"What is truth?" asked jesting Pilate . . .

" . . . and would not stay for answer."

Our drive to discover the truth is the defining characteristic of our nature: our capacity to reason, but more than just the capacity: the NEED for truth, and the irritation and anger we feel when we've been misled or duped or used by someone promoting something else.

The shadow that follows the truth is the delight in falsehood, misrepresentation, and the fruits of deceit, especially when the deceit is undetected: when people simply glory in a lie, and spread it eagerly, and make no attempt to discern whether it's true or false, but revel in it because they want to feel the force of a rebellion or a reaction, the power of an angry mob.

By making the search for information easier, the internet makes the discovery of truth harder. Instead of the labor involved in copying passages out for ourselves, a few keystrokes allow us to cut and paste a link or a series of paragraphs: there's no need to re-assess the material as we repeat it. Poisoned-pen letters & chain letters have nothing on email; recipients of the former might suspect more readily that the contents were unreliable; but with the excitement of being Paul Revere, people pass on emails now, and rouse all the worst passions, waking the shadow of truth, the appetite for lies that curls in us always ready for stimulation & food, ready to be poked, ready to spring into action.