Groucho Marx used to quip, “Who you gonna believe — me or your own eyes?” These days, believing what you see with your own eyes can be problematic. Consider this story from The Associated Press: WASHINGTON (AP) — At first glance, images circulating online showing former President Donald Trump surrounded
Continue readingTag: Misinformation
THE FIFTH COLUMN: AI Has Nothing To Do With Intelligence
AI Has Nothing To Do With Intelligence AI has nothing to do with intelligence but people believe the marketing hype, mostly because we have a distorted idea of what intelligence is, largely do to the media. Take the quiz show “Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader” that says in
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: Escaping the Woke Matrix – Michael Shellenberger
Michael Shellenberger lays out some of the societal ills we face today and some solutions as well.
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: It’s All Connected
It isn’t hard to come to the realization that one of the common denominators in almost all of the existential threats currently facing humanity is our flawed natures; human folly, shortsightedness and credulity have much to answer for. Climate change, resource depletion and pandemics readily come to mind as examples
Continue readingAlex's Blog: Fault Lines
I was honoured to chair the Council Of Canadian Academies panel on misinformation. Our report, Fault Lines, is available here. https://cca-reports.ca/reports/the-socioeconomic-impacts-of-health-and-science-misinformation/
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: On The Public Order Emergency Commission
Public testimony of the commission initiated in the wake of the February 2022 invocation of the Emergencies Act (EA) has concluded this week. Frankly, there were few surprises in the course of testimony. Members of the Convoy swore up and down that they were just peaceful protestors, policing agencies demonstrated that they
Continue readingScripturient: No, Brian Hasn’t Done Any of That!
You probably got one of these disinformation campaign cards in your mail this week. It says that Brian Saunderson and Doug “Jabba the Hutt” Ford are “putting money in your pocket.” And then it lists three things Ford did by himself without Brian’s help. Or input. Or even vote because,
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: While The World Is Preoccupied
While the invasion of Ukraine is undoubtedly the world-shaking event that the media are reporting it as, it would be unwise as Canadians to feel blasé about our home-grown problems, problems made abundantly clear by the recent occupation of Ottawa by a domestic force known as the trucker convoy.
Continue readingNorthern Currents –: Right-wing news outlet “True North” posts misleading vaccination statistics
True North, a conservative-leaning news site, has published a highly misleading article that seems to attempt to undermine vaccine effectiveness. It’s actually kind of shocking how bad it is. Putting True North’s own numbers into context tells an entirely different story than the story its readers have heard. According to
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: On The Use & Abuse Of History
A typical account of history is presented in the video linked below, and here are some reflections on it, and on the general practice, or malpractice, of professional historians, and scholars and intellectuals broadly. As Noam Chomsky has said, the major media portray themselves as free and unbiased media, but
Continue readingThings Are Good: A Toolkit for Addressing Misinformation
Democracy functions best when the people are well educated and the group Evidence for Democracy wants exactly that: a smart public. With COVID vaccinations well underway it’s important to understand what exactly is happening with the vaccines and other public health solutions. First, we need to understand that a lot
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Conspiracy Theory Revisited
We should remember that the cult of authority, the cult of obedience, and the cult of conformity, are profoundly anti-intellectual, anti-science, anti-empirical, and anti-democratic, as well as extremely dangerous. And these three cults now reign supreme across the Western world, as Western societies close down, having imported the authoritarian model
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Facebook And The Unravelling Of Truth
At a time when access to accurate, well-informed and well-researched information is crucial, it is probably not surprising that there are bad actors who promote disinformation. After all, chaos, their preferred state, constantly needs stoking, and oh, what a friend they have in Facebook. Earlier this month, the BBC exposed
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Covid & the Left: An open letter
It matters not what group it was this letter was addressed to. What matters is the content. Please read: (Note that WordPress randomly gets buggy on me and will not let me make paragraph spacing properly: hence the strange use of stars. * And WordPress strangely made my signature invisible
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Global Health System Failure – It’s Not What You Think
Who do we turn to for reliable health information? That is one of the critical questions we need to ask now. (Another is, when is it justified to suspend all civil rights, due process of law, and constitutional rule? Hint: never.) What the media is telling us is that: a)
Continue readingScripturient: Blog & Commentary: Carrier’s Attack Ad
Former mayor Chris Carrier has a big, nasty attack ad in the Connection this weekend. He promises “facts” and attacks the current mayor’s “spin.” But any reader who has followed the debate over the real figures for the town debt knows it’s quite the opposite. You weren’t fooled, were you,
Continue readingScripturient: Blog & Commentary: Promising What Can’t be Done
There’s a wrap up in the Connection this weekend with candidates’ comments on “accountability” I want to address. One deputy-mayoral candidate, Brian Saunderson, wrote, he would, “Strengthen the current council code of conduct to include dealing with siblings as a defined conflict and impose consequences for council members who breach the
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: FreedomWorks Fails Basic Math And Economics To Smear Renewable Energy Investments
Freedom_Works_Logo.gif The corporate funded, Libertarian/Conservative “think tank” FreedomWorks is doing their best to convince Americans that taxpayer-funded energy subsidies and loans are a waste of our resources. Of course, that doesn’t apply to the massive giveaways to the dirty energy industry, only to the federal loan programs established to invest
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: What To Expect When You’re Electing: Part 1 – What’s At Stake
vote-smart-button.jpg Environmental and energy issues became one of the central issues of the 2008 U.S. presidential election. While the economy itself took center stage, energy issues were right behind it, being pushed by the insufferable chant of “Drill baby drill.” In the four years that have followed, the U.S. has
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: House Republicans Go All In With Dirty Energy Industry Bonanza Legislation
Powerplant-and-EPA.jpg The dirty energy industry might experience Christmas in June if House Republicans have their way. Earlier this month, members of the House Energy Action Team (HEAT) unveiled a “package” of legislation that includes numerous bills that would give the industry everything that they’ve dreamt of for years. The legislative
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