Skip to content
EA Crux Project

Reality Fragmentation

📋Page Status
Quality:78 (Good)⚠️
Importance:25 (Peripheral)
Last edited:2025-12-29 (9 days ago)
Words:154
Backlinks:5
Structure:
📊 1📈 0🔗 3📚 0•0%Score: 4/15
LLM Summary:Reality fragmentation is when society splits into incompatible information environments with no shared truth. Brief reference page—see Reality Coherence parameter for comprehensive analysis.
Risk

Reality Fragmentation

Importance25
CategoryEpistemic Risk
SeverityHigh
Likelihoodmedium
Timeframe2030
MaturityEmerging
StatusMeasurable divergence in basic facts
Key ConcernNot disagreement about values—disagreement about reality
Solutions
Epistemic Security

Definition

Section titled “Definition”

Reality fragmentation is when different populations operate with incompatible beliefs about basic facts—not just policy disagreements, but disagreements about what is actually happening in the world.

Section titled “Distinction from Related Risks”
RiskFocus
Epistemic CollapseCan society determine what’s true? — Failure of truth-seeking mechanisms
Reality Fragmentation (this page)Do people agree on facts? — Society splitting into incompatible realities
Trust ErosionDo people trust institutions? — Declining confidence in authorities

Key Evidence

Section titled “Key Evidence”

Cross-partisan news overlap dropped from 47% (2010) to 12% (2024). Large majorities now hold incompatible beliefs about basic events like COVID deaths, election outcomes, and climate data.

AI Acceleration

Section titled “AI Acceleration”

Algorithmic curation → Each user sees different reality → Synthetic content provides infinite confirming “evidence” → Deepfakes fabricate “proof” → Feedback loop strengthens belief silos

Comprehensive Coverage

Section titled “Comprehensive Coverage”

For full analysis of mechanisms, metrics, interventions, and trajectories, see Reality Coherence.

What links here