“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we're being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That's what's insane about it.”
―
Here’s what Hayflick himself had to say about it:
To slow, or even arrest, the aging process in humans is fraught with serious problems in the relationships of humans to each other and to all of our institutions. By allowing asocial people, tyrants, dictators, mass murderers, and people who cause wars to have their longevity increased should be undesirable. Yet, that would be one outcome of being able to tamper with the aging process.
I guess at a minimum, as bad as everyone is, at least they (as an individual) are not around to be bad forever? I’ll take that silver lining.
Anyone who has worked with a CEO may not be surprised that many of them have common personality traits such as charisma, fearlessness, and a cool head under stress. ... According to Dr Tara Swart, neuroscientist, psychiatrist, and Neuroscientist in Residence at the ...
“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we're being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That's what's insane about it.”
―
Here’s what Hayflick himself had to say about it:
To slow, or even arrest, the aging process in humans is fraught with serious problems in the relationships of humans to each other and to all of our institutions. By allowing asocial people, tyrants, dictators, mass murderers, and people who cause wars to have their longevity increased should be undesirable. Yet, that would be one outcome of being able to tamper with the aging process.
I guess at a minimum, as bad as everyone is, at least they (as an individual) are not around to be bad forever? I’ll take that silver lining.
Anyone who has worked with a CEO may not be surprised that many of them have common personality traits such as charisma, fearlessness, and a cool head under stress. ... According to Dr Tara Swart, neuroscientist, psychiatrist, and Neuroscientist in Residence at the ...
The Disturbing Link Between Psychopathy And Leadership - Forbes We tend to think of psychopathy as the province of criminals, with leadership qualities that may land someone atop a fringe religious cult, say - not in a boardroom. ...
THOUGHTS ON CHIVALRY AND CIVILITY. “It is pure madness and entitlement to expect to receive the deferential treatment expected under chivalry or civility when you openly mock the obligations for you to return the favor.”
The Disturbing Link Between Psychopathy And Leadership - Forbes We tend to think of psychopathy as the province of criminals, with leadership qualities that may land someone atop a fringe religious cult, say - not in a boardroom. ...
THOUGHTS ON CHIVALRY AND CIVILITY. “It is pure madness and entitlement to expect to receive the deferential treatment expected under chivalry or civility when you openly mock the obligations for you to return the favor.”
THOUGHTS ON CHIVALRY AND CIVILITY. “It is pure madness and entitlement to expect to receive the deferential treatment expected under chivalry or civility when you openly mock the obligations for you to return the favor.”
Misinformation and news avoidance
The idea that the spread of misinformation makes some people
want to tune out the news altogether has always lent a paradoxical quality to
the work of fact-checkers and other truth-tellers. It’s hard to deliver the
truth if people are avoiding the news because they think there are too many
falsehoods out there.
Now comes another factor to consider, from the Reuters
Institute’s recent 2019
Digital News Report, which studies news trends worldwide. The number of
people who actively avoid the news, the report said, is up from the last time
the report’s authors asked the question two years ago. But people avoid the
news not just because they don’t believe what they read, or don’t think they
can believe it. It also has to do with how the news makes them feel.
In the United Kingdom, for example, the report said, over half
of respondents said the news “had a negative impact on their mood,” while four
in 10 said they felt helpless to change the course of events.
In a recent
essay for Nieman Labs, editor Joshua Benton explored this dynamic further,
suggesting that lack of trust may be a lesser issue than the fact that the news
is just depressing and anxiety-producing. He posits that maybe the news as
delivered just isn’t competing well against “every other form of media,
content, or diversion on your phone.”
The Reuters report did say that concern about misinformation and
disinformation “remains high despite efforts by platforms and publishers to
build public confidence.” But that concern is only one of a constellation of
factors, along with clickbait and the rise of political polarization fueling
partisan agendas online, that combine to undermine trust among readers.
That conclusion comports with work in the United States from
Andrea Wenzel, an assistant professor at Temple University, who found in a
study last year that people often avoided the news due to a combination of
feeling distrustful of it and being overwhelmed by its negativity.
Her report, published
in the International Journal of Communication, was based on conversations
with 13 focus groups made up of news consumers across the country. It paints a
picture of readers frustrated and weary with the “pervasive ambiguity” of
information, navigating from site to site to verify something they had
encountered online, often just giving up altogether.
Wenzel, reached by e-mail this week, said that when people in
her study talked about “fake news” or trying to find “the truth,” they were
often referring to the presence or absence of partisan narratives as opposed to
misinformation.
Wenzel said that in more recent studies she’s done, trust was
often connected with “how people felt their community was represented, and how
they perceived the motives of journalists” — and not just if they thought
something was factually accurate. So in these instances, she said, “traditional
ideas of fact checking would be unlikely to influence people or woo them back
to the news-using fold.”
Indeed, “fake news” is a politically charged term that doesn’t
always mean misinformation, and is often used by people to characterize,
simply, content that they don’t trust or agree with. But misinformers
contribute to the erosion of trust by spreading falsehoods like doctored
videos and disproven theories about the science of vaccinations
or climate change.
