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Hi, I’m John Green, and this is Crash Course: Navigating Digital Information.
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When you were a kid, did you ever hear the
phrase “Because I said so”?
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Like, I most often say that after my kids
ask why they can’t have m&Ms for dinner.
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The answer to which, of course, is “you
will get scurvy if you eat that way.”
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But that just leads to more questions about
scurvy, and them begging to take a multivitamin
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so they can eat M&Ms--It’s because I said
so!
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I say this because it gets results.
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You listen to your parents because, you know,
they’re your parents.
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And also because they can take your phone
away.
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But as you grow older, “because I said so”
no longer cuts it.
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If you told your boss you deserve a raise
“because I said so” you’re liable to
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get fired.
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Also, I can’t afford raises, Stan.
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Do you think my fleet of lamborghinis pays
for itself?
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I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again,
if you want a raise, you need to learn how
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to change the oil in a lamborghini.
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NO!
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You need to provide evidence that you deserve
the raise, and that evidence needs to be convincing.
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And that’s how online information works,
too.
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Not only should you look for reliable sources
of information, but they should provide convincing
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evidence for their claims.
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Solid evidence, ideally.
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And often, they don’t.
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So today we’re going to focus on how to
tell good evidence from bad evidence, and
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maybe importantly, how to identify “Fine
but that doesn’t actually prove your point”
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evidence.
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The stuff that the internet is built on.
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INTRO
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In the past few weeks, we’ve learned how
to ask and answer the questions “Who said
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that and why?” when we encounter new online
information.
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But those two questions alone aren’t enough
to properly evaluate information.
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We need to add another question to our repertoire:
“What is the evidence?”
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Why do we need evidence?
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Can’t we just find a trustworthy source
and believe whatever they say?
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Wouldn’t that just be, you know, easier?
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Well, yes, and it’s important to find and
trust reliable sources of information, the
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credibility of their claims depends on the
evidence provided to back them up.
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Evidence could be anything, really -- text,
photos, videos, data -- as long as it supports
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a claim and gives you a good reason to believe
it’s true.
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If someone is making a factual claim -- and
not just voicing a subjective opinion -- then
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they need to provide proof in order for us
to believe it.
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This classic tweet by comedian Nathan Fielder
explains it all.
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In the photo you see Nathan laughing, looking
off camera.
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The tweet reads “Out on the town having
the time of my life with a bunch of friends.
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They're all just out of frame, laughing too.”
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To ruin the joke by explaining it, Nathan
probably isn’t out on the town with friends,
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otherwise, he would show them laughing instead
of this lonely selfie.
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It’s funny because the evidence doesn’t
back up the claim.
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But often, when the evidence does not back
up the claim, it’s not funny.
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It’s just misinformation.
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Or disinformation.
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As you probably know from just existing on
the internet, it is really easy to hop online
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and make any claim you want.
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Like, I know this is going to sound wild,
but you can literally type anything you want
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into this box and click tweet, and share it
with the world.
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Like, the only thing this box will not publish
to the public is a thought longer than 280
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characters.
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What a system!
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But the same is true across social media:
Politicians claim their opponents are bad
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choices for government on facebook.
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Conspiracy theorists take to YouTube to falsely
claim the Earth is flat.
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Celebrities use Instagram to claim they lost
weight using lollipops.
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And of course, on Tumblr everyone is claiming
that your fave could never, and/or is problematic.
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If a source provides no evidence at all to
back up its claims, we should be suspicious
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immediately.
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I mean, without evidence, we have no way to
know if its claims are true -- and thus no
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reason to believe that they are.
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For instance, take a look at this Facebook
post that went viral in the summer of 2018.
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It was shared 1.5 million times.
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It says, “New Deadly Spider Spreads Across
USA
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The Spider From Hell.
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Five people have died this week due to the
bite of this deadly spider.
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This spider was first seen in South Carolina
in July.
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Since then it has caused deaths in West Virginia,
Tennessee and Mississippi.
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One bite from this spider is deadly.
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U.S.
