The Potential of Public Discussion in Media

“The Potential of Public Discussion in Media: Philosophy of Democracy and Misinformation,” takes up two perspectives on public discussions in media: the outsider’s third-person perspective and the first-person perspective of the engaged subject. A friend recommended an interesting news article to you that changed your view on the topic. Later, you find out that the information in the article was false. Did you learn something, even though the information was not correct? From the subjective perspective at that moment, the answer is “yes,” but from the objective perspective, you were led false. “The Potential of Public Discussion in Media: Philosophy of Democracy and Misinformation,” takes up two perspectives on public discussions in media: the outsider’s third-person perspective and the first-person perspective of the engaged subject. By investigating public discussion in media through both perspectives, public discussion appears simultaneously both crucial and risky for democracy. The book uses phenomenology to frame the problematic of contemporary public discussions in media, which emphasizes the subjective experience of gaining new information. Minna-Kerttu Kekki is a researcher at the University of Helsinki Center of Excellence in European Studies. She has had previous appointments at the University of Oulu (Finland) and the University of Sussex (UK). A friend recommended an interesting news article to you that changed your view on the topic. Later, you find out that the information in the article was false. Did you learn something, even though the information was not correct? From the subjective perspective at that moment, the answer is “yes,” but from the objective perspective, you were led false. “The Potential of Public Discussion in Media: Philosophy of Democracy and Misinformation,” takes up two perspectives on public discussions in media: the outsider’s third-person perspective and the first-person perspective of the engaged subject. By investigating public discussion in media through both perspectives, public discussion appears simultaneously both crucial and risky for democracy. The book uses phenomenology to frame the problematic of contemporary public discussions in media, which emphasizes the subjective experience of gaining new information.