You're Like a Wizard, Samwell
How the dissemination of information, knowledge, and truth has changed
“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” - Arthur C. Clarke
I read a lot. These days, it’s mostly confined to news, short form and long form essays, and Reddit. But it’s my preferred way to digest information. That’s why this scene from Game of Thrones tickled me so much.
Nowadays, with adult literacy above 90% worldwide, it is completely unremarkable for people to learn new things by reading papers and books. But for the vast majority of history, being able to read and write was a privilege reserved primarily for the nobility and priesthood.
If you were a commoner (quick aside: it’s interesting that the word “commoner” is no longer used to describe regular people today) back then, your primary way of discovering new information was simply by talking those closest to you. Those closest to you would get their information by talking to those closest to them. And so on and so forth, until you eventually reached some authoritative source, probably in the priesthood or the nobility.
The communication chain of how information is disseminated throughout society is long and unreliable. With each link in the chain, from king, to courtier, to burgher, and however many number of commoners before information is finally transmitted to you, comes to opportunity to misinterpret, exaggerate, obfuscate, or lie about whatever information is being distributed. Thus, information is useless by itself. The ability to determine what information is true, accurate, and useful is what gives information its power and turns it into knowledge.
Whether it’s the church, the courtroom, or the classrooms in a university, many of our oldest and most venerable institutions primarily concern themselves with the pursuit of knowledge and truth (Harvard’s motto is Veritas which is Latin for “truth”). When we think of technology, we often think of things like computers, airplanes, cars and other tangible things that you can touch and see. But technology can also be the processes that lead to the discovery of knowledge and the advancement of progress. Books are a technology. Civil and criminal procedure in a courtroom is a technology. The Constitution is a technology.
The Stage Expands
It is no small coincidence that the modern era (defined as 1500-1945 CE) begins roughly 50 years after Johannes Gutenberg invents the first movable type printing press. Once it became widespread, the cost of copying writing fell drastically, as you no longer needed to transcribe an original work by hand, which required a literate person. This was very expensive because literacy was a scarce and expensive labor skill at the time. Instead, a machine could quickly and easily copy page after page, driving down the cost of transcription and making it cheaper to produce pamphlets and books.
Cheaper pamphlets and books made it economical for more and more people to learn to read and write. Literacy increased among the common people, and with it, their ability to learn and apply knowledge that had previously been the domain of the aristocracy. In antiquity, the vast majority of surviving literature was written by kings, aristocrats, and priests (who themselves were often part of aristocracy). But once you move into the Middle Ages, significantly more literature was written by the middle class (in the classical rather than the American definition) between the peasantry and nobility.
After the turn of the 20th century, rapid educational and technological progress was able to further decrease the cost and effort to broadcast information across society. Market saturation of the radio, telephone and television created network effects that made it cheap and easy to instantaneously transmit information from one part of the world to another, whether it’s a news broadcast or a conversation between two individuals.
Nothing underscores the material change in circumstances for ordinary people in this time period more than the transformation of professional entertainment from a local curiosity to full fledged industry. What was once a poorly paid and dangerous job traveling from town to town to put on a nightly show, long the refuge of misfits, dreamers, and hucksters turned into a glamorous and lucrative career jealously guarded by a largely hereditary caste.
What changed? The cost to produce went down; actors only need to perform their role once. The cost to distribute went down; the show is recorded and the exact same performance is shown on television or in a theater for nothing more than the cost of electricity and some film.
I bring up show business not only as an example of how decreasing costs of information transfer benefits ordinary people, but also as an example of how information can be distorted and manipulated. We’re now at a point in modern day society where information, knowledge, and truth are reverting back to premodern form.
With the Old Breed
Even as the cost of distributing information plummeted, prior to the widespread use of the internet and computers, it was still a relatively expensive endeavor. It still required lots of skilled labor and capital to run a newspaper, radio program, or television studio.
That was still roughly the case in 2012, when smartphones reached 50% share of the mobile phone market. But with each passing year, smartphones got better and more capable until we finally reached a point where an ordinary person could film, edit, and distribute compelling media all on their smartphone. That capability combined with the enormous reach and ubiquity of social media websites like Facebook, Youtube, Instagram, and Twitter made it possible to bypass the old media institutions entirely.