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Government working on a[n] anti-venom.
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At this time please make your family and friends
aware.”
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The source is a seemingly random Facebook
user you don’t know.
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Although many posts you’ll encounter on
Facebook are from friends or friends of friends,
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you’ll also find posts from strangers.
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And if they’re not public figures, you may
not be able to verify their identity outside
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of Facebook.
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So, to determine if their information is trustworthy,
we need to look at the evidence.
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The post features photos of an admittedly
terrifying-looking spider.
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But it doesn’t include any other evidence.
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It doesn’t say what type of spider this
is, where it typically lives, or how it traveled
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from South Carolina to West Virginia without
visiting Virginia.
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Wait!
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Maybe it’s a flying spider.
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Stan, are we sure that this deadly flying
spider isn’t real?
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There are also, tellingly, no links to the
news stories about the deaths that this spider
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supposedly caused, because you know, there
weren’t any.
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Also, there is nothing to suggest the government
is studying an antidote.
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Or for that matter, A antidote.
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Now, fact-checking site Snopes.com debunked
this all pretty easily.
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They searched reputable sources for deaths
attributed to this spider and found nothing.
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They also found the person who initially posted
this hoax has started other hoaxes in the
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past.
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In this case, the lack of evidence was reason
to be very suspicious.
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We didn’t necessarily need Snopes to tell
us there’s no deadly spider taking over
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the American south, but it is nice to be able
to confirm our suspicions with another party.
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But of course, the mere existence of evidence
is not enough to verify a claim, though.
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For instance, Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe
once brought a snowball onto the Senate floor
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in order to disprove global warming.
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It was February 2015 and he said that scientists
had claimed 2014 was the warmest year on record.
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Then he pulled a snowball out of a plastic
bag and threw it on the ground.
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Inside the Senate.
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He was trying to use the snowball as evidence
that the planet was not getting warmer because
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it was cold in Washington, DC -- because you
know, it was winter.
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But we know, thanks to science, that winter
continues to exist in many parts of the world,
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but at the same time, the planet as a whole
is also warming.
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A snowball does not disprove climate change
any more than a heat wave proves it, because
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weather is what happens every day in the atmosphere,
and climate is what’s happening overall.
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And what’s happening overall is that things
are getting hotter.
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For another example, in 2017 a conspiracy
theory cropped up on anonymous Internet message
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boards claiming the United States Department
of Justice was secretly investigating a global
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pedophile ring.
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The so-called evidence for this included pictures
of Hillary Clinton, her daughter Chelsea Clinton
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and Sen. John McCain wearing boots for foot
injuries at different times.
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The boots were supposedly covering up ankle
monitors tracking them all during the investigation.
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But, of course, all those photos actually
prove is that feet are kind of easy to injure.
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And get easier to injure as you age.
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All of which brings me to perhaps the most
important lesson of this episode: Not all
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evidence is created equal.
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The evidence a source provides should come
from another reliable source.
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And if you find yourself starting to believe
complicated conspiracy theories, which, by
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the way, I think we all do on the internet
in 2018, you need to ask yourself, “does
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this information really make sense, or am
I just making it make sense in my brain?”
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And two, perhaps more importantly, ‘does
this information confirm my pre-existing world
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view which makes me pre-disposed to believing
it?’
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Take this Axios report with the headline “Climate
change may boost pests, stress food supplies.”
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It says the global climate change could make
millions food insecure in the future.
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The article goes on to cite the findings of
a new study from researchers at the University
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of Washington, Stanford University, University
of Vermont, and University of Colorado.
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That study was published in Science, which
some quick lateral reading can tell you, is
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a well-respected peer reviewed journal, god
I love lateral reading.
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But they didn’t just cite that one study.
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Axios also provided context in the form of
a Harvard study published in a different peer-reviewed
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journal and comments from a scientist not
involved in either study.
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In other words, they showed their receipts.
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So really, a search for reliable information
online is a search for reliable evidence.
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Let’s take a closer look in the Thought
Bubble.
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OK.
