Boom: Bubbles and the End of Stagnation
by Byrne Hobart and Tobias Huber · 29 Oct 2024 · 292pp · 106,826 words
of cultural and institutional factors, such as the current incentive structure of science, or whether science itself is approaching an intrinsic epistemic limit. Is the epistemic closure of the scientific frontier unavoidable? This is a matter of debate, but in our view, what prevents us from making more scientific progress is not
A New History of the Future in 100 Objects: A Fiction
by Adrian Hon · 5 Oct 2020 · 340pp · 101,675 words
learn about differing viewpoints has never meant that they’ll take advantage of it. In fact, the internet arguably led to a reinforcing of weak epistemic closure among many groups, a phenomenon which survives to this day in which individuals and communities become stuck in arguments and beliefs that have little to
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new sources that seemed perfectly legitimate at first glance, even if on inspection they didn’t stand up. It was an untethering from reality. Weak epistemic closure was not a new phenomenon, but it took on a new guise as the internet allowed people to pick and choose their news sources and
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beliefs could find a safe harbor online, and even relatively small communities could wield disproportionate political or economic power. Researchers at the time understood that epistemic closure afflicted even highly intelligent people, so more education didn’t seem like a particularly useful solution. However, sociologists at Heidelberg believed that promoting memetic diversity
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rate was far higher than expected. Politics was one of the worst categories for low memetic diversity, with the US Democratic Party showing signs of epistemic closure when compared against the decentralized parties of the new left. But across the world, voters in general tended to be extremely unwilling to consider new
Pity the Billionaire: The Unexpected Resurgence of the American Right
by Thomas Frank · 16 Aug 2011 · 261pp · 64,977 words
a handful of conservatives themselves, such as the blogger Julian Sanchez, have taken note of this phenomenon, which they mourn as a kind of “epistemic closure.” See Patricia Cohen, “‘Epistemic Closure’? Those are Fighting Words,” New York Times, April 27, 2010. 3. Jill Lepore, Whites of Their Eyes: The Tea Party’s Revolution and
The Revolt of the Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium
by Martin Gurri · 13 Nov 2018 · 379pp · 99,340 words
invites counter-revolution by the established order. Again and again, in subject after subject, accredited experts have attempted to regain control over the levers of epistemic closure. At every opportunity, institutional actors attacked the public on the grounds of its uncertainty: for example, the public stands accused of cocooning into a daily
The New Class War: Saving Democracy From the Metropolitan Elite
by Michael Lind · 20 Feb 2020
could claim to be free to run against the American establishment. The rise of charismatic populist tribunes as a response to the increasing social and epistemic closure of Western elites was entirely to be expected. Now that access to political influence depends not on decentralized grassroots party organizations and farm associations and