After nearly 3 years building rbutr, it is time to take a different approach…

rbutr started as a simple idea:

Why can’t I get list of articles which rebut this article?

The simplicity of that idea fails to capture the consequences of having access to such information.

Having now had enough time to really explore the idea behind rbutr, all while struggling with how to communicate the idea to diverse groups of people, I've realised that my biggest problem is that I am still trying to convince people to use an app.

When people are approached with the next big ‘app’ they tend to have certain expectations about that approach. For a start, they only have an incredibly short attention span; 30 seconds is really pushing the limits.

Secondly, they want to judge the app simply by how it looks and how intuitive it is. No one cares that you don’t have a design team and board of usability experts at your disposal; if it isn't beautiful, it probably sucks. (Thanks Apple.)

Finally, and most importantly, what is this app going to do for me today? How is it going to immediately make my life better?

The problem is that rbutr isn’t really an app. I mean, it is, at the moment, but that is a necessary first step. In my head though, rbutr isn’t an app, it is an adjustment to the Internet.

I don’t want people to use an app. I want a revolution.

For me, rbutr is the next step in the story of the Internet. And that is impossible to sell to people who want to know what their immediate personal gain is going to be by installing a plugin.

So, I have to break away from ‘rbutr the app’ and use a different communication channel. Something which allows me more than 30 seconds on Youtube, or 140 characters on Twitter.

I need to write a book.

Every form of media seems to have their own acceptable levels of attention. Ask someone to watch a 40 minute youtube video, and you are pulling teeth. But ask someone to travel for 30 minutes to sit in a theatre for 2 plus hours to watch a movie (with ads!)and that is entirely reasonable.

Equally, expecting people to even read this article here is already pushing people to their limits. Most won’t give it the time. When it comes to the written word, books are still the only viable medium for holding anyone’s attention.

So….I need to write a book.

I doubt this book will be particularly long. I don’t think I have that much to say, but I do think that what I have to say is important.

Ending false beliefs

This probably won’t be the book’s title. But it is what the book will be about.

The current plan is to write it in three main sections.

Section 1. False Beliefs — The biggest threat to society

The main thrust will be about how harmful false beliefs are. My central premise is going to be that when people believe things which aren't true, not only do those beliefs hurt those people, but they hurt society as a whole.

I will explore a couple of examples of how false beliefs are costing society right now, taking up resources like time, money, lives and compounded progress. Ideally I would like to be able to (very roughly) quantify these costs, but I am not sure if that will be possible without a more rigorous academic investigation than I am able to give it.

The objective of this section will be to leave the reader with no doubt that false beliefs are actually the biggest problem in our world — leading to, causing or simply aggravating virtually every other problem we struggle to deal with.

Section 2. Correcting False Beliefs — The impossible challenge

Having made the case that false beliefs are the primary cause of societal self-harm, this section will be all about explaining why we haven’t managed to destroy false beliefs already.

With instant access to more information than the world has ever known before, it seems like we should be a society of supremely knowledgeable individuals. Of course this isn’t the case and the reasons for that are multifaceted and complicated.

So this section will explore the psychology of belief formation and changing our minds.

Confirmation bias and the backfire effect will feature prominently.

The ultimate purpose of this section will be to convince the reader that changing people’s minds is a lost battle. If we want to destroy false beliefs then we will have to find another way to destroy them.

Section 3. Inoculating minds — How the war will be won.

This section will be spent explaining how the Internet can be improved so as to significantly reduce the spread of false beliefs into new minds.

I will argue that since we can’t destroy false beliefs (people won’t change their minds), of all of the remaining options, only one is viable. We need to strengthen the ‘immune system’ of the brain to resist forming bad beliefs to begin with.

The method to do this is to fix the Internet so that it is no longer simply a passive information retrieval system, but is also a critical reflection tool. That is, by providing people access to articles which critically analyse whatever it is they are currently consuming, then those people will be actively reminded to doubt the information they are consuming, actively shown how to doubt that information, and provided more information on the subject at hand.

The Internet would thus have its own false belief immune system — not one which destroys false beliefs, but one which reduces incidences of transmission.

With every idea on the Internet providing access to the best possible critical analysis of that idea, we should expect to see the transmission of bad ideas and false beliefs drop significantly.

Much more importantly, we would also see the next generation growing up with an experience of the world where all ideas are framed within a critical context. Every claim should be critically analysed. Every idea is open to question. Dogma disappears from their world entirely.

When we have an entire generation critically evaluating all ideas, from a fully informed perspective in all cases, the false beliefs will slowly die out, left hiding only in the brains of the older generations.

(This is a video of a workshop I gave in 2013 which effectively makes the arguments that I plan on writing the book around)

What’s the point?

The objective of all of this isn’t necessarily to have everyone read the book (though that would be great). The main objective is just to reach the minds of the influential people. If I can influence the influencers, then I can make a difference.

Firstly, I want to reach the science communicators out there who continue to ignore rbutr despite it providing so many solutions to so many of the problems they rail against.

Secondly, the Internet people, like Tim Berners-Lee who even when creating the web wanted a semantic web. This isn’t exactly what he was thinking, but this works and is available as soon as someone like him says that he wants it.

Thirdly, the key influencers. Being able to give a TED talk would make a huge difference — but despite a fantastic contact with TED organisers, they weren’t the slightest bit interested in rbutr. If I can get a mildly successful book on the subject though, then that might be a different story.

That’s all

That is the plan for the moment.

This plan doesn’t actually change anything at all about rbutr-as-app. rbutr still exists. It is still active. It will continue to grow.

The only change is that I plan on putting more of my energy into this plan than in trying to reach people on account of rbutr the app.

If you have any comments, criticisms or just want to help out, then please let me know. You can reach me with shane at rbutr. Thanks!