Catherine's altered photo betrays our trust in truth

A photo sits on a shelf. Or hangs on a wall. Or nestles in a scrapbook with a collection that tells the story of a life.

You study them for clues about the past. You note the fine clothes the couple was wearing in this one, the cars parked along the street in the background of that one, the implements scattered around the backyard in another.

And you know what the photos depict — your great grandparents' wedding, your uncle on a stoop in the old neighborhood, your cousin's family on their Midwestern farm.

Or do you know?

Thanks to the recent uproar over a photo posted online by Catherine, Princess of Wales and wife of William, heir to the British throne, it's clear we are entering an era where we all will be asking ourselves such questions about the photos, videos and other aspects in our lives.

This is not about Catherine's blunder — her apology for supposedly doctoring in some unspecified way a photo of Catherine and their three children allegedly taken by William and posted and sent to news agencies for Britain's Mothering Day celebration last week. The photo was obviously edited, calling into question whether it was taken in the setting and time of year depicted, whether the four were ever together in that way, and whether they wore those clothes on whatever occasion it was, if it was an occasion.

The amateurish revisions drew withering criticism of the royal family and set off waves of speculation about the marriage of the future king. But our focus should be on larger concerns.

Rapid tech advances have been stoking anxiety about deepfake photos and videos, but there is nothing like catching a celebrity in the act to illuminate the threat. And while much of the hand-wringing over this ability to put people in places they were not and put words they didn't say into their mouths has been about what this will mean for our politics, the more worrisome issue is what this means for our concepts of reality and truth.

Trust what you see and hear with your own eyes and ears, we are taught, advice that suddenly seems hopelessly quaint when what we see and hear is subject to intentional manipulation.

The truth is that truth has always been malleable in the hands of deceivers, just another commodity that could be exploited for gain. And yet we still thought of truth as something concrete in the end, something real and tangible that we could uncover by peeling away the deceptions. Now what?

On some level, what we see is always subjective. Some people see the lion, others see the cage. Still others see the watchers watching the lion and the cage. But there is a hard truth that girds that scene: The lion is in the cage. But what if he is not?

Hollywood has trampled the border of real/unreal for years, of course, but you accept that when you sit down to watch a movie. “Real life” is supposed to be different. What happens when reality also becomes a show, when truth becomes nothing more than performance?

That field has been plowed by politicians and other leaders who relentlessly tell us that black is white. Now come the photos and videos and songs that are not what they purport to be. When we no longer can distinguish between what's real and not real, what's true and not true, the ground is fertile for the growth of suspicion and mistrust, and the seeds of conspiracy theories bloom.

Catherine discovered that last week, as stories sprung up that she was severely ill, that William was having an affair, that she had undergone plastic surgery, narratives an altered photo encouraged and could not dispel.

We treasure our photos for what they tell us. We should enjoy that certainty while we can.

Columnist Michael Dobie's opinions are his own.

By Michael Dobie

michael.dobie@newsday.commwdobie

Michael Dobie is a member of the Newsday editorial board.