What makes things "true"?

[WashingtonBay]

The internet has been lauded as the bringer of the 'information age'. An age where all of us, at any time, can find information about anything, in an instant. It really is amazing. Name anything... someone has written about it on the internet.

You'd think in this day and age, we would become better and better informed. And in many ways we have. I can find out the answer to any question in moments. Or can I? How do we tell what is true any more? Even the word "truth" has a dozen or more theories about what it means. (Truth - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth))


I think Obama is president because I watched him do this:

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-01/20/xin_5120106210121265708415.jpg

I didn't like it, necessarily, it's not what I would have HOPEd for, but it happened, I watched it happen.... I think it's TRUE. I dunno... maybe it was an impostor (http://www.idahostatesman.com/inauguration/v-print/story/633052.html).

Not everyone believes that man is really legitimately president. Legitimately. Now there's another word that can't be defined in objective terms.

I'm talking about the birthers, at the moment. -Those who think Obama was really born in Kenya and is therefore not qualified to be president. At the center of their argument is a small piece of paper they want to see, which will answer this question once and for all. But will it really? I mean RLY? Is there any proof that could possibly be offered at this point that wouldn't easily be declared a 'fake' as all the other documents have?

These people aren't stupid, after all! (Well, not in the classical definition of the word.)

No more stupid than any of the other conspiracy theorists that continue to believe all sorts of ideas from 'the moon landing was faked' to 'Bush planned 9-11'.

Bill Whittle wrote a terrific essay called "Seeing the Unseen" about conspiracy theories, and how they survive, not because they're true, but because people lose their ability to perform critical thinking.

And I think 10 years ago, that was a fair argument. Because 10 years ago... We'd be watching a weird little guy on TV trying to convince us the moon landing was faked at some Hollywood soundstage, by pointing to what might be some kind of a number stamped on a rock in a photo (we all know that all Hollywood fake rocks are numbered) and we could watch him, listen to him, look in the background, think for a moment, and say "hey - this guy is in his mother's basement isn't he?"

But I think that kind of critical thinking is much harder now. The amount of information available on the internet is quite literally, overwhelming. No matter what the controversy, there are literally thousands of sites, and thousands of rabbit trails to follow to try to find out the truth, and they weave in and out of sites that are both credible and incredible, and who's to judge which is which until they all blend into a mix of fact and fiction and rumor and the mere act of trying to figure out which thing is true or not true is exhausting.

No one can check it all. No one. And if they did, we'd have to take their word for it, and half of us wouldn't believe it.

And this leads at least one man, a army officer, to first volunteer for, and then refuse to serve, the armed forces of the United States, until Obama himself personally proves to him he was born in Hawaii. And if Obama fails to do so (because, I dunno, maybe he's busy)... ostensibly for any soldier that asks, then he's obviously hiding something. (Bombshell: Orders revoked for soldier challenging prez (http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=104009))

It doesn't work that way. The system can't function like that.

IMHO, BHO is president until we elect a new guy. Am I being suckered? Am I just a sheep now? Apparently. These people have now apparently taken over Free Republic, and I'm akin to those who put the Jews on the trains, because they didn't question orders either. <<< I was told that yesterday... By someone who thinks it is our DUTY to remove Obama from office.

...Unless of course, Obama produces this little piece of paper. If he does that they'll be happy.

Yeah... :popcorn: Right.


Can anyone help me out here? I think my brain is going to explode.:coffee:

[HoustonFarrier]

No one has answered WHY John McCain had to prove his birth place BEFORE CONGRESS, and Obama did not.

Steve

[miatapony]

No one has answered WHY John McCain had to prove his birth place BEFORE CONGRESS, and Obama did not.

Steve

AGREED!

[WashingtonBay]

Aw geeze...

Well, folks, my answer is, because McCain's own life story tells of him being born in Panama, and because he wanted to.

[HoustonFarrier]

and because he wanted to.

There's allot to that....allot.;) I wonder if John McCain has more than one national passport, and if he does, is the name the same on them ?

