... is a fancy Greek word meaning "dig here"
Hat tip: Judith.
2005-10-19
Saddam on Trial
Iraq's deposed fuehrer went on trial today. Saddam Hussein pleaded "innocent" to the first charges brought against him, stemming from the 1982 killings of more than 150 people.
MSNBC:
Mohammed at Iraq the Model:
Tammy Bruce points out an unsettling episode.
Go read the full posts at the links.
MSNBC:
A judge on Wednesday adjourned the trial of Saddam Hussein and seven co-defendants until Nov. 28, after Saddam pleaded innocent to murder and other charges, questioned the court’s authority and scuffled with guards.
The main reason for the adjournment was because some 30 to 40 witnesses had been too scared to show up, the presiding judge said.
“They were too scared to be public witnesses,” Rizgar Mohammed Amin told Reuters. “We’re going to work on this issue for the next sessions.” ...
The first session lasted just three hours, during which presiding judge Rizgar Mohammed Amin read the defendants their rights and the charges against them — which also include torture, forced expulsions and illegal imprisonment in a case involving the massacre of nearly 150 Shiites in 1982. ...
Mohammed at Iraq the Model:
“Does he deserve a fair trial?” this was the question that kept surfacing every five minutes…he wasn’t the least fair to his people and he literally reduced justice to verbal orders from his mouth to be carried out by his dogs.
Why do we have to listen to his anticipated rudeness and arrogant stupid defenses? We already knew he was going to try to twist things and claim that the trial lacks legitimacy or that it’s more a court of politics rather than a court of law, blah, blah, blah…
“Why do we have to listen to this bull****?” said one of my friends.
“I prefer the trial goes like this:
Q:Are you Saddam Hussein?
A:Yes.
Then take this bullet in the head.”
Everyone could find a reason to immediately execute a criminal who never let his victims say a word to defend themselves “let’s execute him and get over this” sentiments like this were said while we watched the proceedings which were rather boring and sluggish for the first half of the session.
At the beginning we were displeased by the presentation of the prosecution which was more like a piece of poetry in the wrong time and place and this is what encouraged the defense to give us a worn out speech about objectivity and how the court must not go into sideways; the thing which both the prosecution and the defense were doing.
Anyhow, the prosecutor began reading the facts and figures about what happened in Dijail. The defendants went silent but Saddam objected on some details and then prosecutor said “Do you want me to show the film where you said and did that?” Saddam stopped talking and the prosecutor asked the court to allow showing the film, we don’t know if it was played there as transmission was paused for a while.
As the prosecution went deeper into details and facts, the way we viewed the trial began to change an d those among us who were demanding a bullet in Saddam’s head now seemed pleased with the proceedings “I don’t think I want to see that bullet now, I want to see justice take place as it should be”.
We were watching an example of justice in the new Iraq, a place where no one should be denied his rights, not even Saddam.
Tammy Bruce points out an unsettling episode.
Go read the full posts at the links.
Google Does the Right Thing
Physics Org:
Please take a moment to send a message to Google.
Mainland media control over Chinese-language content took a blow Wednesday with state press claiming rage after Mountain View, Calif.-based Internet giant Google removed referrals to Taiwan as a province.
Chinese media reports said "Google.com, world's largest Internet search engine, deleted the words 'Taiwan, a province of the People's Republic of China' on a map of Taiwan linked to its maps search engine maps.google.com. This has drawn rage from Chinese officials and the people." ...
Please take a moment to send a message to Google.
2005-10-18
Headline of the Day
First, the text of the article:
And now, the headline:
Libyans Demonstrate Against Bush's Stance
Well, that tells you everything you need to know, right?
TRIPOLI, Libya [AP] - Several hundred Libyans demonstrated Tuesday in the Libyan capital to protest President Bush's call for the release of five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor sentenced to death for allegedly infecting 400 children with the AIDS virus.
The United States and European Union have been pressuring Libya to free the six, who were sentenced to death in May 2004 on charges they infected Libyan children with HIV-contaminated blood in an experiment to find a cure for AIDS.
The defendants have appealed the verdicts, and international observers say the charges were contrived and extracted by torture. ...
And now, the headline:
Libyans Demonstrate Against Bush's Stance
Well, that tells you everything you need to know, right?
Chinese Dissident Protests Yahoo/PRC Collusion
David Kopel at The Volokh Conspiracy:
Read the rest at the link.
