Re:Viral 'human bird wings' video fake, probably an ad, expe...
by simplefish on Thursday March 22, 2012 @06:33PM
(#3742389)
grins I hope some of the more credulous commenters here on HN[1] like the taste of crow. Especially the ones that attacked other commenters as being closed-minded for pointing out obvious problems with the video.
Re:Viral 'human bird wings' video fake, probably an ad, expe...
by jff on Thursday March 22, 2012 @02:15PM
(#3741146)
What a close-minded person you are. This is essentially an ad-hominem attack, as HN loves to point out--because it comes from a certain source, you dismiss it immediately and attempt to discredit it.
Re:Viral 'human bird wings' video fake, probably an ad, expe...
by mistercow on Thursday March 22, 2012 @02:41PM
(#3741284)
Discounting based on a source repeatedly shown to be unreliable is not ad hominem; it is proper evidential weighting.
It would be bad reasoning to say "because [source] says [claim] and [source] is unreliable, [claim] is probably wrong." But it is correct reasoning to say "[source] says [claim], but [source] is unreliable, so my beliefs about [claim] are virtually unaffected."
Edit: of course, if you saw the original video, you should already believe it to be fake. An article from foxnews.com should not change that. And yes, I realize that this is only being reproduced by foxnews.com, and is not their original material. Still, "don't click [unreliable source].com links" is a worthwhile policy to have because the human mind is not very good at tracking sources.
Re:Viral 'human bird wings' video fake, probably an ad, expe...
by lotharbot on Thursday March 22, 2012 @04:24PM
(#3741772)
> "Discounting based on a source repeatedly shown to be unreliable is not ad hominem; it is proper evidential weighting."
Consider the related approach of giving someone who is a known expert in field X undue weight for their commentary in field Y. We recognize this as a mistake because one's ability in field X does not necessarily correlate with their ability in field Y.
In this case, you're suggesting we completely ignore the statement of a source which is known to be unreliable on a particular set of partisan topics, and known to be reliable on non-partisan topics (such as sports scores), when they are addressing a topic within the second category.
Proper evidential weighting takes into account not merely the "reliability" or "unreliability" of a source in a generic sense, but the specific details of that (un)reliability.
(The problem with the heavily-downvoted grandparent post is more than mere improper evidential weighting. The larger problem is that it's boring and off-topic. Here on Hacker News, we prefer comments that add value to the discussion.)
Re:Viral 'human bird wings' video fake, probably an ad, expe...
by mistercow on Thursday March 22, 2012 @07:08PM
(#3742527)
>In this case, you're suggesting we completely ignore the statement of a source which is known to be unreliable on a particular set of partisan topics, and known to be reliable on non-partisan topics (such as sports scores), when they are addressing a topic within the second category.
Perhaps it is not quite right to say that ignoring it completely is "proper evidential weighting". What I mean is that it is a better heuristic than the ones your brain's native evidence-weighing routines will employ. And since it is impossible to completely override those instinctive heuristics, there is some level of credibility below which the best course of action is to simply disregard a source. The fact that we have limited investigative resources further raises that bar.
Otherwise, I would have to spend all of my time weighing odds and researching the plausibility of claims gleaned from Prison Planet, during which I could learn much more information about the world by focusing my attention elsewhere.
>(The problem with the heavily-downvoted grandparent post is more than mere improper evidential weighting. The larger problem is that it's boring and off-topic. Here on Hacker News, we prefer comments that add value to the discussion.)
Well yes, it just bothers me quite a lot when people act like ignoring disreputable sources is some kind of sin against rationality.
Re:Viral 'human bird wings' video fake, probably an ad, expe...
by lotharbot on Sunday March 25, 2012 @06:06PM
(#3753992)
If you're looking for heuristics for evidence-weighting, I submit "this story is getting significant votes on HN" should usually be enough to override the low-credibility-score based heuristic you might otherwise use.
Google Translate should do a decent job ;).
By the way, the real name of the guy is 'Floris Kaayk'.
[1]: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3732385
http://metabunk.org/threads/480-Debunked-Human-Birdwings
It would be bad reasoning to say "because [source] says [claim] and [source] is unreliable, [claim] is probably wrong." But it is correct reasoning to say "[source] says [claim], but [source] is unreliable, so my beliefs about [claim] are virtually unaffected."
Edit: of course, if you saw the original video, you should already believe it to be fake. An article from foxnews.com should not change that. And yes, I realize that this is only being reproduced by foxnews.com, and is not their original material. Still, "don't click [unreliable source].com links" is a worthwhile policy to have because the human mind is not very good at tracking sources.
Consider the related approach of giving someone who is a known expert in field X undue weight for their commentary in field Y. We recognize this as a mistake because one's ability in field X does not necessarily correlate with their ability in field Y.
In this case, you're suggesting we completely ignore the statement of a source which is known to be unreliable on a particular set of partisan topics, and known to be reliable on non-partisan topics (such as sports scores), when they are addressing a topic within the second category.
Proper evidential weighting takes into account not merely the "reliability" or "unreliability" of a source in a generic sense, but the specific details of that (un)reliability.
(The problem with the heavily-downvoted grandparent post is more than mere improper evidential weighting. The larger problem is that it's boring and off-topic. Here on Hacker News, we prefer comments that add value to the discussion.)
Perhaps it is not quite right to say that ignoring it completely is "proper evidential weighting". What I mean is that it is a better heuristic than the ones your brain's native evidence-weighing routines will employ. And since it is impossible to completely override those instinctive heuristics, there is some level of credibility below which the best course of action is to simply disregard a source. The fact that we have limited investigative resources further raises that bar.
Otherwise, I would have to spend all of my time weighing odds and researching the plausibility of claims gleaned from Prison Planet, during which I could learn much more information about the world by focusing my attention elsewhere.
>(The problem with the heavily-downvoted grandparent post is more than mere improper evidential weighting. The larger problem is that it's boring and off-topic. Here on Hacker News, we prefer comments that add value to the discussion.)
Well yes, it just bothers me quite a lot when people act like ignoring disreputable sources is some kind of sin against rationality.
http://slatest.slate.com/posts/2011/11/21/fairleigh_dickinso...