Covid-19 has produced an ongoing epistemological crisis, meaning a problem of determining what counts as "knowledge." A lot of our debates about covid-related personal behavior and public policy stem from this problem of knowledge. Social media makes it especially acute.
Broadly speaking (and oversimplifying), there are three kinds of knowledge: logical, empirical and revealed. The first two are well-understood. Logical can be mapped symbolically. E.g. If A->B, therefore If not-B->not-A. Empirical means using the senses to gather data.
Scientists use logical and empirical methods together to produce coherent models that explain scientific phenomena. But then there is that third form: "revealed." What I mean by "revealed" is that some trusted authority declares something to be "known" and you accept it as so.
"Revealed" knowledge is usually best for explaining religion - a trusted sacred text, prophet or ritualist tradition signifies that something is true or not. But "revealed" knowledge works in the secular world too - parental "wisdom", institutional "experts", trusted kinfolk, etc
When the first two epistemological realms (logic and empiricism) produce uncertainty, we naturally cling to "revealed" sources. But the problem with covid-19 is that key secular revealed sources - CDC, credentialed medical experts, etc. - were uncertain and oft-contradictory.
So it fell back to "do your own research" on social media to make sense of this novel virus, which naturally opened up the door for charlatans of various stripes. The social media space quickly flooded with a mix of honest uncertainty and dishonest "certainty."
Over time people developed their own empirical understanding of the virus, much of which had to do with contingent factors surrounding the specific time, place and manner one experienced it. Meanwhile, some early scientific observations faced a headwall of personal incredulity.
Alas, early hard-hit communities like NYC fully embraced outdoor masking - and still do - "just to be sure" because that was something one could do in those earliest traumatic days of March/April 2020. People in places spared the earliest waves were less likely to ingrain that.
Couple this uneven trauma experience with mixed messaging from institutional experts and a whole lotta motivated reasoning from explicitly political voices (in the heat of a Presidential election) and you have the recipe for an epistemological crisis.
My son asked me yesterday what was the moment the 2010s became the 2020s. I said, "Oh, Covid-19 for sure." But beyond the immediate health crisis, it will be the epistemological implications that we need to reckon with most in the decade ahead. /end
So this will be a good test of epistemic humility, public policy and mass behavioral change...
https://twitter.com/JonLemire/status/1392887133476638721?s=20
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