the deformation age.
Because information is a commodity item, it must cater to the tastes of its consumers. In other words, information is shaped by cultural priorities. The priorities of contemporary America include selfishness and entertainment. Therefore, information should be about me and be fun. The "entertainment economy" affects every kind of information, from news to advertising, to sermons, to college textbooks. American culture is also increasingly visual. Therefore, information should be visual or at least contain lots of color pictures. Publishers may hold their noses when they publish some books, but if those books sell, those books are published. Self help books take up many feet of shelf space in the average bookstore because those books move through the cash register and out the door.
"For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths."
The information we receive comes to us filtered, selected, slanted, verbally charged, and sometimes fabricated. What is left out is often even more important than what is included. Bias and perspective are a large part of this, together with worldview or ideology (some things must be true while others are not permitted to be true), but so too is the idea that information or "truth" is now just a story, with every teller feeling the right to add or alter details. And of course, as the proverb says, "The central work of life is interpretation." What facts mean is a major issue. What assumptions underlie interpretations?
Some people have ideologies which are much more powerful than a mere concern for truth or even reality, and they are quite willing to bend or fabricate information to support their beliefs.
don't wear a blindfold in the scottish pastures, k?
"For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths."
The information we receive comes to us filtered, selected, slanted, verbally charged, and sometimes fabricated. What is left out is often even more important than what is included. Bias and perspective are a large part of this, together with worldview or ideology (some things must be true while others are not permitted to be true), but so too is the idea that information or "truth" is now just a story, with every teller feeling the right to add or alter details. And of course, as the proverb says, "The central work of life is interpretation." What facts mean is a major issue. What assumptions underlie interpretations?
Some people have ideologies which are much more powerful than a mere concern for truth or even reality, and they are quite willing to bend or fabricate information to support their beliefs.
don't wear a blindfold in the scottish pastures, k?