15 ms·

A glitch in the human psyche that equates repetition with truth

277 points by varunvkrishnan 10y ago

CuriouslyC 10y ago
Better than saying it over and over is to imagine the scenario of the lie repeatedly. Memory is malleable, and this actually creates "false" memories.
Girlang 10y ago
It worked for the so-called "Palestinians"
koolba 10y ago
All the best salesmen know this innately.
- losteverything 10y ago
  And the best parents
  - koolba 10y ago
    "You love asparagus! It's your favorite!"
    - acchow 10y ago
      I've used this on myself rather effectively.
lacampbell 10y ago
I wish once people realised this, they had the courage to apply this to their own dearly held beliefs, particularly political or social ones - how many of those are just lies repeated ad nauseum that clearly aren't true? But I think most peoples reaction is just to say "Yeah! that's totally what those other people do that our side never does because we're right.".
- dilemma 10y ago
  Have you applied it to your own beliefs? Which ones? Do you no longer believe in them?
  - lacampbell 10y ago
    I have. I'm not going to mention which ones as that would cheapen the general message, which is bigger than politics. And yes, I no longer believe them.
    - xapata 10y ago
      No it wouldn't cheapen the message, it would illustrate it. I'm also curious which ones.
      - gramstrong 10y ago
        I've got two for you, from both sides: "Fake News" and "Muslim Ban".
      - aptwebapps 10y ago
        'Cheapen' might not be the right word but it wouldn't certainly tend to hijack it. As soon as you get specific people start debating the specifics.
        xapata 10y ago
        The devil is in the details.
    - dilemma 10y ago
      What about your current beliefs? Why not apply it to them too?
  - novalis78 10y ago
    Triangulation. Take in news sources from opposite sides of the political (scientific etc) spectrum and take them all in in equal size/depth. They'll repeat their own message to make you believe you are "on the right side of the issue" but with triangulation both brainwashing attempts cancel out.
zaque1213 10y ago
"In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." - George Orwell
- Xeoncross 10y ago
  So how do propose we pick "the truth"? This is the problem we now face: Truth has been labeled relative.
  - tunap 10y ago
    Parse the wording of the statement(s) in question. Look for lapses existing between the actual language of a message and it's intended result. Wordsmith's are expert at saying nothing substantial while allowing(encouraging) the audience to perceive or project their biases to said message.
    - Xeoncross 10y ago
      I'm curious now, mind dissecting this quote?
      - tunap 10y ago
        Ambiguous, leading statements allow a listener to assume the content in lieu of specifics. In the spirit of the MSM's "Fake News" news lately, I submit a seemingly innocuous example: Of all of the "Supermoon" articles back in December(and priors), how many mention the fact that the closest full moonrise is indiscernable in size to the naked eye as the furthest full moonrise? Besides Phil Platt, I believe the answer is approaching 0. Yet, every MSM news site/channel promoted it as "the biggest in ~100 years", many webizens clicked the links, some even went out to watch it live and most now believe it appeared physically larger than any other full moonrise in ~100 years. edit:added "in" to discernable. swapped ~ for +/-.
  - losteverything 10y ago
    1. Admission. "I did it" is one way. (Thinking of caught on camera) - after admission often the search for truth stops. As an aside one strong component of a couples ability to coexist is just this: how do they interpret relative truths. And how do they gain input for truth moments.
m-i-l 10y ago
More on the "big lie" propaganda technique at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_lie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_lie .
draw_down 10y ago
There are people who understand this, and there are people who think you can just debate everything forever, and that the one with the most supporting points and references to Latin names of argumentative fallacies wins.
gizmo 10y ago
Repetition makes lies seem true, but repetition also makes truth seem true. All persuasion (and indoctrination) happens through repetition, whether in a classroom setting, a forum like this one, or in sales. This realization is also deeply depressing, because it means you're doomed to repeat yourself over and over if you want to persuade people. Let's take Noam Chomsky for instance. He gives more than a hundred talks every year for the past 50 years. He has written dozens (if not a hundred) books, given thousands of interviews. His message is always the same. Because after you've figured out what your best and most persuasive arguments are the only thing left to do is repeat yourself over and over. Every day is groundhog day. Startups also have to learn the value of repetition. Long form sales text works, because of repetition. Long form video demos work, because of repetition. Drip email campaigns work, because of repetition. It's often better to give customers one good reason to use your product, repeated three times than to give three distinct reasons why they should purchase. Counter-intuitive, perhaps, unless you've heard this argument before.
- krrrh 10y ago
  Another example is Ronald Reagan. I can't remember who said it, but one of the people around him was asked how he managed to become president and known as the great communicator, and the reply was along the lines of, "he made the same speech [1] every week for 25 years." [1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qXBswFfh6AY https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qXBswFfh6AY
- CoryG89 10y ago
  I take your point, but I think it's a bit of an overstatement to say that all persuasion happens through repetition. Maybe I'm a bit full of myself, but I like to think that with sound enough logic, I could be persuaded from my position by hearing an argument only once. That would probably be the distinction I would draw between persuasion in general and indoctrination / brainwashing. Of course, generally indoctrination and brainwashing seem to have a much higher rate of success in changing minds, which is indeed depressing.
  - metaobject 10y ago
    I've read geometric/mathematical proofs that have convinced me immediately. Just seeing the logical steps flow from step to step was enough to prove the assertion was true.
coldcode 10y ago
"His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it." Hitler's rules sound vaguely familiar.
- Shubley 10y ago
  Bear in mind that this is contemporary writing. They likely wrote it in such a way with the goal of forming this comparison in your mind. I think one needs to look at older writings to get a take that isn't designed to reinforce the constructed media narrative du jour. Even then its hard to get decent info on this topic because its always been so morally charged. Nothing obscures reality worse than moral concerns. Edit: I think you can also apply that description to several parties in the modern media environment.
  - wwweston 10y ago
