# Wiki Tutorial

**Defining the Terms**

Agnotology - "the study of culutally induced ignorance"

Epistemology - "the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion"

## **Overview of Reading**

It's not uncommon to go online and search something completely mundane and to fall down a "rabbit hole" after an hour or so of browsing. More often than not, we end up in a different place than we started. I thought the article brought up a lot of interesting points on how easy it is for people to become radicalized through the internet. One example mentioned a student searching up the term social justice for class research and ending up on an anti-feminist website and having their worldview slightly changed.

This has become increasingly relevant in the age of fake news and cancel culture because it is so easy to access this kind of radical information that sometimes you do it without even trying. We constantly have different claims being stuffed down our throats and for people, it's easier to deny them than to try and understand said claims for themselves.

## Fragmenting Epistemologies

Before this reading, I had no idea how certain beliefs became so charged and polarized. The idea of "purposefully and intentionally seeding doubt to fragment society" seemed bizzare to me because I personally didn't see the point in lying to mass groups of people. Unfortunately, it's a common way grab people's attention by playing into people's fears. As effective as it is, it's also extrememly dangerous when that fear becomes denial which becomes inaction.

Epistemological framentation can unify people–mass propagnda, for example–but it smaller forms, it can also siphon people off into radical communities like the white nationalists discussed in the reading. Climate change is another good example of it. People who don't believe in climate change, or the earth being round are people who have become detached from common beliefs due to epistemological fragmentation.

## How Do We Prevent It?

It's important to have information that is unbiased and factual when addressing the general public. Unfortunately, it's hard to do that when the news cycle is so fast-paced and looks for the first story, not necessarily the most factual one. I think it's important to look for as many sources as you can to see where the commonalites lie. It's also just as important, if not more, to engage in these conversations about controversial topics, and not just with people who confirm your beliefs either. If we want to be well informed, the sad truth is that we have to go out of our way to do so, but if we truly want the right information, we most likely have to do it ourselves because mass media isn't concerned with properly informing us, but rather having us hooked until they find the next story.