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Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

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Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#291

Post by richk449 »

ralph84 wrote: post #285
harpiaharpyja wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fact-checking is a dead end, a poor substitute for development of critical thinking skills in the broader population. It may be more challenging, but that's what we need to start working towards.

Has there ever been a time in history when those in power desired critical thinking skills in the broader population? Those in power want a compliant population, not a questioning one.

I’m curious what you mean by this. Assuming you are American, do you think that Obama or Trump or Biden wish that the population was more compliant, and had weaker critical thinking? Why would that benefit them?

Most leaders think they are right, and I would think they would want enhanced critical thinking in the population so that the people would better appreciate the leaders rightness.

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#292

Post by Uhhrrr »

bartread wrote: post #280
WalterBright wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how hearsay evidence could ever be debunked. And even if a recording could be found of him saying that, he could always just say he was joking.

> I don't see how hearsay evidence could ever be debunked. Well, that's the thing, isn't it? Hearsay doesn't reach the necessary standard to be considered evidence in the first place in sensible forums, including most courts.

Yes. But the other thing is debunking rumors is the task they set for themselves. And in these cases, they went for the dopamine hit of writing "FALSE" over the eternally annoying "Unconfirmed".

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#293

Post by technothrasher »

javert wrote: post #287
unclebucknasty wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But, even critical thinking ability relies on good inputs. There must be some baseline of facts to work with. I do agree however that fact-checking is extremely challenging, but for different reasons. That is, in a society that is being programmed to choose the reality/truth they prefer, you'll end up with cult-like belief systems that no amount of fact-checking will break through.

For a critical thinker, the baseline facts come from the person's own direct experience. They have to. For example, I probably wouldn't 100% believe that hundreds of people can cross the sky in a metal tube (i.e., modern jet airplane) if I had only been told about it. But I've seen it myself. Another example: I've learned enough about technology to think the moon landings were feasible, and I've learned enough about…

Won't relying on direct experience as a basis for critical thinking lead to all kinds of problems due to faulty perception and cognitive biases that we all share? Additionally, how are we to evaluate situations were are not likely to have any experience with? None of us have any experience with, say, the big bang or anything close to what the universe was like then, but can't we still come to many likely conclusions about it without any even indirect experience?

So doesn't critical thinking in fact have to have a baseline in something other than one's own direct experience? Rationality, possibly?

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#294

Post by tablespoon »

colpabar wrote: post #243
tablespoon wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sure, but they need to be clear that they aren’t committed to it being an accurate story at the time of publish (expectation of a newspaper). You're misreading the situation. The media doesn't have a crystal ball any more than you or I do. They can be "committed to it being an accurate story at the time of publish," but then new stuff happens after that time, or they have the time to go into more depth. The news is…

>The media doesn't have a crystal ball any more than you or I do. Sure, but the media is not writing encyclopedia entries. They make hyperbolic claims about how they break stories before anyone else, and how accurate they are. But since they are human, sometimes mistakes are made, and I think it's pretty dishonest to quietly change an article after it's been published. Publishing a story should mean that you back its…

> Sure, but the media is not writing encyclopedia entries. They make hyperbolic claims about how they break stories before anyone else, and how accurate they are.

Well, breaking news stories is their job an no one else's.

> If new information comes out later that changes things, write a new article that references the mistakes of the original. There were still decisions made to include the content that was later shown to be incorrect, and I would _much_ rather see a follow up explaining what they got wrong than "correcting" the article after publication.

I'm sure a front page of mea culpas and minutiae about the process of reporting itself would scratch some people's ideological itches, but it wouldn't actually be very useful as an information source about what the current state of things are, which is what people are actually going there to get.

Personally I'd prefer they just issue a new version of the story with a kind of version history (or at least leave the old version up somewhere), at least for major revisions, but I also kind of empathize with them not wanting to do that, because that would probably be a feature almost exclusively used by annoying pests trying to stir up BS outrage (e.g. like the kind of people who think that software should never have bugs).

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#295

Post by rootsudo »

I enjoy the irony of one internet news site, criticizing, accurately, one of the original "internet" news sites.

While both had a shaky past, how buzzfeed went from "take this quiz to discover which disney princess are you" to taking down an snopes expose is fantastic.

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#296

Post by cmrdporcupine »

Scoundreller wrote: post #245
aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A coworker of mine had his big toe amputated after it was crushed while moving a refrigerator. Afterwards he had no problems and remained very athletic.

