I haven't seen any evidence of that. Human beings communicate and consume information much more than they have before, but where's the evidence that has made the 'problem' worse? We're much less insular than we've ever been before, so any increase in exposure to misleading information has been accompanied by an increase in exposure to opposing view points.

> It can only get you so far

So can any pursuit of the truth. If you want to set the bar at discovering universal truths, then you're going to be disappointed.

> this trend will produce a situation where there won't be any source you trust enough to cross-check against

Good. There should never be a single source that you trust to always tell you the truth.

One guy claims, might as well stop there.

I'm on the side of wanting to believe, it's just important to stay skeptical because if it were all true it would probably be one of the most important things to happen to humanity. We're not alone after all.

Indeed we are, it's also the interesting thing about confirmation bias in communities. In any community, they seem to always believe any news that is immediately negative about the subject that they haven't researched about or want they don't like as the real truth.

It's up to us to do our own research with actual evidence rather than sources such as: 'X suggested', 'sources say', 'my friend who works at ABCXYZ' or because it has 1000+ retweets, upvotes, etc.

Generally, a healthy dose of skepticism is needed on social media content like FB, Twitter, HN, etc.

Then give them the tools.

> Indeed, that is a risk, but not the only risk.

It's not really a risk, it's a fact. Governments routinely lie about plenty of things, and deny things that we later find out to be true.

I would much rather have a bunch of people believe the wrong thing, than have true things labeled as misinformation, or worse, censored.

The onus is on us, as citizens of a free society, to set the record straight, and constantly work to educate people. That's just the responsibility we have to accept. "Freedom isn't free" and all that.

I agree with you, although there's a large contingent for whom whether or not it's factually accurate is the most significant concern.

I didn't realize it could have such a powerful impact on you, sorry to hear that. I also saw something to that effect, accepted it, and moved on. I don't think there is really a way to consume information without trusting some things, but seeking deeper validation for things you may think are important. In light of other news, this didn't seem like something worth validating, so I assume many many people have internalized it as truth somewhat.

Such is the nature of disinformation.

I'm not sure that's a good thing.

Unfortunately, facts aren't very effective against such conspiracy theories. People who believe in them aren't (typically) engaged in a pursuit after the truth.

It's a social phenomena and has to be treated as such.

I think what's even more troubling is that this isn't just changing fashions, but that some are actively trying to shake people's faith in the truth.

Call me a cynic, but I'd hope all of us would want to take that approach with every source.

I'd say that depends. If this story paraphrases a bunch of facts we know to be true from other sources, then I see your point.

But if this story is not literally true, then we should be very cautious about using it as the grounding for other beliefs.

I don't know if I agree with you here.

> It's as if the mainstream is using these even sicker people to pretend it itself is not sick, contrary to the mountains of evidence.

I feel quite strongly that this is happening.

Without going into the medical and scientific reasons why this perception may exist among people, I'd just like to point out that trust in the media and other institutions has been sabotaged over the last 5-6 years among a non-trivial percentage of the population, perhaps permanently, just for the sake of political victory.

The lesson that these institutions should learn is a self-reflective critical one that they'll forever refuse to acknowledge. Don't cry wolf repeatedly for years and then complain that the ignorant villagers won't believe literally anything you have to say on any topic ever again.

No. The important thing is to _GET OTHER PEOPLE_ to do this.

My mom, or my sister's father in law, will not trust what I say if it contradicts their news sources. So there's no feasible way I (or really, anyone else) can get them to throw away their bad news sources.

I used to believe that as well. Then we did real world practical experiments over the last decade. It's clear most people don't give a shit about informing themselves and will readily believe just about anything.

Not saying the solution is regulating what can / cannot be said, but this idea that free speech is the ultimate thing isn't working when you have groups that can spend troves of cash making their disinformation legitimate enough for the masses.

Both you and i probably believe at least one, maybe more of those things, by the way. It's not all outlandish nonsense, sometimes it's reasonable enough to believe at first glance and you don't bother looking it up afterwards.

It's starting with the conclusion and stretching whatever you find to meet it, versus looking at reality and accurately describing what you find.

Whenever someone starts with a conclusion, you can't trust that their facts accurately depict reality. It's now a propaganda piece or a sales pitch, and you can only trust that it's the best thing they could find to support their agenda.

This is a tactic in itself. I can't find the details behind it, but the act of so much misinformation at once that helps drowned out more factual news while simultaneously making it so that you don't believe what you're reading. It's not a new tactic, but it's well used.

What would be certainly possible though is for them to stop putting lies inside. Exaggerating claims and inventing linkbait nonsense actually requires work - work which shouldn't be done in the first place.

Please tell me which media source you consume that's telling you the other media sources are lying to you.