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Imagine this post pops into your news feed:
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I can’t believe the mainstream media is
hiding this story.
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The moon landing was fake this whole time.
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It’s accompanied by an image from the 1969
moon landing and includes a link to a video
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called: Were the moon landings faked?
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At face value, this post is claiming that
the U.S. government never actually sent astronauts
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to the moon in 1969.
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The evidence provided is a video purporting
to explain how they deceived the public.
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But the presence of evidence, here in the
form of a video link, does not guarantee the
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claim’s validity.
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If you follow the link, you’ll find the
video in question belongs to a channel called
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“Alltime Conspiracies.”
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It’s a channel is filled with videos about
conspiracy theories and supposed cover-ups,
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like “10 real life vampires.”
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Not exactly a trustworthy source.
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There have only been 4 vampires in real history.
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The video itself points out both what conspiracy
theorists have said about the moon landing
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and what official sources have said.
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But the video is structured to make you think
some questions have been left unanswered.
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YouTube has also added an information panel
to the video that points to the Encyclopedia
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Britannica article on the Apollo Space Program.
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Because YouTube wants you to look for information
from other sources, especially around topics
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that are prone to misinformation.
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But let’s be clear: the moon landing definitely
happened.
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And for it not to have happened, a conspiracy
would have needed to involve thousands of
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people.
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Thousands of people never conspire to do anything
secretly.
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The video may have looked interesting, but
if you check the evidence, you will see how
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clearly wrong the post is.
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Thanks, Thought Bubble.
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So sometimes, the source of evidence for a
claim will be reliable, it just won’t exactly
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be relevant to the argument.
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Like, say you read a story online about how
e-cigarette companies are marketing their
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products to be attractive to teens.
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Someone has commented on it, saying “It’s
totally safe for kids.
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After all, they help people stop smoking,
don’t they?”
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But wait a minute.
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What does smoking cessation have to do with kids using e-cigarettes?
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Nothing.
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This is a classic case of utilizing evidence
that may be relevant to the broader topic
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of conversation -- in this case, e-cigarettes
-- but doesn’t actually have any bearing
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on the claim at hand -- that e-cigarettes
are safe for kids.
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And the use of irrelevant evidence like this
can be a big obstacle when evaluating online
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information.
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Because not only must you determine whether
a source sharing information is credible,
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you also have to determine whether they’ve
provided evidence and whether that evidence
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is credible.
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And this irrelevant evidence or evidence that
doesn’t quite make the right point is all
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around us online.
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One very popular form of irrelevant evidence
is the spurious correlation.
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A spurious correlation is the implied causal
relationship between events that are coincidentally
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linked.
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And this happens constantly with data.
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For instance, there’s a strong correlation
between the number of people who drown by
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falling into a pool every year and the number
of films that Nicolas Cage appears in that
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year.
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But Nicolas Cage movies do not, like, throw
people into pools, because CORRELATION IS
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NOT CAUSATION.
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For instance, plenty of blog posts and misleading
news articles have incorrectly implied a connection
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between the rate of vaccines given to children
and the rate of autism diagnoses.
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In the past few decades, the number of vaccines
recommended for kids has gone up as new medical
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discoveries have been made.
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The prevalence of autism spectrum disorder
has also increased over the past few decades.
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Despite bountiful scientific evidence showing
there is no link between these two facts,
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many continue to believe and use the web to
spread the idea that vaccines “cause”
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autism.
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In fact, they’ve been so successful in spreading
this spurious correlation that a drop in vaccination
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rates and an outbreak of measles swept through
Europe in 2018.
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So this is not only about spiders that don’t
exist.
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This is, in some cases, a true matter of life
and death.
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Interrogating the evidence our online sources
provide us is incredibly important.
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We need to ask whether that evidence is reliable
and whether it actually backs up the claim
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being made.
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The quality of our evidence, like the quality
of our information, effects the quality of
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our decisions.
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And also the prevalence of measles.
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We’ll dig even deeper into evidence next
week.
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I’ll see you then.
