000 02561cam a2200277 i 4500
001 on1002297524
003 OCoLC
007 ta
008 210607s2018 mau b 001 0 eng
020 _a9780262535045 (pbk.)
020 _a0262535041 (pbk.)
035 _a(OCoLC)1002297524
050 _aBD171
_b.M356 2018
100 1 _aMcIntyre, Lee C.
245 1 0 _aPost-truth /
_cLee McIntyre.
260 _aCambridge, Mass. :
_bThe MIT Press,
_c[2018]
300 _axvi, 216 p.
490 1 _aThe MIT Press Essential Knowledge Series
504 _aIncludes bibliographical references and index.
505 0 _aWhat is post-truth? -- The roots of cognitive bias -- The decline of traditional media -- The rise of social media and the problem of fake news -- Did post-modernism lead to post-truth? -- Fighting post-truth.
520 _a"Are we living in a post-truth world, where "alternative facts" replace actual facts and feelings have more weight than evidence? How did we get here? In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Lee McIntyre traces the development of the post-truth phenomenon from science denial through the rise of "fake news," from our psychological blind spots to the public's retreat into information silos. What, exactly, is post-truth? Is it wishful thinking, political spin, mass delusion, bold-faced lying? McIntyre analyzes recent examples--claims about inauguration crowd size, crime statistics, and the popular vote--and finds that post-truth is an assertion of ideological supremacy by which its practitioners try to compel someone to believe something regardless of the evidence. Yet post-truth didn't begin with the 2016 election; the denial of scientific facts about smoking, evolution, vaccines, and climate change offers a road map for more widespread fact denial. Add to this the wired-in cognitive biases that make us feel that our conclusions are based on good reasoning even when they are not, the decline of traditional media and the rise of social media, and the emergence of fake news as a political tool, and we have the ideal conditions for post-truth. McIntyre also argues provocatively that the right wing borrowed from postmodernism--specifically, the idea that there is no such thing as objective truth--in its attacks on science and facts. McIntyre argues that we can fight post-truth, and that the first step in fighting post-truth is to understand it"--
650 4 _aTruth.
650 4 _aTruthfulness and falsehood.
830 0 _aMIT Press essential knowledge series.
942 _2lcc
_cBK
999 _c2576
_d2576