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The mere word "denialism" is a scary sign of the times we live in. Is the idea that anything that goes against the current "consensus" be removed? And is this

The mere word "denialism" is a scary sign of the times we live in. Is the idea that anything that goes against the current "consensus" be removed? And is this just regarding climate change or does it apply to how we think about physics, statistics or even software engineering? Are you an "agile denialist"? This type of reasoning shows a profound lack of understanding of what free speech is and why it's fundamental to our society. That involves catering to people who produce/consume content that is not consensus-based, regardless of whether they are right or wrong. Did it even occur to these so-called journalists that if Greta wants to do research prep for a debate against a "denialist", then it's a very useful feature to be able to search for all their arguments and get them served to you? Or should she and others just focus on censorship and deplatforming instead?

raverbashing 7y ago
Except refuting BS is 10x harder than creating it By the way I'm an Iowa denialist. I refuse to believe the state of Iowa exists. Don't tell me you're part of the brainwashed masses that believe Iowa exists.
- Mirioron 7y ago
  Clearly you're delusional for thinking that Iowa does not exist, thus every argument you've ever made and will ever make can be dismissed. Furthermore, because you're an Iowa-denialist you probably should lose your job and never hold another job ever again. That's essentially the danger of this type of reasoning. Differences in opinion and disagreements end up essentially as feuds. I think that the Internet is partly to blame here, because the mob simply tries to outdo one another at destroying the arguments, and eventually, the person that disagrees. We can see the extreme examples of this in the case of the gender debate. I wonder whether some people fighting against climate change will become as extreme.
  - raverbashing 7y ago
    It's certainly an interesting discussion. There are levels and levels of believe and promotion. Some Iowa denialist might also reject someone from a job because the candidate claim they're from Iowa and that's obvious a lie. And what if you're making Iowa denial videos and that's causing people to vandalize cars with Iowa plates? But hey, it all started as a joke right? That guy Bob was a jerk and he was from Iowa. Or some company that's competing with your company was from Iowa so, hey, why not mess things up right?
    - bsaul 7y ago
      There’s a clear distinction between calling for violent actions and discussing a scientific theory : one is condemned by laws, the other should be fine. Try censoring every ideas that conduct people to commit physical violences and you’ll end up with being allowed to talk about absolutely nothing. religion, politics, science, philosophy, all have implications in our lives, and so some people will always take it personally and act violently.
      - speedplane 7y ago
        > Try censoring every ideas that conduct people to commit physical violences and you’ll end up with being allowed to talk about absolutely nothing. religion, politics, science, philosophy, all have implications in our lives, and so some people will always take it personally and act violently. Freedom of speech should absolutely be protected. But censorship is not really the problem. Today, more people have more outlets to speak and express themselves than at any time in history. The problem today is that institutions of trust are being eroded. Every individual cannot be expected to become an expert on every single issue, they need to delegate that research to institutions they trust, and then trust that institutions recommendations. The problem today, is that trust is lacking these institutions (whether that's government, academic, religious, etc.). Without proper authorities of trust, there is a power vacuum that charlatans are eager to take.
        bsaul 7y ago
        I see it pretty differently : people are trying to get educated. they don’t rely on official channels to tell them what to think, they try to understand the phenomenons. If you take climate chnage, most « official source of information » today don’t discuss the theory of climate change itself, simply because it’s a complex theory and that it doesn’t want to take the time to do it. Climate sceptics will make hours long video giving « scientific » explanations for why this can’t be true. To me it’s a all in all a good thing. in the long term, this will force everyone to take the time to educate the audience before feeding them with a conclusion. As a personal exemple, i tried to understand what were deniers saying, and in the process i learned a lot about co2, temperature networks, ice melting process, forest fires cycles, thermal conduction models, and the fact that medias outlets have been calling for an « upcoming climate disaster » for at least a century without interruption. This made me extemely careful not to call anyone a fool too hastly on this particular topic.
  - qqqwerty 7y ago
