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Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

bmj.com

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Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#151

Post by torgoguys »

webdoodle wrote: post #38

The 'elites' control the narrative through propaganda censors like Facebook, Twitter and Reddit. Anything that doesn't conform to their predetermined agenda gets discredited, the author smeared, then eventually banned from posting. These are legitimate 1st amendment issues that need to be defended or what little freedom we have left will be boiled away like baby frogs.

Ummm...BMJ is close to the very definition of 'elites' with regard to medicine. This circumstance goes against the typical complaints of things being as simple as "elites controlling the narrative."

Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#152

Post by deadalus »

barefeg wrote: post #71

Why should Facebook be the platform where people post facts? Facebook has no responsibility of implementing any constitutional rights if they don’t want to. If people don’t agree with Facebook’s terms of service then they should use a different platform. This is what ultimately create better platforms for other types of discussions

The problem is that BigTech funded 'news' organizations will bad-mouth and deplatform these new and different platforms as soon as they pose any threat. Their domains will be seized(Dreamhost removed Parler), infrastructure will be taken out(Cloudflare removed 8chan, Amazon banned Parler) or they will be removed from app stores(Gab was removed from both Playstore and Fdroid).

Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#153

Post by pfortuny »

xenocratus wrote: post #144
jf22 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I ask if you think Facebook fact checking is as serious as the Spanish Inquisition?

Another question would be: which Spanish Inquisition - the real one, or the one that lives in popular culture?

I am talking of the real one (which as you say is much milder than the popular one): they did burn books and prosecute people for their ideas, which is what I was thinking of.

Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#154

Post by cycomanic »

AlexTWithBeard wrote: post #88
goopthink wrote: post #46

In addition to the points raised by BMJ and in the comments below, there is a limit to what independent fact checking can accomplish. For example, are their fact checkers conducting their own scientific experiments validating claims and outcomes of a scientific paper? Are fact checkers reaching out to sources from a news article and verifying quoted information? When “breaking news” or “scoops” are reported presentin…

I wonder how much more expensive would it be to have "explainers" instead of "fact-checkers". We all have heard about "the same lies being repeat over and over". Well, if these lies are indeed all kinda the same, then it should be relatively easy to (1) gather a proper, extensive set of facts that disprove the lies and then (2) hire an army of war hamsters to introduce these facts into discussion - following the guid…

But that has been done again and again.

Let's not talk about Covid, but climate change (which interestingly never attracted the Facebook et al fact checkers even though it is a much more existential crisis for humanity). There are many sites that debunk the arguments like "it was warmer in the middle ages", "warming can be attributed to sun activities", realclimate.org is a great resource for instance. Still the same arguments get brought up every time, and the facts simply get ignored.

Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#155

Post by AlexTWithBeard »

rightisleft wrote: post #127
AlexTWithBeard wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much more expensive would it be to have "explainers" instead of "fact-checkers". We all have heard about "the same lies being repeat over and over". Well, if these lies are indeed all kinda the same, then it should be relatively easy to (1) gather a proper, extensive set of facts that disprove the lies and then (2) hire an army of war hamsters to introduce these facts into discussion - following the guid…

you just reinvented the news journalist...

Well, with the decline of newspapers there should be plenty of unemployed journalists who'll be happy to spread some knowledge around FB for a moderate fee?

Or - this thought scares me the most - FB actually doesn't care about facts?

Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#156

Post by standyro »

shadowgovt wrote: post #137
throwaway_2009 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your doctor is, indeed, simply a fact checker. A real one. Much as I and you, I assume, are fact checkers; we attempt to determine the veracity of information we encounter. Your doctor is not a "fact checker" in the newspeak meaning of the term, because your doctor is not preventing other people from speaking to you.

Facebook is also not preventing anyone from speaking to me; they are refraining from giving some sources a megaphone. If I want to know what the BMJ is writing, https://bmj.com is right there. Facebook is under no obligation to center it on my wall.

That’s not true. Facebook actively censors certain URLs from being shared in a DM on Messenger and WhatsApp. How is that any better than the “Great Firewall of China”?

Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#158

Post by DrHilarius »

YossarianFrPrez wrote: post #94

Two things worth noting. First, this is dated from the November 2nd. Second, as has been pointed out by other commenters, this article is worth reading: https://leadstories.com/hoax-alert/2021/11/fact-check-britis... Unfortunately, the research misconduct that the BMJ letter points to plays right into the hands of anti-vaxxers and anti-science types. Science hard, science communication is even harder, but how is the…

You're looking at the date on the original whistleblower article in the BMJ. The open letter is dated today.

Re: Open letter from the BMJ to Mark Zuckerberg

#159

Post by PKop »

ineptech wrote: post #108
OldManAndTheCpp wrote: post #12

"Fact checking" serves only to ossify the current view on any emerging discussion. Vatican "fact checkers" kept Galileo under house arrest for spreading "fake news", in a sense. This is an unwinnable fight, the only reasonable response is to abandon the pretense that opinions are facts, and that most people can't distinguish truth from falsehood.

I don't think it's unwinnable; we don't want FB to arbitrate between competing scientific opinions, we just want them to blackhole Magic Healing Water and Covid Vaccine 5G Drone Tracker type bullshit. It may be true that it's hard to draw a clear line between bullshit and almost-bullshit, but it's hard to draw a clear line between porn and almost-porn and they somehow manage to do that okay. edit because apparently t…

This is a political fight. The mistake is believing in some sort of disinterested, unbiased institution adjudicating truth separate from influences of interest groups and political power.

The existence of power-centers like giant social media monopolies guarantees they are targets for political interests to hijack that power & censor opponents. Even if you could snap your fingers and magically populate these dominant platforms, and media/journalist institutions as well, with good faith actors (even here they are limited by their ability to actually know what is true), this wouldn't be a stable equilibrium and would in short order be populated and/or lobbied/pressured/swayed by political opportunists.

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