Waves of falsehoods weaponize emotions

We’re living in an age where emotions are weaponized, and personal beliefs often carry more weight than cold, hard facts. Welcome to the post-truth era, where manipulated narratives sweep across social media like wildfire, bending reality and distorting truth. People don’t just hear misinformation—they feel it, and that emotional resonance shapes their beliefs. The result? Waves of falsehoods that too often drown out what’s real.

Don Quixote and the Power of Emotional Manipulation

#GreenTruth friend @Nicholas Robinson hit the nail on the head: manipulation of emotion has become an art form. Take a seemingly absurd claim—"they're eating cats and dogs"—and watch as people, driven by a need for meaning, construct elaborate, false realities around it. His analogy of Don Quixote's "tilting at windmills" illustrates how society gets trapped in these delusions, chasing shadows instead of facts. But here’s the thing: we know it’s happening. And now it’s time to do something about it.

Step Up!

We need a counteroffensive—and it starts with science, academia, publishers, and governments working together to fight back against this tide of misinformation.

Waves of falsehood are sweeping over society, we don’t have to sit back and watch as misinformation takes over. It’s time for action—and the fight doesn’t just rest on governments and academia. Scientific research publishers, research hubs, and the sustainable innovation ecosystem must rise to the occasion and play a critical role in reclaiming truth.

1. Speed Up the Truth: We can’t let fake news get a head start. Governments, publishers and academic institutions must move faster to get scientific, fact-based information out there—open access, simplified, and accessible to everyone. The public can’t wait weeks for peer-reviewed journals to release truths when lies are already going viral.

If misinformation spreads fast, the truth must spread faster.

2. Speak Plainly, Speak Loudly: It’s not enough for experts to know the facts; they need to communicate them in ways everyone understands. If the truth is locked behind technical jargon, it’s as good as lost. We need scientific voices that can cut through the noise, reach people’s hearts, and inspire rational action.

Let's use AI to enhance transversal thinking for everyone, not just a select few.

3. Educate to Empower: This fight starts in the classroom. Governments must invest in education that teaches people to think critically, question what they hear, and demand evidence. Let’s create a society that doesn’t just accept information passively but interrogates it with the scrutiny it deserves.

Don't teach answers, teach how to ask the right questions

4. Reclaim the Power of Emotion: If manipulation of emotion is the weapon of the post-truth age, then let’s fight fire with fire—but in service of the truth. Science can inspire just as powerfully as lies. We need narratives based on facts that are just as engaging, relatable, and human. It’s time to show that truth isn’t cold or detached—it’s something we all can connect with.

Let's move from a reality where someone on a 67-million-view TV show can exploit rumors about citizens eating dogs to manipulate emotions and drive attention, to a future where such manipulations can’t even be conceived because the audience is immune to deceit.

5. Fund Sustainable Innovation—We need more enlightened investors who invest in technologies and breakthroughs that don’t just disrupt markets, but expand human life, improve the planet, and empower future generations. We may need more crowd-based effort in funding to ensure that project models strike a balance between impact and profitability.

I simply can’t let the echo chambers win. A few years ago, I decided to Step Up, Speak Green Truth, and Bootstrap Sustainable Innovation with QuTii and TiiQu. This isn’t just about countering misinformation—for me, it’s about actively driving progress and making a meaningful impact.