A few weeks ago, I criticized Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, and Cisco for cooperating with evil, because each of those companies assists the Chinese suppression of dissent, in order to be able to make money from the lucrative and growing Chinese market. Some apologists for the companies replied that, even though the companies were assisting repression and making it more efficient and pervasive, the companies were somehow encouraging the long-run development of freedom in China.
Today, the Financial Times reports on a letter which a leading Chinese dissident, Liu Xiaobo, has sent to Yahoo. Having spent time in prison for speaking the truth about China's ruling Communist Party, Liu "says Yahoo has enough market clout not to need to toady to authorities." He explains the corporate-communist deal: coporations make profits at the expense of human rights; the communists are given Internet control, and new means to squelch dissent. Thus:
“The collusion of these two kinds of ugliness means that there is no way for western investment to promote freedom of speech in China, and that in fact it greatly increases the ability of the Communist party to blockade and control the internet,” he writes.
“You are helping the Communist party maintain an evil system of control over freedom of information and speech,” he writes.
Simply put, there appears to be no way to be an ethical Internet company in China today, just as there was no way to be an ethical supplier of spy equipment to the USSR or Nazi Germany.
Read the rest at the link.
2005-10-14
Bobby Schindler Speaks Out
Deseret Morning News
Read the rest at the link. (Hat tip: Blogs for Terri.
A couple of points I want to touch on here. The Terri Schiavo case never was about the right to die. It was about the right to live - without which the right to die is meaningless. A lot of liberals were just sure this was a case of some crazed right-wingers trying to keep a woman alive against her wishes. But the nature of Terri's wishes was - in my view, and in the view of many reasonable people - very much open to question. And to compensate for the weakness of the evidence for Terri's supposed wish to die, the kill-Terri side hedged their bets by inviting us to make assumptions about what Terri would want, or what we would want if we were in her place.
There's a lot more I want to say about this, but Shabbat is coming, so I'm going to stop for now.
Bobby Schindler says his memory is seared with images of his sister, Terri Schiavo, after courts approved removal of her feeding tube in a high-profile right-to-die/right-to-life battle he says wasn't always fairly portrayed in the media.
... "She was beautiful, she was alive, she was a human being and had a family willing to . . . show her compassion as every human being deserves. But the courts decided she would be better off dead."
About six months have passed since Schiavo died. And Schindler is on an international speaking tour of sorts, criticizing the right-to-die movement and, through the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation, pushing for changes in federal and state laws to protect the lives of the elderly and people with disabilities.
He addressed about 150 people at Westminster College Wednesday night and spoke with the Deseret Morning News beforehand. Student leaders had invited him after learning he had spoken to another university, free of charge. His Salt Lake speech also included no honorarium, he said....
Read the rest at the link. (Hat tip: Blogs for Terri.
A couple of points I want to touch on here. The Terri Schiavo case never was about the right to die. It was about the right to live - without which the right to die is meaningless. A lot of liberals were just sure this was a case of some crazed right-wingers trying to keep a woman alive against her wishes. But the nature of Terri's wishes was - in my view, and in the view of many reasonable people - very much open to question. And to compensate for the weakness of the evidence for Terri's supposed wish to die, the kill-Terri side hedged their bets by inviting us to make assumptions about what Terri would want, or what we would want if we were in her place.
There's a lot more I want to say about this, but Shabbat is coming, so I'm going to stop for now.
Guerriero: Time for Gay Conservatives to Come Out
From Patrick Guerriero of Log Cabin Republicans:
News Release
For Immediate Release
October 14, 2005
Contact: Christopher Barron
Log Cabin Republicans
(202) 347-5306 or
(202) 297-9807 (cell)
It’s Time for Gay Conservatives to Come Out
Op Ed by Patrick Guerriero, President
This critical moment in the history of the LGBT movement's fight for equality demands that a new generation of Americans come out of the closet—gay conservatives. Now is the time for closeted gay conservatives to find the courage and personal strength to stand up and be counted. Now is the time we can really make a difference. If every gay conservative came out of the closet today, the journey to full equality would be over in years instead of decades. It would soon become ineffective to use gay and lesbian families as wedge issues in campaigns. The cynical efforts to amend our federal and state constitutions would eventually stop. The hypocrisy of anti-gay political tactics being used by way too many Republicans and some Democrats would be finally exposed.