What does that mean? In the past, if you wanted an opportunity to broadcast anything to a wide audience, you had to go through an extensive vetting process administered by layers of paid professionals. If you had an explosive new story, a newspaper or TV journalist had to verify the information you had before allowing it to run, with an editor keeping the journalist in check. If you had a funny video, some TV producer’s lackey would first take a look at it before telling his boss to take a look at it, who would then pitch it to a studio and go through dozens of steps later before it would finally air on live television.
In other words, there was an army of professional gatekeepers who would insist on credentials, quality, and caution before agreeing to distribute some random individual’s content. But smartphones and the internet changed that paradigm. All you needed was to upload your content to some social media platform, do your own marketing to friends and family, and get enough word of mouth to go viral, at which point the old media would have to report on the phenomenon. At no point in this new paradigm did knowledge, truth, or accuracy matter. What mattered was whether enough people saw it or not.
The New Barbarians at the Gate
People have a natural inclination toward things that conform to their preexisting prejudices. Combine that with the natural inclination to popularity, power, influence, and what has been created is a set of incentives that prioritizes attention over accuracy. Information over knowledge. Entertainment over truth. Knowledge and truth were thus sacrificed to the altar of clicks and eyeballs.
While it’s true that the old gatekeepers also cared deeply about popularity, power, and influence, they were insulated by the still-high barrier to entry of their industries, which made the risk of lying and inaccuracy much higher. In an era where people got their news from 3 TV stations and 4 major newspapers, lying or inaccuracy would carry an enormous reputational risk for any one actor within that environment.
But in a media environment where there are literally millions of influencers, podcasters, Youtubers, streamers, and tweeters, lying and inaccuracy simply means that an unknown actor remains unknown. But if the lie or exaggeration is appealing enough, it might catch the attention of millions of people and suddenly that individual is in a much better position than before. The only bad publicity is no publicity.
A popular lie will be believed and repeated by a large enough portion of the population that you can create your own sphere of influence. Even better if a hated member of the outgroup says that you’re lying. You can simply say “something must be true if the enemy says I’m a liar” and gain even more popularity.
What happens to the old gatekeepers? They can either fade into irrelevance, or they adapt with the times. Print journalism has been in a decadeslong crisis, battered by the dynamics explained earlier in this article. Cable TV is suffering a similar crisis, though not nearly as severe. Many of the old media gatekeepers have agreed to partner with the most popular new media barbarians. Many ape the behavior of the barbarians, hoping to replicate their success. Oftentimes, the barbarians succeed in crashing the gate and become the new gatekeepers.
You’re Not Serious People
There is a replication crisis in academia. Trust in the media is near historic lows. Trust in the Supreme Court is at an all time low. Affiliation with religion is at an all time low and continues to plumb new depths. Many of the institutions that we’ve historically trusted with the conversion of information into knowledge, the separation of fact from fiction, and the dissemination of truth are beset by major crises of confidence, whether internally, externally, or both.
One could assume that the country itself is facing some kind of existential crisis, but the truth of the matter is that, in many respects, the country has never been stronger. America has the highest GDP per capita out of any country with a population over 6 million. Unemployment is near an all time low and has been that way for nearly 8 years (not counting the pandemic). The US has the vast majority of the world’s best universities. The US has the vast majority of the world’s most valuable companies. The US continues to have the world’s strongest military (and the second most powerful military is an incredibly distant second).
So why do people have such low trust and confidence in so many of our institutions?
“Academic politics is the most vicious and bitter form of politics, because the stakes are so low.” - Wallace Sayre
At this moment in time, the personification of the country would be an angry, spoiled rich kid. Perhaps the most extraordinary trait that humans have is our ability to adapt. This has mostly worked in our favor, but one of the ways that it works against us is our ability to take for granted the extraordinary advances that we have made in technology and its ability to improve our overall well being.
Even as advances in technology and the economy proceeds apace, the psychology of the people has become unmoored, with many drifting in a sea of parochial self interest. In short, we are not serious people. This is the reason why all of our awesome technology is used to distribute information that flatters our prejudices and makes us feel good at the expense of what is true and what is useful.
A Good Problem to Have
In an era of unbridled prosperity and safety, we have collectively chosen comfort and convenience as our highest desires. We’ve chosen the short term at the expense of the long term. And we have chosen entertainment over truth.
But this state of affairs is not actually a serious problem. There are many worse predicaments to be in. Many countries are much worse shape. Our problem with choosing entertainment over truth is only an actual problem when it interferes with our ability to remain safe and prosper, and so far that has not proven to be the case.
We are living in interesting times, but we are not living in bad times. Serious times call for serious people, but we are living in unserious times. There are worse problems to have.