The fragility of truth: Social epistemology in a time of polarization and pandemic

This essay introduces a thematic issue of Transcultural Psychiatry presenting selected papers from the 2022 McGill Advanced Study Institute in Cultural Psychiatry on "The Fragility of Truth: Social Epistemology in a Time of Polarization and Pandemic." The COVID-19 pandemic, political polarization, and the climate crisis have revealed that large segments of the population do not trust the best available knowledge and expertise in making vital decisions regarding their health, the governance of society, and the fate of the planet. What guides information-seeking, trust in authority, and decision-making in each of these domains? Articles in this issue include case studies of the dynamics of misinformation and disinformation; the adaptive functions and pathologies of belief, paranoia, and conspiracy theories; and strategies to foster and maintain diverse knowledge ecologies. Efforts to understand the psychological dynamics of pathological conviction have something useful to teach us about our vulnerability as knowers and believers. However, this individual psychological account needs to be supplemented with a broader social view of the politics of knowledge and epistemic authority that can inform efforts to create healthy information ecologies and strengthen the civic institutions and practices needed to provide well-informed pictures of the world as a basis for deliberative democracy, pluralism, and co-existence.