    And yet they didn't single out a specific figure, nor did the poster above. As you say, there may well be more than one party someone might apply this description to. Apparently a specific comparison formed in your mind, though, for some mysterious reason. Probably just "constructed media narrative du jour," right? Certainly not because the person might actually be a quintessential example that stands out from everyone else so well that you already knew who people were likely talking about without anyone being named (yet, strangely, apparently want to deny that person should be considered for such a comparison at all). > Nothing obscures reality worse than moral concerns. It's not really clear that it's possible to separate human concerns from moral concerns, and I can only imagine someone arriving at the conclusion that "nothing obscures reality worse" by searching a pretty narrow set of reality-obscuring hazards.
    - aaron-lebo 10y ago
      It's not that great of a leap for the person you are replying to because "Hitler" and his supporters have been called nazis since the summer of 2015 and every comment connected to him inevitably turns into a discussion about neo-Nazis. It's pretty clear who was being referring to. concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it If we really want to get picky it's worth pointing out that the person we aren't mentioning attacks multiple people at the same time and lies about little things all the time. Said person is a jackass and an authoritarian but to compare him to a regime that killed millions using the loosest historical analogies does them a disservice and muddies the water.
kingmanaz 10y ago
That explains the highly repetitious public school curriculum many American GenXers were exposed to: (Diversity is strength)^64 (We're a nation of immigrants)^128 (America's was sinful before the civil rights protests)^256 (The Second World War was a good war)^512 (Only Jews and Gypsies suffered in World War II)^1048576
hueving 10y ago
>Hitler's rules sound vaguely familiar. I don't think comparing Hillary to Hitler is that appropriate.
- pimeys 10y ago
  Can I ask you a question? Are you trolling or what are your aiming here? Now it's of course downvoted to oblivion, but I'd like to know why even here, amongst smart people, we go down into so cheap comments and even try to defend changes that will eventually make lifes of people like me a living hell.
  - EasyTiger_ 10y ago
    He has a different opinion from you, what's so hard to understand?
    - pimeys 10y ago
      If the opinion leads to danger the life of me and my partner, I don't understand.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - mistermann 10y ago
    > we go down into so cheap comments Plenty of people are making the exact same "cheap" comparison to Trump, except to you that's likely ok. You're witnessing a difference of opinion.
    - pimeys 10y ago
      The other opinion is rubbish if it dangers my own life and my partners life.
      - mistermann 10y ago
        Anything that endangers your life is "wrong"?
igouy 10y ago
The structure of discussion threads can be used to achieve repetition: -- early false statements are seen by many -- later corrections down-thread are seen by few -- popular promoted, true but unpopular hidden https://www.reddit.com/r/rust/comments/5queq5/how_high_performance_is_rust/dd29td5/?st=iz1g4c97&sh=345d7e9e https://www.reddit.com/r/rust/comments/5queq5/how_high_perfo...
narrator 10y ago
Some religious books are extremely repetitive. So repetitive that it seemed to me to be a form of intellectual violence against the reader.
- novalis78 10y ago
  Buddhist sermons are an excellent example for that.
  - ino 10y ago
    Mantras, christian chants, and others. Repeat ad infinitum.
    - ralfd 10y ago
      I think this is simply survivors bias for every information transmitted orally. It had to be repetitive, or people couldnt remember it. See here for the Ilyad: http://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/Read_Iliad.htm http://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/Read_Iliad.htm > For an oral poet, however, such repetition is not a fault, but a vital technique (Lord 3–67). Repetition is a psychological necessity in oral discourse, which vanishes as soon as it is uttered
      - ino 10y ago
        It's also useful when the text makes no sense, is offensive, outdated and/or just plain wrong, so with repetition they can always say "that's how we always did it so it's right" to shun off the people who grow up, think for themselves and start questioning the texts.
programminggeek 10y ago
If you think that this is something limited to what evil Trump is doing, you are a fool and you don't understand yourself or the world around you at all.
- r00fus 10y ago
  Of course it isn't just him, he's just the most visible and powerful such example.
  - weberc2 10y ago
    When the media constantly focuses on him as the target, it starts to feel as though they don't really care about the story they're pushing, they only want you to notice how many of these bad things are associated with Trump. It seems dishonest. Personally, I think a better example would have been the wage gap myth; the author could have even noted that Obama was guilty of promoting it. (Disclaimer: I voted for Obama and I did not vote for Trump).
  - makomk 10y ago
    Trump is certainly the example that's repeated again and again, and there's no doubt that does seem to have convinced a lot of people.
rokhayakebe 10y ago
This works mostly/only for the undecided.
te_platt 10y ago
I've heard that many times but I wonder if it's true. The article cites studies but I didn't bother to check the studies themselves. It cites some contemporary anecdotes but I didn't bother to check if they were accurate. It seems to confirm my experience so I'll accept it as reasonable. The article is clearly trying to put Trump in a bad light and other comments here are applying it to other politicians and corporations. I think the important point is that repetition doesn't discriminate truth but can be dangerous because it can seem like it does. On important issues there is no substitute for research and accurate methods to interpret new data.
- tgb 10y ago
  How many times have you heard it? If a lot of times, then I guess it isn't true.
kevinwuhoo 10y ago
There was a related article posted a few months ago from the BBC on "How liars create the ‘illusion of truth’". https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12829781 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12829781 http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20161026-how-liars-create-the-illusion-of-truth http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20161026-how-liars-create-th...
umberway 10y ago
Having heard this idea many times I remain unpersuaded so far (!) because I haven't heard an explanation for it. Anyone know one?
dmitrybrant 10y ago
"It's not a lie if you believe it." --George Costanza
leeoniya 10y ago
> Eating carrots improves your eyesight it doesn't improve your visual acuity, but it can have a positive effect on your overall eye health [1]. there's vastly more to eyesight than sharpness/clarity. my wife is an optometrist. [1] http://yoursightmatters.com/carrots-really-improve-eyesight/ http://yoursightmatters.com/carrots-really-improve-eyesight/
notadoc 10y ago
Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter.
