Daily Reads-2020: Article-51

Article Title: How Celebrity Non-Experts and Amateur Opinion Could Change the Way We Acquire Knowledge

Article Summary

This article discusses how celebrity non-experts and amateur opinion could change the way we acquire knowledge. Its starts on the note that the prediction by digital media entrepreneur Andrew Keen in 2007 that the user generated focus of Web 2.0 would lead to a reduction of well researched and factual information – and in turn the rise of amateur opinion, is turning out to be correct now 11 years later.

The main issue is that through Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, people – particularly celebrities – are also able to promote products and ideas in a much more immediate and visual way. And to frame or reinvent themselves as experts in completely different areas than the ones they gained fame in. The article has highlighted this point through different examples.

The conclusion states that as social media has proved that people can be successful with no obvious qualifications or training, and point of view increasingly confirms people’s perspectives, scientific expertise might arguably be eroded.While many people have benefited financially and in terms of social status, the quality of knowledge that has emerged from social media is increasingly narrow and difficult to gauge.

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Words to learn from this Article:

Prognosis: a forecast of the likely outcome of a situation.
Emulate: match or surpass (a person or achievement), typically by imitation.
Empirical: based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic.
Pseudoscience: a collection of beliefs or practices mistakenly regarded as being based on scientific method.
Proliferation: rapid increase in the number or amount of something.
Narcissism: excessive interest in or admiration of oneself.