Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online • Hacker News Board

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#271

Post by tempf4h8f44f8f » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:30 AM UTC

cletus wrote: post #79

The only positive for me from this misinformation plague is that as soon as the next issue comes along all of the anti-Covid vaccine sentiment will be completely forgotten. Don't believe me? When was the last time you heard about the MMR vaccine causing autism? The "good" part of this is that rejection of science, politicization of science and the use of this issue to manipulate people who somehow claim to be "free"…

> I don't think we should be worried about censorship of misinformation.

My parents coming from a communist nation (Yugoslavia) I strongly disagree with this. Who determines what is truth and what is misinformation? One of the major arguments communists used to oppress speech was to prevent panic and the spread of misinformation. (Misinformation being anything that wasn't pro-communist)

Imagine that the worst and most corrupt people you can think of are now in charge of controlling truth and misinformation. That is why the freedom of speech is a fundamental human right - no one should have that kind of power. I agree that we need better fundamental education and critical thinking, but not less rights and more power for large entities.

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#272

Post by s1artibartfast » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:30 AM UTC

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #240

s1artibartfast wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There has also been a huge emphasis on institutional misdeeds, driven by the outrage economy. Nobody takes note of the hundreds of life improving drugs developed in the same time period as opioid epidemic. Nobody takes note when cops arrest the right guy and saved the day. Nobody takes note when a country doesn't militarily threaten or invade the US.

Interesting point. Do you think were it not for outrage economy, would US tackle it faster/slower/at the same rate? Maybe the reason for outrage economy is that there is a fair amount of things to be outraged about.

I personally think the majority of the outrage economy is counter productive. It is important to identify and communicate areas for improvement, but I think most of the solutions generated from the state of outrage are off target. I think emotional outrage is a natural response to some of the injustice in the world, but rarely helpful in actually solving a problem.

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#273

Post by seventytwo » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:30 AM UTC

There’s a major distinction between misinformation and disinformation.

Disseminating DISinformation should be considered fraud, provided it can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the purveyors knew the information was false. Otherwise, any provably-false thing is misinformation.

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#274

Post by AnimalMuppet » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:31 AM UTC

sockpuppet_12 wrote: post #244

s1artibartfast wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There has also been a huge emphasis on institutional misdeeds, driven by the outrage economy. Nobody takes note of the hundreds of life improving drugs developed in the same time period as opioid epidemic. Nobody takes note when cops arrest the right guy and saved the day. Nobody takes note when a country doesn't militarily threaten or invade the US.

Is the life of one innocent person an acceptable price for success?

Is the life of one innocent person an acceptable price for the lives of several innocent people?

Note well: I'm not actually a consequentialist. I'm just pointing out what "for success" actually means, at least some of the time.

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#275

Post by cgrealy » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:32 AM UTC

omosubi wrote: post #184

WalterBright wrote: post #75

I remember when the government and scientific consensus informed me that margarine was good for me. For decades. Who knows what damage that has done to my internals.

The best diet is the one eaten for 1000s of years by your ancestors

You mean the one for people whose life expectancy was less than half the modern day? Who lived completely different lives?

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#276

Post by seventytwo » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:33 AM UTC

AussieWog93 wrote: post #87

Just throwing my 2c into the well, as someone who used to be highly "pro-science" but lost confidence in much of academia and the validity of scientific research in general after starting a PhD and seeing how the sausage is made. The biggest problem science is facing is not an external threat from a rabble of ignorant science deniers, but the complete degradation of quality within the scientific institutions themselv…

You’re correct with this issue, but what other, better option does the general public have other than to try to follow scientific concensus?

It’s flawed and can be improved, but it’s still the best thing we have.

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#277

Post by tonto » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:33 AM UTC

AussieWog93 wrote: post #87

Just throwing my 2c into the well, as someone who used to be highly "pro-science" but lost confidence in much of academia and the validity of scientific research in general after starting a PhD and seeing how the sausage is made. The biggest problem science is facing is not an external threat from a rabble of ignorant science deniers, but the complete degradation of quality within the scientific institutions themselv…

you really think science is suffering that big of an existential threat or are you just pandering to the crowd here

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#278

Post by amcoastal » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:35 AM UTC

donw wrote: post #138

yesenadam wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if one were to assume that every single scientific discovery of the last 25 years was complete bullshit, they'd be right more often than they were wrong. Has that maybe been true since the beginning of 'natural philosophy'? Perhaps things seem (much) worse now because we have survivorship bias, the same way classical music seems higher quality than pop, because the 90% crud[0] has been long forgotten. [0] https://e…

> Has that maybe been true since the beginning of 'natural philosophy'? Unlikely. In its infancy, science -- aka "Natural Philosophy" as it was called at the time -- had to establish its credibility. It did so by delivering results.

And in the same way, a lot of science done and published in the last 25 years has shown real technological improvement in the world around us.

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#279

Post by s1artibartfast » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:35 AM UTC

CPLX wrote: post #263

s1artibartfast wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There has also been a huge emphasis on institutional misdeeds, driven by the outrage economy. Nobody takes note of the hundreds of life improving drugs developed in the same time period as opioid epidemic. Nobody takes note when cops arrest the right guy and saved the day. Nobody takes note when a country doesn't militarily threaten or invade the US.

Sorry nobody gives a fuck that our global military dick swinging prevented Senegal and Guatemala from sailing into New York harbor and carting off our treasures. The outrage economy tends to focus on people and interpersonal drama. Some comedian said this, or maybe some company did something stupid and there’s a walkout. If anything there’s a massive shortage of outrage. Given the degree of misery the entrenched elit…

Outrage is only good in that it generate interest in the topic. There is a surplus of hot-headed illogical people bogging down any real constructive discussion. There is a shortage of people that understand the realistic challenges involved and working to come up with viable Solutions on either side of a given issue

Re: Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific misinformation online

#280

Post by slg » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 1:36 AM UTC

rgrieselhuber wrote: post #247

slg wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It doesn't mean that but it should always be treated as a possible factor, and analyzed in light of other connections. But do you not see how this will result in conspiracy theories? You are no longer engaging with the merits of a study and are instead questioning the motivations and source behind that study. You are shifting from a more objective argument to a more subjective one allow more room for conspiracy theo…

Ok, let's look at a scenario. If a board member of a powerful pharmaceutical company was also a chief executive at a news organization responsible for "fact-checking" claims about that company's medicines, would it be inappropriate to wonder about financial incentives?

You seem to only be looking at the surface of this issue. I agree that it is appropriate to be concerned about conflict of interest, but what happens when you take it one step further beyond your comment? I decide to "do my own research" and plug the drug's name into Google. The top site that comes up is the same news organization's fact check because no one else has a financial incentive to investigate this issue and report the truth. Me "doing my own research" leads me to the same biased information. The "do your own research" portion doesn't fix anything.