I of course hearken to my esteemed SR colleague’s bracing call to gloom. But how could one not feel just a little bit joyful at yet another sign of the grass-roots knowledge explosion that the internet has fostered?
an army of volunteer cartographers . . . are logging every detail of neighborhoods near and far into online atlases. From Petaluma to Peshawar, these amateurs are arming themselves with GPS devices and easy-to-use software to create digital maps where none were available before, or fixing mistakes and adding information to existing ones.
How wonderful is that? I don’t possess anywhere near the understanding to be able to imagine where this extraordinary power to generate and share knowledge will lead us, but it seems to me that the results can only be overwhelmingly positive. Yes, of course, there’s internet-enabled pornography and child trafficking, web-based Islamist organizing, and barbaric youth culture multiplied through social networking sties. But the power to aggregate information globally and to connect individuals free of any intervening institutions will surely on balance result in more life-enhancing than life-blighting discoveries. And I’m neither a particular fan of the masses nor an opponent of authority. Yet the internet seems to me a most amazing embodiment of a Hayekian free-market vision of bottom-up innovation. At the very least, apart from its democratic uses, the ability to share scientific knowledge instantaneously can only greatly accelerate our ability to overcome such god-given afflictions as disease and vulnerability to natural disasters.
And no, the internet won’t solve such eternal human problems as the abuse of power, ethnic and national animosity, and the failure to socialize certain segments of the population. But it has already allowed the very best that humans have created to be more universally available than at any time in history. That is cause for unqualified celebration–and even optimism.
The Web has also multiplied the ability to propagate errors and lies. I edit Wikipedia. Very often, I have found a page which is badly written and contains obvious errors. I can fix the bad writing on my own authority, but to correct the errors it’s better to have a reference source. In many cases I find that the Wiki page is the first hit on Google, and that many additional hits are sites that replicated the corrupt Wiki content. (Even in these cases, it’s still possible to find authoritative sites with correct information.)
The Web is especially vulnerable to concerted efforts at concealment and well-poisoning. A determined mob can effectively shout down all opponents.
It’s definitely increased the availability of intellectual garbage: anti-vaccinationists, 9/11 Truthers, Jew-haters, and jihadists all flourish via the Web.