The Ancient Art of Being Wrong: A Response to AI "Contagion"

© 2025 Charles Sun. All rights reserved.

© 2025 Charles Sun. All rights reserved.

Editor’s Note: This piece was originally published on LinkedIn in June 2025. It is reposted here for archival continuity and broader access via my official publishing hub.

“The most dangerous hallucination isn't the one generated by AI—it's the one that convinces us this is somehow a new problem.”

The recent satirical “study” on “Cross-System Hallucinatory Contagion,” circulating on social media, deserves applause—not for its scientific rigor, but for brilliantly exposing our collective amnesia about human nature.

The "Discovery" That Wasn't

The study's shocking revelation? People often repeat false information from authoritative sources without verifying its accuracy. They cite non-existent studies. They defend fabricated facts when challenged. They mistake confident presentation for truth.

This isn't groundbreaking science. It's Tuesday.

A Brief History of Human Gullibility

For millennia, humans have:

• Repeated "facts" from books, newspapers, and broadcasts without checking sources
• Cited studies they never read (or that never existed)
• Defended misinformation when it came from trusted authorities
• Confused eloquence with accuracy

We've seen this with medical quackery, political propaganda, urban legends, and academic fraud. The medium changes—stone tablets, printing presses, radio waves, television signals, internet posts—but the pattern remains identical.

The Real Question

Instead of marveling at AI's supposed power to "infect" human cognition, we should ask: Why, after centuries of being misled by authoritative-sounding sources, haven't we developed better critical thinking habits?

The problem isn't that AI is uniquely persuasive. It's that humans have always been uniquely lazy about verification. We've always preferred cognitive shortcuts over cognitive effort. We've always mistaken fluency for truth and confidence for competence.

The Uncomfortable Truth

What we're witnessing isn't AI "contagion"—it's the latest chapter in humanity's long romance with intellectual shortcuts. AI didn't create our tendency to outsource thinking; it just gave us a more sophisticated partner in that dance.

The real "contagion" isn't synthetic—it's our persistent refusal to do the hard work of thinking critically, regardless of whether our information comes from a chatbot, a CEO, a professor, or a LinkedIn influencer promising revolutionary insights.

The Way Forward

Perhaps instead of studying how AI "infects" human cognition, we should study why human cognition remains so consistently vulnerable to infection—artificial or otherwise.

The cure isn't just better AI. It should be much better humans. And that's been true since long before we taught machines to hallucinate as confidently as we do.

📚 Citation Formats for This Article:

APA (7th Edition) Citation

Charles Sun. (2025, September 23). The ancient art of being wrong: A response to AI "contagion". IPv6 Czar's Blog. https://ipv6czar.blogspot.com/2025/09/the-ancient-art-of-being-wrong-response.html

Charles Sun. (2025, June 13). The ancient art of being wrong: A response to AI "contagion". LinkedIn Pulse. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ancient-art-being-wrong-response-ai-contagion-charles-sun-sjjze/

MLA (9th Edition) Citation

Sun, Charles. "The Ancient Art of Being Wrong: A Response to AI 'Contagion'." IPv6 Czar's Blog, 23 Sept. 2025, https://ipv6czar.blogspot.com/2025/09/the-ancient-art-of-being-wrong-response.html.

Sun, Charles. "The Ancient Art of Being Wrong: A Response to AI 'Contagion'." LinkedIn Pulse, 13 June 2025, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ancient-art-being-wrong-response-ai-contagion-charles-sun-sjjze/.

Chicago (17th Edition) Citation

Charles Sun. "The Ancient Art of Being Wrong: A Response to AI 'Contagion'." IPv6 Czar’s Blog. September 23, 2025. https://ipv6czar.blogspot.com/2025/09/the-ancient-art-of-being-wrong-response.html

Charles Sun. "The Ancient Art of Being Wrong: A Response to AI 'Contagion'." LinkedIn Pulse. June 13, 2025. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ancient-art-being-wrong-response-ai-contagion-charles-sun-sjjze/

#AI #GENAI #AIHallucinations #GenerativeAI #AICognitiveRisk #Misinformation #Disinformation #AIEthics #TrustInAI #SyntheticCertainty #CognitiveContagion #AIimpact #LargeLanguageModels #CriticalThinking #DigitalLiteracy #AIandHumanBehavior #InformationPathogen #CognitiveOutsourcing #TechAccountability #GenerationalDivide

Disclaimer: The views presented are only personal opinions and they do not necessarily represent those of the U.S. Government.

© 2025 Charles Sun. All rights reserved.