Pluralizacja eksperckich dyskursów medycznych w komunikacji internetowej

The multiplicity of ways of living, beliefs and options to choose from is a distinctive feature of modern society. It coincides with a rapid increase in publicly available information due to the advancement of the internet and other media. The development of science has led to a profound expansion of knowledge. Struggling with the rising abundance and complexity of information, people opt for cognitive heuristics (e.g. affect and similarity, authority, social proof and scarcity heuristics) in its assessment. The growing complexity of the social world is also reflected in abstract systems – complexes of devices and organised social activities whose operation for most people remains unclear. Given our increasing dependence on these systems, we must trust someone. However, our trust is also founded on heuristics. The text presents expert discourses emerging in online communication and shaped in the conditions of information overflow and reliance on abstract systems. Referring to the case of medicine, it explains how the assessment of information quality and our trust in various entities depend on cognitive heuristics. A working classification of online medical experts is proposed that includes traditional, excommunicated and self-proclaimed experts. The author concludes that we are increasingly faced with the need to find and evaluate medical information on our own – a task that has never been more difficult.