>> Lies can be carefully crafted to exploit the way human brains work,
> Well, sure. But the problem is the censors are also human. If crafty lies can deceive the average person, why do we believe that the authorities are any less immune?
> I feel like so many times anti-libertarian arguments follow this formula. "Regular people keep making this mistake. So let's just have the government, helpfully stop them from making the mistake. Except of wait... the government is also made up of people who make mistakes." In other words, who watches the watchmen?
If you can't design and build an iPhone from scratch, yourself, then why can Apple? If you personally can't write code that's nearly bug-free, then how can NASA?
Institutions are made up of people that make the same mistakes as the rest of us, but they can also have institutional practices that compensate and correct those mistakes. It's never perfect, but it's something an individual can't really do.
Society needs institutions whose job is to figure out what the truth is, and information dissemination channels that filter out lies and disinformation. Otherwise it'll be blinded. This work can't be mainly put on the shoulders of each individual, because they just don't have the bandwidth.
> But when millions have access to open information, it's virtually guaranteed that at least some non-neglible subset will figure out the truth.
That may not matter when the millions are robustly deceived by the lies.
The truth will probably win out, in the end, but the end might be one, ten, or a hundred years from now. If we're talking about election-influencing disinformation, that's too little, too late.
> Society needs institutions whose job is to figure out what the truth is, and information dissemination channels that filter out lies and disinformation.
We do have these. Scientists and journalists. As we know, they aren’t perfect, but they do pretty well.
> We do have these. Scientists and journalists. As we know, they aren’t perfect, but they do pretty well.
Exactly, and it's a good thing if the social media networks (for instance) follow their lead when it comes to handling disinformation, conspiracy theories, and other lies and falsehoods.
> Well, sure. But the problem is the censors are also human. If crafty lies can deceive the average person, why do we believe that the authorities are any less immune?
> I feel like so many times anti-libertarian arguments follow this formula. "Regular people keep making this mistake. So let's just have the government, helpfully stop them from making the mistake. Except of wait... the government is also made up of people who make mistakes." In other words, who watches the watchmen?
If you can't design and build an iPhone from scratch, yourself, then why can Apple? If you personally can't write code that's nearly bug-free, then how can NASA?
Institutions are made up of people that make the same mistakes as the rest of us, but they can also have institutional practices that compensate and correct those mistakes. It's never perfect, but it's something an individual can't really do.
Society needs institutions whose job is to figure out what the truth is, and information dissemination channels that filter out lies and disinformation. Otherwise it'll be blinded. This work can't be mainly put on the shoulders of each individual, because they just don't have the bandwidth.
> But when millions have access to open information, it's virtually guaranteed that at least some non-neglible subset will figure out the truth.
That may not matter when the millions are robustly deceived by the lies.
The truth will probably win out, in the end, but the end might be one, ten, or a hundred years from now. If we're talking about election-influencing disinformation, that's too little, too late.