Redactors Does An Analysis Of Politifacts.com

[shira]

Kind of like what they say about fiction writing, that you want to "show" rather than "tell." So perhaps showing works where telling does not. With respect to homosexuality, my theory has always been that a shift in the portrayal of gays in popular culture which seemed to start in the 90's is responsible for changing attitudes, so that would fit.

Of course, this means that there is no way to persuade people through fact and logic. They have to come to it themselves through personal experiences which may or may not happen. Which begs the question of why anyone bothers with a discussion forum like this.

The problem with "facts and logic" is that people hear different "facts" about the same topic, and they choose the facts (and associated "logic") that are consistent with their basic ideology.

 

[Moonbeam]

You're giving a philosophical answer to what is really a scientific question. I'm interested in the mechanics of how someone may change their mind on one or more issues if people are fundamentally not persuadable on facts.

If you want to be scientific, then you will have to state your question more accurately. The way you ask it does not flow from the premise. The premise is that people are not persuaded by argument that oppose their conformational bias and in fact, furthermore, become more convinced that they are right. (It was that point I wanted to make to DSF when he asked me to provide peer reviewed data. It would wind up creating more denial of my claim.) But our lives are not solely lived in an argumentative state. We do not always have a solid wall up.

There is a Mulla Nasrudin story I don't remember well, about when the Mulla was a Doctor with a patient who the Mulla knew would resist the treatment he needed, lets say more protein in his diet like eggs, so the Mulla sat and pondered his condition out loud. You need something that is oval shaped, and it should be white, and it should come in a shell.... The patient butted in, I need eggs. Yes that would be perfect said the Mulla. What the patient really needed besides more protein was time and buy-in.

The science of the development of wisdom is ancient and well hidden, but if you seek a taste you won't do better than the stories of Mulla Nasrudin. And time, of course.

No, I'm not making that presupposition. My question didn't assume it. I'm asking about the mechanism by which people change their minds. The mechanism could be entirely a matter of outside influence. What the research says is that one form is outside influence - persuasion based on facts - is ineffective. For all I know there may be another that works perfectly well.

I posted to you elsewhere in the last day or so, that the ego can't change itself.

Kind of like what they say about fiction writing, that you want to "show" rather than "tell." So perhaps showing works where telling does not. With respect to homosexuality, my theory has always been that a shift in the portrayal of gays in popular culture which seemed to start in the 90's is responsible for changing attitudes, so that would fit.

Of course, this means that there is no way to persuade people through fact and logic. They have to come to it themselves through personal experiences which may or may not happen. Which begs the question of why anyone bothers with a discussion forum like this.

You speak as if change were a horizontal neutral phenomena, a drifting of fashion here and there. I see spiritual evolution. The drop in prejudice against gays as a result of more exposure to gays happened in part because of exposure but in part because the soul feels better. It is an increase in the capacity to love. What you call philosophical, I call the mechanics of our real human nature.

The reason to bother with a forum like this for me is not that my arguments will persuade, but that my making them here in relation to others in the way that I do, creates an experience. I try to post from an other dimension as a mind that doesn't know anything, a blind man in a land of knowers.

 

[brycejones]

he wont.

If it confirms his bias its ok.

If it supports a different pov, then its not worth reading.

Name a website you find acceptable that performs the same function as politifact or factcheck.

Still waiting.......

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

http://youarenotsosmart.com/2011/06/10/the-backfire-effect/

I looked at the first study cited in the article that you linked without comment (https://www.dartmouth.edu/~nyhan/nyhan-reifler.pdf) and don't see how it supports your point that conservatives lie to themselves in greater numbers than liberals do. Please point to a specific study that supports your contention.

 

[shira]

More proof that Politifact is remarkedly unbiased!

Since 2000, the Times has issued 10 endorsements in elections for U.S. President, U.S. Senate, and Florida Governor. Nine of the 10 endorsements went to Democrats, with the sole exception being the Times’ endorsement of Democrat-leaning Independent Charlie Crist in the 2010 U.S. Senate contest.

The Times’ Democrat bias is perhaps most apparent in its endorsement of Bill McBride in the 2002 Florida Governor election. After picking up substantial Democrat and Independent support in a landslide 11-percentage point victory over Democrat Buddy MacKay in the 1998 gubernatorial election, Republican Jeb Bush earned high grades and bipartisan respect in his first term as governor. As a result, Bush cruised to an even larger 13-percentage point landslide victory in his 2002 reelection bid against Democrat Bill McBride. Despite Bush’s strong record and bipartisan support, the Times stayed true to its Democrat partisanship and endorsed McBride.

