What can we trust? Why is the 'information ecology' so damaged, and what would it take to make it healthy? This is a fundamental question, because without good sensemaking, we cannot even begin to act in the world. It is also a central concern in what many are calling the "meaning crisis", because what is meaningful is connected to what is real.

We are living through an epidemic of mistrust, particularly here in the United States. Trust in social media and traditional media is at an all-time low. Trust in the U.S. federal government to handle problems is at a near-record low. Trust in the U.S.’s major institutions is within 2 percentage points of the all-time low. The consequences are... See more

Sometimes called “the last innocent year,” 1964 was the high point of American institutional trust at 77%, per Gallup polling. Both the failed Vietnam War and corruption scandals at home — such as Watergate and the findings of the Church Committee on CIA abuses — deeply damaged public faith in the following years. By 1979, it had plummeted to 29%.