percolate around to the point where it enters group consensus. Whether it's objectively true or not is mostly irrelevant. For something to be considered true the only criterion it's required to meet is mass acceptance.

What's changed with the internet is the speed at which these truths propagate around the hivemind. By extension, they can be replaced with more popular worldviews at the same speed. So now we're living in a maelstrom of ever shifting truths. There's barely enough time to consider a fact before it's been superseded by half a dozen conflicting ones. Consensus? Forget it.

My personal opinion is why bother even trying. There's little or no profit or lulz in doing so and it's fucking impossible to boot. Makes more sense to me just to cherry pick ones that look likely to best serve my agenda (whatever that might be at any given moment in time) and do my best to help them spread.

[MMIX]

Not only are there myriad encyclopaedias out there now but anybody with an agenda can create their own and tote it as the gospel truth. I guess back in the days of print there may have been more rigourous fact checking and more severe repercussions for reporting something that turned out to be false.

If I interpreted your link correctly it is suggesting that authored works should be engaged with not only at face value but with consideration to the character and environment of the author? That is an interesting point but  (and?) adds another layer of complexity/obfuscation to uncovering truth.

Equally, if not more, relevant is the Barthes' recognition that the reader is in some very real metaphysical sense also the author. Its a BIP thing. Everything the reader brings to the table is part of what they bring to their reading of the work. The "Death of the Author" is quite literal in the sense that an author does not have ultimate power to ensure that what they write is what someone else reads. It recognises that the power relationship between the author and the reader is not a simple one. Barthes is trying to  suggest that the power lies not, as you might expect, with the author, [ie authority] but with the reader.

[Hagtard Celine Dion Mustard]

I can't say how much it pleases me to see this thread - arguably the only one of mine with any genuine value - getting back on track.

Not wishing to overstate the obvious but

All affirmations are true in some sense, false in some sense, meaningless in some sense, true and false in some sense, true and meaningless in some sense, false and meaningless in some sense, and true and false and meaningless in some sense. Sri Syadasti

I think the key word in Sri Syadasti is the one that is most often overlooked: affirmations. It's important to recognize that it does not say that all facts or that all ideas or even that all opinions are true, false, and meaningless, but rather anything which seems to confirm our own predispositions, positions, or conclusions.

For something to be considered true the only criterion it's required to meet is mass acceptance.

Even "mass acceptance" - insofar as it matters - can be purposefully limted. In a society that relies less on public opinion to achieve progress and more on the expertise and recommendations of professionals, it would only matter, for instance, that most climate scientists accept something like climate change. It would matter far less - in theory anyway - whether or not the general public "accepts" it.

Although it's rather unsourced and somewhat conspiratorially-minded, there is a fascinating documentary called The Century of the Self which suggests that the "elites" of the 20th century actively attempted to socially engineer a public interest in materialism as a distraction - in order to deter the average person from influencing or wanting to influence exactly these kinds of top-level problems. The argument itself is circular: make the public ignorant because the common person is too stupid to be involved. Thus, we were offered The American Dream^TM.

The irony, I think, is that the end result of all that materialism is that public opinion now directly influences certain top-level problems. In the case of climate change, for example, alternative energy industries are now competing with fossil fuel companies, and each side is waging an information war (or possibly a disinformation war) against the other in order to either gain or prevent public support for and patronage of these new alternatives. The side-effect is that the same public will then vote for policy-makers who represent their views on the matter, making any potential action on climate change ultimately dependent upon how the public feels about it.

The critical adage that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge" is, in fact, true. Ignorance has value, and disinformation mints it.

Makes more sense to me just to cherry pick ones that look likely to best serve my agenda (whatever that might be at any given moment in time) and do my best to help them spread.

This level of self-awareness can be a characteristic of enlightenment, but also of villainous malice.

Everything the reader brings to the table is part of what they bring to their reading of the work.

Robert Anton Wilson referred to this in Maybe Logic as "interacting-processing".

[MMIX]

Not wishing to overstate the obvious but

All affirmations are true in some sense, false in some sense, meaningless in some sense, true and false in some sense, true and meaningless in some sense, false and meaningless in some sense, and true and false and meaningless in some sense. Sri Syadasti

I think the key word in Sri Syadasti is the one that is most often overlooked: affirmations. It's important to recognize that it does not say that all facts or that all ideas or even that all opinions are true, false, and meaningless, but rather anything which seems to confirm our own predispositions, positions, or conclusions.