The Times’ political bias appears to dictate the rulings handed out by its PolitiFact Florida project. A self-proclaimed political referee, PolitiFact Florida tilts its “Truth-o-Meter” heavily against Republican political figures. A Media Trackers Florida analysis shows PolitiFact Florida targets Republicans with 11 times more “Pants on Fire” rulings than Democrats.

According to the Media Trackers analysis, PolitiFact Florida issued its derisive “Pants on Fire” ruling against 27 individuals. Of those 27 individuals, 22 are Republicans, three are Independents or individuals with no clear party affiliation, and only two are Democrats.

http://mediatrackers.org/florida/20...-times-scores-pants-on-fire-for-partisan-bias

Have you ever heard of circular reasoning? The OP indicates that PolitiFact rates a much higher percentage of Republican statements as untrue than Democrat statements. So you "prove" bias by PolitiFact by producing an article that says the same thing about PolitiFact. Conclusion: PolitiFact must be biased because it finds Republicans to be untruthful more than Democrats.

Genius!

 

[fskimospy]

Have you ever heard of circular reasoning? The OP indicates that PolitiFact rates a much higher percentage of Republican statements as untrue than Democrat statements. So you "prove" bias by PolitiFact by producing an article that says the same thing about PolitiFact. Conclusion: PolitiFact must be biased because it finds Republicans to be untruthful more than Democrats.

Genius!

He compared it to a coin flip as if each time a Republican or a Democrat said something it would have an equal chance of being rated 'pants on fire' false by a truly unbiased fact checker. This means he was assuming a binomial probability with both sides being equally probable and with normal distribution. This caused him to find Politifact's numbers to be statistical evidence of bias.

I asked him repeatedly what his basis was for why the distribution would be equally probable or even normally distributed but he wouldn't answer. It all comes from the failed assumption that political statements are like coin flips and not the product of the audience they are trying to appeal to and the circumstances of that appeal.

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

Still waiting.......

Yup

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Have you ever heard of circular reasoning? The OP indicates that PolitiFact rates a much higher percentage of Republican statements as untrue than Democrat statements. So you "prove" bias by PolitiFact by producing an article that says the same thing about PolitiFact. Conclusion: PolitiFact must be biased because it finds Republicans to be untruthful more than Democrats.

Genius!

Multiple studies of Politifact by George Mason University and University of Minnesota all arrive at the same conclusion...either Republicans significantly lie more than Democrats (nearly an order of magnitude!) or Politifact has a serious bias problem. Let me guess what you think.

 

[jackstar7]

I looked at the first study cited in the article that you linked without comment (https://www.dartmouth.edu/~nyhan/nyhan-reifler.pdf) and don't see how it supports your point that conservatives lie to themselves in greater numbers than liberals do. Please point to a specific study that supports your contention.

As long as you didn't read the article.

 

[jackstar7]

Multiple studies of Politifact by George Mason University and University of Minnesota all arrive at the same conclusion...either Republicans significantly lie more than Democrats (nearly an order of magnitude!) or Politifact has a serious bias problem. Let me guess what you think.

Who cares. What do YOU think?

Or as Moonie suggests, does your self-hate make what you think seem so insignificant in your view that it surely will not be of value to us?

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

As long as you didn't read the article.

If you have a conclusion after reading that study that you would like to share, by all means, please share it. Or if there's another study that you feel conclusively proves Moonie's point...please cite.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Who cares. What do YOU think?

Or as Moonie suggests, does your self-hate make what you think seem so insignificant in your view that it surely will not be of value to us?

I think both are true. What do you think?

Or does your self-hate make what you think seem so insignificant in your view that it surely will not be of value to us? <-- See...I can say incredibly stupid things too!

 

[jackstar7]

I think both are true. What do you think?

You think both R's lie more AND the site is biased? Or that your opinion is meaningless and you are full of self-loathing?

I feel like everything is on the table.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

You think both R's lie more AND the site is biased? Or that your opinion is meaningless and you are full of self-loathing?

I feel like everything is on the table.

Am I supposed to take you seriously? Or chalk you up as a jackass?

