In the January, 2009 issue of Discover Magazine, Robert Proctor discusses "agnotology," defined as the "politics of ignorance."

It’s the study of the politics of ignorance. I’m looking at how ignorance is actively created through things like military secrecy in science or through deliberate policies like the tobacco industry’s effort to manufacture doubt through their “doubt is our product” strategy [spelled out in a 1969 tobacco company memo]. So it’s not that science inherently always grows. It can actually be destroyed in certain ways, or ignorance can actually be created. . . . It’s pretty common. I mean, in terms of sowing doubt, certainly global warming is a famous one. You know, the global warming denialists who for years have managed to say, “Well, the case is not proven. We need more research.” And what’s interesting is that a lot of the people working on that were also the people working for Big Tobacco. The techniques of manufacturing doubt were created largely within the tobacco industry, and then they were franchised out to other industries.

In this Wikipedia article, the root causes of agnotology are deemed to be "media neglect, corporate or governmental secrecy and suppression, document destruction, and myriad forms of inherent or avoidable culturopolitical selectivity, inattention, and forgetfulness." To this list, I would add, fatigue, the bright-shiny distractions and gadgets offered by society, the "Dunning-Kruger Effect," limited attentional capacities and the banality of evil. I do like the trend that so many writers and scientists are beginning to focus in on these topics and the related topics of undue certitude and "tortucanism."