I agree. Based on descriptions over the last few years, I'd assume that the definition of "disinformation" used was "anything that contradicts the preferred narrative". In the absence of evidence to the contrary, I assume that the people who made this list believe the following:
1. Climate change poses a threat of catastrophe for human civilization.
a. The only way to prevent this catastrophe is to prevent further warming by achieving "net zero" emissions.
2. Public health officials have all the information needed to accurately assess threats from communicable diseases, the most effective steps to deal with them, and the appropriate trade-offs in implementing these steps.
3. Race-based inequality is the most important internal issue affecting Western societies, and threatens to tear these societies apart.
4. Global elites have the information needed and the purity of motives to establish appropriate worldwide policies to solve all problems.
5. Any questioning of these positions is "misinformation and disinformation."
This is a nice extension of your points from last week's post. It also raises the broader question of how to characterize, let alone compare, problems of very different types and causal structure. When I read the WEF list, I see a bunch of apples and oranges reflecting different ontology, levels of analysis, positions upstream or downstream from the source or outcome of concern. "Extreme weather events" highlights what is most visible in terms of suffering - catastrophic outcomes enabled by a warming planet - but to call it the *target* problem rather than what caused it is almost incoherent. (Meanwhile, "involuntary migration" will increasingly be driven by extreme weather events). "Cyber insecurity" is not an event but an enabling condition, and impacts infrastructure, not physical health like pollution (which doesn't cause violent death like war). Misinformation can reflect "societal polarization," but perhaps these are better conceived as two sides of an overarching phenomenon such as breakdown of trust (which comes from....?)
So any of these listed problems and their framings is laden with interpretive choices. But what stands out with "misinformation" is its intuitive appeal as a static noun, a reified *thing*we imagine is directly responsive to intervention. A hammer always looks for a nail, and "misinformation" is that perfect nail - something to be eliminated. The other problems cited by WEF, even phrased as nouns, describe broad overdetermined processes and conditions.. Misinformation in theory is reducible to individual propositional statements, replaceable by "this-information."
Great points - completely agree. In some ways the very idea of creating a list like this just looks confused. Your question about what causes the breakdown of trust is really important and something I will be writing about this year as I try to really understand this phenomenon, because I think many other problems are downstream of it.
Hmmm, interesting. Though do you really believe that mainstream media produces broadly reliable info? Given its ownership that is unlikely and does not seem to be the case as a matter of fact.
I love the Nate Silver quote and I mostly agree with you but I have one point of concern.
"However, such things have always been true in democracies and there is little reason to believe they have generally gotten worse in recent years."
First, we fundamentally disagree on where people get their news.
"Among those who pay attention to politics at all - many citizens don’t - the overwhelming majority get their information from mainstream, broadly reliable sources."
Not long ago maybe we all got most of our dis/misinformation from the same sources. That is no longer true. Our sources are very different. For this and maybe other reasons, the left and the right are victims of very different dis/misinformation. They hold very different untruths. While the quantity may not have changed, the fact that it now results in very strongly competing groups is something to be concerned about. Maybe this isn't a huge problem either but it is definitely a way things "have generally gotten worse in recent years."
I thought about clarifying one point and didn't. Rereading my comment I think I have to. Yes, there have always been very strongly competing groups. I think the difference is it has become both far more unlikely and far more difficult to "switch sides" on a particular issue. It is becoming uncommon to chose sides based on an evaluation of the issue. The group to side with is chosen and then justifications for opinion on an issue are developed to match that side.
Enlightening essay - brings to mind social psychologists French and Raven’s landmark work on bases of power. They identified five, and later a sixth - coercive, reward, legitimate, referent, expert, and informational power. Now, with our advancing technologies, informational power presenting increasing, and often valid, challenges to coercive and expert power.
Good essay. Perhaps what scares Davos and its experts - and explains their scoring - is the loss of their science-mediated monopoly on truth. Dan Sarewitz and I wrote that much here: https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/reformation-in-the-church-of-science.
Extremely interesting piece - thanks for sharing.
