The FORMATION OF PUBLIC OPINION IN TIMES OF TECHNODIVERSITY AND CONTROVERSIAL INFORMATION

Abstract

This article discusses the formation of public opinion in the digital age based on the articulation between Peirce's pragmatist semiotics (2000), Lippmann's concept of pseudo-environment (2008), and Yuk Hui's idea of technodiversity (2020). The analysis is based on the understanding that signs — such as media discourses and news — not only represent but also produce reality through their practical effects. It provides a literature review on how the circulation of news on digital networks cannot be understood solely by the criterion of veracity, but also by the impacts it generates on public action. It introduces the concept of symbolic pseudo-environment, which refers to the perceived world, not directly experienced; it discusses Yuk Hui's (2020) proposal of technodiversity, which offers a critique of the homogeneous technical paradigm and suggests that cultural and epistemological diversity should also be reflected in communication technologies. Finally, it concludes that contemporary public opinion is formed in a technically mediated and symbolically contested scenario. Its articulation between semiotics, technodiversity, and digital communication allows us to understand the complexity of this process and points to the need for an ethical, pluralistic, and critical approach in the debate on the circulation of information and the construction of public reality.