 

[woolfe9998]

If you want to be scientific, then you will have to state your question more accurately. The way you ask it does not flow from the premise. The premise is that people are not persuaded by argument that oppose their conformational bias and in fact, furthermore, become more convinced that they are right. (It was that point I wanted to make to DSF when he asked me to provide peer reviewed data. It would wind up creating more denial of my claim.) But our lives are not solely lived in an argumentative state. We do not always have a solid wall up.

I think when you say "we do not always have a solid wall up" you're correct, but the finer point was already stated by Shira. I characterized it as showing rather than telling. Our walls may be down when something is shown to us without being presented as an argument. My observation is that this is most often the case when what we are shown produces an emotional reaction. For example, in the wake of Sandy Hook some people might have been persuaded to favor certain gun control measures they would not otherwise have favored. But then the liberals used Sandy Hook to explicitly argue for gun control, which ironically had the opposite effect of polarizing those against gun control. The incident itself may have been persuasive, but the argument flowing from it may have been counter-productive.

What I find frustrating is that an anecdotal incident which produces an emotional reaction is not a valid reason for changing policy. The valid reason would be actual data which shows that the policy should be changed because doing so would have a positive effect. But any attempt to present the issue in this manner will ironically have the opposite effect.

You speak as if change were a horizontal neutral phenomena, a drifting of fashion here and there. I see spiritual evolution. The drop in prejudice against gays as a result of more exposure to gays happened in part because of exposure but in part because the soul feels better. It is an increase in the capacity to love. What you call philosophical, I call the mechanics of our real human nature.

I don't honestly know about this. If people are undergoing some kind of spiritual development, increasing their "capacity to love," that should signal something more general than a shift in a particular issue like gay marriage. However, in the given case, a person may become more tolerant of say, gays, but less tolerant of another group, say Muslims. There's no reason to assume that people in general have undergone any sort of spiritual enlightenment during the period of time in which support for gay marriage increased. It's more likely to do with factors particular to the perception of gays than it is a more general shift in our world view.

 

[jackstar7]

Am I supposed to take you seriously? Or chalk you up as a jackass?

It's clear how we should take you, since you can't answer simple questions.

An obfuscating pedant is a special snowflake.

 

[MongGrel]

So far no specific examples of politifact ruling incorrectly in regards to GOP candidates. Anyone have some they want to bring forward for discussion?

The Left loves this site...what's not to like?

Apparently not.

In other words, you've got nothing.

Someone had to go and ask him for useless charts.

 

[etrigan420]

<-- See...I can say incredibly stupid things too!

This is what Donald Rumsfeld would call a "known known".

 

[First]

Multiple studies of Politifact by George Mason University and University of Minnesota all arrive at the same conclusion...either Republicans significantly lie more than Democrats (nearly an order of magnitude!) or Politifact has a serious bias problem. Let me guess what you think.

You're impressively stubborn.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

It's clear how we should take you, since you can't answer simple questions.

An obfuscating pedant is a special snowflake.

Jackass it is.

 

[MongGrel]

This is what Donald Rumsfeld would call a "known known".

:awe:

 

[shira]

Multiple studies of Politifact by George Mason University and University of Minnesota all arrive at the same conclusion...either Republicans significantly lie more than Democrats (nearly an order of magnitude!) or Politifact has a serious bias problem. Let me guess what you think.

What I think is that unless someone can show a differential approach by Politifact in the types and relevance of statements evaluated for Democrats and Republicans, and/or a differential standard of assessing the truthfulness of statements - and assigning a "truthfulness label" - by Politifact for Democrats and Republicans, a claim of bias is utterly without foundation.

 

[jackstar7]

Jackass it is.

Naturally I have to be dismissed. The alternative is you participating in a meaningful way.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Naturally I have to be dismissed. The alternative is you participating in a meaningful way.

I gave you the opportunity to participate in a meaningful way...you chose not to and resorted to deprecation instead. I see no value in wasting any more of my time attempting to have a relatively civil conversation with you.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

What I think is that unless someone can show a differential approach by Politifact in the types and relevance of statements evaluated for Democrats and Republicans, and/or a differential standard of assessing the truthfulness of statements - and assigning a "truthfulness label" - by Politifact for Democrats and Republicans, a claim of bias is utterly without foundation.

Here's one example where I think Politifact totally screwed Republicans. The GOP made a completely true statement and Politifact somehow twisted it into Half-True. Wow. Just wow.

http://www.politifact.com/ohio/stat...op-claims-sherrod-brown-special-interest-all/