THE AMBIGUITY OF POST-TRUTH: FROM MODAL POWER TO THE INSTABILITY OF THE POSSIBLE

Abstract

The study develops a conceptual framework of post-truth ambiguïté to make sense of epistemological transformations in the digital age. In classical rhetoric, ambiguity was considered a stylistic flaw, whereas in 20th-century phenomenology it became a condition of human experience. The article argues that under the conditions of post-truth, ambiguity is transformed into an operational logic of knowledge, defining the structure of reality. Drawing on Steve Fuller's theory of modal power, which interprets post-truth as a competition between internally consistent discourses to establish the boundaries of the necessary, the work reveals the limits of this approach: its inability to explain the internal ambivalence of discourses where the boundary between fact and fiction loses its clarity. The concept of post-truth ambiguïté is introduced as an epistemological regime that emphasizes the instability of knowledge, where every discourse combines the necessary with the possible. The relevance of the study is driven by the crisis of traditional epistemological categories, caused by digital technologies – deepfakes, large language models (LLMs), personalization algorithms – which fragment reality, making instability its defining characteristic. In contrast to Fuller's understanding of post-truth as a competition for modal power, ambiguïté emphasizes the internal indeterminacy of discourses, offering a new analytical perspective. The scientific novelty lies in creating a typology of modal power regimes – Platonic (monopolization of the necessary), Fullerian (pluralization of the possible), and ambiguïté (instability of the possible) – which systematizes the logics of knowledge without historical linearity. The study offers an original interpretation of the «Botul» hoax (1999) as a paradigmatic manifestation of ambiguïté, where fiction generates productive knowledge, as well as an analysis of digital technologies as generators of internal ambivalence within discourses. The methodology synthesizes Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological approach with post-truth theory to analyze digital phenomena. The work reconstructs Fuller's vision of modal power, critically assesses its limitations, and proposes ambiguïté as an optic that reveals the instability of discourses. The goal is to develop a conceptual foundation of post-truth ambiguïté that explains contemporary epistemological challenges and their philosophical and ethical consequences.