Goodbye to the year of the Big Lie; hello, reverse centaur

We live in a world of lies, damned lies, and AI hallucinations.A US publication calculated that Donald Trump told 30 573 lies during his first term as president. 1 Trump is neither alone nor atypical-except that his rate of lying and the thickness of his brass neck may be unprecedented.A lie, they say, travels halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on.Today, a lie travels so fast that the truth might as well stay in bed.We live in the era of the Big Lie.The more powerful you are, the bigger the lie you can tell.Nobody holds you to account.We no longer call lies "lies": they are alternative facts, different versions of the truth, and-in perhaps the most sinister twist-hallucinations.Our old fashioned, and possibly unfashionable, view at The BMJ is that words and facts do matter.