What all this means for fact-checkers and other journalists is
peril as well as opportunity. The peril is that people tune out due to all
sorts of factors, misinformation being just one of them. The opportunity is in
figuring out how to frame fact-checks and stories in ways that draw people in
and in making them a compelling refuge from all the noise that might otherwise
drive readers away.
. . . technology
·
Opinion
is divided
about how concerned we should be about deepfakes. But given the amount being
written about them, one thing is for sure: If they start appearing with more
regularity, no one can say they weren’t warned. The Verge wrote about new
research from London that shows how a single photo can be manipulated into
a singing or talking video portrait. Among the (hilarious) examples is Russian
religious mystic Grigori Rasputin singing Beyonce’s “Halo.”
·
The
Washington Post, meanwhile, has launched a special
guide to identifying manipulated videos, complete with a unique
landing page that explains the terms and gives examples. And Fast
Company had a piece about research into detecting deepfakes.
·
That
slowed-down Pelosi video continues to generate
headaches for Facebook.
. . . politics
·
The
first debate among Democrats (10 of them) running for U.S. president began last
night, prompting a flurry
of fact-checking
and war-room
efforts by social media companies. The Post concluded
that the candidates “rarely strayed over the factual line.” The debates will
continue tonight with 10 more candidates.
·
On
Poynter.org, Cristina Tardáguila, IFCN’s associate director, explored
the question of why fact-checkers in the United States don’t collaborate on
elections coverage the way they do in other countries.
- The International Centre for Investigative Reporting has identified and analyzed instances of blatant misinformation and propaganda leading up to Nigeria’s general elections earlier this year.
. . . the future of news
- We’re assuming all those fact-checkers who attended Global Fact 6 last week in Cape Town are now back at their desks, freshly inspired and ready to tackle all the falsehoods the world has to offer. By all accounts the event was a success. Here are some lessons from the gathering. And here is a post from three big fact-checkers — Africa Check, Chequeado and Full Fact — calling for an evolution in the craft.
·
Two
University of Washington professors have developed a course in “calling BS,” The
Washington Post reported. They say more than 70 colleges have contacted them
about the curriculum.
·
As
part of a New York Times series of op-eds about the future, science fiction
writer Cory Doctorow imagines what
life would be like if the United States regulated social media platforms,
as some
have demanded.
This
week we’re going with a
story by the joint venture of PolitiFact and Kaiser Health News about
claims from President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden that they will
cure cancer.
This
isn’t a typical truth-o-meter type fact-check. It’s basically a story about why
politicians’ claims that their administration will cure cancer are
oversimplified, even though voters might appreciate the intention behind them.
Research to cure cancer has long been a priority for Biden, whose son Beau died
of brain cancer in 2015, and whom then-President Barack Obama chose in 2016 to
lead what they called a “cancer
moonshot.”
Cancer,
however, is not just one disease but rather a collection of them, and they all
call for different treatments, most of which need funding more than anything.
Moreover, prevention is a key to cancer reduction. The Kaiser reporter, Shefali
Luthra, captured these all factors in her clear-eyed explanation.
What we liked: This claim lent itself to the kind of
nuance with which it was treated. Claims that “we will cure cancer” don’t
really call for a thumbs up or down. The science is complex because cancer is
complex. These politicians know that, and many Americans probably know it, too,
given their personal or family experiences. This piece can help people
understand why.
1.
Researchers
in the U.K. have created an online
simulation that they say can increase people’s resistance to “fake news.”
2.
DW.com
profiled
Juliane von Reppert-Bismarck, a former reporter who created "Lie
Detectors," a European news literacy program that has made hundreds of
classroom visits across Belgium, Germany and Austria. The program is making
plans to expand to other countries and languages.
3.
The
Washington Post chronicled
the journey of cancer patients who sought help online and instead became
ensnared in a “web of false, misleading and potentially dangerous cancer
cures.”
4.
Misinformation
about U.S. travel and immigration policies continues to circulate overseas. The
latest, that Malaysia was added to a visa waiver program, was debunked
by Agence France-Press.
5.
AFP,
meanwhile, has joined
with Facebook has in a fact-checking agreement to combat misinformation in
Malaysia.
6.
A
new law in Canada aimed at stemming the spread of political misinformation has
led Twitter to ban political advertising in advance of this fall’s elections. Here’s
the Toronto Star’s take.
7.
A
doctor in the Democratic Republic of the Congo beat Ebola. Now he’s working to
dispel misinformation about the virus, Nature
reported.
8.
Researchers
at the London School of Economics have drawn a number of conclusions from
studies they’ve done on social media use. There is a lot there. We, of course,
zeroed in on the part about the “shelf-life” of fact-checking. See
what you think.
9.
Wired
chronicled
how misinformation and vaccine fears combined to spread measles in Brooklyn.
10.
Yes,
that spider really was eating that ‘possum, says
Snopes. It was a very big spider and a very small ‘possum. Still, ewww.
That's
it for this week!
