The statement that facts no longer matter as much in a digital world strikes me as ill-informed. When exactly haven't human beings latched onto whatever baloney justified what they want to do? I am certain Cain slandered Abel. A cursory reading of American history, or just a quick check in on the Reconstruction period, would reveal that the truth has always been valued much less than a good lie.

And, it seems to me that articles like this one, products of the so-called "digital world," show that communication gives as well as it takes. After all this article is spreading corrections and analyses. Why exactly is it that the old one-to-many paradigm of communication is assumed to be so honest? I think it's because that mode of communication gave the appearance of being honest. I'd suggest that the discomfort with the "digital world" is that it does reveal conflicting versions of the truth, that what leads us to say its the father of lies is the very fact that it exposes the truth for what it is, most often a tissue of pleasing falsehoods.

First off, I will say that you wrote an interesting post, so it's not my intention to just butt heads (I see a lot of that around here) but rather just to play devil's advocate.

I have generally tended towards futurist optimism when it comes to the democratizing power of the internet. But I think the guy is on to something in his book (which I haven't read - only excerpts).

The obvious response to your post that first comes to mind is that sure, this article is spreading corrections, but only so far as to the people that are willing to read it. The fact (so to speak, heh heh) remains that articles like this one don't seem to really matter. The deceitful processes the article describes are what seem to matter... or so say the latest polls.

Maybe that will right itself in the next 7 weeks, but that didn't bear out in 2000 and 2004 either. I'm not optimistic.

I think we still have yet to see how the "post-fact" world will shake out, whether truth has a natural buoyancy and bounces to the top. I'd like to think it does, but I don't think we know yet.

Steven Johnson and I debated all this stuff and more in Slate months ago; that's a good place to go to answer the questions you pose. <link>

Thanks, Farhad. I did read that when it was first published, and it was fascinating. It was awhile ago, though, so I probably internalized stuff you already said, and just thought I came to it independently here.