[Note: As always, before reading this post, if you are new to the party, my first post is a prerequisite to every other post which can be found at
This level of deliberate confusion over what might be considered justifiable knowledge is causing an enormous amount of conflict and polarization today. You could arguably say that, for example, if you accepted the values, definitions and assumptions of Christian Science while rejecting other value sets that did not permit the coherence of religion with the modern understanding about how the universe is structured, that it would be more about group selection instead of it being an instance of the deliberate manipulation of someone's perceptions for nefarious ends. You have to ask which values, assumptions, and definitions should I go with? Do you simply defer to the value set the majority of what the Scientific Community has agreed with because they are who they are, or do you go with your own value system and then judge what results you choose to give weight to based off of how well they align? I know for myself, I find that I disagree quiet often with what people claim usually because of an assumption or decision that turned left instead of right which was made at step two or three of a 50 step argument or explanation... Does that mean there would be nothing that someone would be able to take from others who hold differing foundations? Is the fact that certain 'authorities' (who are operating on assumptions, values and definitions that you do not agree with) have already been shaping someone's worldview a sign of how easy it is to fall victim to agnotologic manipulations and that the solution would be to double down on examining foundations to see what the correct values, assumptions, and definitions would be as far as choosing which conclusions and world views to endorse? Should you even be interested in what the conclusions would be given a certain value, assumption and definition set or should you try picking values, assumptions and definitions based off of their own merit and sticking with whatever result you get?
Would the ONLY way for someone to be confident on something was if they knew all of the values, assumptions, and definitions that went into the foundational levels of any given domain? People in Academia would immediately say that you do not need to have a complete inside and out understanding of the foundations of mathematics in order to be able to do mathematics, so why wouldn't the same be true about neuroscience, psychology, physics? That's certainly not true for things like physics and (good) philosophy, so why wouldn't it also not be true for psychology and really anything else you may work with, otherwise aren't you going with the story you were given without really understanding what your doing? If I give you some primitives to work with and then you go off and combine them together in complex ways instead of first learning why those primitives were chosen (or even exist in the first place) and not other primitives to work with, could that be justifiable in any sort of intellectually honest way?
You don't have to be told a lie in order to be manipulated into holding unjustified levels of doubt (or confidence) about something by those who use doubt as their weapon, though being tricked by lies can be the fastest way to skew your perceptions. It could be that the information that was presented, while being true, is not relevant to the specific focus of whatever judgement or decision you are making while on the surface 'feeling' as though it could plausibly be relevant, or that it could be relevant to the decision but made to 'feel' as if it is more relevant than it really is. Another common thing is to make an assertion or manipulation and then leave out a piece of relevant information which would have provided the proper nuance which would have significantly changed your level of doubt/confidence in whatever it was.
So how is it that the 'flow of influence' is typically controlled to create unjustified levels of doubt other than by agnotoligic means? Well, marketing tactics are involved where specific human 'automatic responses' are exploited to either prime an individual with the smallest of nudges or with other strategies (or at other points in larger strategies) that I like to call the 'sledge hammer effect' where you are invaded by a massive amount of emotional/psychological pressure in a very short period of time. Using the sledge hammer effect is (to my experience) usually reserved for very crucial moments while the nudges are used to prime you before the larger invasion, remember this is about influence over decisions based on information. So what are the typical 'automatic responses' or other vulnerable areas where humans can easily be guided to one conclusion over the other? There is a wonderful book that I would recommend to people who are interested in typical marketing tactics which is called 'Influence', it was written by a professionally trained marketer who goes into specific categories of attack but from the self-defense side. The book mainly focuses on 'Cognitive Biases' that have been evolutionarily ingrained into the human psyche, like the bandwagon effect or the cultural impact that presumed authorities have based solely off of specific cues as opposed to legitimately holding a position.
As someone who has spent 'some' time deliberately learning about Cognitive Biases and Logical Fallacies, it is apparent that you can learn to recognize and lower 'some' of the effects of influence whenever a Red Herring comes up just by being able to label the category to which the manipulation belongs however it is not necessary to consciously memorize the different labels as long as you know the process by which these errors and manipulations are typically structured, its the way you think that is important. As far as implementing self defense tactics against those who use doubt as their weapon, I would say that the ability to be aware of what you know to be true and why you know it, as in literally asking yourself what is it that you know that has a high enough certainty to be sure enough to operate with and what does not as in something that has enough doubt to not be certain enough to operate with (its the unfortunate reality with this kind of warfare that if you are to have any shot at developing accurate models of reality, you need to become proficient with this sort of process). Work on developing a strong and skeptical Devil's Advocate to check everything you assume and operate on, a specific focus on what the true incentives for the players involved is also important, learning to recognize Logical Fallacies and where you yourself hold Cognitive Biases, and most importantly to know when to make a move and when not to make a move. To be honest, I don't think I have mastered most of what would be needed to fight off these sorts of attacks completely, but I do know some of the tricks they use and wanted to share. I also know its a thing that, just like everything else, takes practice. Good luck.
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