Beware of side effects of psychological "Vaccine" being developed by psychologists.
So, scientists are claiming that they developed a psychological “vaccine” against fake news. I think it is fabulous news for health and welfare of humanity (topic of this blog) and tremendous tool to save democracy.
But I do think that the result of such psychological “vaccine” will have potential far reaching unintended consequences, and I doubt very much that the “vaccine” will be rolled out any time soon to general public.
It is very unlikely that “vaccine” will be specific enough for our brains to use it specifically on news. What about cross-reactivity with political messages and marketing?
It will be a disaster for our stable political systems if inoculated public was to see through manipulations used by media (“Jeremy Corbyn is an anti-Semite” meme), collusion between media oligarchs and politicians, hypocrisy of “chumocracy” or large scale precision manipulation of public opinion (see: Cambridge Analytica and Brexit) .
But such side effects would be nothing in comparison to damage it would make to our economy and way of life. The life satisfaction surveys repeatedly show that there is a spending cap beyond which happiness does not improve.
This is where marketing comes in: it creates dissatisfaction with status quo and offers consumerism as a cure. Can we imagine the sheer damage to economy if we could see clearly through such manipulation? Even worse: what if children were to learn to spot the fake marketing claims before they are hooked on dopamine hits from western diet and and relentless consumerism.
It would end the world as we know it.
But look at the paper again: it is not really looking to stop people seeing through the fake news - it is really searching for a way to successfully persuade people who hold rigid, unwelcome and unwanted beliefs to be become susceptible to re-education.
https://vip.politicsmeanspolitics.com/2021/02/20/covid-19-misinformation-scientists-create-a-psychological-vaccine-to-protect-against-fake-news/
2. Sagarin, B. J., Cialdini, R. B., Rice, W. E., & Serna, S. B. (2002). Dispelling the illusion of invulnerability: The motivations and mechanisms of resistance to persuasion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83(3), 526–541. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.83.3.526
Post photo borrowed from : http://www.subliminalhacking.net/