WhitneyLand 10y ago
What makes some people more vulnerable to accepting things uncritically? Why is it so hard to admit when they or someone they support makes a mistake? I have an ego, I don't like being wrong, and I think I'm right a lot. Ok, so far I get it. But to constantly ignore or avoid objective evidence? How do people not become ill at the thought? 1) Clinical narcissism or sociopathy? It's all an intentional means to an end. 2) Simple lack of practice in critical thinking? They are acting in good faith but just not seeing the con. 3) Their morale code does not exclude machiavellian tactics and they just want to win. Maybe the population has all three types collaborating both knowingly and unknowingly across different roles.
- dwaltrip 10y ago
  It's not some people. It's most people. Investigating claims rigorously is very difficult, even for highly skilled individuals. And it usually has very minimal direct impact on the mundane aspects of day-to-day to life. For many, there isn't an easy answer to the question: "Why should I bother, given everything else going on in my life?" Honestly, it's pretty great how many people are willing to spend time and effort that doesn't directly benefit them (on a base material level) to care about this stuff. It's also harder than one may think to do this well. You have be fairly skeptical 24/7, even of yourself and your own thoughts. I think that doing it halfway likely leads to lots of seemingly well-rationalized ideologies. I like to think I'm getting better at being generally skeptical and slowly layering together a coherent, mutually supportive set of usefully accurate mental models of how the world works, but I find it very tough to know to what extent I'm fooling myself or not. One simple maxim I've found useful is to try to avoid allowing any idea from becoming "sacred" and above questioning. While not practical for daily life, I think it's a great fundamental background orientation for our thoughts and perception of the world.
  - kough 10y ago
    > I like to think I'm getting better at being generally skeptical and slowly layering together a coherent, mutually supportive set of usefully accurate mental models of how the world works You may be interested in the Meaningness project: http://meaningness.org http://meaningness.org
return0 10y ago
Why does the article not mention the russia-hysteria as another prime example of baseless repetitive untruth of the current news cycle? It's also surprisingly light on its facts and logic: in the american left-right debate is there really excessive repetition from one side more than the other? Is it really a matter of repetition or a matter of trust? Does it matter that fact-checkers point out the errors in trumps tweets? He has gained the trust of his followers, while the fact-checkers have a bad reputation and shady relationships with establishment. Even if they get the facts right, people don't trust them to make decisions right. It's more about what you plan to do with the facts than who has the most facts, and policy decisions are not deterministic, no matter how many facts you throw at them. Same goes for establishing scientific facts indeed. Peer review is based on a few, reputable reviewers, rather on a crowd of anonymous but trust-less fact-checkers.
- makomk 10y ago
  Indeed. It's astounding how many of the Trump-Russia claims simply fell apart: the supposed lifting of sanctions on selling IT equipment to the FSB that in fact specifically forbade that, the secret communications link with Russia that turned out to be a sub-sub-subcontractor sending marketing emails for Trump hotels, the fake Clinton email that Trump could only have got from Russian outlet Sputnik... or from the Trump supporter on Twitter whose misreading of a real email went viral and lead to that article, the supposed pro-Russian change to Republican foreign policy that left almost all the anti-Russian parts intact but matched up neatly with Trump's long-stated foreign policy views, and so on ad nauseam. Despite this, the endless repetition turned it into something that everyone simply knows is true.
CurtMonash 10y ago
"Just the place for a Snark!" the Bellman cried/ As he landed his crew with care/ Supporting each man on the top of the tide/ By a finger entwined in his hair. "Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice/ That alone should encourage the crew/ Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice/ What I tell you three times is true."
logingone 10y ago
Religion, worship.
yarou 10y ago
I'm reminded of the initial "processing" scene in The Master between Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix. Hoffman's character repeatedly asks questions to Phoenix's character, inducing a hypnotic state. Repetition can also be used as a form of mind control.
rawnlq 10y ago
See also the problem of induction from philosophy: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/induction-problem/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/induction-problem/. Here induction refers to inductive reasoning rather than mathematical induction. For example if you see a billion white swans you might conclude that "swans are white". It's not "true" but it's not wrong either from a bayesian point of view. We really don't have any other way of doing experimental science.
espeed 10y ago
"See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." ― George W. Bush (2005) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxnegxNEDAc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxnegxNEDAc
avenoir 10y ago
I was hoping for an interesting read. Instead it was another politically-fueled piece on HN.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
scotty79 10y ago
Repetition not only feels like truth but also like beauty. If you create art, even if it's primitive or ugly, if you can repeat something within one artwork or across multiple works, the works suddenly gain some merit, feel more like art, less like random doodle, just due to repetition. To be clear, I'm not claiming that's the only way to invoke perception of truth or perception of beauty. It's just something I observed while trying to appreciate some contemporary art.
pasbesoin 10y ago
I only read the headline, but this seems a very obvious part of empirical observation and learning that sits at the center of human existence. Perhaps with one layer of indirection, where you are observing a message/interpretation as opposed to direct physical events. (Or, you're observing those events but in concert with a in incorrect but repeated interpretation.) Basically, we learn patterns real well. Doesn't matter the nature of the pattern, if we have no counter-example of significant or equivalent weight.
ghufran_syed 10y ago
I find it amusing that this article quotes a single research study, doesn't really describe why you should find it compelling, but just repeats its claims multiple times.
powertower 10y ago
