We’re currently experiencing a deluge of information, the veracity and quality of which is getting ever harder to determine. Polarisation is on the rise and it seems as if everyone can now decide their own truth. Faith in facts and experts appears to have evaporated.  

 

If it remains contained within narrow echo chambers, increased ‘noise’ in the system can have a limited real world impact.

But there are places in which opinions and beliefs carry more weight and have more impact. For example, in representative democracies. If our elected representatives adopt views that are not underpinned by evidence, and are extreme and unjustified, then this undermines our ability to tackle problems that affect the common good.

 

‘Alternative facts’ in these fora can have an outsized impact, undermining the protection of public health and environmental standards and helping to stoke nationalism. But they can also lead to harmful and unnecessary obstacles to economic development, human prosperity and progress.  

Extremism and unsupported assertions erode political will and are damaging no matter from which end of the political spectrum they originate.

 

Fortunately, humanity has invented tools that enable us to make sense of huge volumes of data which means we can track and respond to political discourse more effectively. 

 

Our goal is to shine a light on the conversations that matter, the debates that shape our collective rule making processes.

 

Our tools will enable signals to be detected amid the noise and allow us more easily to hold our elected representatives to account, reducing polarisation.