Actually when I looked at this quote I took the trouble to go and confirm that my understanding of the term affirmation was such that the quote as whole really said what I thought it did.

The critical adage that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge" is, in fact, true. Ignorance has value, and disinformation mints it.

Well Trump is for sure going to make bank on it, you can bet on that. I must admit, though, I prefer the whole quote though which contains a different, or maybe an alternative, 'truth' than the abbreviated version you give

"Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'"

Gotta love Asimov.

[Hagtard Celine Dion Mustard]

Actually when I looked at this quote I took the trouble to go and confirm that my understanding of the term affirmation was such that the quote as whole really said what I thought it did.

The critical adage that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge" is, in fact, true. Ignorance has value, and disinformation mints it.

Well Trump is for sure going to make bank on it, you can bet on that. I must admit, though, I prefer the whole quote though which contains a different, or maybe an alternative, 'truth' than the abbreviated version you give

"Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'"

Gotta love Asimov.

While I don't dispute the potentially universal application of the full quotation, I prefer to view it - at least partially - in a historical context. I sometimes think that this quote is abused today in order to defend what one might call a thread of false-intellectualism. What I have seen more lately is a certain type of person who, while tending to feel as if they are on the correct side of "objective truth", far too often fails to adequately question their own sources of information. Even "intellectuals" like to hibernate in echo chambers.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Makes more sense to me just to cherry pick ones that look likely to best serve my agenda (whatever that might be at any given moment in time) and do my best to help them spread.

This level of self-awareness can be a characteristic of enlightenment, but also of villainous malice.

Fascinating.

Have you, by any chance, read  The Celestine Prophecy by Carlos Castaneda?

[Hagtard Celine Dion Mustard]

Have you, by any chance, read  The Celestine Prophecy by Carlos Castaneda?

I have, yes. It was lent to me many years ago by a friend who insisted I would enjoy it. The plot was a little thin, from what I remember, but there's a conversation in the book that struck a chord with me at the time, something about enlightened societies becoming restless but failing to ask the right existential questions.

Aha, I've found it:

Eventually we arrived at what seemed to be a very logical solution. We looked at each other and
said: "Well, since our explorers have not yet returned with our true spiritual situation, why not settle into
this new world of ours while we are waiting? We are certainly learning enough to manipulate this new
world for our own benefit, so why not work in the meantime to raise our standard of living, our sense of
security in the world?

He looked at me and grinned. "And that's what we did. Four centuries ago! We shook off our
feeling of being lost by taking matters into our own hands, by focusing on conquering the Earth and
using its resources to better our situation, and only now, as we approach the end of the millennium can
we see what happened. Our focus gradually became a preoccupation. We totally lost ourselves in creat-
ing a secular security, an economic security, to replace the spiritual one we had lost. The question of why
we were alive, of what was actually going on here spiritually, was slowly pushed aside and repressed
altogether"

He looked at me intensely, then said, "Working to establish a more comfortable style of survival has
grown to feel complete in and of itself as a reason to live, and we've gradually, methodically, forgotten
our original question... We've forgotten that we still don't know what we're surviving for."

I'm not sure if this particular segment is relevant to the topic, but it's the one part of the book that I really remember appreciating.

[LMNO]

Makes more sense to me just to cherry pick ones that look likely to best serve my agenda (whatever that might be at any given moment in time) and do my best to help them spread.

This level of self-awareness can be a characteristic of enlightenment, but also of villainous malice.

Fascinating.

Have you, by any chance, read  The Celestine Prophecy by Carlos Castaneda?

Ok, that was mean.   

[Hagtard Celine Dion Mustard]

Ok, that was mean.

Nothing is mean unless I choose to perceive it as such. Take your comment, for example. I don't see that as mean; I see it as stupid.

[LMNO]

I see.  So you meant to agree that The Celestine Prophesy was written by Carlos Casteneda?

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Wow oh wow. 

[Hagtard Celine Dion Mustard]

So... that was it? That was your master plan for getting one over on me?

[LMNO]

No, but it did confirm a few suspicions.

[Hagtard Celine Dion Mustard]

No, but it did confirm a few suspicions.

If your suspicion was that I'm capable of making what is tantamount to a clerical error, then congratulations. You really caught me with my pants down.

[LMNO]

That wasn't it, but I appreciate your effort.