Truth and democracy in an era of misinformation

Concern about misinformation and its toxic effects on democracy is widespread. A survey of nearly 1500 experts by the World Economic Forum ranked misinformation and disinformation (the latter being intentionally spread, whereas the former may arise accidentally) as the top global risk during the next 2 years. Examples of misinformation-fueled events abound. In the United States, baseless claims about election fraud in 2020 by the losing presidential candidate, Donald Trump, culminated in a violent insurrection against the US Capitol on 6 January 2021. At the time of this writing, Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are fearful of the future after Trump baselessly alleged on national TV that immigrants there were eating their white neighbors' pets-a racist trope dating back centuries. In the UK, right-wing mobs recently attacked mosques and hotels housing asylum seekers on the basis of the false claim that a Muslim refugee had fatally stabbed children at a dance class. The suspect was actually born in Britain, and his family regularly attended a Christian church. The list goes on.