Fake News: Disinformation, Deception, and Magical Thinking Over TimeMain MenuConnecticut's Own Bigfoot: The Winsted Wild Man"I Have Convinced Myself": The Cottingley Fairies and the Desire to BelieveCF0Going Viral: Disinformation and the Smallpox VaccineCigarettes: Advertising, Fake News and Fighting ScienceThe tobacco industry in the United States saw huge increases in sales in the 20th century. Industry leaders were early adopters of both advertising, public relations and more subtle forms of product promotion. As research mounted linking cancer to smoking, the industry started a campaign to fight the scientific evidence.Explore Themes in this ExhibitCovid - 19: Real Debates and Fake NewsAbout the AuthorsWe did this thing
Fifth and Final Photo of the Fairies and Their Sun-Bath
12019-12-18T18:41:11+00:00Joelle Thomas0feb3b2b7a8befeee2c7d2d710d303ed96772141Cottingley Fairies: GalleryJoelle Thomas11very realism, much convincinggallery2020-02-27T18:39:51+00:00Joelle Thomas0feb3b2b7a8befeee2c7d2d710d303ed96772141
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1media/6F714BE1-F803-4A7D-A85F-2004A7743224.jpegmedia/6F714BE1-F803-4A7D-A85F-2004A7743224.jpeg2020-01-09T21:08:30+00:00(Dis)Believing What You See13CF4plain2020-02-14T19:08:01+00:00To modern eyes, Frances and Elsie's staged photographs are not particularly convincing (though there are some who are still willing to entertain Frances's claim that the fifth photo was authentic). The ease and awareness of digital image manipulation have contributed to a more savvy viewing audience in the early twenty-first century than existed in the early twentieth; of course, many of the same tells that a modern viewer might notice were pointed out by contemporary debunkers.
As audiences grow more sophisticated, so do methods of media manipulation. There has much attention recently to deepfakes, which use machine learning trained on video or audio of a particular person to generate new video or audio of that person saying things they never actually said. Deepfakes can be created with humorous or malicious intent, and awareness of them makes the public less likely to trust that any media is authentic.
How does your desire to believe affect your willingness to be accept information that affirms or contradicts your assumptions?
Dismissing any surprising image or video as fake can be every bit as harmful as believing everything that you see. How do you balance healthy skepticism with openness to new information that contradicts your assumptions?