    > Furthermore, because you're an Iowa-denialist you probably should lose your job and never hold another job ever again. Cancel Culture! Your attempt to silence my Iowa-denialism proves that the Iowa-exists researchers are a dissent squashing cabal hell bent on silencing any and all critics. More clicks, more views, more money. The BS continues, and we are all worse off for it.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
cm2187 7y ago
It’s also counterproductive. It very much starts to look like a cult, not science.
- paganel 7y ago
  Lots of things look like cults from the outside, for me at least the other HN thread from today about self-driving cars was a perfect example of that, it had lots and lots of commenters (I presume the big majority of them pretty smart people) saying things like “I believe” and dismissing those that didn’t “believe” (in the idea of self-driving cars, in that case).
  - LockAndLol 7y ago
    When you talk about the future, there's only one thing you can actually do and that's believe (not in the religious sense), because it is uncertain. Especially sensationalist expressions like "self-driving cars will never happen". Making absolute statements, especially about the future, is not a mark of an intellectual or of intelligence. But everything is relative.
    - paganel 7y ago
      Believing in self-driving cars is believing in AGI, and if some people find not believing in that “sensationalist” then it all kind of proves my point. I also don’t live in the SV bubble, maybe down there the AGI church is stronger, I wouldn’t know. I strongly recommend Jacques Ellul’s “The New Demons” [1], and Ellul’s works generally speaking. [1] https://www.amazon.com/New-Demons-Jacques-Ellul/dp/0816402663 https://www.amazon.com/New-Demons-Jacques-Ellul/dp/081640266...
- Drakim 7y ago
  You'll face roughly the same response from denying the Holocaust happened or for saying the earth is flat. I assume you don't think those are respectable positions that deserve serious consideration. If you do, then how about people who think they are vampires, and those who claim to be reborn pharaohs? Is there any limit where you just go "this is nonsense and I'm not gonna waste my time on it"? Are you part of a cult at that point? The debate over climate denial boils down to what sort of respectability the position has, is it a serious contender, or is it a wacko idea?
sklogic 7y ago
You "free speech" proponents must be physically exterminated. No mercy to you subhuman scum!
starfallg 7y ago
The first amendment in the US prevents the government from regulating speech, the fundamental reasoning is to allow the people to have varied political opinions or to disseminate them. This does not cover private companies nor commercial activities. YouTube already prohibits certain content on their platform, and limits ability to profit from certain content. This is just an extension of this doctrine. Furthermore, please consider that there is no absolute right to say anything you want, it has always been a balance. Even in the US, where free speech is enshrined in the constitution, there are criminal and civil limits to free speech if you cause harm to others.
- apatters 7y ago
  The parent is not making a legal argument, but a civic one. The argument is that our society will benefit from embracing free speech and suffer from censorship, regardless of legality.
  - starfallg 7y ago
    And I'm making an argument that this has already been considered in both the legal and civic spheres, weighing both the benefits of free speech with some of the problems that it brings. The question here (and in many other similar situations) is where to draw the line.
    - apatters 7y ago
      I don't get it. You're saying that he's wrong because the issue has already been discussed?
  - onion2k 7y ago
    For YouTube there are three antagonistic forces at work with free speech - there's the freedom users have to publish on the platform without censorship, the freedom users have to see recommended videos that are promoted honestly based on their interests without undue political influence by YouTube or others, and lastly there's the freedom YouTube has to promote things that make them money. There is no way for all these things to work together. What is positive for one will often be negative for the others. You can't talk reasonably about freedom and censorship without understanding that freedom means different things to different people in the same group.
fulafel 7y ago
Usually media will "deplatform" (even in the ages before social media) things that the consensus of society deems sufficiently harmful. How these questions can be still honestly debated in the intellectual sense is a valid question and we should ensure there are good platforms for it, but "family tv" style media like youtube would have good grounds for adopting a policy against obvious denialism propaganda. edit: not sure which point elicits the voter opposition, maybe the family-tv part since it's more opinionated? i'd like to flesh out the point: Youtube is rather selective about content it allows, it bans a lot of tame stuff, and it bans political speech like white supermacism. I guess this argument for banning more things can be viewed as a sort of whataboutism by people who would like youtube to be a free speech platform? That's a valid argument I guess, but not something I subscribe to - youtube is in the corporate curated ad-supported content category, despite the user-contributed content nature.
- bsaul 7y ago