I agree. Based on descriptions over the last few years, I'd assume that the definition of "disinformation" used was "anything that contradicts the preferred narrative". In the absence of evidence to the contrary, I assume that the people who made this list believe the following:
1. Climate change poses a threat of catastrophe for human civilization.
a. The only way to prevent this catastrophe is to prevent further warming by achieving "net zero" emissions.
2. Public health officials have all the information needed to accurately assess threats from communicable diseases, the most effective steps to deal with them, and the appropriate trade-offs in implementing these steps.
3. Race-based inequality is the most important internal issue affecting Western societies, and threatens to tear these societies apart.
4. Global elites have the information needed and the purity of motives to establish appropriate worldwide policies to solve all problems.
5. Any questioning of these positions is "misinformation and disinformation."
This is a nice extension of your points from last week's post. It also raises the broader question of how to characterize, let alone compare, problems of very different types and causal structure. When I read the WEF list, I see a bunch of apples and oranges reflecting different ontology, levels of analysis, positions upstream or downstream from the source or outcome of concern. "Extreme weather events" highlights what is most visible in terms of suffering - catastrophic outcomes enabled by a warming planet - but to call it the *target* problem rather than what caused it is almost incoherent. (Meanwhile, "involuntary migration" will increasingly be driven by extreme weather events). "Cyber insecurity" is not an event but an enabling condition, and impacts infrastructure, not physical health like pollution (which doesn't cause violent death like war). Misinformation can reflect "societal polarization," but perhaps these are better conceived as two sides of an overarching phenomenon such as breakdown of trust (which comes from....?)
So any of these listed problems and their framings is laden with interpretive choices. But what stands out with "misinformation" is its intuitive appeal as a static noun, a reified *thing*we imagine is directly responsive to intervention. A hammer always looks for a nail, and "misinformation" is that perfect nail - something to be eliminated. The other problems cited by WEF, even phrased as nouns, describe broad overdetermined processes and conditions.. Misinformation in theory is reducible to individual propositional statements, replaceable by "this-information."
Great points - completely agree. In some ways the very idea of creating a list like this just looks confused. Your question about what causes the breakdown of trust is really important and something I will be writing about this year as I try to really understand this phenomenon, because I think many other problems are downstream of it.
Triangulation just came out with a substack post about this.
_Harvard's plagiarism scandal reveals a deeper truth about the educational system_
https://substack.com/inbox/post/139766396
Hmmm, interesting. Though do you really believe that mainstream media produces broadly reliable info? Given its ownership that is unlikely and does not seem to be the case as a matter of fact.
I love the Nate Silver quote and I mostly agree with you but I have one point of concern.
"However, such things have always been true in democracies and there is little reason to believe they have generally gotten worse in recent years."
First, we fundamentally disagree on where people get their news.
"Among those who pay attention to politics at all - many citizens don’t - the overwhelming majority get their information from mainstream, broadly reliable sources."
Not long ago maybe we all got most of our dis/misinformation from the same sources. That is no longer true. Our sources are very different. For this and maybe other reasons, the left and the right are victims of very different dis/misinformation. They hold very different untruths. While the quantity may not have changed, the fact that it now results in very strongly competing groups is something to be concerned about. Maybe this isn't a huge problem either but it is definitely a way things "have generally gotten worse in recent years."
I thought about clarifying one point and didn't. Rereading my comment I think I have to. Yes, there have always been very strongly competing groups. I think the difference is it has become both far more unlikely and far more difficult to "switch sides" on a particular issue. It is becoming uncommon to chose sides based on an evaluation of the issue. The group to side with is chosen and then justifications for opinion on an issue are developed to match that side.
Great essay. I suspect what the Davos folks mean by "disinformation" is "people don't believe us".
Enlightening essay - brings to mind social psychologists French and Raven’s landmark work on bases of power. They identified five, and later a sixth - coercive, reward, legitimate, referent, expert, and informational power. Now, with our advancing technologies, informational power presenting increasing, and often valid, challenges to coercive and expert power.