Steve

[peace_baby]

Too... Much... Thinking...

I think my brain just short circuited reading this, WBay lol. [Kidding, of course.] ;)
I think you have a really good point. Who's to say what's true and what's not true anymore? And it's something I've thought of before, just not as in depth.
It definitely puts things into perspective.

[WashingtonBay]

Too... Much... Thinking...

I think my brain just short circuited reading this, WBay lol. [Kidding, of course.] ;)
I think you have a really good point. Who's to say what's true and what's not true anymore? And it's something I've thought of before, just not as in depth.
It definitely puts things into perspective.

EVERYTHING can be faked. So how are we going to determine truth? Going forward, it will not get easier.

[peace_baby]

EVERYTHING can be faked. So how are we going to determine truth? Going forward, it will not get easier.

I agree.. It's truly a sad situation.

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

[...]
How do we tell what is true any more? [...]

Great piece. Good points made.

But the birthers haven't totally overrun FR, I don't think. They just tend to cluster on those threads. I think.

There was one interesting point the birthers make, about a change in the law regarding citizenship after Obama was born. Nowadays, anyone born to a mother that's a citizen, is a citizen nomatter where they are born. But it's true that the law in effect at the time made an exception for underage mothers that did not confer citizenship to a baby born outside the U.S. unless the father was also a citizen, which he wasn't. So, yes, a birth in Kenya would be a big deal. A technicality, to be sure, but a legitimate one.

But I think a trip to Kenya (and right back) just for the birth strains the limits of credulity. It just doesn't make a lick of sense. Every lump of evidence suggests that mumsy was in Hawaii at the time, and I haven't seen anything remotely plausible to seriously suggest otherwise.

And you're also right, in that there's nothing now that could be produced, no birth certificate or anything else would be "proof enough".

If only we could find a picture of His Holiness actually still in the manger where the three WiseGuys from Chicago went to visit and bring him gifts... now THAT would be proof.
:p

[Tatesgram]

EVERYTHING can be faked. So how are we going to determine truth? Going forward, it will not get easier.

I agree.. It's truly a sad situation.

A youth minister here in Alabama was contacted by a production company wanting to make a documentary about a gay man that wanted to be counseled by a minister. He wanted to give up his gay life and become straight. Well, the minister got on the web and looked up the production company, the name of the producer and directors. He found all the information he was looking for, so assumed it was legit. After his two hour counseling sessions with "Bruno" he left him with a prayer because he felt he couldn't do anything more for the young man.

It wasn't until he saw the commercials that he realized that he had been duped. Guess what? All those websites, they're gone. They were all part of the set up.

So back to WB's original question: What makes things "true"?

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

EVERYTHING can be faked. So how are we going to determine truth? Going forward, it will not get easier.

It's an excellent point. Now that photos and videos can be so easily and seamlessly faked... it's going to be tough. I suppose it all comes down to the credibility of the source. A source with sufficient credibility will be believed.

A source with sufficient credibility could also manipulate an awful lot of people into doing just about anything.

Hmmm....

[JackieB]

But I think a trip to Kenya (and right back) just for the birth strains the limits of credulity. It just doesn't make a lick of sense. Every lump of evidence suggests that mumsy was in Hawaii at the time, and I haven't seen anything remotely plausible to seriously suggest otherwise.


It's not that hard for me to determine what I believe to be "true", WB. First, I try to apply what Ragnar is suggesting above to the situation. Is there any common sense in the scenario. There are some things that we have to be willing to accept as either credible or ridiculous. For example, I may not have agreed with a lot of what GWB did, but there is no doubt that he loved his country as much as anyone. Any suggestion that 9-11 was executed by our government is preposterous.

But I don't stop there. After considering the sensibility of the point, then I try to find a few relatively objective sources. This takes maybe 15-30 minutes on the Internet. They are out there, one just has to sift around a bit.

After this, then I usually feel like I'm pretty well informed.

[WashingtonBay]

After this, then I usually feel like I'm pretty well informed.

