Post-truth, agnotology and instrumentality on the internet

Abstract

In times of relativisation and discredit of truth, as mere opinion and manipulation (post-truth), and of deliberate use of the production and manipulation of ignorance (agnoto-logy) increasingly mobilised through digital media, the relation between these practices and the core design of the Internet has not yet been addressed. Drawing on the concept of instrumentality and through a dispositf analysis, the article analyses the fundamental design of the Internet and its strategic function, to demonstrate the intertwinement between the latter and the production and management of ignorance as instrument of a third party. The main argument is that agnotology is a systemic component of the Internet that benefits generally unacknowledged values and interests.