  « obvious denialism propaganda » Was JFK killed by a random crazy sniper ? Did the US finance afghan rebels or south american totalitarian regim ? Did french president françois mitterand work under vichy collaborationist regime ? Did he have a secret child while he was president with a second wife ? Etc etc I can’t believe someone could still say that it’s fine to discard « obvious propaganda » on the most popular personal video publishing platform. And that it should be a private company to decide who should be banned and who isn’t, without any kind of judgment by a public authority. If an argument is strong enough for a theory, then deniers will eventually loose its steam ( flat earth is going nowhere). On the other hand, think about the impact of making it casual for video platform to censor every « non official » theories.
  - franga2000 7y ago
    > If an argument is strong enough for a theory, then deniers will eventually loose its steam ( flat earth is going nowhere). I wouldn't be so sure about that. Crystal ball fortune telling, horoscopes etc. are still alive and well, as is denying the Moon landing and (this will get me downvoted to hell) religion - the most popular one of these. But going back to the main discussion, these people want to believe something against all evidence (for various psychological reasons) -> more and better evidence threatens their world view (and in the case of YT - revenue stream) -> they make even larger leaps of logic to , start getting more extreme, more aggressive -> their followers do as well. Sprinkle on some echo-chamber effects and you've got yourself a perfect machine for turning "sceptics" into extremists. Now, with most political issues, conspiracy theories and other beliefs, it doesn't matter much and doing anything against them would be setting a dangerous precedent, but things like this are just too dangerous. We can "debate" the Moon landing for hundreds of years, but climate change is already happening and we need to do things now, not in 1 year or 100. There's no time to hope these people will just go away eventually.
fzeroracer 7y ago
I'm surprised that people on HN accept this new era of scientific denialism. Regressing back to the era where scientists were prosecuted and jailed for saying things like 'geocentrism is wrong and the earth is not flat' is not a good idea. And make no mistake, for all the complaints about the poor climate change deniers being censored, those same people are harassing scientists with the backing of the fossil fuel industry. But it seems people are more concerned about a teenage talking about climate change than they are the companies and conspiracy theorists harassing scientists.
- mikaeluman 7y ago
  The issue is that you seem to not be able to abstract the fact that you may very well find yourself on the "wrong" side of the debate at one point in time. When that happens, you desperately need channels to communicate what's true and break through so we get a better world to live in. And in fact, this has been the case for many rights we today hold as self-evident such as abolishment of slavery and the equality of the sexes. This is not a debate about science, it's a meta-debate about science and a debate about philosophy and the liberal arts. Even your example with geocentrism is actually a counter-argument to yourself. At that time, the consensus view was geocentrism and so naturally anything that went against the consensus was dangerous and scorned, resulting in being put in prison and silenced. That's what you are suggesting we regress to...
trekrich 7y ago
YouTube was lost ages ago. All they care about is selling ads.
zoul 7y ago
I think the problem is not that the opposing views exist, but that the modern distribution channels make it very easy to serve to each his own. The result is not a productive (even if heated) debate in search of truth, but pools of opposing propaganda. When we lose the common ground for debate, we seem to lose the power of consensus. And I think that is something we can blame the social networks for. As a journalist, I think a lot about what to publish and what not to. Not based on the opinions or world views held, but based on the validity of the arguments. The recommendation algorithms only care about maximizing views. When you add advertising money to the mix, the problem just amplifies, resulting in real damage for the society.
- speedplane 7y ago
  > As a journalist, I think a lot about what to publish and what not to. Not based on the opinions or world views held, but based on the validity of the arguments. The recommendation algorithms only care about maximizing views. Maximizing "view count" is a bit simplistic way to think about the internet. Traditional media (e.g., TV, newspapers, magazines) are also incentivized to maximize view count. The difference between traditional media and new social media is that newer media is not held responsible for the content they publish. If a newspaper publishes an obviously false story, they need to retract it otherwise they lose credibility. If Facebook does the same, they blame it on the individual and say they can't be expected to police their networks. The problem is not about maximizing views, it's about accountability.
  - ben509 7y ago
