Limit the Influence of "Fake Facts"

6. Civic Knowledge and Skills

This introductory article was written by ChatGPT at the direction of Heidi Burgess, who reviewed, edited, and approved the final content.
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False information has always been part of public conflict, but digital media have made the problem much more severe. Rumors, conspiracy theories, manipulated images, misleading statistics, and deliberately fabricated claims can now reach millions of people before anyone has time to check them. One especially damaging strategy was named by the Rand Corporation as the "firehose of falsehood": a flood of claims sent out rapidly and repeatedly until people become confused, exhausted, or convinced that no one can know what is true, so it isn't even worth trying to sort out the facts. In such an environment, many people give up on facts altogether. They believe what their side says, distrust what the other side says, and treat truth as just another weapon in the conflict.

That response is understandable, but dangerous. Reality does not stop mattering because people distrust the institutions that describe it. Bad facts lead to bad decisions. A community that misunderstands wildfire risk is more prone to destructive wildfires. One that ignores the risk of pandemics and distrusts vaccines compromises public health. When policy choices run up against actual social, political, and environmental challenges, if the facts weren't understood, the chances of the policy or decision catestrophically failing are high.

False claims also damage relationships. They make opponents seem more evil, threats seem more extreme, and compromise seem more dangerous than it really is. In intractable conflicts, fake facts do not merely misinform people; they help keep the conflict going.

Limiting the influence of fake facts begins with slowing down. People are most vulnerable to false information when a claim is emotionally satisfying, frightening, or humiliating to an opponent. Those are exactly the moments when verification matters most.

A useful first step is to ask basic questions: Who is making this claim? What evidence do they provide? Is the source known for accuracy? Are other credible sources reporting the same thing? The Digital Inquiry Group's lateral-reading approach encourages people to leave the original webpage and see what other reliable sources say about the source or claim. This is often more useful than studying a suspicious site in isolation, because deceptive sources are usually designed to look credible on their own terms.

Individuals and organizations can also build habits of information hygiene. Before sharing a claim, especially an alarming one, check to see whether it has been verified by reliable news organizations, subject-matter experts, official data sources, or nonpartisan fact-checkers. Distinguish between misinformation, which may be shared by people who believe it, and disinformation, which is spread with the intent to deceive. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has encouraged people to recognize manipulative content, verify before sharing, and rely on authoritative sources for high-stakes information. These habits are not perfect safeguards, but they can reduce the speed and reach of false claims.

Correcting fake facts also has to be done carefully. Simply repeating a false claim over and over, even to deny it, can make the claim more familiar. The Debunking Handbook recommends leading with the accurate information, giving only enough of the false claim to identify it, explaining why it is wrong, and then returning to the factual account. Corrections work better when they fill the gap left by the false story. People often believe misinformation because it offers a simple explanation for something confusing or frightening. A useful correction therefore needs to provide a clearer and more accurate explanation, not just a scolding.

Finally, limiting fake facts requires trustworthy institutions and trusted messengers. Journalists, scientists, educators, public officials, religious leaders, community organizations, and civic groups all have roles to play. They should explain what they know, how they know it, and what remains uncertain. They should correct errors openly and avoid using "fact-checking" as a cover for partisan advocacy. Citizens, for their part, should resist the temptation to accept weak evidence from their own side while demanding impossible proof from everyone else. Truth is not always easy to determine, and honest people will still disagree about many things. But constructive conflict depends on a shared commitment to keep asking what is real. Without that commitment, public debate becomes a contest of stories detached from consequences, and consequences always win.

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This page was created by ChatGPT in response to this prompt. It was then reviewed, edited, supplemented and approved by Heidi Burgess. More information about how and why we are using AI in this way, and about the growing number of ways in which Beyond Intractability is using ChatGPT, Claude and other AI systems to generate content and build out the BI system, is available on our BI/AI Overview Page.