‘It’s all a cover up!’: An Examination of Epistemic Vices and Conspiracy Theories in the Internet Age

Conspiracy theories and fake news can be found in both off and online discourse. With COVID-19 still mutating, the same can be said for disinformation. At the beginning there were conspiracies that COVID- 19 was engineered to prevent global population growth, and now on vaccine hesitancy, with some conspiracies pointing to embryos being used as an ingredient to the vaccines. In this paper, I aim to address the era of digitality in which we live, asking and answering fundamental questions such as: what is fake news? How harmful are conspiracy theories? Has there been a shift in the conspiracy theory paradigm? And is there a way to prevent conspiracy theory growth? To answer such questions, I will focus on the philosophical discipline of vice epistemology: vicious intellectual characteristics that can give way to a loss of knowledge i.e., closed- mindedness, lack of thoroughness, dogmatism and more. Moreover, I will introduce my theory ‘Epistemic Cluster Vices’ to categorise each recognised vice into their respective groups and assess whether other epistemic vices can off-shoot from the is a central/ capital vice. It must be stated that my theory is in its embryonic stage and further academic examination is necessary to cement this idea into vice epistemology.

Grantor dc:publisher

Oxford Brookes University

Year dc:date

2021

Author dc:creator

• D'Arcy-Grantham, Joshua Michael

Contributors dc:contributor

• O'Brien, Daniel

Statement dc:rights

• All rights reserved

Language dc:language

en

DOI dc:identifier

https://doi.org/10.24384/2fke-hn07

OAI identifier oai:identifier

tle:5432bd15-607e-4e8a-bacd-1f728811bf45:d6bd9758-527a-46cd-bfe2-c433766e8fca:1