3 ms·

Can we get away from the logical fallacies here? If you have a problem with the facts in the article list them instead of attacking the author/publisher.

by adrr 7y ago

loceng 7y ago
I think it's valuable to know if a source is generally biased in one direction or another, whether there's accuracy in comparison to other major media sources - who knows, we unfortunately don't have a system that makes that easy and obvious, yet.
jerf 7y ago
I think people overestimate the fallaciousness of examining the motivations of the speaker. It only applies to the factual and logical matters; the fact that CNBC may or may not hate Tesla or Elon Musk does not affect whether or not tape was used to correct cracks in parts or whether or not people were asked to work in low-quality conditions on pain of firing, or any strictly logical conclusions you may draw from those facts. Those purported facts may be true or false, but whether someone at CNBC has it out for Elon is not a relevant consideration in whether those facts are true or false. However, it is entirely relevant in determining whether or not the slant of the piece is necessarily factual or whether it has bias, and in determining the probability that the speaker may have left out information unfavorable to the cause they are advancing. It is a logical fallacy, but it is only a logical fallacy. It is completely relevant in arenas other than pure, strict logic, such as meta-logical analyses about potential biases. (There's a few other "fallacies" for which this is true too; many of them like affirming the consequent are just straight-up errors, but "appeal to authority", for instance, is a fallacy in Aristotelian binary true/false logic, but in a more realistic probabilistic logic, it can be valid to use it to update your probabilistic beliefs about the world. You just are not logically justified in taking an authority and setting your belief in their statements to a true, mathematical 100.0000...% (which is what the fallacy would be in Aristotelian logic), and you are obligated to make judgments about the quality of the authority as you make the updates.)
- Angostura 7y ago
  What makes you think that CNBC is particularly hard on Tesla?
  - nkoren 7y ago
    Anonymous anecdotes aside, the scandalous news they report is that Consumer Reports puts Tesla's reliability in the bottom half -- yes, shock and consernation, the BOTTOM HALF!!! -- of all automobile manufactures. Of course, 50% all automobile manufacturers are in the bottom half, and sure, it's not where you want to be. But none of the rest get special attention for being so. Want proof? Do a search for the the following: CNBC consumer reports reliability rating. What comes up? In order: 1. "Tesla Tanks": https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/tesla-tanks-subaru-soars-in-consumer-reports-new-reliability-survey.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/tesla-tanks-subaru-soars-in-... 2. "Tesla Slips": https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/24/tesla-reliability-slips-to-third-worst-in-us-consumer-reports-says.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/24/tesla-reliability-slips-to-t... 3. "Consumer reports yanks recommendation for Tesla": https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/reuters-america-update-2-consumer-reports-yanks-recommendation-for-teslas-model-3-citing-reliability.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/reuters-america-update-2-con... 4. "Tesla Falls": https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/tesla-falls-after-consumer-reports-yanks-its-reliability-ranking/ar-BBTUtWt https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/tesla-falls-after-... ..And so forth. Note, however, that we didn't search for "Tesla". The spotlight given them is CNBC's bias. There's an entire automobile industry out there, and at any given time, half of it is in the lower half of reliability ratings. But only one is ever given headlines for it. That's bias.
    - bildung 7y ago
      >* Anonymous anecdotes aside, the scandalous news they report is that Consumer Reports puts Tesla's reliability in the bottom half -- yes, shock and consernation, the BOTTOM HALF!!! -- of all automobile manufactures.* Actually Consumer Reports placed the Model S at the third-worst of 29 positions, so at the bottom 7%. "Tesla Slips" is actually a pretty mild headline, considering they slipped 6 spots and 8 was the technical maximum.
aaomidi 7y ago
Problem is, with the fast paced nature of today's life you sometimes read a headline and MAYBE a tiny bit of extra info. Too many news outlets are using clickbait headlines that sound like a big deal but isn't.

