Dangers of Customized News and Feeds. Conspiracy Theories. Confirmation Bias. Online Echo Chambers
The following is an edited excerpt from the edX Course “Think101x The Science of Everyday Thinking”
Conversation with Stephan Lewandowsky
Q: People tend to believe some pretty weird things, from NASA faking the moon landing to pharmaceutical companies conspiring with government departments to keep people sick, and climate change obviously. Why does that happen? Why do people believe strange things like that?
A: People tend to focus selectively on what they consider to be “the evidence”. They may focus on one data point in the case of climate change, one thermometer somewhere that has been showing cooling for the last ten years. it is only one of about a billion different measurements that tell us that the climate is changing. Yet by focusing on just this one convenient piece of evidence that is protecting people’s worldview, they can be absolutely convinced that they’re right: “Look here, there is this one thermometer. It’s cooling,” and they’re ignoring absolutely everything else. It is difficult to get people to go beyond that one piece of evidence because doing so would imply that they have to change their opinion, and that’s a very difficult thing for people to do.
Q: One of the major drivers in the maintenance of people’s beliefs and the formation of their beliefs is the role of the media. The media clearly plays a large role. You encountered that yourself?
A: There’s an abundance of evidence to suggest that certain segments of the media have done a very poor job informing the public about a number of issues, from the mythical weapons of mass destruction in Iraq to climate change. The media are culpable to some extent. That is a serious problem, especially now that we have the ability to choose their own media by focusing on certain sources on the Internet. People have become more immersed in their own bubble of information they like, and that is what they are consuming to the exclusion of everything else.
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