When I grew up in central Europe in the 1960s and 70s, life was a lot simpler than it is today. No internet, no computers (although we had an IBM 360 mainframe at the University of Vienna, which took up a couple of rooms), not even cell phones. It was a peaceful time. With the two World Wars only in the distant memories of parents and grandparents, our knowledge about the world increased exponentially. Science was riding high. Getting access to this knowledge was more cumbersome than it is today, but it was straightforward.
Say, for example, you wanted to know how new stars are forming. You first had to find your way to a library and look for a book, something like Astronomy 101. Today it would be called Astronomy for Dummies. And that would tell you all you need to know about the process of star formation. Or, you could have invited a professional from a nearby university to give a talk to your group, to your club. After the talk and after having answered all your questions, you would say thank you professor, and that would be that. Back in those days, misinformation and disinformation were foreign words. The phrase ‘alternative facts’ had not yet been invented.
How do we go about looking for new information today? Well, that’s a whole lot easier nowadays. You grab your phone (in case you’re not holding it already) and ask your question. Or you type it in, if you are still from the old school.
Let’s take a question which is slightly more controversial than star formation (at least for some people): climate change. Typing these two words into Google Search, just now, got me 1.77 billion hits. Narrowing the query down to ‘climate change explained’ still gave me an impressive 539 million links, all competing for my attention.
If you are of a curious nature, the internet can provide you with thousands of articles, discussions, comments and even academic papers on the topic of climate change. There are hundreds of informative videos, in case you don’t like reading. A great time to be alive! Is there a problem?
Yes, there is. You will also come across websites which downplay, or simply deny that climate change is happening. To the credit of the internet, it took me quite a while to find such a site. It depends on your preferences. Google looks over your shoulder and quickly learns about what you like to see. This is particularly true for social media.
The challenge today is to sift through the morass of information on offer, and find what is really true.