Countries around the world love trotting out their increasing literacy figures. Look, we have a 97% literacy rate among adults! That’s close to 100%! As if that were the most important thing in the world, right? Hah. Nonetheless it’s true more and more people are learning to read, and that more and more knowledge is being consumed. Everyone in the world now has access to vast amounts of information.
This information could, in theory, grant limitless power to an individual. One person with a phone today has more knowledge than the entire Library of Alexandria. If knowledge is power, we are pretty powerful indeed. Then what does the average person do with all this power? Surprisingly, they become less informed. Huh? What gives?
Because not all information is useful information. Different sources contradict each other. Some even contradict themselves. And many sources of information have biases in them, so the consumer must not only understand the nature of the information itself, but also the lens through which that information is presented. Having to process an overwhelming amount of information is as good as having a complete absence of information.
According to some research, “smart” people are more susceptible to cults. This seems like a paradoxical result. Why would intelligent people be more likely to join cults than less intelligent people? Aren’t intelligent people better at making decisions? Aren’t they more well-informed? Indeed, they are more well-informed — but that also means they are also better at making bad decisions, and are more susceptible to being misinformed than people on average.
It’s ironic that the main impact literacy has had on people is that it gave them another means through which to be manipulated. For example, a lot of “news” today no longer can be considered news at all. How “well-informed” someone is about things is not an indicator of how much they really know. Furthermore, this apparent wealth of information has made it difficult for people to form their own opinions. People avoid expressing their opinions because there are already so many out there. Why form your own opinion when you can just take one that already exists? As a result, many people excuse themselves from having to use their ability to think.
At the end of the day, the purpose of any kind of information is to convey some kind of underlying message. With all this random information floating around, any semblance of an underlying meaning is lost. Hence, people who consume large amounts of information are no more aware of the world than people who close off their minds and actively avoid consuming information. Now more than ever, it pays to be selective about what you consume.