Yes, but can you ever prove it to someone else who has done the same thing, and come to the complete opposite conclusion?

How is anything "proved" these days? "Truth" is whatever an arguable majority on a forum think it is. And I'd say it's all harmless chatter, but I do think it has an effect.

[natisha]

It's true if I believe it

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

Yes, but can you ever prove it to someone else who has done the same thing, and come to the complete opposite conclusion?

How is anything "proved" these days? "Truth" is whatever an arguable majority on a forum think it is. And I'd say it's all harmless chatter, but I do think it has an effect.

I'll even quote a democrat for this one, the venerable Daniel Patrick Moynihan: "You're entitled to your own opinion, but you're not entitled to your own facts."

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

It's true if I believe it

No, it's true if *I* believe it. :p

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

It's not that hard for me to determine what I believe to be "true", WB. First, I try to apply what Ragnar is suggesting above to the situation. Is there any common sense in the scenario. There are some things that we have to be willing to accept as either credible or ridiculous. For example, I may not have agreed with a lot of what GWB did, but there is no doubt that he loved his country as much as anyone. Any suggestion that 9-11 was executed by our government is preposterous.

But I don't stop there. After considering the sensibility of the point, then I try to find a few relatively objective sources. This takes maybe 15-30 minutes on the Internet. They are out there, one just has to sift around a bit.

After this, then I usually feel like I'm pretty well informed.


After re-reading this... I'm stumbling over a couple of things.

Common sense is a good guide, but it can also be a trap. Yes, Occam's Razor generally works, but sometimes we have to watch out for the rare time it doesn't. In your example it was of course just fine.
Objective sources: There is no such thing. There is no observer without a point of view, and no reporter of facts that hasn't sifted those facts and presented their opinion via the facts they choose to report. I would suggest that the more reliable things to look for are credible sources, and more than one. Ideally, credible sources with known opposing points of view are even better. I'd rather read what two or more opposing points of view have to say about something, and then weigh their fact sets myself, on my own scales. It's just common sense, seems to me... [snicker]

[JackieB]

After re-reading this... I'm stumbling over a couple of things.

Common sense is a good guide, but it can also be a trap.
Objective sources: There is no such thing.

I agree with what you are saying about common sense. There are plenty of actions/statements that would seem to defy common sense, but end up being true. However, I've found applying basic common sense to be a pretty good starting point for myself.

There are objective sources. Security cameras simply record what passes in front of them. Raw audio that hasn't been edited is also objective. An original document or transcript can also be objective. For example, I'll usually look up a house/senate bill, state wildlife plan, etc., to check the accuracy of statements presented to me if I question the accuracy of those statements.

[JackieB]

Yes, but can you ever prove it to someone else who has done the same thing, and come to the complete opposite conclusion?


I don't think it's possible to prove or disprove some things to others, such as determining the ultimate cause of the financial meltdown. There are just too many factors. But something more precise, such as whether or not a person uttered a particular statement can often be proven beyond a doubt.

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

[/LIST][...]
There are objective sources. Security cameras simply record what passes in front of them. Raw audio that hasn't been edited is also objective. An original document or transcript can also be objective. For example, I'll usually look up a house/senate bill, state wildlife plan, etc., to check the accuracy of statements presented to me if I question the accuracy of those statements.

Fair enough, and I don't want to just go around and around with semantics, but like I said, even the security camera has a point of view. The things that don't happen in front of the camera can be just as important as the things that do. It's easy to get tunnelvision, for example, and think in the absence of other information that the camera picture may be all that needs to be known about a thing. Maybe so but maybe not.

Most media stories though, require the action of a person to collect, edit, and present the available facts, and what I was getting at is that just because there's bias doesn't make it useless. I'd rather know the bias of the editor and then see the same thing from the point of view of an editor with a different (and known) bias. And however many more can be found. But merely knowing the filter through which the facts have passed can be just as useful as anything else.

What I find singularly annoying are those reporters out there that maintain (and may actually have convinced themselves) that they are "objective" reporters and never inject their own bias into the stories they present. Those are the ones where you have to be the most suspicious and cautious. You know they'll lie to you because they're obviously already lying to themselves.