One of the biggest un-kept secrets in Washington, DC is that closeted gay Republicans are everywhere—the White House, Republican Party organizations, the halls of Congress, the most influential law offices, and the most powerful lobbying firms in our nation's capitol. Some of those who remain closeted have chosen to be either passive bystanders or, in some cases, active critics of our movement while comfortably partaking in the fringe benefits of our community work—all the while sipping the finest martinis in our trendiest gay bars.
Coming out is an intensely personal journey. As someone who struggled long and hard with how and when to come out of the closet, I unequivocally oppose outing. I am unaware of a single forced outing that led to passage of a single piece of pro-LGBT legislation. Coming out on one’s own terms, with free will, and with personal courage is a positive catalyst for change. Forced outings don’t advance our movement because they’re motivated by vengeance.
Over the years, many closeted gay Republicans have discreetly and impressively helped advance equality. In spite of attacks from too many on the partisan gay left, some gay conservatives work behind the scenes to pass equality legislation, increase funding for HIV/AIDS, offer vital counsel to LGBT groups, and help defend us against anti-gay legislation. These gay conservatives have quietly come out to their bosses and colleagues—changing some into gay allies and challenging others to soften their positions over time. These individuals have been quiet heroes, not asking for or wanting public credit.
Other gay Republicans, however, simply have failed to stand-up—more concerned about keeping their title, their paycheck, their chance for promotion, or their chance to attend another White House cocktail party.
During this moment in the culture war, we face a fight that will determine how LGBT Americans are treated for decades to come. Those who choose to be missing in action are running from the most critical fight of our generation. During these historic times, the closet is not only a place which suffocates personal dignity, it is also a place which suffocates the powerful force of personal integrity that can change the hearts and minds of even the most conservative Americans and most conservative politicians. Coming out doesn’t have to mean putting a sticker on your car, flying a rainbow flag from your front porch, or marching in a parade. Coming out means different things to different people. It may be as simple as putting a picture of your partner on your desk at work, sharing your personal story with your boss, or speaking up when someone says something anti-gay. For others, it may be as difficult as offering a letter of resignation instead of implementing or assisting with an anti-gay campaign strategy.
For many conservatives, coming out will come with real and profound sacrifice. Thankfully, we can find role models in and inspiration from a new generation of Log Cabin members who are coming out in some of America's most conservative places, joining new Log Cabin chapters in places such as Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, Kentucky, New Mexico, and the Carolinas. They are coming out to family members who sometimes turn them away from the Thanksgiving dinner table if they insist on bringing their partners, in towns where they’re the only openly gay person, in traditional churches where they’ve heard intolerance from the pulpit, in high schools without gay/straight student alliances, and in workplaces where there are no protections that prevent them for being fired for simply being gay. They are the real heroes of today's LGBT movement and they need and deserve to be given a helping hand in the days ahead.
That helping hand needs to come from gay conservatives. We hold the key to changing the hearts and minds of fellow Republicans, conservative Democrats, and people of faith. In the not too distant future, the history books will record who had the courage to come out of the closet and lead us to victory when it mattered most. Only with the help of gay conservatives can our movement achieve victory over the radical right. Only with the help of gay conservatives can we prevent the radical right from hijacking the Republican Party. Only with the help of gay conservatives can we defeat the voices of fear and intolerance that are feverishly working to deny any and all civil recognition for gay families. The history books will note not only those who had the courage to stand up, but sadly also, those who remain silent. The time is now.
###
Log Cabin Republicans is the nation's largest organization of Republicans who support fairness, freedom, and equality for gay and lesbian Americans. Log Cabin has state and local chapters nationwide, a full-time Washington office, and a federal political action committee. www.logcabin.org
2005-10-12
AJWS: Help End Darfur Genocide
From the American Jewish World Service:
Sign the Petition
American Jewish World Service
As we approach the holiest time in the Jewish calendar, American Jewish World Service is launching an unprecedented campaign to end the horrific genocide in Darfur, Sudan.
I need your help: please sign our Call to Action
today.
AJWS has brought together Jewish leaders from across the spectrum to urge President Bush to lead the world community in putting an end to the atrocities that have claimed more than 400,000 lives and left millions homeless. You may have seen our full page ad in The New York Times on Tuesday, which officially kicked off the campaign.
After the Holocaust, the world vowed "Never Again." That pledge was repeated after the genocide in Rwanda in 1994. Yet genocide continues in Darfur, Sudan.
