Summary
The talk begins with the observation that liberal democracy is globally in retreat. Lewandowsky highlights that misinformation and disinformation are cited by World Economic Forum experts as the top risk to society over the next 2–10 years, particularly because they undermine the shared epistemological foundations necessary for democratic deliberation.
The political asymmetry in misinformation
Lewandowsky presents empirical evidence that misinformation consumption and dissemination in the United States is heavily concentrated among conservative audiences. Two key datasets illustrate this:
- Facebook data (208 million users): All misinformation on Facebook is consumed, disseminated, or shared predominantly by highly conservative audiences.
- Congressional tweets (2016–2022): Republican members of Congress share significantly more untrustworthy news links than Democrats, as measured by NewsGuard domain quality scores.
He notes this creates a researcher's dilemma: reporting the data accurately invites accusations of political bias, while pretending symmetry misrepresents reality. He chooses to report the data.
Two conceptions of honesty
Central to the talk is Lewandowsky's distinction between two forms of discourse:
- Belief speaking: Honesty defined primarily through sincerity and authenticity — expressing what one genuinely believes or feels in the moment, regardless of factual accuracy. Example: "I really think the Earth is flat."
- Fact speaking: Honesty defined through correspondence to reality — making claims grounded in evidence and verifiable facts. Example: statements about climate, election results, or documented events.
In populist frameworks, belief speaking is elevated as the authentic voice of "the people" against the alleged elitism and deception of expert or institutional "fact speakers." This reframes honesty away from accuracy toward conviction.
Populism as a gateway to misinformation
Lewandowsky argues that populism, characterized by:
- A thin ideology emphasizing a virtuous "people" vs. corrupt "elites"
- Direct appeal to common sense over evidence
- Negation of pluralism and opposition
...inherently privileges belief speaking. This rhetorical shift creates conditions where false claims can be defended as honest if expressed sincerely.
Empirical findings from congressional speech
The team analyzed belief speaking vs. fact speaking in 1.6 million tweets from ~1,000 congressional members and 160,000 news articles they shared:
Result 1: The more fact speaking in a tweet or shared article, the higher the NewsGuard trustworthiness score — true for both parties.
Result 2: The more belief speaking in shared articles, the lower their trustworthiness — a pattern driven almost entirely by Republicans. This suggests belief-speaking rhetoric is a gateway permitting politicians to share low-quality information.
Evidence of "participatory propaganda"
When shown two photographs (Trump's vs. Obama's inauguration) and asked which had more people, 11–26% of Trump voters incorrectly chose Trump's photo despite its obvious falsity. Lewandowsky interprets this not as perceptual error but as deliberate signal-sending ("participatory propaganda") — knowingly choosing false information to support a cause.
Strikingly, highly educated Trump voters were most likely to make this "error," suggesting political conviction, not intellectual limitation, drives the behavior.
Contagion effects: Politicians shape public discourse
The team studied ~10,000 Twitter conversations between politicians and the public (100,000 replies to 10,000 seed tweets). Key findings:
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Rhetorical contagion: When politicians use fact speaking, replies mirror that with increased fact speaking. When politicians use belief speaking, replies increase in belief speaking. This holds even when controlling for selection effects (same individuals replying to the same politician on different occasions with different rhetorical seeds).
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Polarization effect: The more fact speaking a politician uses to seed a conversation, the less polarized the replies. This relationship is causal or quasi-causal, not merely correlational.
These findings underscore the power of political leadership in shaping both the epistemological frameworks and affective tone of public discourse.
Notes
This talk synthesizes empirical research on a key mechanism by which misinformation spreads: the populist redefinition of honesty that prioritizes sincerity over accuracy. The contagion findings (that public discourse mirrors politicians' rhetorical choices) have direct implications for media literacy, political leadership, and democratic norms. The emphasis on belief speaking as a gateway (rather than guarantee) of misinformation sharing is more nuanced than simple left-right partisanship and points to ideology and framing as the relevant mechanisms.