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Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

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Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#321

Post by aero-glide »

bvinc wrote: post #296

The problem with this line of thinking isn't that it's wrong. I could complain about the media all day. The problem is that main stream establishment media: NYTimes, APNews, The Guardian, Reuters, etc are the best we have. The people that complain about the media are the people that seek out alternative media. Alternative media is infinity more misleading and misinformed. Thomas Jefferson surely didn't mean that you…

I like APNews and Reuters. Gaurdian and NYTimes are pretty inaccurate, atleast when they report about my country.

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#322

Post by princeb »

cortesoft wrote: post #310
princeb wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he knew personally in various parts of the world who have firsthand experience and write him about it. i cannot even be sure that my version of truth is the truthiest version of the truth out there. i cannot say much more about the people i know, even those personally affected by various events around the world. every time i feel confident about my beliefs, i remember rashomon. everyone is affected by bias. the onl…

You can't avoid bias, but there are certainly mitigation techniques.

how do you know those bias mitigation techniques are not skewed by bias? and if you verified it/came up with it yourself, how do you know you are not skewed by your own bias?

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#323

Post by ycombinete »

ardy42 wrote: post #207
ycombinete wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds good. Those close to us are the most likely to have news that has actual significance to us. And are probably the most trustworthy.

> Sounds good. Those close to us are the most likely to have news that has actual significance to us. And are probably the most trustworthy. So third-hand information from my InfoWars-reading brother and workplace rumors (or even worse, official workplace corporate communications)?

Fair enough. I think I worded my sentiment badly.

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#324

Post by vmladenov »

minimuffins wrote: post #117

The feeling that it's just completely impossible to know what's going on in the world is really debilitating. I spend probably an hour a day reading headlines from major outlets with a bunch of different political alignments, and to be honest, I don't really know why I even do it. By the end of it, all I really have is a vague silhouette of a picture of what might have happened, according to a handful of corporations…

You could read wire services like Associated Press, Reuters, and United Press International, which are the sources from which mainstream outlets buy their news. Just be warned that the stories are exceptionally dry

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#325

Post by phobosanomaly »

wellplayed76 wrote: post #317
phobosanomaly wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally view it as a duty. Part of being a citizen in a (kind of) functioning democracy is understanding the nuances of the stuff that is screwed up around you to the best of your ability so that when the time comes to vote or have a meaningful discussion with others around you, you can be a voice of reason. Ignoring the world around them is how so many Americans still think Iraq had something to do with 9/11. I…

I will say, you are the perfect user/customer to have for media companies. Given the moral duty you ascribe to information consumption from these sites, I'd imagine it'd take a lot to lose you as a user. As a user researcher, I'm really curious on how you think about what matters/what doesn't matter in terms of your news consumption. Obviously, there is a near infinite amount of things that happen every day/week/mont…

I use an in-house AI-driven solution.

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#326

Post by dang »

insidepgsmind wrote: post #101

I love this part: “I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great facts, and the details are all false.“ When I read the headlines or scan articles here on HN I’m under the impression that I know things and unde…

Trollish usernames aren't allowed on HN because they effectively troll every thread they post to. I realize it's a borderline case, but a username like that is going to forever exert a trollish skew on every thread (especially on this site, given the particular celebrity you're referencing) and we've learned that it's better to deal with this earlier than later, so I've banned the account. Happy to rename and unban it if you want to pick a more neutral username.

https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#327

Post by throwawayinfo »

6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #290
throwawayinfo wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I'm convinced independent journalists are the future. Fact finding itself is a shrinking part of the job. Fact checking the monunental amount of data out there is increasingly important. As such, the need for these megacorp publishers is going away. Edit: Just look at the BLM movement. Lots of people believe these are peaceful civil disobedience and lots of people believe they're communist race riots. Rig…

When there's enough conflicting information out there, fact checking just turns back into fact finding, doesn't it?

I mean people don't need to go gather primary sources as much if every important event has thousands of smartphone cameras at the scene.

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#328

Post by forgot_account »

TheDong wrote: post #190
snarf21 wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the best approach is to read a story from a left, right and centrist source. The intersection of "facts" is probably all true and the things that point far one direction or the other are probably in the middle somewhere.

This reads to me like saying "the best way to determine if god exists is to read the hebrew bible, the koran, and the book of mormon and take the average". It starts with the assumption left, right, and centrist sources all have biases, but those biases cancel out. That the "middle" of those things is meaningfully better. I see no evidence that that's the case. All popular news sources these days seem to be biased to…

>>>This reads to me like saying "the best way to determine if god exists is to read the hebrew bible, the koran, and the book of mormon and take the average".

That's kinda what led Aleister Crowley to create Thelema. In a very broad sense, he learned about belief systems from around the world, especially focused on "Messiah" type characters and the similarities in their experiences/stories/methods of enlightment, and then built a system that was somewhat of a fusion of all methodologies, largely as an extension of Jewish mysticism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thelema

Part of the problem with sticking to recently-published books is the lag time involved. Consuming a variety of current news sources can not only lead you toward a "ground truth" for that particular case, but can also frame a better understanding of other evolving situations, and arm you with a better frame of reference to not only understand those as well, but shape your actions in yet a third actively-developing scenario.

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#329

Post by acqq »

lmm wrote: post #307
acqq wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it's useful to just see the news for what it is: a timely first rough draft of history. Only, it's not what "the news" are. One can reconstruct the history using "the news" as source material, but it's a grave error to think that "the news" are "a first draft of history." Try to find how the media covered the claimed "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq in 2003, and how they wrote many years later about th…

> Try to find how the media covered the claimed "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq in 2003, and how they wrote many years later about the same events. What you believe to be a "first draft" was historically completely false. But it was at the time used as an excuse to start the war, which are both now verified historical facts -- both the fake "news" in the major media and the start of the war. Really? My memory i…

The way I remember, the major media in the US claimed WMDs existed until the war progressed and nothing was found. Then, what you remember regarding Kelly you probably have read only later, that is, only after the start of the war, 19 March 2003.

Re: Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

#330

Post by [deleted] »

minimuffins wrote: post #117

The feeling that it's just completely impossible to know what's going on in the world is really debilitating. I spend probably an hour a day reading headlines from major outlets with a bunch of different political alignments, and to be honest, I don't really know why I even do it. By the end of it, all I really have is a vague silhouette of a picture of what might have happened, according to a handful of corporations…

[deleted]
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