BBC Learnings · Section 7

Is this the era of distrust

As well as bringing the world to a halt, the coronavirus epidemic has led to an increase in misinformation –

Level: C1 · 114 sentences

Transcript

  1. As well as bringing the world to a halt,
  2. the coronavirus epidemic has led to an increase in misinformation –
  3. lies and conspiracy theories on the internet.
  4. In an era of fake news,
  5. where even the President of the United States is accused of spreading misinformation,
  6. Could it be that we are living through a crisis in trust?
  7. What is trust?
  8. And who should we place our trust in?
  9. These are some of the questions we'll be discussing
  10. in this programme. And we'll be hearing from a philosopher
  11. who believes the problem is not about trust itself,
  12. but about trustworthiness –
  13. the ability to be trusted as being honest and reliable.
  14. And, as always, we'll be learning
  15. some related vocabulary along the way.
  16. Of course, telling lies and lacking trustworthiness is nothing new.
  17. Just think of the Trojan horse
  18. used to trick the ancient Greeks.
  19. More recently, the American financier Bernie Madoff became
  20. infamous as the biggest swindler in history.
  21. In 2009, he was sentenced to 150 years
  22. in prison for his part in the Ponzi scam.
  23. But how much did he defraud from investors?
  24. That's my quiz question.
  25. $65 million or c $65 billion?
  26. I'll say b $65 million.
  27. OK Rob, we'll come back to that later.
  28. Generally speaking, trust can be described
  29. as a judgement that someone can be believed and relied upon.
  30. When we trust each other, it
  31. makes life easier, quicker and friendlier.
  32. Society can't function without trust,
  33. so does that mean the more trust the better?
  34. Well, not according to philosopher Honora O'Neill.
  35. Here he is speaking to David Edmonds,
  36. presenter of the BBC World Service programme, The Big Idea.
  37. We have another word which is gullible.
  38. And if you simply place trust indiscriminately
  39. without making a judgment about whether
  40. the other person or institution is trustworthy,
  41. then just trusting to luck, as we
  42. say, is probably not a virtue.
  43. There's a difference between trusting someone
  44. because you have good reason to believe them
  45. and being gullible – that's easy to deceive because you
  46. trust and believe people too quickly.
  47. If you don't judge who is trustworthy and who is not,
  48. you are trusting to luck – simply believing
  49. or hoping that things will happen for the best.
  50. But being gullible and trusting to luck
  51. is exactly how Bernie Madoff was able to trick
  52. so many people into giving him their money.
  53. Their biggest mistake was to trust him indiscriminately,
  54. in a way that does not show care
  55. or judgment, usually with harmful results.
  56. So if indiscriminately trusting people is such
  57. a bad idea, how do we avoid it?
  58. How can we tell who is trustworthy and who is not?
  59. Here's the BBC World Service's Big Idea presenter,
  60. David Edmonds, asking Onora O'Neill to give some details.
  61. An individual or organisation is trustworthy
  62. if they can justifiably be trusted.
  63. To be trustworthy, they need three ingredients.
  64. First, honesty. People have to be able to believe what they're told.
  65. Second, competence. Beyond honesty and competence,
  66. there's a third element to trustworthiness, reliability.
  67. That's the boring one.
  68. That's just being honest and competent each time
  69. so that it's not enough to be episodically honest
  70. and competent for some of the things you claim
  71. to be able to do but not others.
  72. Philosopher Honora O'Neill identifies three ingredients for trustworthiness.
  73. Honesty, competence and reliability.
  74. Competence means the ability to do something well.
  75. You would trust a car mechanic to fix your broken car engine,
  76. but you wouldn't go to them for dental work.
  77. They're not competent to remove your tooth like a dentist is.
  78. And you wouldn't trust your dentist
  79. to fix your broken-down car either.
  80. Onora O'Neill also mentions reliability – being trustworthy
  81. because you behave well all the time
  82. and keep all the promises you make.
  83. It's the combination of these three – being honest,
  84. competent and reliable – that makes someone truly trustworthy.
  85. And not someone like Bernie Madoff,
  86. who would run off with your money and entire life savings.
  87. All of which brings me to my quiz question.
  88. Do you remember, Rob?
  89. Yeah, I do. You asked how much Bernie Madoff stole
  90. from the American investors he lied to.
  91. And I said b $65 million.
  92. But in fact it was c $65 billion –
  93. a lot of money to give to such an untrustworthy man.
  94. So, we've been discussing whether there is a crisis of trust
  95. and asking how to know who is trustworthy –
  96. able to be trusted as honest, competent and reliable.
  97. Placing your trust in someone trustworthy
  98. is very different from being gullible – easy to trick
  99. because you trust and believe people too quickly.
  100. And it can also be unhelpful to trust things to luck –
  101. simply hope or believe that everything
  102. will work out for the best.
  103. Both of these problems come about when people trust indiscriminately.
  104. in an unsystematic way that does not show care
  105. or judgment, usually with harmful results,
  106. as Bernie Madoff's victims found out to their cost.
  107. But luckily there are many trustworthy people around,
  108. and we can spot them using three criteria – honesty ,
  109. competence and reliability.
  110. Competence means an ability to do something well,
  111. in the correct and effective way.
  112. And reliability means being honest and competent all the time.
  113. not just being honest sometimes or reliable in some actions,
  114. but not others.