The title tries to make it seem as this is completely non-political, yet the entire body of the article is basically anti-Trump rhetoric. So here is another human psyche detail - when someone removes the actual details (such as what these 3 exec orders are and the specifics of the mentioned crimes), they are doing so to protect the narrative... I'll give you an example: "Ban of majority Muslim countries" vs. "Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen". The reason the media removes the list of countries and replaces them with the quote, is because when people see the names of these countries, they realize that they are an open death-sentence destination for Americans, and have a large public that often chants death threats to America. And that is a problem for the narrative the media is using (to exploit the situation). So the details have to be removed. This is the first step of the manipulation of public opinion. The second step is the repetition.
davesque 10y ago
Truth seems more like a matter of frequency and consistency. Repetition is an essential part of that equation. From an abstract point of view, I don't think there's any getting around that.
kmote00 10y ago
I didn't believe the premise of this article the first time I heard about it. But now that I've encountered it a number of times on the internet, I'm beginning to think it might be true.
danbruc 10y ago
Almost a bit ironically I am really surprised by the amount of agreement in this discussion. How is this a glitch in the human psyche oder something like that? Everything you remember is something you believe to be true and repetition makes you remember things, really no surprise or glitch here. You tell me Mount Everest is 5742 meters high, seems a reasonable size for the largest mountain on earth. A year later you tell me Mount Everest is 6488 meters high. Seems reasonable and I have long forgotten that you claimed a different height last year. For whatever reason you keep telling me Mount Everest is 6488 meters high every Sunday afternoon, week after week. I have no reason to doubt that what you are telling me is true and after a couple of weeks I will start to know and remember that Mount Everest is 6488 meters high. But then a couple of years later someone else tells me that Mount Everest is actually 8893 meters high. I object. To settle the issue we decide to look it up on Wikipedia and lo and behold the official height of Mount Everest is indeed 8893 meters. This may or may not make me remember that Mount Everest is 8893 meters high but it is very likely that I will remember that 6488 meters is not the correct height and it might make me trust you less with regard to mountain related facts. Even without any repetition. If you want me to accept a statement, the statement must be believable based on what I already know and believe to be true. And I have to have some trust that you are telling me a true statement. Repetition is only secondary, only required if you or I want that I remember the statement in the long term. And if something is surprising or exciting or whatever, then one might remember something easily without a lot of repetition. The height of Mount Everest was never really interesting to me and learning the wrong height took some repetition. But then learning that Mount Everest is actually 8893 meters high and that I remembered the wrong height for years, that came as a surprise and may not take much if any repetition to remember.
BrailleHunting 10y ago
Marketing 101: bullshit repeated consistently enough with a large reach wins a broadcast-modality "contest of wills" where consent/attitudes/preferences can be manufactured to accomplish almost any aim, from the sinister, public good or prank.
hoziyw 10y ago
Did she really mis-spell Hitler's name? Also, I highly suggest everyone making the Hitler comparison actually read the definitive work "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany," so we can perhaps have some more intelligent comparisons than: "You know who else used repetition? Hitler." Every article I read seems to have become a fun little exercise in "How can I put both Trump and Hitler into this seemingly innocuous article about cognitive fusion?" It's obnoxious and old. If you want to actually do a Trump-Hitler comparison, read a book on the topic and write an actual paper about it instead of just flinging it out willy-nilly so you can fear-monger your readership into believing that actual dystopian eugeno-fascism is just on the horizon.
AlexisDT 10y ago
This article completely misrepresents why introducing false facts is effective. Repetition, in itself, does not persuade anyone of anything. Repetition, as others have noted, simply makes the thing being repeated easier to remember. The true "persuasion" -- i.e., the misinterpreting of the false fact as true -- occurs because we forget the /source/ of a statement quicker than we forget the /content/. So, for example, if you happen from your friend Joe (whom you know to be a compulsive liar) that "Priuses are actually less environmentally friendly than Hummers, because manufacturing the batteries for Priuses actually releases more greenhouse gases than a Hummer releases over its average lifespan," you'll likely remember that statement for far longer than you remember that it came from Joe, the compulsive liar. And if you find yourself in an argument with a pretentious Prius driver two years down the road and you search your memory banks for relevant facts to throw in his face, you may well pull out the "Prius battery" statement, without ever remembering that it is almost certainly bunk. You have, in essence, adopted a false belief due to having an imperfect/poorly configured memory. To take it a step further: If you then make the "Prius battery" statement to the Prius driver, presenting it as fact, you have repeated it (thus making it more firmly entrenched in your mind) and you have replaced the (previously empty) "Spoken By" metadata field with one that now reads "Me [trust score: 100%]." Speaking the false fact is not necessary to make the false-belief-adoption effect appear, but if you do happen to speak the false fact, it only serves to strengthen the effect and further entrench the false fact. This effect, of course, only works with facts that are not absurd or plainly wrong on your face. If you hear 2+2=5, you don't need to remember the source to know that's wrong. But there's a whole class of facts out there that exist in a gray area -- where they are wholly falsifiable on their face, and would require some serious digging to validate/disprove -- where this effect can lead to serious confusion. To the extent the repetitive blasting of falsehoods works, it works because of this and this alone. Wired here is doing us (and the fools who paid for the "HeadOn" advertising campaign) a disservice by implying otherwise.
lngnmn 10y ago
That's, of course, by design. If you are an animal then repetition is the only way to learn and make sense of the environment. One could learn what usually happened and what to do, but not, obviously, how it works. Humans are the only beings who has language and hence reason to understand how everything works, unless they engage in producing dogmas and chimeras out of words and abstract concepts, which is what they usually do.
RichardHeart 10y ago
You're better off making all the arguments you can, and letting the medium do the repeating for you. The people you reach in person are a very small set of the people you reach in total.
vu3rdd 10y ago
Reminds me of the ancient Indian parable in Panchatantra - http://panchatantra.org/of-crows-and-owls/the-brahmin-and-the-crooks-1.html http://panchatantra.org/of-crows-and-owls/the-brahmin-and-th...

