Before you go on, an article in the May 8 & May 22, 2021 issue of Science News ran with a cover "Awash in Deception: How science can help us avoid being duped by misinformation." In the lead article titled: "The Battle Against Fake News," Alexandra Witze presents five suggestions on how to debunk bad information. They come from the News Literacy Project (see the above link). How to Debunk: 1. Arm yourself with media literacy skills, at sites such as the News Literacy Project (newslit.org), to better understand how to spot hoax videos and stories. 2. Don't stigmatize people for holding inaccurate beliefs. Show empathy and respect, or you're more likely to alienate your audience than successfully share accurate information. 3. Translate complicated but true ideas into simple messages that are easy to grasp. Videos, graphics and other visual aids can help. 4. When possible, once you provide a factual alternative to the misinformation, explain the underlying fallacies (such as cherry- picking information, a common tactic of climate change deniers. 5. Mobilize when you see misinformation being shared on social media as soon as possible. If you see something, say something. "Misinformation is any information that is incorrect, whether due to error or fake news. "Disinformation is deliberately intended to deceive." "Propaganda is disinformation with a political agenda." Sander van der Linden Social Psychologist University of Cambridge Source: Science News/May 8, 2021 & May 22, 2021 Update: September 22, 2023: This is more important now than ever. Be vigilant and speak in your own way. Love Wins.
I’m growing weary of having to define nearly every word I write. Granted there are words and sentences that need to be explained, but I find myself needing to define and explain my usage of way too many words.
Why is that? I think that it is the loss of “common” sense or “Common,” the American rapper and actor that I just learned about in search of a common meaning for the word “common.”
I have become a big fan of technology. But, with the rapid changes in technology, there has evolved an inverse correlation with the commons. The more different media options make it more likely that we will have less and less in common with anyone, even those we think we are very close to. Even the word common is subject to debate.
Technology has many upsides. The rapid dissemination of information (and regrettably, mis and dis information), the ability to stay in touch and reconnect with people all over the world basically for what seems almost free, and the ability to share thoughts and opinions at the click of a button.
I was a grade schooler in the ’60’s. I got to high school in 1970. Back in those ancient days, my classmates could go home and return to school the next day to discuss the latest episode of Gilligan’s Island. Today there are so many channels…make that so many networks, on the television screen that the odds of sharing a TV show with even one classmate are infinitesimally small.
Add to that recorded media, internet media, streaming media, social media and multimedia and the choices for information and entertainment are beyond dizzying. So many choices, so little chance of finding common ground. I did a Google powered search of the odds of two people doing the same thing at the same time and I found this from a Reddit post from eight years ago from R/Math (emidway).
what is the statistical probability of two people in this world doing the exact same thing at the exact same time? let make it simple two people separated geographically (listing to the same song or watching the same movie) ok let me lay the ground work here (time factor is irrelevant could be day or night )to increase number but position of body (siting laying walking), direction of body east west north or south has to be the same , position of limbs, song or movie has to be played at the exact same time for both individuals) there are many variables but there are 7 billion people in the world you tube makes music available to every one could there a be a high probability that two people doing the same thing at the same time or not ? Note: The odds have gotten considerably smaller over the past eight years. The world's population is now is 8.1 Billion people (8,100,000,000).
From the same Reddit thread from eight years ago, aleph_not responded to the same prompt with this response:
It depends on how specific you want to be. If "doing the same thing" means "sitting down facing the same cardinal direction listening to the same music" then probably pretty high, since at any given time the most popular current song is being listened to by thousands of people, so two of them are almost surely facing the same direction. But if your idea of "same thing" is super specific, then the chances are almost zero. For example, with direction, is "facing west" enough? Or maybe more specific like "facing north-east at an angle of 24 degrees"? Or do you want the angle to be the same up to the thousandths-place? Millionths-place? Do these two people need to be breathing in the same pattern? Blinking at the same time? Curling their toes in the same way? What if one of them has longer arms so is necessarily holding them in a different position. Does that count against them? In short this isn't really a well-posed question. Try r/theydidthemath if you want some better estimates on these things.
So, maybe you’ll have the patience to look up what r/theydidthemath has to say on the subject. Alas, I’m veering off course. What else is new? My wife can relate to that.
Back to the point, if we are not watching or listening to any common information or entertainment, how are we ever going to communicate with each other in a meaningful way? This seems pretty brain-dead simple to understand in concept.
What is not brain dead simple is the answer(s) to the question of how do we rediscover common sense. It is the most important human question of our time. The most important overall issue of our time is climate change. And on that point, I’ll leave you hanging.