Space

Space and Fake News

18 October 2019 | Written by Alberto Laratro

Among aliens, lunar hoaxes and secret Nazi bases, space is one of the most popular themes for fake news. We asked astrophysicist Luca Perri why.

The space has been defined as the new border to be explored, and like all the border areas, even the stories that are told about these places are on the border between real and fantasy. It may be because space is a place foreign to our personal experience, it will be because it both fascinates and frightens us, or it will be science fiction films that have spoiled our imagination a little, the fact remains that when we talk about issues related to astronautics or astronomy, hoaxes, conspiracy theories and fake news are plentiful.

 

The situation in Italy. This is confirmed by a report by the Authority for communications guarantees: On average, misinformation has affected 8% of online information content produced monthly last year and has mainly concerned news and political topics (in 53% of cases) and news of a scientific nature (18% of the contents of disinformation).

To try to understand the matter better, we talked about it in a minute with Luca Perri, an astrophysicist and scientific divulger. He has collaborated with Rai, DeAgostini, Radio Deejay, Repubblica, Focus and CICAP. He is the author and presenter of the Nautilus program, for Rai Cultura. He has published the books “La pazza scienza” (Sironi Editore), “Errori Galattici” (DeAgostini) and “Astrobufale” (Rizzoli), winner of the COSMOS Award for Students 2019.

 

Watch the video:

Alberto Laratro
Alberto Laratro

Graduated in Communication Studies and with a Master in Communication of Science taken at the SISSA of Trieste, he understood that in his life science and communication are two fixed points.

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