277 points by varunvkrishnan 10y ago

Better than saying it over and over is to imagine the scenario of the lie repeatedly. Memory is malleable, and this actually creates "false" memories.

Girlang 10y ago

It worked for the so-called "Palestinians"

koolba 10y ago

All the best salesmen know this innately.

losteverything 10y ago
And the best parents
- koolba 10y ago
  "You love asparagus! It's your favorite!"
  - acchow 10y ago
    I've used this on myself rather effectively.

lacampbell 10y ago

I wish once people realised this, they had the courage to apply this to their own dearly held beliefs, particularly political or social ones - how many of those are just lies repeated ad nauseum that clearly aren't true? But I think most peoples reaction is just to say "Yeah! that's totally what those other people do that our side never does because we're right.".

dilemma 10y ago
Have you applied it to your own beliefs? Which ones? Do you no longer believe in them?
- lacampbell 10y ago
  I have. I'm not going to mention which ones as that would cheapen the general message, which is bigger than politics. And yes, I no longer believe them.
  - xapata 10y ago
    No it wouldn't cheapen the message, it would illustrate it. I'm also curious which ones.
    - gramstrong 10y ago
      I've got two for you, from both sides: "Fake News" and "Muslim Ban".
    - aptwebapps 10y ago
      'Cheapen' might not be the right word but it wouldn't certainly tend to hijack it. As soon as you get specific people start debating the specifics.
      - xapata 10y ago
        The devil is in the details.
  - dilemma 10y ago
    What about your current beliefs? Why not apply it to them too?
- novalis78 10y ago
  Triangulation. Take in news sources from opposite sides of the political (scientific etc) spectrum and take them all in in equal size/depth. They'll repeat their own message to make you believe you are "on the right side of the issue" but with triangulation both brainwashing attempts cancel out.

zaque1213 10y ago

"In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." - George Orwell

Xeoncross 10y ago
So how do propose we pick "the truth"? This is the problem we now face: Truth has been labeled relative.
- tunap 10y ago
  Parse the wording of the statement(s) in question. Look for lapses existing between the actual language of a message and it's intended result. Wordsmith's are expert at saying nothing substantial while allowing(encouraging) the audience to perceive or project their biases to said message.
  - Xeoncross 10y ago
    I'm curious now, mind dissecting this quote?
    - tunap 10y ago
      Ambiguous, leading statements allow a listener to assume the content in lieu of specifics. In the spirit of the MSM's "Fake News" news lately, I submit a seemingly innocuous example: Of all of the "Supermoon" articles back in December(and priors), how many mention the fact that the closest full moonrise is indiscernable in size to the naked eye as the furthest full moonrise? Besides Phil Platt, I believe the answer is approaching 0. Yet, every MSM news site/channel promoted it as "the biggest in ~100 years", many webizens clicked the links, some even went out to watch it live and most now believe it appeared physically larger than any other full moonrise in ~100 years. edit:added "in" to discernable. swapped ~ for +/-.
- losteverything 10y ago
  1. Admission. "I did it" is one way. (Thinking of caught on camera) - after admission often the search for truth stops. As an aside one strong component of a couples ability to coexist is just this: how do they interpret relative truths. And how do they gain input for truth moments.

m-i-l 10y ago

More on the "big lie" propaganda technique at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_lie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_lie .

draw_down 10y ago

There are people who understand this, and there are people who think you can just debate everything forever, and that the one with the most supporting points and references to Latin names of argumentative fallacies wins.

gizmo 10y ago

Repetition makes lies seem true, but repetition also makes truth seem true. All persuasion (and indoctrination) happens through repetition, whether in a classroom setting, a forum like this one, or in sales. This realization is also deeply depressing, because it means you're doomed to repeat yourself over and over if you want to persuade people. Let's take Noam Chomsky for instance. He gives more than a hundred talks every year for the past 50 years. He has written dozens (if not a hundred) books, given thousands of interviews. His message is always the same. Because after you've figured out what your best and most persuasive arguments are the only thing left to do is repeat yourself over and over. Every day is groundhog day. Startups also have to learn the value of repetition. Long form sales text works, because of repetition. Long form video demos work, because of repetition. Drip email campaigns work, because of repetition. It's often better to give customers one good reason to use your product, repeated three times than to give three distinct reasons why they should purchase. Counter-intuitive, perhaps, unless you've heard this argument before.

krrrh 10y ago
Another example is Ronald Reagan. I can't remember who said it, but one of the people around him was asked how he managed to become president and known as the great communicator, and the reply was along the lines of, "he made the same speech [1] every week for 25 years." [1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qXBswFfh6AY https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qXBswFfh6AY
CoryG89 10y ago
I take your point, but I think it's a bit of an overstatement to say that all persuasion happens through repetition. Maybe I'm a bit full of myself, but I like to think that with sound enough logic, I could be persuaded from my position by hearing an argument only once. That would probably be the distinction I would draw between persuasion in general and indoctrination / brainwashing. Of course, generally indoctrination and brainwashing seem to have a much higher rate of success in changing minds, which is indeed depressing.
- metaobject 10y ago
  I've read geometric/mathematical proofs that have convinced me immediately. Just seeing the logical steps flow from step to step was enough to prove the assertion was true.

coldcode 10y ago

"His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it." Hitler's rules sound vaguely familiar.

