2 ms·

>I think the climate science, reporting, and advocacy seems pretty good (at least with respect to bias) Doesn't this blow a hole in your whole argument? If th

by slg 6y ago

>I think the climate science, reporting, and advocacy seems pretty good (at least with respect to bias) Doesn't this blow a hole in your whole argument? If there is little bias in this climate change coverage and conservatives still object to it, what makes you think they will accept any form of objective truth? >Consistency, consistency, consistency. It's not enough to be honest or well-behaved once, it has to be a protracted effort over time. On the basis of this one event, a reasonable person wouldn't conclude that NYT is genuinely aspiring toward honesty and neutrality, much less someone who tends toward paranoia. You aren't going to get an argument from me that the mainstream media is perfect on this. However I think it is clear that centrist and left leaning media is much much better about this than right leaning media. >I don't think that "the right" has ever been this detached from mainstream epistemology in the first place--I don't think our institutions have ever been as compromised as they are now, at least not on a left-right axis. But there's probably no reason to limit our case studies to corruption of a left-right nature; we could equally look for any institution that lost the trust of a group of people and then gained it back (in part or in full). Fair enough, but the loss of trust needs to be linked primarily to a perceived lack of truthfulness and I can't think of any examples of that either that aren't linked with an overt lack of truthfulness. Right now any bias in reporting, no matter how small, is magnified and even truthful and completely objective reporting is seen as biased. I simply don't know how you regain trust after that when the problem is more exaggerated in people's perception than in reality.

throwaway894345 6y ago
> Doesn't this blow a hole in your whole argument? If there is little bias in this climate change coverage and conservatives still object to it, what makes you think they will accept any form of objective truth? I don't think so. I think the bias in other fields poisons the well of good faith. Specifically the conservative interface to these fields is probably angry people on the Internet who are as likely to bash them for their climate politics as for their opinions on BLM protests. If they were better plugged-in to the sciences, I think they would see that climate science is less problematic than critical studies. > You aren't going to get an argument from me that the mainstream media is perfect on this. However I think it is clear that centrist and left leaning media is much much better about this than right leaning media. I agree. I think even when things were good in these institutions, their relationship with the right was already strained. > Fair enough, but the loss of trust needs to be linked primarily to a perceived lack of truthfulness and I can't think of any examples of that either that aren't linked with an overt lack of truthfulness. I'm having a hard time thinking of examples too. I think that the 'perceived vs overt' consideration is just a reflection on how bad things have gotten--if you abuse the trust of someone for a long time, eventually their perception of affairs will become exaggerated. That's basically the whole thesis. Note that it's possible that we can't regain the trust of some people who have such a distorted view, but even still it's worth being honest if only to keep more people from crossing the threshold (and insodoing, those who have already crossed will become more marginalized and constitute a decreasing percentage of the population).
- slg 6y ago
  I think the well that is poisoned is not individual fields or institutions but the idea of institutions in general. It isn't that conservatives have any reason to distrust the National Weather Service or the Center for Disease Control specifically, it is that they distrust all institutions. I don't think there is much the NWS or CDC can do to change that while still remaining objective and truthful. Like you said, some people may already be gone for good. My main concern is not necessarily bringing those people back. It is preventing them from corrupting the perception of more people who are still open to discussion. That brings us back to the original topic of social media censorship. Sometimes it isn't enough to constantly argue down these dangerous ideas. We likely need to start banning people who are actively doing harm.

by slg 6y ago

throwaway894345 6y ago

> Doesn't this blow a hole in your whole argument? If there is little bias in this climate change coverage and conservatives still object to it, what makes you think they will accept any form of objective truth? I don't think so. I think the bias in other fields poisons the well of good faith. Specifically the conservative interface to these fields is probably angry people on the Internet who are as likely to bash them for their climate politics as for their opinions on BLM protests. If they were better plugged-in to the sciences, I think they would see that climate science is less problematic than critical studies. > You aren't going to get an argument from me that the mainstream media is perfect on this. However I think it is clear that centrist and left leaning media is much much better about this than right leaning media. I agree. I think even when things were good in these institutions, their relationship with the right was already strained. > Fair enough, but the loss of trust needs to be linked primarily to a perceived lack of truthfulness and I can't think of any examples of that either that aren't linked with an overt lack of truthfulness. I'm having a hard time thinking of examples too. I think that the 'perceived vs overt' consideration is just a reflection on how bad things have gotten--if you abuse the trust of someone for a long time, eventually their perception of affairs will become exaggerated. That's basically the whole thesis. Note that it's possible that we can't regain the trust of some people who have such a distorted view, but even still it's worth being honest if only to keep more people from crossing the threshold (and insodoing, those who have already crossed will become more marginalized and constitute a decreasing percentage of the population).

slg 6y ago
I think the well that is poisoned is not individual fields or institutions but the idea of institutions in general. It isn't that conservatives have any reason to distrust the National Weather Service or the Center for Disease Control specifically, it is that they distrust all institutions. I don't think there is much the NWS or CDC can do to change that while still remaining objective and truthful. Like you said, some people may already be gone for good. My main concern is not necessarily bringing those people back. It is preventing them from corrupting the perception of more people who are still open to discussion. That brings us back to the original topic of social media censorship. Sometimes it isn't enough to constantly argue down these dangerous ideas. We likely need to start banning people who are actively doing harm.