trading posts

From time to time I'm reminded that it's misguided to ask, "Why is it that faulty or unverified ideas not only survive but thrive?" In my opinion the opposite question is more appropriate: "What has prevented, or could prevent, faulty or unverified ideas from achieving even more dominance?" The latter recognizes the appalling history of errors which have seized entire populations in various eras. The errors sprout up in all the corners of culture. The sight of substandard ideas spreading like weeds isn't exceptional; it's ageless.

The explanations are ageless too. One of these is that the ideas could be sitting atop a heaping pile of spellbinding stories of dubious origin. After a story has drawn its audience toward an unreal idea, it doesn't vanish. Its audience reproduces it. It might mutate in the process. When it's packaged with similar stories, its effect multiplies. Circles of people go on to trade the stories eagerly, because when they do they're trading mutual reassurance that they're right. There's a balance at work. Possessing uncommon knowledge is thrilling, especially when it's said to be both highly valuable and "suppressed". But the impression that at least a few others subscribe to the same arcane knowledge shields each of them from the doubt that they're just fantasizing or committing an individual mistake.

As is typical, the internet intensifies this pattern of human behavior rather than creates it out of nothing. It's a newer medium, albeit with a tremendous gain in convenience and visibility compared to older forms. In the past, the feat of trading relatively obscure stories depended on printed material such as newsletters or pamphlets or rare books. Or it happened gradually through a crooked pipeline of conversations that probably distorted the "facts" more and more during the trip. Or it was on the agenda of meetings quietly organized by an interested group that had to already exist in the local area.

Or a story could be posted up somewhere for its intended audience. This method especially benefited from the internet's speed and wide availability. Obviously, a powerful computer (or huge data center full of computers) with a memorable internet address can provide a spectacular setting for modern electronic forms of these posted stories—which have ended up being called "posts". Numerous worldwide devices can connect to the published address to rapidly store and retrieve the posts. Whether the specific technology is a bulletin board system, a newsgroup, an online discussion forum, or a social media website, the result is comparable. Whole virtual communities coalesce around exchanging posts.

Undoubtedly, these innovations have had favorable uses. But these also have supplied potent petri dishes for hosting the buildup of the deceptive, apocryphal stories that boost awful ideas. So when people perform "internet research", they may trip over these. The endlessly depressing trend is for the story that's more irresistible, and/or more smoothly comprehended, to be duplicated and scattered farther. Unfortunately that story won't necessarily be the most factual one. After all, a story that isn't held back by accuracy and complex nuance is freer to take any enticing shape.

It might be finely-tuned in its own way, though. A false story that demands almost no mental effort from its audience might provoke disbelief at its easiness. It would have too close of a resemblance to a superficial guess. That's avoided by a false story that demands a nugget of sustained but not strenuous mental effort—or a touch of inspired cleverness. It more effectively gives its audience a chance of feeling smug that now they're part of the group who're smart and informed enough to know better.

I wish I knew a quick remedy for this disadvantage. I guess the superior ideas need to have superior stories, or a mass refusal to tolerate stores with sloppy substantiation needs to develop. Until then the unwary public will be as vulnerable as they've ever been to the zealous self-important traders of hollow stories and to the fictional "ideas" the stories promote.