Shubley 10y ago
Bear in mind that this is contemporary writing. They likely wrote it in such a way with the goal of forming this comparison in your mind. I think one needs to look at older writings to get a take that isn't designed to reinforce the constructed media narrative du jour. Even then its hard to get decent info on this topic because its always been so morally charged. Nothing obscures reality worse than moral concerns. Edit: I think you can also apply that description to several parties in the modern media environment.
- wwweston 10y ago
  And yet they didn't single out a specific figure, nor did the poster above. As you say, there may well be more than one party someone might apply this description to. Apparently a specific comparison formed in your mind, though, for some mysterious reason. Probably just "constructed media narrative du jour," right? Certainly not because the person might actually be a quintessential example that stands out from everyone else so well that you already knew who people were likely talking about without anyone being named (yet, strangely, apparently want to deny that person should be considered for such a comparison at all). > Nothing obscures reality worse than moral concerns. It's not really clear that it's possible to separate human concerns from moral concerns, and I can only imagine someone arriving at the conclusion that "nothing obscures reality worse" by searching a pretty narrow set of reality-obscuring hazards.
  - aaron-lebo 10y ago
    It's not that great of a leap for the person you are replying to because "Hitler" and his supporters have been called nazis since the summer of 2015 and every comment connected to him inevitably turns into a discussion about neo-Nazis. It's pretty clear who was being referring to. concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it If we really want to get picky it's worth pointing out that the person we aren't mentioning attacks multiple people at the same time and lies about little things all the time. Said person is a jackass and an authoritarian but to compare him to a regime that killed millions using the loosest historical analogies does them a disservice and muddies the water.

kingmanaz 10y ago

That explains the highly repetitious public school curriculum many American GenXers were exposed to: (Diversity is strength)^64 (We're a nation of immigrants)^128 (America's was sinful before the civil rights protests)^256 (The Second World War was a good war)^512 (Only Jews and Gypsies suffered in World War II)^1048576

hueving 10y ago

>Hitler's rules sound vaguely familiar. I don't think comparing Hillary to Hitler is that appropriate.

pimeys 10y ago
Can I ask you a question? Are you trolling or what are your aiming here? Now it's of course downvoted to oblivion, but I'd like to know why even here, amongst smart people, we go down into so cheap comments and even try to defend changes that will eventually make lifes of people like me a living hell.
- EasyTiger_ 10y ago
  He has a different opinion from you, what's so hard to understand?
  - pimeys 10y ago
    If the opinion leads to danger the life of me and my partner, I don't understand.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- mistermann 10y ago
  > we go down into so cheap comments Plenty of people are making the exact same "cheap" comparison to Trump, except to you that's likely ok. You're witnessing a difference of opinion.
  - pimeys 10y ago
    The other opinion is rubbish if it dangers my own life and my partners life.
    - mistermann 10y ago
      Anything that endangers your life is "wrong"?

igouy 10y ago

The structure of discussion threads can be used to achieve repetition: -- early false statements are seen by many -- later corrections down-thread are seen by few -- popular promoted, true but unpopular hidden https://www.reddit.com/r/rust/comments/5queq5/how_high_performance_is_rust/dd29td5/?st=iz1g4c97&sh=345d7e9e https://www.reddit.com/r/rust/comments/5queq5/how_high_perfo...

narrator 10y ago

Some religious books are extremely repetitive. So repetitive that it seemed to me to be a form of intellectual violence against the reader.

novalis78 10y ago
Buddhist sermons are an excellent example for that.
- ino 10y ago
  Mantras, christian chants, and others. Repeat ad infinitum.
  - ralfd 10y ago
    I think this is simply survivors bias for every information transmitted orally. It had to be repetitive, or people couldnt remember it. See here for the Ilyad: http://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/Read_Iliad.htm http://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/Read_Iliad.htm > For an oral poet, however, such repetition is not a fault, but a vital technique (Lord 3–67). Repetition is a psychological necessity in oral discourse, which vanishes as soon as it is uttered
    - ino 10y ago
      It's also useful when the text makes no sense, is offensive, outdated and/or just plain wrong, so with repetition they can always say "that's how we always did it so it's right" to shun off the people who grow up, think for themselves and start questioning the texts.

programminggeek 10y ago

If you think that this is something limited to what evil Trump is doing, you are a fool and you don't understand yourself or the world around you at all.

r00fus 10y ago
Of course it isn't just him, he's just the most visible and powerful such example.
- weberc2 10y ago
  When the media constantly focuses on him as the target, it starts to feel as though they don't really care about the story they're pushing, they only want you to notice how many of these bad things are associated with Trump. It seems dishonest. Personally, I think a better example would have been the wage gap myth; the author could have even noted that Obama was guilty of promoting it. (Disclaimer: I voted for Obama and I did not vote for Trump).
- makomk 10y ago
  Trump is certainly the example that's repeated again and again, and there's no doubt that does seem to have convinced a lot of people.

rokhayakebe 10y ago

This works mostly/only for the undecided.

te_platt 10y ago

I've heard that many times but I wonder if it's true. The article cites studies but I didn't bother to check the studies themselves. It cites some contemporary anecdotes but I didn't bother to check if they were accurate. It seems to confirm my experience so I'll accept it as reasonable. The article is clearly trying to put Trump in a bad light and other comments here are applying it to other politicians and corporations. I think the important point is that repetition doesn't discriminate truth but can be dangerous because it can seem like it does. On important issues there is no substitute for research and accurate methods to interpret new data.

tgb 10y ago
How many times have you heard it? If a lot of times, then I guess it isn't true.

kevinwuhoo 10y ago

There was a related article posted a few months ago from the BBC on "How liars create the ‘illusion of truth’". https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12829781 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12829781 http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20161026-how-liars-create-the-illusion-of-truth http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20161026-how-liars-create-th...

umberway 10y ago

Having heard this idea many times I remain unpersuaded so far (!) because I haven't heard an explanation for it. Anyone know one?

dmitrybrant 10y ago

"It's not a lie if you believe it." --George Costanza

leeoniya 10y ago

> Eating carrots improves your eyesight it doesn't improve your visual acuity, but it can have a positive effect on your overall eye health [1]. there's vastly more to eyesight than sharpness/clarity. my wife is an optometrist. [1] http://yoursightmatters.com/carrots-really-improve-eyesight/ http://yoursightmatters.com/carrots-really-improve-eyesight/

notadoc 10y ago

Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter. Facts don't matter.