This comment makes me queasy.

My mother chopped off the toe next to her big toe with our lawnmower (accidentally.)

To this day none of us can figure out how it hit that toe and not the big toe.

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#297

Post by millzlane »

ALittleLight wrote: post #288
kstrauser wrote: post #210

I really want to like Snopes, but I'm not convinced that they weigh evidence correctly. For example, they debunked the myth that Marilyn Monroe had 6 toes. First, I don't believe that she did . Or even care, for that matter. But at the time, one of their "facts" was that if she'd had a toe removed, she'd basically have to learn to walk all over again because it would throw her balance completely off. (Note: the artic…

I think Snopes has pretty clear political biases that detract from their ability to fact check. An example is their article on "Sweden is the rape Capitol of Europe"[1] which they rate false. Their article talks about Trump and immigration and Farrage and doesn't really get to what they are supposed to be debunking, which is the rape Capitol thing. Sweden does have the highest rate of rape per capita in Europe. This…

Rapes actually dropped. They debunked it in the article. Sweden doesn't have the highest rape rate. If you look at the graph that they mention from the article. https://www.snopes.com/tachyon/2017/03/sd-graph.jpg

"– The question posed on sexual crimes in NTU includes a wide range of crimes. It can range from minor events [like] flashing and groping, to very serious incidents of rape. Those who say they suffered must therefore answer questions about the severity of the crime. The responses show that in 29 percent of cases [have been] a more serious form of sexual crimes, says Emelie Hambrook, investigator at the National Council."

"While Brå noted that the broad category of “sexual crimes” had increased since 2012, the same was not true for rape. Another Brå graph shows that reported cases of rape (represented by the purple line below) did not spike suddenly after the influx of refugees in 2015 – instead, they dropped from 6,697 in 2014 to 5,918 in 2015 (about the same amount as in 2009). "

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/crime-sweden-rape-capital-...

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#298

Post by hobs »

richk449 wrote: post #291
ralph84 wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has there ever been a time in history when those in power desired critical thinking skills in the broader population? Those in power want a compliant population, not a questioning one.

I’m curious what you mean by this. Assuming you are American, do you think that Obama or Trump or Biden wish that the population was more compliant, and had weaker critical thinking? Why would that benefit them? Most leaders think they are right, and I would think they would want enhanced critical thinking in the population so that the people would better appreciate the leaders rightness.

That's so far from the truth it is comical - populism is literally appealing to the base and stupid indistinct and creating an environment hostile to intellectual thinking... and it's been kind of a big thing the last 100 years...

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#299

Post by rustyminnow »

richk449 wrote: post #291
ralph84 wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has there ever been a time in history when those in power desired critical thinking skills in the broader population? Those in power want a compliant population, not a questioning one.

I’m curious what you mean by this. Assuming you are American, do you think that Obama or Trump or Biden wish that the population was more compliant, and had weaker critical thinking? Why would that benefit them? Most leaders think they are right, and I would think they would want enhanced critical thinking in the population so that the people would better appreciate the leaders rightness.

Sure, the President of the United States holds an office with a lot of executive power, but there are plenty of other people with other forms of power that would have an interest in a compliant population.

I hate to beat the "evil-zillionaire" drum, but if you made your fortunes selling people juice-boxes they don't really need, you'd prefer it if they complicitly buy all the junk your ads tell them to buy instead of critically thinking "maybe I DON'T need another one"

Take also cult-leaders for example (or other con-men in power/leadership positions). If their followers possessed the critical thinking skills to see through their manipulations, they wouldn't have any followers. Complacency in this case is fundamental

Re: Co-founder of Snopes was writing plagiarized articles under a fake name

#300

Post by exporectomy »

unclebucknasty wrote: post #283
harpiaharpyja wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fact-checking is a dead end, a poor substitute for development of critical thinking skills in the broader population. It may be more challenging, but that's what we need to start working towards.

But, even critical thinking ability relies on good inputs. There must be some baseline of facts to work with. I do agree however that fact-checking is extremely challenging, but for different reasons. That is, in a society that is being programmed to choose the reality/truth they prefer, you'll end up with cult-like belief systems that no amount of fact-checking will break through.

You can do a lot with thought experiments that show logical inconsistencies in ideas without any actual knowledge of the facts.

Physics is a fairly clear example. It's hard to make all those equations work without creating paradoxes unless they actually model the real world correctly. If it was all fake but internally consistent, then even a small amount of observation could destroy the whole thing.

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