I'm asking you to sign this Call to Action to President Bush today and to spread the word to your friends and colleagues. You will be adding your name to an extraordinary list of signers from the American Jewish community.
Sign the Petition
American Jewish World Service
2005-10-11
"How can you determine a source's biases?"
What are a source's biases? And why is it important to consider a source's biases?
In November 2006, just days before the national mid-term elections, the magazine Vanity Fair issued a press release suggesting that several leading neoconservative thinkers - David Frum, Michael Ledeen, Richard Perle, and others - had renounced their earlier beliefs about Iraq and the Middle East. But according to the neoconservatives, the release grossly distorted and misrepresented their views, and some expressed regret that they had granted the interviews at all: in the words of Frank Gaffney, "None of us who responded candidly on the basis of such promises to thoughtful questions posed by reporter David Rose would likely have done so had the magazine’s true and nakedly partisan purpose been revealed." More at the post Neocons Blast Vanity Fair.
Suppose you are the reader, reading a magazine - or a book, or a newspaper, or a page on the internet. How do you determine the source's biases?
I don't think there's any simple answer, and I'm not sure it's the kind of question you can really find the answer to by typing it into a search engine. But I'll share my own thoughts on it. I addressed the problem of media (and source) bias in an earlier post, "Poison Pill: The Media Today". I quoted a New York Times editorial by Patrick Healy and a post by Neo-Neocon tracing the use of anonymous sources. The media's problem, I argued, was largely created by its own reliance on apocryphal sources - potentially biased, and anonymous, informants whose reliability and accountability are doubtful. As a first step toward correcting the problem, I echoed Neo's suggestion that
Now to the question at hand. Journalists are here being exhorted to "disclose to readers the source's potential biases". How would a journalist, or a layperson, make such an assessment? Well, I think it's mostly commonsense, but I'll throw a few ideas out there:
The centrally-managed and -edited traditional media (including radio, TV, print periodicals, and books) have nothing to fear from the internet ... provided they do not contribute to their own irrelevance by ignoring it.
The internet is anarchical, and therefore makes great demands on the individual user in terms of critical thinking skills. How do we know to trust a site? We compare information from multiple sources, listen to different analyses, learn to weed out irrelevant input and compare the picture with what we know from our own previous experience.
With the traditional media, this is all delegated to the editor, publisher, producer, or university. Often we have to do this, because the material is specialized or technical in nature, or because individual contributors don't have the credibility to reliably provide the information we need.
But centralized media can serve their own agendas at the expense of accuracy. That's where the supremely democratic world of blogging comes in.
Traditional media still play a valuable role. But they risk abdicating this role if they fail to recognize the democratizing effects of electronic communications.
Why do we believe what we believe? How do we decide what is true, and what is important? Consider the role of the following factors, and feel free to add others:
Finally, what does biased writing look like? Bias isn't necessarily bad, but you need to be aware of it and, if necessary, allow for it. Yahoo offers this:
Make a game of it: print out a copy of this post, and go through your local newspaper with a pen or a highlighter. Look for anonymous sources, or people who might have an incentive to be partial, or examples of journalists possibly putting their own opinions into the mouths of the ubiquitous "some people". Look for snarl words, purr words, and weasel words. Try to spot logical fallacies. Check for internal consistency, external consistency, and awareness of objections. Ask yourself which analyses come from people who know what they're talking about - those who have first-hand knowledge of the relevant "facts on the ground" and who are prepared to respond to opposing arguments - and which ones are unsupported opinions from people with their own agenda.
I hope you have found this post helpful. But the most important thing in determining a source's biases is to do your own thinking! And that's important for students, too - so if you are a student, please take the time to come up with your own answers to this question. Remember, your instructor can use a search engine just as easily as you can.
Related. On Scott Thomas Beauchamp and source biases.
In November 2006, just days before the national mid-term elections, the magazine Vanity Fair issued a press release suggesting that several leading neoconservative thinkers - David Frum, Michael Ledeen, Richard Perle, and others - had renounced their earlier beliefs about Iraq and the Middle East. But according to the neoconservatives, the release grossly distorted and misrepresented their views, and some expressed regret that they had granted the interviews at all: in the words of Frank Gaffney, "None of us who responded candidly on the basis of such promises to thoughtful questions posed by reporter David Rose would likely have done so had the magazine’s true and nakedly partisan purpose been revealed." More at the post Neocons Blast Vanity Fair.