    Where's the accountability in a correction? Traditional media has always buried their corrections such that only a handful of readers or viewers actually see them. And even if one finds the correction, one has to dig up the original story to figure out how the correction affects it.
    - speedplane 7y ago
      > Where's the accountability in a correction? Traditional media has always buried their corrections such that only a handful of readers or viewers actually see them. Correcting a mistake is by definition accountability. If there was no accountability, there would never be any correction, and anyone would be free to lie or be sloppy. One can definitely take issue with the way certain publications make corrections, but new media does not even attempt to do anything.
avip 7y ago
If you take the "scientific consensus" at face value, it's more apt to use "vax denialist" or "nicotine is bad for health denialist" as an analogy, instead of "agile denialist".
speedplane 7y ago
> The mere word "denialism" is a scary sign of the times we live in. Is the idea that anything that goes against the current "consensus" be removed? And is this just regarding climate change or does it apply to how we think about physics, statistics or even software engineering? This isn't a free speech issue, no one is suggesting that this content be removed from the internet. The issue is that sites like YouTube don't just provide content, they also promote it by showing people recommendations. No one is suggesting that climate change deniers should be prohibited from expressing their views, just that YouTube should not promote it. Take a more extreme issue: flat-earthers. Someone who believes the earth is flat should definitely be able to say so, but it's not a good idea for YouTube to actively promote that viewpoint. It's also just as bad for YouTube to present the issue purely as flat-earthers versus non-flat-earthers, as it suggests there is some sort of balance between the viewpoints. To the extent that YouTube is promoting content, they should do within some bounds of reasonable consensus. If they refuse to police their recommendations, they aren't improving free speech, they are just destroying the existing mechanisms of consensus.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- hgoel 7y ago
  You're just playing at semantics at that point.
- pensatoio 7y ago
  The thing is, there’s no way for an algorithm to know the intent behind why someone wants to see more of a certain kind of content. I get recommendations for flat earth videos because I’ve gone on several spurts of watching them. (It’s a good laugh, what can I say.) Sure, this is anecdotal, but I’m certain so are many other individual viewing habits. On top of all this, climate denialism is such a fuzzy topic. The science community barely even agrees on many aspects of the data and potential remediations. My point is, whenever these content hosts start adjusting recommendations based on their view of the world, regardless of whether I agree or not, I think we’re all done a disservice. What YouTube’s management define as “reasonable consensus” is most certainly not going to be a moderate position.
andor 7y ago
Free speech is not the same as free reach. With free speech, the state grants climate deniers the right to state their opinion in public without negative consequence (from the state). This does not extend to a right to free broadcasting of this speech by private companies like YouTube. Always publishing both sides to make reporting "fair and balanced" trivializes most topics. While it seems like it gives viewers the freedom to form their own opinion and to inform their behavior in a way most beneficial to themselves, they rarely have enough knowledge to understand all consequences. Expertise is real, it's usually focused on a narrow subject, and difficult to detect for the casual viewer. I do my job all day, trying to get really good at it I become somewhat of an expert. Meanwhile, my insights into climate research are very limited as I have only seen a few talks here and there and spent a few days reading about climate history on Wikipedia. Having studied another topic much more deeply, I understand and respect the amount of effort required to gain expertise. The producers of aforementioned doubtful YouTube content are most likely experts at video production and marketing. They benefit from the existing incentive structure not by explaining the scientific consensus and conveying the difficult message that viewers will have to change their lifestyle, but by making their videos as controversial as possible. Is the idea that anything that goes against the current "consensus" be removed? And is this just regarding climate change or does it apply to how we think about physics, statistics or even software engineering? Are you an "agile denialist"? Some things are simply more harmful than others. Inspire people to become "agile denialists" and their software will get worse. Users will switch to the competition. Inspiring to ignore the climate catastrophe is a contribution to the destruction of ecosystems, huge amounts of wealth [0], and risks the lives of hundreds of millions of people. [0] https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Business%20Functions/Sustainability/Our%20Insights/Climate%20risk%20and%20response%20Physical%20hazards%20and%20socioeconomic%20impacts/MGI-Climate-risk-and-response-vF.ashx https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Business%20Functio...