Can we get away from the logical fallacies here? If you have a problem with the facts in the article list them instead of attacking the author/publisher.

by adrr 7y ago

Can we get away from the logical fallacies here? If you have a problem with the facts in the article list them instead of attacking the author/publisher.

loceng 7y ago

I think it's valuable to know if a source is generally biased in one direction or another, whether there's accuracy in comparison to other major media sources - who knows, we unfortunately don't have a system that makes that easy and obvious, yet.

jerf 7y ago

I think people overestimate the fallaciousness of examining the motivations of the speaker. It only applies to the factual and logical matters; the fact that CNBC may or may not hate Tesla or Elon Musk does not affect whether or not tape was used to correct cracks in parts or whether or not people were asked to work in low-quality conditions on pain of firing, or any strictly logical conclusions you may draw from those facts. Those purported facts may be true or false, but whether someone at CNBC has it out for Elon is not a relevant consideration in whether those facts are true or false. However, it is entirely relevant in determining whether or not the slant of the piece is necessarily factual or whether it has bias, and in determining the probability that the speaker may have left out information unfavorable to the cause they are advancing. It is a logical fallacy, but it is only a logical fallacy. It is completely relevant in arenas other than pure, strict logic, such as meta-logical analyses about potential biases. (There's a few other "fallacies" for which this is true too; many of them like affirming the consequent are just straight-up errors, but "appeal to authority", for instance, is a fallacy in Aristotelian binary true/false logic, but in a more realistic probabilistic logic, it can be valid to use it to update your probabilistic beliefs about the world. You just are not logically justified in taking an authority and setting your belief in their statements to a true, mathematical 100.0000...% (which is what the fallacy would be in Aristotelian logic), and you are obligated to make judgments about the quality of the authority as you make the updates.)

Angostura 7y ago
What makes you think that CNBC is particularly hard on Tesla?
- nkoren 7y ago
  Anonymous anecdotes aside, the scandalous news they report is that Consumer Reports puts Tesla's reliability in the bottom half -- yes, shock and consernation, the BOTTOM HALF!!! -- of all automobile manufactures. Of course, 50% all automobile manufacturers are in the bottom half, and sure, it's not where you want to be. But none of the rest get special attention for being so. Want proof? Do a search for the the following: CNBC consumer reports reliability rating. What comes up? In order: 1. "Tesla Tanks": https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/tesla-tanks-subaru-soars-in-consumer-reports-new-reliability-survey.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/tesla-tanks-subaru-soars-in-... 2. "Tesla Slips": https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/24/tesla-reliability-slips-to-third-worst-in-us-consumer-reports-says.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/24/tesla-reliability-slips-to-t... 3. "Consumer reports yanks recommendation for Tesla": https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/reuters-america-update-2-consumer-reports-yanks-recommendation-for-teslas-model-3-citing-reliability.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/21/reuters-america-update-2-con... 4. "Tesla Falls": https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/tesla-falls-after-consumer-reports-yanks-its-reliability-ranking/ar-BBTUtWt https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/tesla-falls-after-... ..And so forth. Note, however, that we didn't search for "Tesla". The spotlight given them is CNBC's bias. There's an entire automobile industry out there, and at any given time, half of it is in the lower half of reliability ratings. But only one is ever given headlines for it. That's bias.
  - bildung 7y ago
    >* Anonymous anecdotes aside, the scandalous news they report is that Consumer Reports puts Tesla's reliability in the bottom half -- yes, shock and consernation, the BOTTOM HALF!!! -- of all automobile manufactures.* Actually Consumer Reports placed the Model S at the third-worst of 29 positions, so at the bottom 7%. "Tesla Slips" is actually a pretty mild headline, considering they slipped 6 spots and 8 was the technical maximum.

aaomidi 7y ago

Problem is, with the fast paced nature of today's life you sometimes read a headline and MAYBE a tiny bit of extra info. Too many news outlets are using clickbait headlines that sound like a big deal but isn't.