5 ms·
Kind of scary how a random person on twitter can say something and that gets turned into a fact.
by 91edec 6y ago
Kind of scary how a random person on twitter can say something and that gets turned into a fact.
- _qulr 6y agoBut it didn't get turned into a fact. There was a period of discussion, and the facts eventually came out, which the original tweeter even acknowledged. You might even say, the system worked. ;-)
- gilrain 6y agoIt's very likely that the original story spread to more people than the retraction. So sadly, yes, for a significant number of people the falsehood is now a "fact". One they might drop as a curiosity in conversation long after the retraction has faded from view, further spreading the "fact".
- _qulr 6y agoYes, but many who saw the original story will probably forget about it in time. Moreover, the retraction did spread in a way that it wouldn't have if this controversy never got public discussion. People who saw the retraction will now be available to refute the assertion if it comes up again.
- _qulr 6y agoFalsehoods will spread, that's inevitable. But that's not the real misinformation problem. Falsehoods also get pushback, often strong pushback. Falsehoods can get corrected, eventually. As a society, we have a real problem when people deliberately push falsehoods that they know to be false. This is not such a case, however.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- usefulcat 6y agoImagine the effect if multiple sources were to repeat the same false claim.
- marcosdumay 6y agoImagine it if the available sources were few, and they were all repeating the same false claim.
- dwild 6y agoThe craziest is how obvious we can be about it. It just happened and yet the whole conversation right now is not about how to verify it, but just to trust that new one as fact too. It's nice that we acknowledge that we were wrong... but we are doing the same exact mistake right now.