raverbashing 7y ago

Except refuting BS is 10x harder than creating it By the way I'm an Iowa denialist. I refuse to believe the state of Iowa exists. Don't tell me you're part of the brainwashed masses that believe Iowa exists.

Mirioron 7y ago
Clearly you're delusional for thinking that Iowa does not exist, thus every argument you've ever made and will ever make can be dismissed. Furthermore, because you're an Iowa-denialist you probably should lose your job and never hold another job ever again. That's essentially the danger of this type of reasoning. Differences in opinion and disagreements end up essentially as feuds. I think that the Internet is partly to blame here, because the mob simply tries to outdo one another at destroying the arguments, and eventually, the person that disagrees. We can see the extreme examples of this in the case of the gender debate. I wonder whether some people fighting against climate change will become as extreme.
- raverbashing 7y ago
  It's certainly an interesting discussion. There are levels and levels of believe and promotion. Some Iowa denialist might also reject someone from a job because the candidate claim they're from Iowa and that's obvious a lie. And what if you're making Iowa denial videos and that's causing people to vandalize cars with Iowa plates? But hey, it all started as a joke right? That guy Bob was a jerk and he was from Iowa. Or some company that's competing with your company was from Iowa so, hey, why not mess things up right?
  - bsaul 7y ago
    There’s a clear distinction between calling for violent actions and discussing a scientific theory : one is condemned by laws, the other should be fine. Try censoring every ideas that conduct people to commit physical violences and you’ll end up with being allowed to talk about absolutely nothing. religion, politics, science, philosophy, all have implications in our lives, and so some people will always take it personally and act violently.
    - speedplane 7y ago
      > Try censoring every ideas that conduct people to commit physical violences and you’ll end up with being allowed to talk about absolutely nothing. religion, politics, science, philosophy, all have implications in our lives, and so some people will always take it personally and act violently. Freedom of speech should absolutely be protected. But censorship is not really the problem. Today, more people have more outlets to speak and express themselves than at any time in history. The problem today is that institutions of trust are being eroded. Every individual cannot be expected to become an expert on every single issue, they need to delegate that research to institutions they trust, and then trust that institutions recommendations. The problem today, is that trust is lacking these institutions (whether that's government, academic, religious, etc.). Without proper authorities of trust, there is a power vacuum that charlatans are eager to take.
      - bsaul 7y ago
        I see it pretty differently : people are trying to get educated. they don’t rely on official channels to tell them what to think, they try to understand the phenomenons. If you take climate chnage, most « official source of information » today don’t discuss the theory of climate change itself, simply because it’s a complex theory and that it doesn’t want to take the time to do it. Climate sceptics will make hours long video giving « scientific » explanations for why this can’t be true. To me it’s a all in all a good thing. in the long term, this will force everyone to take the time to educate the audience before feeding them with a conclusion. As a personal exemple, i tried to understand what were deniers saying, and in the process i learned a lot about co2, temperature networks, ice melting process, forest fires cycles, thermal conduction models, and the fact that medias outlets have been calling for an « upcoming climate disaster » for at least a century without interruption. This made me extemely careful not to call anyone a fool too hastly on this particular topic.
- qqqwerty 7y ago
  > Furthermore, because you're an Iowa-denialist you probably should lose your job and never hold another job ever again. Cancel Culture! Your attempt to silence my Iowa-denialism proves that the Iowa-exists researchers are a dissent squashing cabal hell bent on silencing any and all critics. More clicks, more views, more money. The BS continues, and we are all worse off for it.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

cm2187 7y ago

It’s also counterproductive. It very much starts to look like a cult, not science.

