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Absolute freedom of speech is equally as detrimental to society as totalitarian government censorship. Propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies can convinc

Absolute freedom of speech is equally as detrimental to society as totalitarian government censorship. Propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies can convincingly be passed off as truth. The vast majority of the populace neither has the time, nor the inclination to properly vet, research, and confirm the information that is presented to them. Humans rarely acknowledge their own confirmation biases, which makes it trivial to manipulate the so called "marketplace of ideas". We're now beginning to see the myriad detrimental effects of an absolutist free speech society. Political troll bots manipulate opinions and sow discord. A huge slice of the United States relies on a reality warping "news" network that claims the right to fabricate falsehoods under the banner of free speech. Algorithms that feed users content send people down rabbit holes of extremist information fomenting groups of fervent believers in utter nonsense like "The Earth is flat", because the algorithms naively equate "engagement time" with value/truth. Freedom of speech is a spectrum, and neither extreme of that spectrum is beneficial to a healthy society.

tchaffee 6y ago
> Propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies Who would decide what is fake news? The federal government? Perhaps a free speech Czar appointed by the president of the US? The current president of the US certainly does talk about fake news a lot. But no thanks.
- DeathArrow 6y ago
  He might refer to "right minded people" with the "right" ideology, whatever that might mean. For the "greater good", of course.
- zipwitch 6y ago
  The facile answer is, "have an educated public who can make those decisions themselves". But it seems clear to me that the "educated public" approach has failed. The spread of memetic hazards has risen to the level where a significant segment of the public have been robbed of their ability to think critically, and the post-Enlightenment consensus that objective reality exists is under attack. Beyond fighting a Fabian struggle in favor of critical thinking and quality information flows (which are lacking all across our society, even if that lack is particularly obvious with a certain political group) I'm by no means certain what a good, useful, and just response ought to be. I am confident that the danger is real and needs to be acknowledged. We need to find paths forward if we're to have any hope of keeping our civilization. And that means talking (and doing something) about the "propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies". Sticking our heads in the sand and screaming "Free Speech!" while the tidal wave informational sewage rolls over us isn't going to be sufficient.
  - jacobsenscott 6y ago
    Education != ability to think critically. It is a problem of biology - we are hardwired to believe things in a certain way based on all kinds of cognitive biases, etc. I don't see a way around regulation, and I don't see a path towards effective regulation given the current system benefits those who would design the regulations.
  - ThrowawayR2 6y ago
    > "And that means talking (and doing something) about the 'propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies'" The problem with your viewpoint is that, unless you plan to remove the ability of large swaths of the population who have been "robbed of their ability to think critically" to vote, ending democracy as we know it, whichever authority you construct to define what is "true" may not remain under the control of you and people who think as you do and then it will become Orwell's Ministry of Truth in all but name. Game over; civilization loses. "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" as they say. Forgive us old-school liberals if we choose not to follow you down that road.
    - zipwitch 6y ago
      I reject the presumptions that the only possible response is a unitary authority and that we shouldn't do anything in response because any such response is automatically going to be bad. Come, on, this is Hacker News! Why do we have to have a single central authority? We ought to at least be willing to speculate about AI-mediated Blockchains of Truth that reward factually accurate reporting. Or about ways to smoothly tell users how accurate the source they're reading has been in the past, or how to implement smart filtering of information streams to protect our own minds so that we can avoid wasting time on cognitive hazards. The point is that we have options beyond just sitting back and giving up. The problem is real, as are the risks to responding poorly. But that doesn't justify not responding at all.
      - tchaffee 6y ago
        The options you described just leave us with a less direct version of what we have now. Someone owns and runs media companies because it is a source of influence and income. Someone will run the AI-mediated Blockchains of Truth, etc for the same reasons. All you will accomplish is shifting the power around momentarily, perhaps even to worse actors than we have now. But even if your ideas are very vague they are at least approaching concrete which is good because we can compare with existing solutions. But looking at those ideas, I don't see anything promising there.
- jacobsenscott 6y ago
  We have a system to filter "real" information from "fake" information where distributing fake information is a lucrative business. It is called peer review, and it can be applied to news as well as science, and doesn't require some nefarious government czar.
  - tchaffee 6y ago
    Peer review of news by citizens is already done in an informal way based on what they click on and share. Even when you point someone to Snopes showing a news article is false, people will respond saying Snopes is run by lefties and cannot be trusted. All you are suggesting is mob rule - the majority decides what is fake news.
    - jacobsenscott 6y ago
      That's the opposite of peer review. Peer review means experts in the field review articles, not the unwashed masses.
      - tchaffee 6y ago
        That would be a horrible system for news. It would put a huge amount of power in the hands of whoever is determined to be an expert. And I don't see how it fulfills your previous claim: > and doesn't require some nefarious government czar. Because someone has to decide who the experts are. Peer review in science is performed by those who have a degree from a government accredited institution.

