i think actual information is way too difficult to suss out these days with the misinformation campaigns and the paywalls and the trolling, etc.

shit try to do some comparison shopping today and try to figure out which reviews are real and if the thing you're buying is really the thing you think you're buying.

Stupidity has never been because of lack of access to information. That's ignorance.

To the people saying that this is because of "laziness" or "lack of curiosity":

I'm bombarded with so much information every day that it's not feasible to fact-check it all. I have to pick my battles and take things I care less about at face value until I have a reason not to.

Nah. We knew the difference between ignorance and stupidity before then.

Lack of applicable or pertinent information is still rampant.

Excess information of the stupifying type is everywhere.

It's still the problem. Information is widely available but misinformation is easier to find and the ones that need information are the ones that find the misinformation

The problem with internet was always that access to bullshit is way easier than access to information. Except now the difference gets exponentially bigger, and bullshit is indistinguishable from truth.

I remember seeing a lot of people expand their horizons on all kinds of topics when the internet first started catching on.

Now I think it was because they were actively looking for understanding something new, and did not represent the general population.

Yes and no. If people had access to correct information, rather than every passing thought anyone has ever had ever, including complete fabrications and things that were never meant to be taken seriously, then they'd probably be okay.

Even making a claim about what is true and factual seems to be a point to be argued on the internet lately.

We've given everyone a voice and access to everyone else's voice as well as access to all information. Most are lost in the noise, and can't find the signal.

Turns out, people are just stupid and the more information access you give them the more they can reinforce their stupidity with other idiots' opinions

People here seem to be mistaking stupidity as a measure of intelligence. Stupidity is a measure of wisdom.

An abundance of information doesn't fix stupidity in the same way that shoveling water out of a boat with a leak won't stop it from sinking.

You have to address the leak before shoveling water becomes productive. Or to circle back around, you have to address how someone learns, parses, and applies information before feeding them more information becomes productive.

We shall not confuse data and information. With internet we have access to a lot of data, but information is hard to find. Furthermore information are structured by the institution that made it : university, TV, newspaper, and social network Those dominant institution are not very interested in homelessness or other class struggle in your neighborhood. So relevant information for your social and geographical position is even more rare.

I truly believe it’s a lack of curiosity, people simply are not interested in learning more than they have to.

That’s why I see curiosity as a gift. Friends think I am intelligent, but I’m simply curious enough to learn things.

Late 90s to 2000s was the decade of internet glory. Then social media and big tech took over. Now with personalized feeds and searches, along with conflict promoting engagement metrics, many people spend their time within echo chambers and those chambers keep getting more partisan. On top of that, rampant misinformation has made it all the more difficult to separate fact from fiction.

Sure, but let's not remove our libraries please.

We've had libraries since long before the Internet. I don't think lack of access to information is as much to blame as lack of time and/or willingness to make an effort.

Also, we live in a culture that celebrates, glorifies and rewards stupidity to an insane degree. There is simply very little incentive for people to try and improve themselves.

Plus the access to misinformation. Now where even more stupiderer,

Kinda? I figured that there's some portion of the population that's not smart - bell-curve statistical distribution and all that. But I always thought that the problem was education, or rather, access to a good^1^ education and all the socio-economic and political boundaries around that.

To be blunt: modest to insanely powerful people have something invested in keeping such barriers high, and it's worrysome.

1. Good = a program that teaches critical thinking and has access to liberal arts, trades, traditional arts, libraries, and information technology.

It's called the Information Deficit Hypothesis.

And yes, it's been proven wrong.

Stupid, ignorant, misinformed, and gullible are all different things.

Access to information helps with ignorance, and even then only if the ignorant person isn't too dumb to understand or hear had their mind poisoned with falsehood.

Pretty sure it's a complex soup of dis/misinformation, conservative (not necessarily the political type) leadership, laziness, indifference, lead poisoning, and a kaleidoscope of logical fallacies.

I think what we currently see is too much misinformation.