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A Special Philosopher's Cafe: Confronting the Disinformation Age

2019, Summit Confronting the Disinformation Age, Media + Information

The SFU Philosophers' Café invites people of all ages to an open and inclusive discussion about truth in the modern age.

Lies and mistruths have always been used to sway people’s beliefs, and people have always created false personas. Plato wrestled with how to tell appearance from reality, and suggested that those in “the cave” might choose shadows and reflections over being truly enlightened. Are current times different and, if so, why and how? For example, does the Internet make it easier to create and disseminate persuasive lies? Are snark and falsehood now rewarded with more attention and money than ever before? Or is there nothing new under the sun?

And—the big questions—how important is all this? Is truth essential? Why? And what truth? Can we live with lies? Should we insist on truth in some arenas but accept that anything goes in others? If disinformation is a serious problem, then how do we recognize it and how do we teach this skill?

This event is presented by SFU Public Square, SFU Philosophers' Café and SFU Liberal Arts & 55+ Program.

Wed, 10 Apr 2019

11:00 - 12:30 p.m. (PT)

SFU’s Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue
580 West Hastings Street
Vancouver, B.C.

We respectfully acknowledge that this event takes place on the Unceded, Traditional, Ancestral Territories of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, səl̓ilw̓ətaʔɬ, and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm First Nations.

About Philosophers' Café

Since 1998, Philosophers' Café has engaged philosophers and non-philosophers together in the passionate exchange of ideas. The Liberal Arts and 55+ Program has been offering university-level non-credit courses to older adult learners since the 1970s.

About Confronting the Disinformation Age

SFU Public Square’s 2019 Community Summit considered how the proliferation of disinformation is impacting society and challenging our capacity to make informed decisions about our economic, social, and political lives. Together, we co-created strategies to ensure stronger and healthier information ecosystems and stimulate more connected and resilient communities.

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The Disinformation Age
Information is fundamental to our existence. Without it, we cannot understand or effectively respond to the events that shape our world. Throughout history, campaigns to deliberately spread false information to influence public opinion or obscure the truth have been launched by individuals, organizations, and governments. But today, we’re living in a new age of information facilitated primarily by digital technology. These advancements offer us extraordinary access to facts and data but also allow for harmful, inaccurate, and manipulated information to be created and disseminated at an unprecedented speed, scope, and scale. Falsehoods are pitted against facts in competition for our attention and technology is used to exploit our cognitive functioning without repercussion. In what is being called the “post-truth” era, the distortion of our information landscape is eroding our trust in institutions, political systems, the media, and each other.

Watch

Confronting the Disinformation Age | Trailer

In the News

Philosophy of Fake News and the Diffusion of Disinformation — Siddhartha Bala, The Source (April 8, 2019)

Reports and Resources

Confronting the Disinformation Age | Resources

Books, articles, videos and other resources on disinformation.

Supporters and Partners

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