And people are trained out of their skepticism. In informal conversations people react negatively when met with skepticism, people dislike those who correct inaccurate information, parents train their kids to accept their word as fact when they tire of answering questions. Most people are not inclined to think deeply or question what they are told. Ignorance is ~bliss~ strength.
There is some hope as "googling it" becomes acceptable, people are more inclined to do cursory research in informal conversations. But that's subject to bias by Google and SEO shenanigans.
I've started doing this more often in informal chats with my wife, for instance. We both kind of make half-guesses based on what we know, and then I've started thinking "I can just look this shit up on my phone real quick." I use Wikipedia for a quick answer, which is not the best source, but it's good enough for something on the fly.
From the article:
"They weren't looking for high-level analysis of data but just a "reasonable bar" of, for instance, telling fake accounts from real ones, activist groups from neutral sources and ads from articles."
but I guess you'd have to look at the study itself to see how reasonable their bar was.
There is plenty of benefit in an awareness of false and biased information in common media sources. With the current environment I think we should take everything with a grain of salt unless we care enough to do the research. Sadly I think most people don't have the research and critical thinking skills to ever determine the truth with any practical certainty.
There is plenty of benefit in an awareness of false and biased information in common media sources.
There is benefit but it is a benefit of knowledge, intangible. You have to value that already or you won't see any benefit. An hour spent researching a study's legitimacy is wasted time for someone who would rather spend that time playing ball.
An hour spent researching a study's legitimacy is wasted time for someone who would rather spend that time playing ball.
I agree, and it's often wasted time for me as well. However, I think the benefit of healthy skepticism isn't particularly intangible compared to many other 'benefits'... What I'm saying is that we shouldn't seriously accept what we can't be bothered researching. Life is full of unanswered and unanswerable questions, it helps to be aware of and at peace with that.
Who can blame them? Distinguishing what's real from fake without diving in and doing a solid amount of research yourself seems a near-impossible task. And there's just not enough benefit to that kind of learning and effort for most people to bother with it.