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Ask HN: How do I defeat my filter bubble?
4 points by shanusmagnus on Nov 10, 2016 | hide | past | favorite | 2 comments
Like many Americans, I find myself doing some post-election soul searching. I read - a lot - and listen to podcasts - a lot - and travel and blah blah blah and generally try to be aware of the world. But evidence suggests I am way less aware than I thought.

One lesson of all this is that there's only so aware you're going to get of the world when that awareness is mediated by a screen. In other words, much of the solution is probably not technical. But some of it surely could be. Any suggestions on how to use technology, or something systematic, to become a more fully aware person?




I believe educating yourself about things you are exposed to is the way out of the bubble. If you understand how things work underneath, you see them very differently, you see who is trying to do what and not what is presented to you.

Do you read news? Do you listen to what government officials and politicians say and take them seriously? Do you have some trust in law enforcement, in governments, in CEOs and corporations? You shouldn't. Learn about power, influence, state actors, coups, revolutions, media, propaganda, PR, etc. This is the escape you are looking for.


Did people in your bubble make fun of a group? Did they create memes about others and pass them around? Did they dismiss a group's concerns as unimportant or ignorant?

If any of those are true, go find out what those groups, meme targets, unimportants, and ignorants are reading. You probably won't agree with it, but at least you'll understand it.




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