Oh... and another thing while I'm at it... perhaps you've had this experience yourself: Like a lot of people I suppose, at times in my life there have been events that I've been directly involved in-- I was there when it happened-- and later that thing was reported in the news, both TV and print. For example, in the CG I was directly involved in a large number of Search And Rescue cases, or law enforcement operations, or whatnot and these items were generally carried in at least a local paper, sometimes wider coverage. Any of us can probably think back and have such an experience.

Anyway... Every single time an event like this was reported in the paper or on TV news-- every time-- the reporters made material errors with regard to basic simple facts of the story. Not some of the time, not most of the time... every time. Some of the errors were more eggregious than others but always they were simple, easy to check things: they'd get the name of a boat wrong, or the name of the skipper, or misrepresent the location or get some other simple basic fact wrong. Or... worse yet, they'd completely leave out something important that changes the whole nature of the story. Stuff they could so easily have double-checked or had reviewed by some knowledgable person. They weren't trying to get it wrong, they just didn't care enough to get it right. It's like they play the whisper game in the newsroom and publish whatever comes out the other end.

So whenever I see a story in the news I start with this basic filter, first: Not everything in here may be exactly right, and big parts may be missing.

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

[...]It's like they play the whisper game in the newsroom and publish whatever comes out the other end.


Which brings us to the perfect place for another quote from Johnny Dangerously:


Lil (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000447/): Get this to Johnny on the grapevine. Vermin is going to kill Johnny's brother at the savoy theater tomorrow night. Got it?
Polly the parrot: Got it.
[flies away]
Polly the parrot: [arrives at prison mess hall and lands on the shoulder of a prisoner] Vermin is going to kill Johnny's brother at the Savoy theater. Pass it on.
Prisoner: [to the next prisoner sitting next to him] Vermin is going to kill Johnny's brother at the Savoy theater tonight. Pass it on.
Prisoner: [to the next prisoner, "telephone" style] Vermin is going to kill Johnny's mother at the Savoy theater tonight. Pass it on.
Prisoner: [to the next prisoner] Vermin's mother is going to kill Johnny tonight at the Savoy theater. Pass it on.
Prisoner: [to the next prisoner]
[unintelligible]
Prisoner: ... at the Savoy. Pass it on.
Prisoner: There's a message through the grapevine, Johnny.
Johnny Dangerously (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000474/): Yeah? What is it?
Prisoner: Johnny and the Mothers are playing "Stompin' at the Savoy" in Vermont tonight.
Johnny Dangerously (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000474/): Vermin's going to kill my brother at the Savoy theater tonight.
Prisoner: I didn't say that.
Johnny Dangerously (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000474/): No, but I know this grapevine.

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

I don't think it's possible to prove or disprove some things to others, such as determining the ultimate cause of the financial meltdown. There are just too many factors. But something more precise, such as whether or not a person uttered a particular statement can often be proven beyond a doubt.

Just because somebody refuses to believe something doesn't mean that it hasn't been proven. :)

[JackieB]

What I find singularly annoying are those reporters out there that maintain (and may actually have convinced themselves) that they are "objective" reporters and never inject their own bias into the stories they present. Those are the ones where you have to be the most suspicious and cautious. You know they'll lie to you because they're obviously already lying to themselves.


That's a good point. Long ago, I accepted the statement - "We don't see things as they are, we see things as we are." Everything we experience is filtered through our life experience, personal viewpoint, etc.

So, "credible" is more appropriate than "objective". I should have used "credible" earlier.

Oh, and I did discover that news articles virtually always contain errors of fact when articles about my own volunteer work on behalf of animals began to appear in our local paper. I was initially very surprised at the number of errors, but have since become accustomed to it.

[cowgirlup@idaho]

- "We don't see things as they are, we see things as we are." Everything we experience is filtered through our life experience,

I love this JB! Thanks for sharing it, I'm going to share it with a client today :)