A Hoax of a Hoax

Normally, we hope not to be duped.  These aren't normal times, it seems.

We've grown to expect hoaxes.  That expectation, when intelligent, allows us to avoid being fooled.  There are many who wish to fool us, so the fact we anticipate they'll try to do so is useful.  We're watchful, we're careful to assess claims made.

That expectation, when unintelligent, leads us to be fooled by foolishly believing what isn't a hoax actually is a hoax.  While we believe we're being watchful and clever, we're in fact accepting a hoax--a hoax that inclines us to think a hoax is being perpetrated regarding what we would accept if we were using our intelligence.  We're in effect being duped twice; by ourselves and by others.

Perhaps we've seen so many hoaxes that we see them everywhere.  It's easier now to perpetuate a hoax than it was in the past, as our technology allows each of us to instantly communicate a hoax or create a hoax which will be instantly presented to millions.  We know, or at least most of know or at least suspect, that there are many who seek to provide false information through the Web and otherwise.  We know that those who seek to influence us are able to try to do so much more effectively than in the past.  There's good reason to believe that hoaxes abound.  

The peculiar thing is that despite this knowledge so many of us are so ready, even eager, to believe there are hoaxes without exercising judgment.  On the lookout for hoaxes, we think them omnipresent.  Many of us accept there is a hoax unthinkingly.  Instead of being on our guard against hoaxes, we are persuaded to accept that they exist without question.  It's an extraordinary compulsion to be suspicious that a hoax is taking place to such an extent that we don't suspect that there may be no hoax.

The saying that a sucker is born every minute is ascribed to P. T. Barnum.  The saying that nobody has ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the American public has been attributed to H. L. Mencken.  Has anyone ever said that we are so concerned about being suckers that we necessarily are suckers?

One can speculate that our time is one of unreasonable, excessive suspicion, i.e. of paranoia.  Or, we can speculate that we're more stupid than we've ever been--something admittedly hard to believe, so spectacular is our record of stupidity.  Thus we think climate change is a hoax, or Covid 19 is a hoax, perpetuated by vaguely identified wrongdoers.  But I wonder if there's something even more insidious at work.

We're not stupider than we have been.  But we may have reached or it may be that we're reaching the limits of our ability, or even capacity, to think reasonably.  That may be due to the fact that we've never had to sift through so much information, so much misinformation, so many opinions, fears, emotions, beliefs, claims, allegations, actions, conduct, than we ever have had to in the past.  We're unable to do so in the face of all that we encounter, knowingly or unknowingly.  So, we react without thinking, and thereby fall back on what we accept without thought.

If we've reached the limit of our ability to think, there's some hope that with training in, for example, logic and the arts of rhetoric, we can process the information which overwhelms us with greater efficiency.  But here in our Great Republic, at least, I think it's likely that parents would object to any learning or training which would make their offspring think differently than they do.  

If we've reached the limit of our capacity to think, it's hard to predict what our fate will be, but there may be those who have the capacity left to think of themselves and what would be best for them (something that can be done by thinking in the narrowest sense, of oneself and nothing else) and act accordingly.