Suppose you are the reader, reading a magazine - or a book, or a newspaper, or a page on the internet. How do you determine the source's biases?
I don't think there's any simple answer, and I'm not sure it's the kind of question you can really find the answer to by typing it into a search engine. But I'll share my own thoughts on it. I addressed the problem of media (and source) bias in an earlier post, "Poison Pill: The Media Today". I quoted a New York Times editorial by Patrick Healy and a post by Neo-Neocon tracing the use of anonymous sources. The media's problem, I argued, was largely created by its own reliance on apocryphal sources - potentially biased, and anonymous, informants whose reliability and accountability are doubtful. As a first step toward correcting the problem, I echoed Neo's suggestion that
If the MSM really wanted to clean up their act, they might follow these sensible guidelines, devised by prominent journalists in a 2003 Poynter report:
• Anonymous sources should be encouraged to go on the record.
• We should weigh the source’s reliability and disclose to readers the source’s potential biases.
• The more specific we can be in describing the source in the story, the better.
• Anonymous sources should not be used for personal attacks, accusations of illegal activity, or merely to add color.
• The source must have first-hand knowledge.
• Journalists should not lie in a story to protect a source.
Now to the question at hand. Journalists are here being exhorted to "disclose to readers the source's potential biases". How would a journalist, or a layperson, make such an assessment? Well, I think it's mostly commonsense, but I'll throw a few ideas out there:
What is the source's ideological orientation? What are the person's political sympathies, their party affiliation, etc? This is not to say that people can't be objective or critical about a movement they belong to - but the potential for bias is certainly there.
What are the source's financial interests? I think this one is a no-brainer, but a person who owns a lot of stock in XYZ Corporation is going to have an incentive to promote pro-XYZ legislation and contracts. In the case of the MSM, we all know that "bad news sells".
Debts and favors. Is the source looking for a payoff down the road? If I go on record saying nice things about Candidate A, maybe I am hoping to get appointed to a nice comfy job if A wins the election.
The medium is the message. News stories go through news networks, broadcast networks, and publishers. Books go through publishing houses. In other words, somebody has to provide the materials for the message to be communicated. Somewhere, a network executive makes decisions about what gets on the air and what doesn't. Somewhere, an editor or publisher decides what gets printed and what doesn't. So if you're reading a book you have to think about not only the author's background and point of view, but also the publisher's orientation: for example, they might publish mostly liberal books or mostly conservative books. Knowing something about the background of a publisher or a broadcast network can help give you an idea of what to expect.
What are the source's own experiences? How might those experiences be relevant, and how might they affect the source's perceptions? First-hand knowledge of any issue is always helpful; on the other hand, a person might have had an experience that was atypical or unrepresentative. A soldier on the front lines is going to have a very vivid, detailed, and specific recollection of a battle. The general in a command bunker may not see the battle up close, but he will have information on the "big picture" of troop strengths, enemy positions, strategic decisions, and other things that the soldier will not know, and may not be allowed to know. The soldier's memory may be distorted by trauma, confusion, fear, or shame (of a real or imagined failiing on the battlefield); the general may ignore or suppress key information, perhaps with his career in mind. Both perspectives are valuable, both have their limitations.
Psychological factors. There are basic psychological factors that operate in all of us to one degree or another. Resistance to change is one; Neo has written extensively and insightfully on the human reluctance to change familiar patterns of thought. There is a need for approval of others; there is also a need for a sense of autonomy and a belief that we determine our own destiny. And of course we all like to be thought knowledgeable, which is why we are often tempted to speak more than we actually know.
The centrally-managed and -edited traditional media (including radio, TV, print periodicals, and books) have nothing to fear from the internet ... provided they do not contribute to their own irrelevance by ignoring it.
The internet is anarchical, and therefore makes great demands on the individual user in terms of critical thinking skills. How do we know to trust a site? We compare information from multiple sources, listen to different analyses, learn to weed out irrelevant input and compare the picture with what we know from our own previous experience.
With the traditional media, this is all delegated to the editor, publisher, producer, or university. Often we have to do this, because the material is specialized or technical in nature, or because individual contributors don't have the credibility to reliably provide the information we need.
But centralized media can serve their own agendas at the expense of accuracy. That's where the supremely democratic world of blogging comes in.
Traditional media still play a valuable role. But they risk abdicating this role if they fail to recognize the democratizing effects of electronic communications.
