>> Malicious groups spreading misinformation to destabilize society has been a thing since at least the ancient Greeks. Unverifiable reality has been the topic

>> Malicious groups spreading misinformation to destabilize society has been a thing since at least the ancient Greeks. Unverifiable reality has been the topic of religious debate for centuries as well. The recent language models are cool but they are not better at lying than humans. > They have never such power to do so convincingly with such little effort. Yes, it has always been a problem, but no where close to the extent it is about to become. And at such scale. The annoying pro-tech trope of "the ancient Greeks had problems sort of like this, so these problems aren't new (so they're not problems), so full speed ahead" refuses to acknowledge how technology has drastically changed things and how we should judge technology using the previous situation as a reference, not the situation 2000 years ago. A long time ago, everyone had to be pretty mistrustful of strangers, and spend a lot energy avoiding lies and cheating (to the point of tolerating a high false positive rate). Relatively recently, society changed in ways that allowed people to reap the benefits of letting their guard down and trust strangers to a large degree (reduced effort, greater efficiency and effectiveness). Now we might be reverting back to the original condition, which is a bad thing.