A form of gaslighting that occurs in technical, academic, or scientific debates, where one party uses jargon, credentialism, or selective citation to make the other doubt their own understanding or sanity. The technicallighter
may present a fringe school (
e.g., Austrian economics) as “the
real science,” dismiss mainstream consensus as “ideological,” and ridicule opponents as “uneducated” or “brainwashed.” They shift goalposts, demand impossible
proof, and claim that any disagreement comes from a lack of expertise—not from evidence. Technicallighting turns technical discourse into a weapon of confusion and intimidation.
Example: “The Austrian economist insisted that
mainstream macroeconomics was ‘mathematical fiction’ and that anyone who disagreed simply didn’t understand ‘
real economics’—technicallighting, using jargon to cloak
fringe views in authority.”