Why do we believe what we believe? How do we decide what is true, and what is important? Consider the role of the following factors, and feel free to add others:
· internal consistency (details of the narrative agree with each other)
· external consistency (details of the narrative agree with information previously verified)
· insider details (information available only to an authentic source)
· dialog and dissent (narrative welcomes questions and challenges; fosters better understanding among divergent opinions)
· awareness of objections (narrative recognizes legitimate counter-arguments and seeks to refute them)
· nuance (recognition that a proposition may hold true in general and still admit of exceptions)
· the human voice (an intangible quality that may include a distinctive personality, awareness of ambivalence, self-analysis and self-criticism)
Finally, what does biased writing look like? Bias isn't necessarily bad, but you need to be aware of it and, if necessary, allow for it. Yahoo offers this:
Check for the tone of the publication - pick out opinion statements and check the publication's references (are all of the references from the same author or does the publication offer a variety?). What other articles has the author written - the topics of these may help determine her/his bias.That sums up the main points: variety of sources, obvious rhetorical slant, agenda. Going a little deeper, I'll offer the following ideas:
Does the author present both sides of the argument/topic? If not, which side is presented more often? What is the point s/he is trying to make? Ask yourself these questions and you should be on the right track!
* Look for "snarl words" versus "purr words" - words that mean the same thing but sound bad or good.Another common form of potential bias is the use of "weasel words" - words or phrases that make a statement appear factual but really undercut the precision of the statement. They're called "weasel words" because they allow the writer to wiggle out of being pinned down to a specific statement that can be proved or disproved. Wikipedia's style manual has an excellent section on weasel words:
* See if you can tell what kind of overall picture, or "narrative", the writer is trying to present.
* Sometimes an article will seem to present both sides, but will use better arguments to represent one side, and weaker arguments for the other, so that one side sounds more convincing; this is a kind of implicit bias.
* Sometimes people will use bogus arguments (called "red herrings" or "straw men") to evade questions they don't have answers for; these are examples of fallacies or bad logic. Studying the types of fallacies can help you see when somebody is trying to pull a fast one on you; you can find out more about logical fallacies here, here, or here.
Words and short phrases that make a statement difficult or impossible to prove or disprove:In an earlier post at Dreams Into Lightning, I complained about the use of vague modifiers in the media:
The following examples often qualify for weasel words by vaguely attributing a statement to no source in particular:
- Some humans practice cannibalism. (True, but useless and misrepresentative)
- Many humans practice cannibalism. (“many” could well be two, three, ten, or even five billion)
- Throughout human history, there have been many individuals with three arms. (to illustrate.)
- Most scientists believe that there is truth
- "Most" can mean any amount over 50% but short of 100%
- A "scientist" could be anyone with any knowledge of science
- The statement gives no necessary contextual data:
- How, when and by whom were the individual beliefs counted
- Whether the statement concerns all published scientists, or all
those presently alive, or only those who are qualified in the given
scientific field- The meaning of "truth" varies
- "More and more", "more than ever", "an increasing number"
- "Possibly", "may", "could", "perhaps" and the like
- It is believed that... Anyone could believe anything so it is very important to know who believes that, and why?
- It remains to be seen... Pointless, since it usually introduces an unverifiable statement.
- "According to some (reports, studies, rumors, sources…) …"
- "Actually, Allegedly, Apparently, Arguably, Clearly, Plainly, Obviously, Undoubtedly, Supposedly ..."
- "(Contrary, as opposed) to (many, most, popular, ...) ..."
- "(Correctly, Justly, Properly, ...) or not, ..."
- "Could it be that..."
- "(Critics, detractors, fans, experts, many people, scholars, historians, ...) contend/say that ..."
- "It (could be, should be, may be, has been, is) (argued, speculated, remembered, …) …"
- "(Mainstream, serious, the majority of, a small group of ...)
(scholars, scientists, researchers, experts, scientific community...)
..."- "It has been proven that…"
- "Research has shown..."
- Personifications like "Science says ..." or "Experience has proven..."
- "There has been criticism that ..."
- "It turns out..."'
Have you ever noticed how often they use vague quantifiers like "some"Now go take another look at Wikipedia's list - better yet, print it out! - and spend some time looking for weasel words in your favorite media source. I bet you'll find a lot of them. (How many is "a lot"? Well, try it and find out for yourself!)
and "many", especially when they're talking about public opinion? But
of course you have - Dreams Into Lightning readers are a smart bunch.
