I think much of it can be attributed to the eternal September. The quality of discussion on the internet has declined steadily since it’s inception. The barriers to entry have steadily lowered, and I think those barriers selected for people who valued better epistemic conditions. Now that anyone can participate, the overall quality of discussion has gone down the drain. Furthermore, I think platforms have adapted to appeal to the general population that does not value good epistemic conditions. (Compare the reddit redesign to the old reddit with custom CSS turned off.)
A look at history will show that people have always had terrible epistemic practices. The major abrahamic religions all had components that encouraged their members to spread the religion using violence and required unquestioning faith from their believers. Communist Russia had lysenkoism. All the propaganda posters during world war 2 from all sides we’re straight-forward appeals to emotion.
So things have probably always been around this bad, however, I don’t know how the presence of the internet and social medial will change things compared to before.
I think much of it can be attributed to the eternal September. The quality of discussion on the internet has declined steadily since it’s inception. The barriers to entry have steadily lowered, and I think those barriers selected for people who valued better epistemic conditions. Now that anyone can participate, the overall quality of discussion has gone down the drain. Furthermore, I think platforms have adapted to appeal to the general population that does not value good epistemic conditions. (Compare the reddit redesign to the old reddit with custom CSS turned off.)
A look at history will show that people have always had terrible epistemic practices. The major abrahamic religions all had components that encouraged their members to spread the religion using violence and required unquestioning faith from their believers. Communist Russia had lysenkoism. All the propaganda posters during world war 2 from all sides we’re straight-forward appeals to emotion.
So things have probably always been around this bad, however, I don’t know how the presence of the internet and social medial will change things compared to before.