Post-truth as post-democracy
Duration: 53 mins 41 secs
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About this item
| Description: | Professor Rae Langton argues that a living democracy needs and deserves better than post-truth. |
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| Created: | 2018-10-25 12:01 |
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| Collection: | Alumni Festival 2018 |
| Publisher: | University of Cambridge |
| Copyright: | Isabel Ronaldson |
| Language: | eng (English) |
| Abstract: | ‘What is the point of free speech? Truth’, said the philosopher J S Mill; he was partly right. Free speech is not a fisticuff free-for-all. What matters is knowledge, especially the knowledge needed to govern ourselves in a democracy.
‘Post-truth’ was recently the Oxford English Dictionary’s word of the year, made manifest in speech that manipulates and deceives, in the media and on social media networks. But the abandonment of truth would be the death, not the vindication, of free speech. In this session, Professor Rae Langton argues that a living democracy needs, and deserves, better. |
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