WhitneyLand 10y ago

What makes some people more vulnerable to accepting things uncritically? Why is it so hard to admit when they or someone they support makes a mistake? I have an ego, I don't like being wrong, and I think I'm right a lot. Ok, so far I get it. But to constantly ignore or avoid objective evidence? How do people not become ill at the thought? 1) Clinical narcissism or sociopathy? It's all an intentional means to an end. 2) Simple lack of practice in critical thinking? They are acting in good faith but just not seeing the con. 3) Their morale code does not exclude machiavellian tactics and they just want to win. Maybe the population has all three types collaborating both knowingly and unknowingly across different roles.

dwaltrip 10y ago
It's not some people. It's most people. Investigating claims rigorously is very difficult, even for highly skilled individuals. And it usually has very minimal direct impact on the mundane aspects of day-to-day to life. For many, there isn't an easy answer to the question: "Why should I bother, given everything else going on in my life?" Honestly, it's pretty great how many people are willing to spend time and effort that doesn't directly benefit them (on a base material level) to care about this stuff. It's also harder than one may think to do this well. You have be fairly skeptical 24/7, even of yourself and your own thoughts. I think that doing it halfway likely leads to lots of seemingly well-rationalized ideologies. I like to think I'm getting better at being generally skeptical and slowly layering together a coherent, mutually supportive set of usefully accurate mental models of how the world works, but I find it very tough to know to what extent I'm fooling myself or not. One simple maxim I've found useful is to try to avoid allowing any idea from becoming "sacred" and above questioning. While not practical for daily life, I think it's a great fundamental background orientation for our thoughts and perception of the world.
- kough 10y ago
  > I like to think I'm getting better at being generally skeptical and slowly layering together a coherent, mutually supportive set of usefully accurate mental models of how the world works You may be interested in the Meaningness project: http://meaningness.org http://meaningness.org

return0 10y ago

Why does the article not mention the russia-hysteria as another prime example of baseless repetitive untruth of the current news cycle? It's also surprisingly light on its facts and logic: in the american left-right debate is there really excessive repetition from one side more than the other? Is it really a matter of repetition or a matter of trust? Does it matter that fact-checkers point out the errors in trumps tweets? He has gained the trust of his followers, while the fact-checkers have a bad reputation and shady relationships with establishment. Even if they get the facts right, people don't trust them to make decisions right. It's more about what you plan to do with the facts than who has the most facts, and policy decisions are not deterministic, no matter how many facts you throw at them. Same goes for establishing scientific facts indeed. Peer review is based on a few, reputable reviewers, rather on a crowd of anonymous but trust-less fact-checkers.

makomk 10y ago
Indeed. It's astounding how many of the Trump-Russia claims simply fell apart: the supposed lifting of sanctions on selling IT equipment to the FSB that in fact specifically forbade that, the secret communications link with Russia that turned out to be a sub-sub-subcontractor sending marketing emails for Trump hotels, the fake Clinton email that Trump could only have got from Russian outlet Sputnik... or from the Trump supporter on Twitter whose misreading of a real email went viral and lead to that article, the supposed pro-Russian change to Republican foreign policy that left almost all the anti-Russian parts intact but matched up neatly with Trump's long-stated foreign policy views, and so on ad nauseam. Despite this, the endless repetition turned it into something that everyone simply knows is true.

CurtMonash 10y ago

"Just the place for a Snark!" the Bellman cried/ As he landed his crew with care/ Supporting each man on the top of the tide/ By a finger entwined in his hair. "Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice/ That alone should encourage the crew/ Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice/ What I tell you three times is true."

logingone 10y ago

Religion, worship.

yarou 10y ago

I'm reminded of the initial "processing" scene in The Master between Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix. Hoffman's character repeatedly asks questions to Phoenix's character, inducing a hypnotic state. Repetition can also be used as a form of mind control.

rawnlq 10y ago

See also the problem of induction from philosophy: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/induction-problem/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/induction-problem/. Here induction refers to inductive reasoning rather than mathematical induction. For example if you see a billion white swans you might conclude that "swans are white". It's not "true" but it's not wrong either from a bayesian point of view. We really don't have any other way of doing experimental science.

espeed 10y ago

"See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." ― George W. Bush (2005) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxnegxNEDAc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxnegxNEDAc

avenoir 10y ago

I was hoping for an interesting read. Instead it was another politically-fueled piece on HN.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

scotty79 10y ago

Repetition not only feels like truth but also like beauty. If you create art, even if it's primitive or ugly, if you can repeat something within one artwork or across multiple works, the works suddenly gain some merit, feel more like art, less like random doodle, just due to repetition. To be clear, I'm not claiming that's the only way to invoke perception of truth or perception of beauty. It's just something I observed while trying to appreciate some contemporary art.

pasbesoin 10y ago

I only read the headline, but this seems a very obvious part of empirical observation and learning that sits at the center of human existence. Perhaps with one layer of indirection, where you are observing a message/interpretation as opposed to direct physical events. (Or, you're observing those events but in concert with a in incorrect but repeated interpretation.) Basically, we learn patterns real well. Doesn't matter the nature of the pattern, if we have no counter-example of significant or equivalent weight.

ghufran_syed 10y ago

I find it amusing that this article quotes a single research study, doesn't really describe why you should find it compelling, but just repeats its claims multiple times.

