THE WORLD STILL HAUNTED BY DEMONS: CARL SAGAN AND THE URGENCY OF CRITICAL THINKING

Abstract

SAGAN, Carl. The World Haunted by Demons: Science Seen as a Candle in the Dark. Trans. Rosaura Eichemberg. 1st ed. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2006.

Fake News, Pseudoscience, and Conspiracy Theories: Symptoms of an Era Marked by Disinformation. It is a fact that in the information society, we are constantly bombarded with the most varied statements, hypotheses, beliefs, gossip, and conspiracy theories from a variety of media outlets, especially the internet and social media. This is partly due to a radical paradigm shift in the evolution of media, which now takes on an air of extreme agility and liquidity, without the necessary time to filter the information received. This culminates in the unbridled consumption of scattered ideas without any rigor or criteria, making viewers susceptible to a strategy of mass disinformation, given its enormous power of seduction. Therefore, critical thinking becomes an essential tool in times of disinformation.