deathrey Posted March 16, 2018 Share Posted March 16, 2018 One of my teenage relatives (who I'm surprised has actually heard of Hawking) posted a possibly fake quote by Hawking 'Life would be tragic if it weren't funny' followed up by a picture collage of herself. I'm not really sure what she was trying to do.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BomberPat Posted March 16, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 16, 2018 51 minutes ago, John Matrix said: As a complete aside, this worries me far more during the elections and in politics generally. I'm nowhere near politically astute enough to distinguish what's right from wrong when it comes to GDP, economic prospects, income vs inflation etc, but the amount of, sometimes quite crude quotes, graphics, charts i'd see posted to social media without any sort of source attached that had had hundreds and hundreds of RT's was scary. The fact that in some quarters, public opinion can be so easily influenced by simply throwing together a bogus quote or graph and reporting it as fact, having it go completely unchallenged and spreading like wildfire really plays on my mind - sure I read somewhere, possibly on here that so called fake news is far likelier to be shared online because of its controversial or sensationalist nature, could enough twats with photoshop really sway an election however well intentioned? This is something I've thought about a lot - we're looking at stuff like "fake news" and misleading Facebook posts and how they affect elections in isolation, rather than as part of a broader decaying of the nature of objective truth. Traditionally, I would say there are three arbiters of "truth" that society requires to function correctly - the scientific community, education, the justice system and journalism. That's not to say that any of those four are bastions of truth, but that they form, if you like, the kind of epistemological pillars underpinning our knowledge, and allowing us to determine what is or isn't true. What we've seen over the past few years is a concerted effort to undermine all three of those - largely by the right wing, though I am saying that from within my lefty bubble, and I'm sure the other side isn't blameless either. When legitimate journalism can be slandered as "fake news", and social media bubbles make it easier and easier to avoid anything that contradicts your world-view, trust in journalism is eroded, so they lose their role as an arbiter of truth - the one thing that's become terrifying clear since Trump's election is that he can lie through his teeth and it doesn't matter. A political journalist's role should be to hold the elected officials to account - to expose the lies they tell, and the truths they don't - but when journalists and doing that and Trump's supporters simply don't care, or their trust in journalism has been consciously eroded to the point where they don't believe anything that contradicts them, that's a huge problem. Throw in accusations of schools "indoctrinating" students, of universities being lefty liberal enclaves, tabloid "you can do a degree in Kim Kardashian!" dumbing down scare stories, and the same trust is eroded in the education system. Accuse global warming of being a conspiracy, scientists and intellectuals of being "the metropolitan liberal elite", publicise sham science or ignore evidence and promote things like anti-vaxer bullshit or questioning evolution (which can be tied into the issues with education, certainly in America, where the right wing courting evangelicals has more than bridged that particular gap), and the occasional tabloid story about how scientists have done an expensive study to find out something that the general public would see as a waste of money, and we get the same scenario in the scientific community. We've "had enough of experts". With the justice system, you just have to look at the Daily Mail calling judges "enemies of the State" or "elites", or accusing legitimate legal challenges to the Brexit process as being "undemocratic" or "anti-British" to see how that one goes. Throw in what you said - the vast majority of us don't know about the economy, we don't know all the stats we need to make an informed decision, so we have to rely on others to be that arbiter of truth. On one hand, we could be easily misled by made up or misrepresented statistics that look convincing, or just play on our political biases and make us think they sound about right, but on the other hand, this erosion of trust in institutions makes it just as likely that people will see the real statistics, and write them off as "fake news". It all comes together to create an environment where it's harder to ascertain what to believe, and where the truth lies. Where it's easier to scam people, because the institutions we should be relying on to determine the truth of the matter aren't trusted - so even when they are giving us the answers, we're not listening. I don't think it's a coincidence that in recent years we've seen all this happening, while also seeing a rise in belief in conspiracy theories moving towards the mainstream, rather than being the reserve of the lunatic fringe. Not just politically, either - the fact that there are people who legitimately believe the Earth is flat is evidence of a massive epistemological failing. And it's only going to get worse - bots will become more sophisticated, video editing software is already making it easier for complete amateurs to manipulate video footage with face-mapping and audio manipulation to make it look like someone is saying something they're not, things like Photoshop aren't going away, and nor are trolls and charlatans prepared to misrepresent footage or photos as being something they're not ("Muslims celebrating a terrorist attack", for example), and fewer and fewer people will resort to newspapers, TV news, or really any "established" source of news that is under at least some requirement not to just completely make shit up, instead turning to social media, to online "news" sites, and so on, all of which is under far less scrutiny. