I think people will adapt by finally doing the thing they should have been doing all along: don't trust anything they see on the internet.
Maybe a flood of AI-generated propaganda is what it will finally take to get the average person to realize that the internet is (and always has been) overflowing with manipulative garbage made by people with bad intentions. So maybe the next time they see a video of <political opponent> kicking a puppy in the face, their first thought will be "maybe this video is fake?" rather than instant outrage.
I think most people aren't gullible/naive, but for some reason that part of their brain that protects them from being exploited/manipulated/ripped off/tricked/etc completely shuts down whenever the internet is involved. Maybe increased exposure can change that?
"I think people will adapt by finally doing the thing they should have been doing all along: don't trust anything they see on the internet."
I'm pessimistic on this. There is the question around people's ability to adapt well to this, but maybe more fundamental, trust the internet is all-permeating now. What's not "the internet" these days? All media that distribute news are on the internet. May this be the New York Times or Twitter. Even more traditional publications get news from Twitter. On the other hand, are your friends on Facebook the internet? How about when you call them?
Not sure what the solution here is. Going back to a few networks that show news at 8pm?
I've recently been thinking about the possibility of a social platform that rewards things like providing additional sources for or against things others posted.
I think all of this is gonna be a defining struggle of our time.
I think you're telling yourself this as a self protection mechanism in order to avoid asking some harsh truths about reality. The first one should be that your exposure to things in real life is very limited. You cannot make judgements on most things you see on the Internet/TV/News because you have no experience with complicated environments they exist in. And yet almost everything you see is trying to bring you to a call to action on said topics.
For example, if you live in a nice wealthy white suburbanite neighborhood the idea a cop would just pull up and shoot you is tantamount to a spaceship appearing. And yet with the ever increasing amount of body cam footage this seems to be an occurrence in cities far more than we'd like. Now, if a video shows up online of a cop just executing someone what opinion are you supposed to form? Apparently cops do things like this, but at the same time there are motivations for people to fake this too.
Because society/people are good at adaptation. Currently, the misinformation problem is big, but it’s not so big that it’s obvious to even the dumbest people… or at the very least it’s too recent a phenomenon for most people to have fully grasped it yet.
It’s like advertisements. Banner ads used to be very effective, but they were so pervasive that now people are blind to them. Doesn’t matter how big and flashy it is, most people will literally not see it because their brain is blocking it out somehow.
Personally, whenever I see something outrageous on social media, my immediate reaction is always “this is probably fake, and someone is trying to make me angry”. Not because I’m actively trying to remain skeptical, but because I’ve been on the internet long enough to have experienced being misled by similar stuff.
If you burn your hand touching a hot stove, you learn to be careful around stoves for the rest of your life. Sure, you can learn that lesson without having to burn your hand, but if you need a guarantee that the lesson is learned, getting burned will do that.
Right up until the follow a fascist leader and then hundreds of millions of people die in a war. Ignoring black swan events is a great way to become extinct in paradigm shifts.
Here is an even bleaker concern: Looking at North Korea, I've been wondering if with modern technology totalitarian regimes are a one-way street. With the amount of surveillance in place in NK, I am unable to see how any form of resistance could be mounted. NK is behind in tech. How much harder to topple can a system like NK be with the latest tech. China seems to be moving in that direction. Surveillance coupled with modern propaganda methods for full indoctrination.
I also perceive a larger weakness for liberal democracies towards propaganda and in particular the flooding the zone with shit approach. These two things together have me very, very worried. If there is a force moving you towards a state that's very hard if not impossible to leave, it stands to expect that eventually everything will end up in that state. In this case that would be authoritarianism or totalitarianism.
People seem willing to believe anything as long as it fits with their preconceived notions about how the world works. I’m not confident this will ever change.
Maybe a flood of AI-generated propaganda is what it will finally take to get the average person to realize that the internet is (and always has been) overflowing with manipulative garbage made by people with bad intentions. So maybe the next time they see a video of <political opponent> kicking a puppy in the face, their first thought will be "maybe this video is fake?" rather than instant outrage.
I think most people aren't gullible/naive, but for some reason that part of their brain that protects them from being exploited/manipulated/ripped off/tricked/etc completely shuts down whenever the internet is involved. Maybe increased exposure can change that?