paganel 7y ago
Lots of things look like cults from the outside, for me at least the other HN thread from today about self-driving cars was a perfect example of that, it had lots and lots of commenters (I presume the big majority of them pretty smart people) saying things like “I believe” and dismissing those that didn’t “believe” (in the idea of self-driving cars, in that case).
- LockAndLol 7y ago
  When you talk about the future, there's only one thing you can actually do and that's believe (not in the religious sense), because it is uncertain. Especially sensationalist expressions like "self-driving cars will never happen". Making absolute statements, especially about the future, is not a mark of an intellectual or of intelligence. But everything is relative.
  - paganel 7y ago
    Believing in self-driving cars is believing in AGI, and if some people find not believing in that “sensationalist” then it all kind of proves my point. I also don’t live in the SV bubble, maybe down there the AGI church is stronger, I wouldn’t know. I strongly recommend Jacques Ellul’s “The New Demons” [1], and Ellul’s works generally speaking. [1] https://www.amazon.com/New-Demons-Jacques-Ellul/dp/0816402663 https://www.amazon.com/New-Demons-Jacques-Ellul/dp/081640266...
Drakim 7y ago
You'll face roughly the same response from denying the Holocaust happened or for saying the earth is flat. I assume you don't think those are respectable positions that deserve serious consideration. If you do, then how about people who think they are vampires, and those who claim to be reborn pharaohs? Is there any limit where you just go "this is nonsense and I'm not gonna waste my time on it"? Are you part of a cult at that point? The debate over climate denial boils down to what sort of respectability the position has, is it a serious contender, or is it a wacko idea?

sklogic 7y ago

You "free speech" proponents must be physically exterminated. No mercy to you subhuman scum!

starfallg 7y ago

The first amendment in the US prevents the government from regulating speech, the fundamental reasoning is to allow the people to have varied political opinions or to disseminate them. This does not cover private companies nor commercial activities. YouTube already prohibits certain content on their platform, and limits ability to profit from certain content. This is just an extension of this doctrine. Furthermore, please consider that there is no absolute right to say anything you want, it has always been a balance. Even in the US, where free speech is enshrined in the constitution, there are criminal and civil limits to free speech if you cause harm to others.

apatters 7y ago
The parent is not making a legal argument, but a civic one. The argument is that our society will benefit from embracing free speech and suffer from censorship, regardless of legality.
- starfallg 7y ago
  And I'm making an argument that this has already been considered in both the legal and civic spheres, weighing both the benefits of free speech with some of the problems that it brings. The question here (and in many other similar situations) is where to draw the line.
  - apatters 7y ago
    I don't get it. You're saying that he's wrong because the issue has already been discussed?
- onion2k 7y ago
  For YouTube there are three antagonistic forces at work with free speech - there's the freedom users have to publish on the platform without censorship, the freedom users have to see recommended videos that are promoted honestly based on their interests without undue political influence by YouTube or others, and lastly there's the freedom YouTube has to promote things that make them money. There is no way for all these things to work together. What is positive for one will often be negative for the others. You can't talk reasonably about freedom and censorship without understanding that freedom means different things to different people in the same group.

fulafel 7y ago

Usually media will "deplatform" (even in the ages before social media) things that the consensus of society deems sufficiently harmful. How these questions can be still honestly debated in the intellectual sense is a valid question and we should ensure there are good platforms for it, but "family tv" style media like youtube would have good grounds for adopting a policy against obvious denialism propaganda. edit: not sure which point elicits the voter opposition, maybe the family-tv part since it's more opinionated? i'd like to flesh out the point: Youtube is rather selective about content it allows, it bans a lot of tame stuff, and it bans political speech like white supermacism. I guess this argument for banning more things can be viewed as a sort of whataboutism by people who would like youtube to be a free speech platform? That's a valid argument I guess, but not something I subscribe to - youtube is in the corporate curated ad-supported content category, despite the user-contributed content nature.