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members mim731 Posted March 16, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 16, 2018 3 minutes ago, BomberPat said: Traditionally, I would say there are three arbiters of "truth" that society requires to function correctly - the scientific community, education, the justice system and journalism I really want this to be an excellent bit of satire, rather than a simple typo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BomberPat Posted March 16, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 16, 2018 Ha! An honest mistake, I'm afraid - when I started writing it I hadn't included the justice system, then the "enemies of the state" headline occurred to me and I realised it fit with what I was talking about. I do think that all this will be the key political/social/ideological struggle of the next generation, and I don't really see any ethical way of resolving it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted March 16, 2018 Share Posted March 16, 2018 I know I've mentioned this before, but taking part in the Stop Funding Hate and Sleeping Giants campaigns is one way to help encourage a more ethical media. Hitting the worst offenders where it hurts most - their advertising revenue - is something we can all contribute to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Carbomb Posted March 16, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 16, 2018 Excellent post from Pat, there. Can't really add anything to that, except a "hear, hear". Thanks for those links, Zeb. I've RTed Stop Funding Hate before, but I didn't realise how extensive their work was. Sleeping Giants UK doesn't seem to have been updated since January, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted March 16, 2018 Share Posted March 16, 2018 2 hours ago, Carbomb said: Sleeping Giants UK doesn't seem to have been updated since January, though. I've not had much time for Twitter lately so hadn't noticed that. Perhaps they felt there was a redundancy in having a UK account when there's already SFH, although you'd think they'd have announced it. Their other international versions, like the general European one, are still active. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Bus Surfer Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 (edited) My first attempts at skating in nearly 20 years. Managed to drop into the mini ramp after falling on my ass a load of times. The bumps hurt like hell but it was awesome to be skating again. Edited March 17, 2018 by Silky Kisser Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BigJag Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 Heelys? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Bus Surfer Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 6 minutes ago, BigJag said: Heelys? Wash your mouth out! Aggressive skates. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BigJag Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 What are Aggressive skates? Don't think I've ever seen those. I'm an X Games fan. Not all that clued up though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Bus Surfer Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 They're basically inline skates or rollberblades that tend to be tougher and rugged to cope with the bumps/grinds and hard wear and tear. The sport was fairly big in the mid to late 90's but fell off in a big way after that. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggressive_inline_skating?wprov=sfla1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members PunkStep Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 I was never an inline skates kid. Roces quads however, now we're talking. I had a lovely massive pair with florescent wheels, laces and socks wrapped around the top. Something like these: Then I got myself a glow in the dark Bauer stick (why wouldn't you get a glow in the dark one??) and joined a street hockey club. I was shit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Bus Surfer Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 (edited) I was actually gonna pick up a pair of Roces aggressive skates (M12's) but decided against it in the end. Was always a big fan of Roces back in the day. Their original Majestic 12 skate was super sexy. New style M12 '97 Majestic 12 Edited March 17, 2018 by Silky Kisser Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members stumobir Posted March 17, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted March 17, 2018 (edited) After 10 days of travelling around southern Spain and Morocco, my movements have been....inconsistent. Reseting the system tonight. Edited March 17, 2018 by stumobir Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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