tchaffee 6y ago

> Propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies Who would decide what is fake news? The federal government? Perhaps a free speech Czar appointed by the president of the US? The current president of the US certainly does talk about fake news a lot. But no thanks.

DeathArrow 6y ago
He might refer to "right minded people" with the "right" ideology, whatever that might mean. For the "greater good", of course.
zipwitch 6y ago
The facile answer is, "have an educated public who can make those decisions themselves". But it seems clear to me that the "educated public" approach has failed. The spread of memetic hazards has risen to the level where a significant segment of the public have been robbed of their ability to think critically, and the post-Enlightenment consensus that objective reality exists is under attack. Beyond fighting a Fabian struggle in favor of critical thinking and quality information flows (which are lacking all across our society, even if that lack is particularly obvious with a certain political group) I'm by no means certain what a good, useful, and just response ought to be. I am confident that the danger is real and needs to be acknowledged. We need to find paths forward if we're to have any hope of keeping our civilization. And that means talking (and doing something) about the "propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies". Sticking our heads in the sand and screaming "Free Speech!" while the tidal wave informational sewage rolls over us isn't going to be sufficient.
- jacobsenscott 6y ago
  Education != ability to think critically. It is a problem of biology - we are hardwired to believe things in a certain way based on all kinds of cognitive biases, etc. I don't see a way around regulation, and I don't see a path towards effective regulation given the current system benefits those who would design the regulations.
- ThrowawayR2 6y ago
  > "And that means talking (and doing something) about the 'propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies'" The problem with your viewpoint is that, unless you plan to remove the ability of large swaths of the population who have been "robbed of their ability to think critically" to vote, ending democracy as we know it, whichever authority you construct to define what is "true" may not remain under the control of you and people who think as you do and then it will become Orwell's Ministry of Truth in all but name. Game over; civilization loses. "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" as they say. Forgive us old-school liberals if we choose not to follow you down that road.
  - zipwitch 6y ago
    I reject the presumptions that the only possible response is a unitary authority and that we shouldn't do anything in response because any such response is automatically going to be bad. Come, on, this is Hacker News! Why do we have to have a single central authority? We ought to at least be willing to speculate about AI-mediated Blockchains of Truth that reward factually accurate reporting. Or about ways to smoothly tell users how accurate the source they're reading has been in the past, or how to implement smart filtering of information streams to protect our own minds so that we can avoid wasting time on cognitive hazards. The point is that we have options beyond just sitting back and giving up. The problem is real, as are the risks to responding poorly. But that doesn't justify not responding at all.
    - tchaffee 6y ago
      The options you described just leave us with a less direct version of what we have now. Someone owns and runs media companies because it is a source of influence and income. Someone will run the AI-mediated Blockchains of Truth, etc for the same reasons. All you will accomplish is shifting the power around momentarily, perhaps even to worse actors than we have now. But even if your ideas are very vague they are at least approaching concrete which is good because we can compare with existing solutions. But looking at those ideas, I don't see anything promising there.
jacobsenscott 6y ago
We have a system to filter "real" information from "fake" information where distributing fake information is a lucrative business. It is called peer review, and it can be applied to news as well as science, and doesn't require some nefarious government czar.
- tchaffee 6y ago
  Peer review of news by citizens is already done in an informal way based on what they click on and share. Even when you point someone to Snopes showing a news article is false, people will respond saying Snopes is run by lefties and cannot be trusted. All you are suggesting is mob rule - the majority decides what is fake news.
  - jacobsenscott 6y ago
    That's the opposite of peer review. Peer review means experts in the field review articles, not the unwashed masses.
    - tchaffee 6y ago
      That would be a horrible system for news. It would put a huge amount of power in the hands of whoever is determined to be an expert. And I don't see how it fulfills your previous claim: > and doesn't require some nefarious government czar. Because someone has to decide who the experts are. Peer review in science is performed by those who have a degree from a government accredited institution.