{"podcast":{"title":"Conspicuous Cognition Podcast","slug":"conspicuous-cognition-podcast-7664943","podcast_index_feed_id":7664943,"rss_url":"https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/2203516.rss","website_url":"https://www.conspicuouscognition.com/podcast","image_url":"https://substackcdn.com/feed/podcast/2203516/fdda2c63aa545f2abe5246b8b98e9035.jpg","author":"Dan Williams","episode_count":15,"summary":"Writer. Academic philosopher. Writing about philosophy, psychology, evolution, politics, artificial intelligence, and more.","last_synced_at":null,"page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspicuous-cognition-podcast-7664943"},"episode":{"title":"AI Sessions #8: Misinformation, Social Media, and Deepfakes (with Sacha Altay)","slug":"ai-sessions-8-misinformation-social-media-and-deepfakes-with-sacha-altay","published_at":"2026-01-23T17:40:02+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspicuous-cognition-podcast-7664943/ai-sessions-8-misinformation-social-media-and-deepfakes-with-sacha-altay","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspicuous-cognition-podcast-7664943","url":"https://www.conspicuouscognition.com/p/ai-sessions-8-misinformation-social","audio_url":"https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/185546769/79a51e97755eda018f296d01087a1778.mp3","summary":"Henry and I chat with Dr Sacha Altay about: * How prevalent is misinformation? * What even is “misinformation”? * Is there a difference between politics and science? * How impactful are propaganda, influence campaigns, and advertising? * What impact has social media had on modern democracies? * How worried should we be about the impact of generative AI, including deepfakes, on the information environment? * The “liar’s dividend” * Whether ChatGPT is more accurate and less biased than the average politician, pundit, and voter. Links * Sacha Altay * “ Misinformation Reloaded? Fears about the Impact of Generative AI on Misinformation are Overblown ” Felix M. Simon, Sacha Altay, & Hugo Mercier * “ Don’t Panic (Yet): Assessing the Evidence and Discourse Around Generative AI and Elections ” Felix M. Simon & Sacha Altay * “ The Media Very Rarely Lies ” Scott Alexander * “ How Dangerous is Misinformation? ” Dan Williams * “ Scapegoating the Algorithm ” Dan Williams * “ Is Social Media Destroying Democracy—Or Giving It To Us Good And Hard? ” Dan Williams * “ Not Born Yesterday: The Science of Who We Trust and What We Believe ” Hugo Mercier * Joseph Uscinski * “ Durably Reducing Conspiracy Beliefs Through Dialogues with AI ” Thomas H. Costello, Gordon Pennycook, & David G. Rand * “ The Levers of Political Persuasion with Conversational AI ” Kobi Hackenburg, Ben M. Tappin, et al. * Ben Tappin Chapters * 00:00 Understanding Misinformation: Definitions and Prevalence * 04:22 The Complexity of Media Bias and Misinformation * 14:40 Human Gullibility: Misconceptions and Realities * 27:28 Selective Exposure and Demand for Misinformation * 29:49 Political Advertising: Efficacy and Misconceptions * 35:13 Social Media’s Role in Political Discourse * 40:50 Evaluating the Impact of Social M…","meta_description":"Henry and I chat with Dr Sacha Altay about: * How prevalent is misinformation? * What even is “misinformation”? * Is there a difference between politics a…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":5004,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/conspicuous-cognition-podcast-7664943/episodes/ai-sessions-8-misinformation-social-media-and-deepfakes-with-sacha-altay/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspicuous-cognition-podcast-7664943/ai-sessions-8-misinformation-social-media-and-deepfakes-with-sacha-altay.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}