Fake News is a Consequence of Rationality
- Before the triumph of the scientific method, debates were settled based on religious books or pure rhetoric (or violence)
- Science is forcing everybody to use facts and logic: collect the facts, and then use logic to derive conclusions
- Now everybody is rational: given the same facts, we would all reach the same conclusions
- The only way to force a different conclusion from the logical one is to change the facts
- Therefore now there is a new business: the business of fabricating the facts
- Politicians have always twisted the facts to push their agendas, but now it is becoming the only way to push an agenda through an increasingly rational audience
- The most important factor is no longer what the Bible says, nor how impressive the speaker is: people increasingly base their judgment on cold reasoning
- The only thing that can alter their conclusions is changing the facts
- Fake news are a consequence of the triumph of rationality and science
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