bsaul 7y ago
« obvious denialism propaganda » Was JFK killed by a random crazy sniper ? Did the US finance afghan rebels or south american totalitarian regim ? Did french president françois mitterand work under vichy collaborationist regime ? Did he have a secret child while he was president with a second wife ? Etc etc I can’t believe someone could still say that it’s fine to discard « obvious propaganda » on the most popular personal video publishing platform. And that it should be a private company to decide who should be banned and who isn’t, without any kind of judgment by a public authority. If an argument is strong enough for a theory, then deniers will eventually loose its steam ( flat earth is going nowhere). On the other hand, think about the impact of making it casual for video platform to censor every « non official » theories.
- franga2000 7y ago
  > If an argument is strong enough for a theory, then deniers will eventually loose its steam ( flat earth is going nowhere). I wouldn't be so sure about that. Crystal ball fortune telling, horoscopes etc. are still alive and well, as is denying the Moon landing and (this will get me downvoted to hell) religion - the most popular one of these. But going back to the main discussion, these people want to believe something against all evidence (for various psychological reasons) -> more and better evidence threatens their world view (and in the case of YT - revenue stream) -> they make even larger leaps of logic to , start getting more extreme, more aggressive -> their followers do as well. Sprinkle on some echo-chamber effects and you've got yourself a perfect machine for turning "sceptics" into extremists. Now, with most political issues, conspiracy theories and other beliefs, it doesn't matter much and doing anything against them would be setting a dangerous precedent, but things like this are just too dangerous. We can "debate" the Moon landing for hundreds of years, but climate change is already happening and we need to do things now, not in 1 year or 100. There's no time to hope these people will just go away eventually.

fzeroracer 7y ago

I'm surprised that people on HN accept this new era of scientific denialism. Regressing back to the era where scientists were prosecuted and jailed for saying things like 'geocentrism is wrong and the earth is not flat' is not a good idea. And make no mistake, for all the complaints about the poor climate change deniers being censored, those same people are harassing scientists with the backing of the fossil fuel industry. But it seems people are more concerned about a teenage talking about climate change than they are the companies and conspiracy theorists harassing scientists.

mikaeluman 7y ago
The issue is that you seem to not be able to abstract the fact that you may very well find yourself on the "wrong" side of the debate at one point in time. When that happens, you desperately need channels to communicate what's true and break through so we get a better world to live in. And in fact, this has been the case for many rights we today hold as self-evident such as abolishment of slavery and the equality of the sexes. This is not a debate about science, it's a meta-debate about science and a debate about philosophy and the liberal arts. Even your example with geocentrism is actually a counter-argument to yourself. At that time, the consensus view was geocentrism and so naturally anything that went against the consensus was dangerous and scorned, resulting in being put in prison and silenced. That's what you are suggesting we regress to...

trekrich 7y ago

YouTube was lost ages ago. All they care about is selling ads.

zoul 7y ago

I think the problem is not that the opposing views exist, but that the modern distribution channels make it very easy to serve to each his own. The result is not a productive (even if heated) debate in search of truth, but pools of opposing propaganda. When we lose the common ground for debate, we seem to lose the power of consensus. And I think that is something we can blame the social networks for. As a journalist, I think a lot about what to publish and what not to. Not based on the opinions or world views held, but based on the validity of the arguments. The recommendation algorithms only care about maximizing views. When you add advertising money to the mix, the problem just amplifies, resulting in real damage for the society.

speedplane 7y ago
> As a journalist, I think a lot about what to publish and what not to. Not based on the opinions or world views held, but based on the validity of the arguments. The recommendation algorithms only care about maximizing views. Maximizing "view count" is a bit simplistic way to think about the internet. Traditional media (e.g., TV, newspapers, magazines) are also incentivized to maximize view count. The difference between traditional media and new social media is that newer media is not held responsible for the content they publish. If a newspaper publishes an obviously false story, they need to retract it otherwise they lose credibility. If Facebook does the same, they blame it on the individual and say they can't be expected to police their networks. The problem is not about maximizing views, it's about accountability.
- ben509 7y ago
  Where's the accountability in a correction? Traditional media has always buried their corrections such that only a handful of readers or viewers actually see them. And even if one finds the correction, one has to dig up the original story to figure out how the correction affects it.
  - speedplane 7y ago
    > Where's the accountability in a correction? Traditional media has always buried their corrections such that only a handful of readers or viewers actually see them. Correcting a mistake is by definition accountability. If there was no accountability, there would never be any correction, and anyone would be free to lie or be sloppy. One can definitely take issue with the way certain publications make corrections, but new media does not even attempt to do anything.