powertower 10y ago

The title tries to make it seem as this is completely non-political, yet the entire body of the article is basically anti-Trump rhetoric. So here is another human psyche detail - when someone removes the actual details (such as what these 3 exec orders are and the specifics of the mentioned crimes), they are doing so to protect the narrative... I'll give you an example: "Ban of majority Muslim countries" vs. "Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen". The reason the media removes the list of countries and replaces them with the quote, is because when people see the names of these countries, they realize that they are an open death-sentence destination for Americans, and have a large public that often chants death threats to America. And that is a problem for the narrative the media is using (to exploit the situation). So the details have to be removed. This is the first step of the manipulation of public opinion. The second step is the repetition.

davesque 10y ago

Truth seems more like a matter of frequency and consistency. Repetition is an essential part of that equation. From an abstract point of view, I don't think there's any getting around that.

kmote00 10y ago

I didn't believe the premise of this article the first time I heard about it. But now that I've encountered it a number of times on the internet, I'm beginning to think it might be true.

danbruc 10y ago

Almost a bit ironically I am really surprised by the amount of agreement in this discussion. How is this a glitch in the human psyche oder something like that? Everything you remember is something you believe to be true and repetition makes you remember things, really no surprise or glitch here. You tell me Mount Everest is 5742 meters high, seems a reasonable size for the largest mountain on earth. A year later you tell me Mount Everest is 6488 meters high. Seems reasonable and I have long forgotten that you claimed a different height last year. For whatever reason you keep telling me Mount Everest is 6488 meters high every Sunday afternoon, week after week. I have no reason to doubt that what you are telling me is true and after a couple of weeks I will start to know and remember that Mount Everest is 6488 meters high. But then a couple of years later someone else tells me that Mount Everest is actually 8893 meters high. I object. To settle the issue we decide to look it up on Wikipedia and lo and behold the official height of Mount Everest is indeed 8893 meters. This may or may not make me remember that Mount Everest is 8893 meters high but it is very likely that I will remember that 6488 meters is not the correct height and it might make me trust you less with regard to mountain related facts. Even without any repetition. If you want me to accept a statement, the statement must be believable based on what I already know and believe to be true. And I have to have some trust that you are telling me a true statement. Repetition is only secondary, only required if you or I want that I remember the statement in the long term. And if something is surprising or exciting or whatever, then one might remember something easily without a lot of repetition. The height of Mount Everest was never really interesting to me and learning the wrong height took some repetition. But then learning that Mount Everest is actually 8893 meters high and that I remembered the wrong height for years, that came as a surprise and may not take much if any repetition to remember.

BrailleHunting 10y ago

Marketing 101: bullshit repeated consistently enough with a large reach wins a broadcast-modality "contest of wills" where consent/attitudes/preferences can be manufactured to accomplish almost any aim, from the sinister, public good or prank.

hoziyw 10y ago

Did she really mis-spell Hitler's name? Also, I highly suggest everyone making the Hitler comparison actually read the definitive work "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany," so we can perhaps have some more intelligent comparisons than: "You know who else used repetition? Hitler." Every article I read seems to have become a fun little exercise in "How can I put both Trump and Hitler into this seemingly innocuous article about cognitive fusion?" It's obnoxious and old. If you want to actually do a Trump-Hitler comparison, read a book on the topic and write an actual paper about it instead of just flinging it out willy-nilly so you can fear-monger your readership into believing that actual dystopian eugeno-fascism is just on the horizon.

AlexisDT 10y ago

This article completely misrepresents why introducing false facts is effective. Repetition, in itself, does not persuade anyone of anything. Repetition, as others have noted, simply makes the thing being repeated easier to remember. The true "persuasion" -- i.e., the misinterpreting of the false fact as true -- occurs because we forget the /source/ of a statement quicker than we forget the /content/. So, for example, if you happen from your friend Joe (whom you know to be a compulsive liar) that "Priuses are actually less environmentally friendly than Hummers, because manufacturing the batteries for Priuses actually releases more greenhouse gases than a Hummer releases over its average lifespan," you'll likely remember that statement for far longer than you remember that it came from Joe, the compulsive liar. And if you find yourself in an argument with a pretentious Prius driver two years down the road and you search your memory banks for relevant facts to throw in his face, you may well pull out the "Prius battery" statement, without ever remembering that it is almost certainly bunk. You have, in essence, adopted a false belief due to having an imperfect/poorly configured memory. To take it a step further: If you then make the "Prius battery" statement to the Prius driver, presenting it as fact, you have repeated it (thus making it more firmly entrenched in your mind) and you have replaced the (previously empty) "Spoken By" metadata field with one that now reads "Me [trust score: 100%]." Speaking the false fact is not necessary to make the false-belief-adoption effect appear, but if you do happen to speak the false fact, it only serves to strengthen the effect and further entrench the false fact. This effect, of course, only works with facts that are not absurd or plainly wrong on your face. If you hear 2+2=5, you don't need to remember the source to know that's wrong. But there's a whole class of facts out there that exist in a gray area -- where they are wholly falsifiable on their face, and would require some serious digging to validate/disprove -- where this effect can lead to serious confusion. To the extent the repetitive blasting of falsehoods works, it works because of this and this alone. Wired here is doing us (and the fools who paid for the "HeadOn" advertising campaign) a disservice by implying otherwise.

lngnmn 10y ago

That's, of course, by design. If you are an animal then repetition is the only way to learn and make sense of the environment. One could learn what usually happened and what to do, but not, obviously, how it works. Humans are the only beings who has language and hence reason to understand how everything works, unless they engage in producing dogmas and chimeras out of words and abstract concepts, which is what they usually do.

RichardHeart 10y ago

You're better off making all the arguments you can, and letting the medium do the repeating for you. The people you reach in person are a very small set of the people you reach in total.

vu3rdd 10y ago

Reminds me of the ancient Indian parable in Panchatantra - http://panchatantra.org/of-crows-and-owls/the-brahmin-and-the-crooks-1.html http://panchatantra.org/of-crows-and-owls/the-brahmin-and-th...