3 ms·

How can you tell if a piece of information is independently verified if you don't know the source? If you're ignoring who presents the facts and who presents th

by fnovd 10y ago

How can you tell if a piece of information is independently verified if you don't know the source? If you're ignoring who presents the facts and who presents the verification, how do you determine whether or not the reporter of the verification is independent from the reporter of the fact? Sources matter. And there is no such thing as a "probably true possible fact". There are facts and there are allegations.

jacquesm 10y ago
> How can you tell if a piece of information is independently verified if you don't know the source? By your reckoning no anonymous source can ever be credible. Some pretty interesting stuff has come out over the years from anonymous sources and turned out - retrospectively - to have been accurate and likely to have been a leak by an insider. Given that nobody is ever (Snowden excepted) to go on the record about an imminent operation from inside some government agency the only way such information could ever come out is through anonymous sources. See also: watergate.
- fnovd 10y ago
  An anonymous source is vetted by the news agency which reports on the story. You're trusting the news agency to do their due diligence and think critically about the information they are given. The source is rarely completely anonymous as their identity is known by the news agency. If the NYT says they got a tip from an anonymous source about Assange, it means more to me than if my neighbor Steve says HE got a tip from an anonymous source.
  - jacquesm 10y ago
    Whether you like it or not, the world has moved on and sources are now able to post stuff directly without having to go through intermediaries like the established press. This causes all kinds of havoc and requires more skepticism on the part of the consumer but that does not diminish the fact that it might be true and that the timing is interesting. Now chances are better than even (a lot better) that this is false, but so far it fits the facts as good (and in some cases better) than most other theories about why this is happening other than the one about today being the day of the 'interview' with the Swedish representatives.
dredmorbius 10y ago
Multiple accounts, particularly ones which are 1) detailed and 2) generally support one another, are a good start. Even if you don't know who the individual reporters are. As an example, the UNHCR follows a similar protocol when investigating reports of atrocities. The individual reporters, while not fully anonymous, frequently have no previous basis to assess credibility. If their stories generally correspond, you've got an indication of truth. If the stories differ on material points, there are problems. The story of Susannah from the Book of Daniel (Bible or Torah) has an excellent early exemplar of this: the stories of two claimed witnesses differed materially in the description of a crucial tree, impeaching their credibility.

by fnovd 10y ago

jacquesm 10y ago

> How can you tell if a piece of information is independently verified if you don't know the source? By your reckoning no anonymous source can ever be credible. Some pretty interesting stuff has come out over the years from anonymous sources and turned out - retrospectively - to have been accurate and likely to have been a leak by an insider. Given that nobody is ever (Snowden excepted) to go on the record about an imminent operation from inside some government agency the only way such information could ever come out is through anonymous sources. See also: watergate.

fnovd 10y ago
An anonymous source is vetted by the news agency which reports on the story. You're trusting the news agency to do their due diligence and think critically about the information they are given. The source is rarely completely anonymous as their identity is known by the news agency. If the NYT says they got a tip from an anonymous source about Assange, it means more to me than if my neighbor Steve says HE got a tip from an anonymous source.
- jacquesm 10y ago
  Whether you like it or not, the world has moved on and sources are now able to post stuff directly without having to go through intermediaries like the established press. This causes all kinds of havoc and requires more skepticism on the part of the consumer but that does not diminish the fact that it might be true and that the timing is interesting. Now chances are better than even (a lot better) that this is false, but so far it fits the facts as good (and in some cases better) than most other theories about why this is happening other than the one about today being the day of the 'interview' with the Swedish representatives.

dredmorbius 10y ago

Multiple accounts, particularly ones which are 1) detailed and 2) generally support one another, are a good start. Even if you don't know who the individual reporters are. As an example, the UNHCR follows a similar protocol when investigating reports of atrocities. The individual reporters, while not fully anonymous, frequently have no previous basis to assess credibility. If their stories generally correspond, you've got an indication of truth. If the stories differ on material points, there are problems. The story of Susannah from the Book of Daniel (Bible or Torah) has an excellent early exemplar of this: the stories of two claimed witnesses differed materially in the description of a crucial tree, impeaching their credibility.