PHILOSOPHICAL-ANTHROPOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF THE MANIPULATION OF MASS CONSCIOUSNESS

Authors

Keywords:

consciousness, manipulation of mass consciousness, cognitive war, artificial intelligence, epistemological crisis, information landscape, algorithmic platforms, social networks, value orientations

Abstract

Based on a wide range of English-language sources, the article analyzes the phenomenon of mass consciousness manipulation. Consciousness is the most important manifestation of spiritual life. Both the life of an individual and the development of the entire civilization and the formation of a corresponding model of reality depend on its functioning. The key question explored in the article is how the technological infrastructure determines the boundaries of the autonomy of consciousness. It reflects the profound transformation of the conditions for the existence of consciousness in the era of digital networks, algorithmic systems of artificial intelligence and a large volume of information flows. Therefore, the purpose of the article is to investigate the manipulation of mass consciousness in the modern era through the prism of philosophical and anthropological analysis. The purpose and objectives of the article determined its methodological basis. The methodology is based on the synthesis of methods of hermeneutics, comparative studies and content analysis. It was found that the basis of mass consciousness manipulation lies in the function of social regulation, control and management. It is found that the concept of "manipulation" is interpreted as the programming of beliefs, desires and other mental states of a person. It is determined that the manipulation of mass consciousness is not only a technological, but also a civilizational phenomenon. The ways in which communities produce, store and transmit meanings are transformed. It is emphasized that consciousness appears not as a cognitive function of the subject, but as a collective symbolic space through which identities, value systems and models of reality are formed

References

Allcott H., Gentzkow M. (2017). Social media and fake news in the 2016 election. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 31(2), 211–236. https://doi.org/10.1257/jep.31.2.211.

Bail C. A., Argyle L. P., Brown T. W., Bumpus J. P., Chen H., Hunzaker M. B. F., Lee J., Mann M., Merhout F., &

Volfovsky A. (2018). Exposure to opposing views on social media can increase political polarization. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 115(37), 9216–9221. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1804840115.

Benkler Y., Faris R., Roberts H. (2018). Network propaganda: Manipulation, disinformation, and radicalization in American politics. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190923624.001.0001.

Bennett W. L., Livingston S. (2020). The disinformation age: Politics, technology, and disruptive communication in the United States. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108914628.

Deppe C., Schaal G. S. (2024). Cognitive warfare: A conceptual analysis of the NATO ACT cognitive warfare exploratory concept. Frontiers in Big Data, 7, Vol. 7. https://doi.org/10.3389/fdata.2024.1452129.

Floridi L. (Ed.). (2015). The onlife manifesto: Being human in a hyperconnected era. Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-04093-6.

Grinberg N., Joseph K., Friedland L., Swire-Thompson B., Lazer D. (2019). Fake news on Twitter during the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Science, 363(6425), 374–378. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aau2706.

Guess A., Nagler J., Tucker J. (2019). Less than you think: Prevalence and predictors of fake news dissemination on Facebook. Science Advances, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aau4586.

Habermas J. (2022). A new structural transformation of the public sphere and deliberative politics. Polity Press.

Humprecht E., Esser F., Van Aelst P. (2020). Resilience to online disinformation: A framework for cross-national comparative research. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 25(3), 493–516. https://doi.org/10.1177/1940161219900126.

Lazer D. M. J., Baum M. A., Benkler Y., Berinsky A. J., Greenhill K. M., Menczer F., Metzger M. J., Nyhan B., Pennycook G., Rothschild D., Schudson M., Sloman S. A., Sunstein C. R., Thorson E. A., Watts D. J., & Zittrain J. L. (2018). The science of fake news. Science, 359(6380), 1094–1096. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aao2998.

Nyhan B., Reifler J. (2010). When corrections fail: The persistence of political misperceptions. Political Behavior, 32(2), 303–330. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-010-9112-2.

Pariser E. (2011). The filter bubble: What the Internet is hiding from you. Penguin Press.

Pennycook, G., Rand, D. G. (2019). Lazy, not biased: Susceptibility to partisan fake news is better explained by lack of reasoning than by motivated reasoning. Cognition, 188, 39–50. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2018.06.011.

Rid T. (2020). Active measures: The secret history of disinformation and political warfare. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Salminen M. (2026). Military leadership in the age of cognitive warfare. In Proceedings of the 21st European Conference on Cyber Warfare and Security (ECCWS). https://doi.org/10.34190/iccws.21.1.4473.

Vosoughi S., Roy D., Aral S. (2018). The spread of true and false news online. Science, 359(6380), 1146–1151. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aap9559.

Woolley S. C., & Howard P. N. (2018). Computational propaganda: Political parties, politicians, and political manipulation on social media. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190931407.001.0001.

Zuboff S. (2019). The age of surveillance capitalism: The fight for a human future at the new frontier of power. PublicAffairs.

Розова Т. В. (2023) Digital anthropology: шлях від етнографічних досліджень до осягнення проблеми людини кіберантропологією. Digital transformations in culture: Scientific monograph. Riga, Latvia: Baltija Publishing. С. 1–18. https://doi.org/10.30525/978-9934-26-319-4-1.

Розова Т. В., Чорна Л. В. (2023). Культурно-антропологічні трансформації: шлях від тексту до образу. Cultural and artistic practices: world and Ukrainian context. Scientific monograph. Riga, Latvia: Baltija Publishing. С. 440–467. https://doi.org/10.30525/978-9934-26-322-4-20.

Chorna L., Rozova,T., Rusakov S., Tselkovskyi H. (2023). The ideal in the cultural system: a structural-functional analysis.

Mizhdystsyplinarni doslidzhennia skladnykh system, 23, 179–190. URL: https://doi.org/10.31392/iscs.2023.23.179.

Published

2026-05-29

How to Cite

Klimenko М. А. (2026). PHILOSOPHICAL-ANTHROPOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF THE MANIPULATION OF MASS CONSCIOUSNESS. Культурологічний альманах, (2), 263–269. Retrieved from https://almanac.npu.kiev.ua/index.php/almanac/article/view/833