avip 7y ago

If you take the "scientific consensus" at face value, it's more apt to use "vax denialist" or "nicotine is bad for health denialist" as an analogy, instead of "agile denialist".

speedplane 7y ago

> The mere word "denialism" is a scary sign of the times we live in. Is the idea that anything that goes against the current "consensus" be removed? And is this just regarding climate change or does it apply to how we think about physics, statistics or even software engineering? This isn't a free speech issue, no one is suggesting that this content be removed from the internet. The issue is that sites like YouTube don't just provide content, they also promote it by showing people recommendations. No one is suggesting that climate change deniers should be prohibited from expressing their views, just that YouTube should not promote it. Take a more extreme issue: flat-earthers. Someone who believes the earth is flat should definitely be able to say so, but it's not a good idea for YouTube to actively promote that viewpoint. It's also just as bad for YouTube to present the issue purely as flat-earthers versus non-flat-earthers, as it suggests there is some sort of balance between the viewpoints. To the extent that YouTube is promoting content, they should do within some bounds of reasonable consensus. If they refuse to police their recommendations, they aren't improving free speech, they are just destroying the existing mechanisms of consensus.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
hgoel 7y ago
You're just playing at semantics at that point.
pensatoio 7y ago
The thing is, there’s no way for an algorithm to know the intent behind why someone wants to see more of a certain kind of content. I get recommendations for flat earth videos because I’ve gone on several spurts of watching them. (It’s a good laugh, what can I say.) Sure, this is anecdotal, but I’m certain so are many other individual viewing habits. On top of all this, climate denialism is such a fuzzy topic. The science community barely even agrees on many aspects of the data and potential remediations. My point is, whenever these content hosts start adjusting recommendations based on their view of the world, regardless of whether I agree or not, I think we’re all done a disservice. What YouTube’s management define as “reasonable consensus” is most certainly not going to be a moderate position.

andor 7y ago

Free speech is not the same as free reach. With free speech, the state grants climate deniers the right to state their opinion in public without negative consequence (from the state). This does not extend to a right to free broadcasting of this speech by private companies like YouTube. Always publishing both sides to make reporting "fair and balanced" trivializes most topics. While it seems like it gives viewers the freedom to form their own opinion and to inform their behavior in a way most beneficial to themselves, they rarely have enough knowledge to understand all consequences. Expertise is real, it's usually focused on a narrow subject, and difficult to detect for the casual viewer. I do my job all day, trying to get really good at it I become somewhat of an expert. Meanwhile, my insights into climate research are very limited as I have only seen a few talks here and there and spent a few days reading about climate history on Wikipedia. Having studied another topic much more deeply, I understand and respect the amount of effort required to gain expertise. The producers of aforementioned doubtful YouTube content are most likely experts at video production and marketing. They benefit from the existing incentive structure not by explaining the scientific consensus and conveying the difficult message that viewers will have to change their lifestyle, but by making their videos as controversial as possible. Is the idea that anything that goes against the current "consensus" be removed? And is this just regarding climate change or does it apply to how we think about physics, statistics or even software engineering? Are you an "agile denialist"? Some things are simply more harmful than others. Inspire people to become "agile denialists" and their software will get worse. Users will switch to the competition. Inspiring to ignore the climate catastrophe is a contribution to the destruction of ecosystems, huge amounts of wealth [0], and risks the lives of hundreds of millions of people. [0] https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Business%20Functions/Sustainability/Our%20Insights/Climate%20risk%20and%20response%20Physical%20hazards%20and%20socioeconomic%20impacts/MGI-Climate-risk-and-response-vF.ashx https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Business%20Functio...