In a post-truth world truth-seeking is more important • Hacker News Board

Re: In a post-truth world truth-seeking is more important

#61

Post by tgv » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 2:56 PM UTC

groundzeros2015 wrote: post #36

tgv wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Before, foreign news would actually include articles about politics in other countries, and their economies. As an avid news paper reader, I knew the prime ministers of bunch of countries, what party they belonged, etc. Nowadays, you have to be happy when you get an article about a national election. Foreign news has been reduced to trade conflicts, wars and gruesome murders.

With the internet what’s stopping you from actually reading the foreign news? In the newspaper days there was greater professionalism due to money and prestige but I think part of the appeal is you never heard conflicting interpretations so it felt more true and less confusing.

That was not the point. One of the ancestors said we're flooded in foreign news, to which another one replied "something something supply chains". While there used to be relevant info in the papers, there no longer is. Foreign news consists of Trump, wars, and some spectacular crimes. Politics, economy, trade, let alone culture is no longer reported on. Reporting nowadays is click-baity, less relevant, even for such a narrow topic as "supply chain" than it used to be, yet the good old days is what people have in mind when they think about foreign news.

Actually reading the foreign news ... how many papers are you going to check? And quite a few of those will only contain government approved news. Good luck getting info on Covid from Chinese news papers.

Journalism has been murdered.

Re: In a post-truth world truth-seeking is more important

#62

Post by groundzeros2015 » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 6:13 PM UTC

tgv wrote: post #61

groundzeros2015 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With the internet what’s stopping you from actually reading the foreign news? In the newspaper days there was greater professionalism due to money and prestige but I think part of the appeal is you never heard conflicting interpretations so it felt more true and less confusing.

That was not the point. One of the ancestors said we're flooded in foreign news, to which another one replied "something something supply chains". While there used to be relevant info in the papers, there no longer is. Foreign news consists of Trump, wars, and some spectacular crimes. Politics, economy, trade, let alone culture is no longer reported on. Reporting nowadays is click-baity, less relevant, even for such…

I see your point - there is poor curation of international sources for Americans.

My point is that at the same time access is unmatched. If you care about it you can find it.

Re: In a post-truth world truth-seeking is more important

#63

Post by cyanydeez » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 8:55 PM UTC

mallowdram wrote: post #59

cyanydeez wrote: post #56

Eh. As a headline, this is probably ambiguous. QAnon demonstrates whats more important is a lack of bias when seeking sources.

QAnon is simply a hack of narrative, and though it's crude conspiracy nonsense, it demonstrates a future form where info is non-linear, modular. If we had more complex modules and not this messy symbolically built info, there could be perception from external memory. Current external memory is junky, cheap.

unfortunely, one mans truth is another mans ill concieved subjective choices to support a preconcieved decision making.

Re: In a post-truth world truth-seeking is more important

#64

Post by mallowdram » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 9:37 PM UTC

cyanydeez wrote: post #63

mallowdram wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

QAnon is simply a hack of narrative, and though it's crude conspiracy nonsense, it demonstrates a future form where info is non-linear, modular. If we had more complex modules and not this messy symbolically built info, there could be perception from external memory. Current external memory is junky, cheap.

unfortunely, one mans truth is another mans ill concieved subjective choices to support a preconcieved decision making.

There are no truths using words, as words are arbitrary, subjective metaphors. Worse we externalize them in arbitrary symbols. What proves decision-making are actions, only actions.

Until we modularize a specific form of external signaling, be it speech or object, nothing we express is the truth.