President Joe Biden – Inaugural Address
“We must reject the culture in which facts themselves are manipulated and even manufactured.“
Quotes
The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe
“Respect for Knowledge and Truth—Skeptics value reality and what is true. We therefore endeavor to be as reality-based as possible in our beliefs and opinions. This means subjecting all claims to a well-founded process of evaluation. Skeptics believe that the world is knowable because it follows certain rules, or laws of nature. The only legitimate method for knowing anything empirical about the universe follows this naturalistic assumption. In other words, within the realm of the empirical (factual knowledge based on evidence), you don’t get to invoke magic or the supernatural.”
The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe
“Anyone who engages in social media witnesses the attribution error on a regular basis. Not only is there a tendency to assume other people’s motivations; we hastily infer their arguments and positions, based upon the pigeonhole into which we think they fit. Without listening to what they are actually saying, charitably interpreting that, and giving them an opportunity to clarify their position, we risk attributing a position to them that they don’t have, attacking a straw man, and then looking foolish. I’ve seen these exchanges rapidly degrade into mutual accusations of being a troll. There are real trolls out there, but sometimes trolling is in the eye of the beholder. Sometimes we can be the troll.”
The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe
“So, while we cannot trust the stories we are told, tradition, faith, convenient or reassuring narratives, charismatic figures, or even our own memories, we can slowly and carefully build a process by which to evaluate all claims to truth and knowledge. A big part of that process is science, which systematically tests our ideas against reality, using the most objective data possible. Science is still a messy and flawed process, but it is a process. It has, at least, the capacity for self-correction, to move our beliefs incrementally in the direction of reality. In essence, science is the process of making our best effort to know what’s really real.”
The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe
“science requires courage—the courage to face reality and accept its findings, even if they upset us or are disruptive to our comfortable ideology.”
Mick West – Escaping the Rabbit Hole
“These false conspiracy theories are a problem. They hurt individuals by affecting their life choices, in terms of money, health, and social interactions. They hurt society by distracting from the very real problems of corruption and decreasing citizens’ genuine participation in democracy.”
Mick West – Escaping the Rabbit Hole
“It’s also tempting to simply label conspiracy theories as either “mainstream” or “fringe.” Journalist Paul Musgrave referenced this dichotomy when he wrote in the Washington Post: Less than two months into the administration, the danger is no longer that Trump will make conspiracy thinking mainstream. That has already come to pass. 1 Musgrave obviously does not mean that shape-shifting lizard overlords have become mainstream. Nor does he mean that Flat Earth, Chemtrails, or even 9/ 11 Truth are mainstream. What he’s really talking about is a fairly small shift in a dividing line on the conspiracy spectrum. Most fringe conspiracy theories remain fringe, most mainstream theories remain mainstream. But, Musgrave argues, there’s been a shift that’s allowed the bottom part of the fringe to enter into the mainstream.”
Carl T. Bergstrom & Jevin D. West – Calling Bullshit
“The rise of misinformation and disinformation keeps us up at night. No law or fancy new AI is going to solve the problem. We all have to be a little more vigilant, a little more thoughtful, a little more careful when sharing information—and every once in a while, we need to call bullshit when we see it.”
Carl T. Bergstrom & Jevin D. West – Calling Bullshit
“New-school bullshit can be particularly effective because many of us don’t feel qualified to challenge information that is presented in quantitative form. That is exactly what new-school bullshitters are counting on. To fight back, one must learn when and how to question such statements.”
Carl T. Bergstrom & Jevin D. West – Calling Bullshit
“Rather, the really big cover-ups take place out in the open, as climate denial does. The smoking gun is there for everyone to see; the cover-up is providing people with alternative reasons to believe it might be smoking.”