In the crazy world we live in today everything seems upside down. We are constantly dealing with half truths and full facades. We have been bombarded with the fake news narrative worldwide and so much of it is actually true. So I was thinking about this the other day and discussing with my family and friends over a weekend dinner and we all had very much the same response to this global crisis. All of us believe that we should read more to stay aware of all that's going on.
When I say read I don't mean just randomly read anything. I think the first thing we need to do is train ourselves to be critical thinkers. We should be able to analyse a situation quickly and objectively without bias. Then we can decide what to read and what to trust. Also, when we start reading about any topic I feel instead of actually reading what's written our first instinct should be to make sure that we are reading from the original source of the information and not consuming information from a second hand source.
I know it's not easy to determine the source of everything we read but if we inculcate this habit of ensuring that the original source is our first priority and then sit down and read the information and later consult other sources then we will be able to become at least slightly better if not much better judges of what's true and what's fake.
This is why I believe we should spend some time reading philosophy and science. For example, Greek philosophy teaches us how the great philosophers constructed their thoughts and how they explored the wonders of the world even without modern technology. They were able to talk about many things that even modern day humans feel scared to discuss. That's because they were so in love with the idea of thinking about things and articulating them in their writings or their debates.
Modern science is an astonishing thing. I have always been in love with science but for the last couple of years I have realised that science provides us with a framework for thinking about problems more clearly. We can use first principles and the approach used in the scientific method to ensure that we are not believing propaganda and nonsense. As the great explainer Richard Feynman once said -
"Science is what we have learned about how to keep from fooling ourselves."
Reading science regularly prevents us from easily falling for fake medicine scams and fake doctors but also from not being so gullible that we simply trust what presumed experts say about certain topics. By reading science we can develop the cognition to determine on our own who is really an expert and who is fake.
I love reading philosophy and science and teach and encourage my daughter to explore these wonderful ideas at her own pace. I am also very fortunate to have a husband and a brother who share the same interest.
So friends I encourage everyone to read more philosophy and science so that we can learn to combat fake news of all kinds on our own through critical thinking and common sense.
Peace and love to all.