So you've already figured out that that's an easy way for the
"journalist" to introduce his or her own opinion into a story, without
having to defend a more stringent assertion, e.g. the claim that said
opinions represent a majority (which would require the word "most").
Make a game of it: print out a copy of this post, and go through your local newspaper with a pen or a highlighter. Look for anonymous sources, or people who might have an incentive to be partial, or examples of journalists possibly putting their own opinions into the mouths of the ubiquitous "some people". Look for snarl words, purr words, and weasel words. Try to spot logical fallacies. Check for internal consistency, external consistency, and awareness of objections. Ask yourself which analyses come from people who know what they're talking about - those who have first-hand knowledge of the relevant "facts on the ground" and who are prepared to respond to opposing arguments - and which ones are unsupported opinions from people with their own agenda.
I hope you have found this post helpful. But the most important thing in determining a source's biases is to do your own thinking! And that's important for students, too - so if you are a student, please take the time to come up with your own answers to this question. Remember, your instructor can use a search engine just as easily as you can.
Related. On Scott Thomas Beauchamp and source biases.
Update
I've been taking a break from playing "Mr. Universe" due to pressures from school and real life. Hoping to get back to posting soon.
Third-semester calculus looks like it's going to be fun. The prof is a young guy from Mexico, very articulate, an excellent explainer, and has an enthusiasm for the material that's infectious. He killed us with homework the first week - review problems - but I'm glad he did because there's so much stuff you have to memorize in the first two semesters that it's easy to forget. Derivatives and integrals of circular functions, integration techniques (integration by parts, partial fractions, etc.). Now we're looking at convergent and divergent series; it's more logic-based. I've taken this class before, but I only got about a C, and it was a few years ago. I'm hoping to get more out of it (including better grades) this time around.
"Modern physics" means all the stuff they don't teach you the first year: relativity and quantum theory. Our prof is a bald German guy with coke-bottle glasses and a thick accent. Relativity is pretty straightforward once you get the hang of how to plug in the Lorentz equation. Quantum theory is weirder than relativity; Einstein himself famously refused to accept quantum physics. The late Richard Feynman, in his popular series of lectures delivered in the early 1960s, explained that "things on a very small scale behave like nothing that you have any direct experience with." That is, you have to set aside your whole sense of "how the world works" - which was built up over a lifetime and painstakingly reinforced in first-year physics - and learn a whole new mental vocabulary of wavefunctions and probability amplitudes. I should point out, by the way, that I do not have any particular facility with mathematics or physics, but I'm really excited by the prospect of learning this stuff and mastering the techniques, so I'm determined to challenge myself a little bit and see this program through.
Our English class just finished Jane Austen's "Northanger Abbey". It's one of Austen's early works, a spoof on Gothic novels in general and "Mysteries of Udolpho" in particular. A key element of the storyline centers around Catherine's overactive imagination (stimulated by the pulp fiction of her day) and her eagerness to believe the most fantastic and dreadful things about Northanger Abbey and the Tilney family. I think the other plot element - General Tilney's changing attitude toward Catherine - invites us to contrast Catherine's mindset with the General's. In a sense, Catherine and the General find themselves in similar situations: both have made mistaken assumptions about other people, and are found out. But while Catherine experiences an epiphany, the General only becomes more obstinate and defensive.
With "Northanger Abbey", Austen is clearly calling on her contemporaries to provide worthwhile reading and not literary "junk food". Even more important, though, is the broader point about how we interpret the information we get about our environment - and I think there's a direct relevance for us in the modern world, not only in the blogging universe but in our daily lives. Here is Henry's rebuke to Catherine, after he has caught her snooping in the Tilney home and she has blurted out her wild imaginings about the Tilneys:
Henry appeals to the highest ideals of their society ("we are English, we are Christians") not to suggest that their neighbors are incapable of committing such a horrid crime as Catherine imagines, but to impress upon her the wildly improbable nature of the sorts of conspiracies she has dreamed up.
"What have you been judging from?" This is the question we have to ask ourselves constantly. Where do we get our information, and how well does it mesh with what we know about the real world? Do we prefer the subtlety and complexity of real life, or the feverish excitement of our paranoid fantasies? "Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you."
I'm going to enjoy English class. The discussion among the other students is fascinating and stimulating; it's especially fun to get the input of younger minds. (I don't think the prof likes me, but that seems to be a constant among my humanities professors, so I'll accept my fate. I'm taking the class to learn literature, not to make the prof happy.) I think immersing myself in literature makes my blogging richer, too.
