Scientific papers are the only news worth reading
The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
311–320 of 378 posts
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#312Earlier quoted context omitted.
I do agree that paying too much attention to the crazy that’s going on is not constructive or healthy. But you can definitely overcorrect. If you completely disconnect you have no data with which to make your decisions come election time. A lot of what’s happening in politics does affect you directly. Changes to tax code, the budget, deregulation of industries (e.g. net neutrality). And some of it may not affect you…
> If you completely disconnect you have no data with which to make your decisions come election time. Nothing has happened in the last 10 years to change who I vote for. And this is the same for the majority of people.
How do you know?
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#313Half of my browser window was ads and cookie warnings and x-articles-left warnings. I just closed the window right away.
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#314I see a number of comments celebrating the choice to live in a bubble uninformed and blissfully unaware of local and global events. Admittedly, a number of news sources are quite bad at actually reporting the news. But there still are quite a number of news organizations and news reporters that take their roles seriously. You can find them, that is if you are actually interested in being informed. I'm sure there's so…
I find comments like this unhelpful. You have made a point, without any real counterpoint. If you wanted to be helpful, instead of doing your own little "You can find them, that is if you are actually interested in being informed" virtue signal posturing, why not post the name of a single such source which you find valuable? I would sincerely be interested in knowing the sources of some great news, so please share. U…
The Economist does a good job of informing and analyzing the news. That and the Sunday newspaper will give you enough info to stay informed. There is still plenty of fluff but at least you get to choose what you consume.
Just keep in mind that most news is useless and meant to entertain and hold your attention but give you little to no benefit. Also, note that it has a big impact on your mental health and not for the better.
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#315I see a number of comments celebrating the choice to live in a bubble uninformed and blissfully unaware of local and global events. Admittedly, a number of news sources are quite bad at actually reporting the news. But there still are quite a number of news organizations and news reporters that take their roles seriously. You can find them, that is if you are actually interested in being informed. I'm sure there's so…
I find comments like this unhelpful. You have made a point, without any real counterpoint. If you wanted to be helpful, instead of doing your own little "You can find them, that is if you are actually interested in being informed" virtue signal posturing, why not post the name of a single such source which you find valuable? I would sincerely be interested in knowing the sources of some great news, so please share. U…
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Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#316Earlier quoted context omitted.
You'd be surprised how even fascists can portray themselves as reasonable on their own websites, or how lacking wikipedia is on some parties. Ballot measures only address a small subset of policies, and they don't exist in many places. From what I understand making a 360 turn on them after being elected isn't uncommon either. So your 'informed' decision is probably just as biased as someone who bases their decision o…
I would never use someone's own website as my sole source of information, that's just begging for trouble. I search out as many different sources as I can find, including voting history, town hall transcripts, interviews, endorsements, etc. etc. I'm not really sure what point you're trying to make. Are you saying nobody can ever know enough to vote responsibly?
I'd say the easiest source is the archive of a reputable news site, since journalists are historically responsible for collecting and refining this information. Thus we are back at the initial question: How to get Slower, Better News?
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#317I think that there is an often overlooked product that solves this problem very well by it's very nature: Weekly newspapers.
Especially when you read them as paperback they take out all the haste. You can't "refresh" them. The style tends to be less lurid, because it is pointless to write an hot article with Tuesday's information if you print on Sunday. Topics are way more broad in my experience but still capture the Zeitgeist of current topics in whatever culture you live in (it has to be a good newspaper, of course). There is of course a certain desire to read everything, since you paid for it, but it's finite: It is not a permanent rat race to read all the news, when you're done, you're done.
Even if you don't use whatever paper you get to it's fullest, you will still realize: You do not actually become an "informed voter" by knowing the exact updated body count of some colorful tragedy on the other side of the world. Reading one well researched multi-perspective article with depth will do just fine!
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#318I stopped reading the news about a year ago. I felt like my emotions were being manipulated by a sharply-honed system built precisely to invoke outrage and draw you in to read more and more of it. I've been able to direct my focus and energy to much more productive tasks since I disconnected. Of course I entirely missed that whole Supreme Court thing until after it was over, and I have no idea what people around me a…
I did this about 4 years ago as well and haven't looked back either. The habits I'd formed around news reading just were not helpful or useful. If you think about it for it a second there is very little informational value given by news articles. The who, where, what, why can be done in a paragraph, the implications and future projects can be done in an opinion piece, because any forward future looking projection is 'opinion' and has error, bias embedded in it. All of this is cheekily now lumped into one. Well that's my view.
I've seen my colleagues go through the most anguishing emotional roller coaster over the the last 3 months with the brexit madness. I've seen emotions run high, I've seen the highs and lows. Everyone is stressed and I'm blissfully content.
I'm yet to experience a life altering impact from skipping the news.
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#319Just read the news less often. Nobody really needs to know the news on a day to day basis unless your personal safety is at risk. Just read a monthly magazine like the Atlantic and learn the overall themes of what’s happening.
Re: The Urgent Quest for Slower, Better News
#320Earlier quoted context omitted.
In 2019, Be careful about what kind of news you uncritically believe. The punishment to those who ignore due skepticism, is being governed by those who will manipulate.
Too true... I can't stand Trump on a personal level... but he's right about one thing. There's a lot of manipulation and outright falsities in news, and almost no research or fact checking in the twitter sphere.
> There's a lot of manipulation and outright falsities in news, and almost no research or fact checking in the twitter sphere.
I think it's pretty safe to assume that he's the one benefitting the most from the lack of fact checking.