And back on the subject of blogging, we now have a face and a name for the famous Wretchard of The Belmont Club! Pajamas Media identifies him as Richard Fernandez, a native of the Philippines now living in Australia and working as a software developer. He will be serving as the Australian Editor for PJM; go read his full profile at the link.
PS - I will probably be posting more on the subject of blogging and critical thinking in the near future; there's quite a bit more I find I want to say. So keep watching this space.
You can't stop the signal!
Third-semester calculus looks like it's going to be fun. The prof is a young guy from Mexico, very articulate, an excellent explainer, and has an enthusiasm for the material that's infectious. He killed us with homework the first week - review problems - but I'm glad he did because there's so much stuff you have to memorize in the first two semesters that it's easy to forget. Derivatives and integrals of circular functions, integration techniques (integration by parts, partial fractions, etc.). Now we're looking at convergent and divergent series; it's more logic-based. I've taken this class before, but I only got about a C, and it was a few years ago. I'm hoping to get more out of it (including better grades) this time around.
"Modern physics" means all the stuff they don't teach you the first year: relativity and quantum theory. Our prof is a bald German guy with coke-bottle glasses and a thick accent. Relativity is pretty straightforward once you get the hang of how to plug in the Lorentz equation. Quantum theory is weirder than relativity; Einstein himself famously refused to accept quantum physics. The late Richard Feynman, in his popular series of lectures delivered in the early 1960s, explained that "things on a very small scale behave like nothing that you have any direct experience with." That is, you have to set aside your whole sense of "how the world works" - which was built up over a lifetime and painstakingly reinforced in first-year physics - and learn a whole new mental vocabulary of wavefunctions and probability amplitudes. I should point out, by the way, that I do not have any particular facility with mathematics or physics, but I'm really excited by the prospect of learning this stuff and mastering the techniques, so I'm determined to challenge myself a little bit and see this program through.
Our English class just finished Jane Austen's "Northanger Abbey". It's one of Austen's early works, a spoof on Gothic novels in general and "Mysteries of Udolpho" in particular. A key element of the storyline centers around Catherine's overactive imagination (stimulated by the pulp fiction of her day) and her eagerness to believe the most fantastic and dreadful things about Northanger Abbey and the Tilney family. I think the other plot element - General Tilney's changing attitude toward Catherine - invites us to contrast Catherine's mindset with the General's. In a sense, Catherine and the General find themselves in similar situations: both have made mistaken assumptions about other people, and are found out. But while Catherine experiences an epiphany, the General only becomes more obstinate and defensive.
With "Northanger Abbey", Austen is clearly calling on her contemporaries to provide worthwhile reading and not literary "junk food". Even more important, though, is the broader point about how we interpret the information we get about our environment - and I think there's a direct relevance for us in the modern world, not only in the blogging universe but in our daily lives. Here is Henry's rebuke to Catherine, after he has caught her snooping in the Tilney home and she has blurted out her wild imaginings about the Tilneys:
"... Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from? Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you -- Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing; where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dear Miss Morland, what ideas have you been admitting?"
Henry appeals to the highest ideals of their society ("we are English, we are Christians") not to suggest that their neighbors are incapable of committing such a horrid crime as Catherine imagines, but to impress upon her the wildly improbable nature of the sorts of conspiracies she has dreamed up.
"What have you been judging from?" This is the question we have to ask ourselves constantly. Where do we get our information, and how well does it mesh with what we know about the real world? Do we prefer the subtlety and complexity of real life, or the feverish excitement of our paranoid fantasies? "Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you."
I'm going to enjoy English class. The discussion among the other students is fascinating and stimulating; it's especially fun to get the input of younger minds. (I don't think the prof likes me, but that seems to be a constant among my humanities professors, so I'll accept my fate. I'm taking the class to learn literature, not to make the prof happy.) I think immersing myself in literature makes my blogging richer, too.
And back on the subject of blogging, we now have a face and a name for the famous Wretchard of The Belmont Club! Pajamas Media identifies him as Richard Fernandez, a native of the Philippines now living in Australia and working as a software developer. He will be serving as the Australian Editor for PJM; go read his full profile at the link.
PS - I will probably be posting more on the subject of blogging and critical thinking in the near future; there's quite a bit more I find I want to say. So keep watching this space.
You can't stop the signal!
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