Playboy: Farhad Manjoo on the "truthiness found in internet Echo chambers"

For those interested, get the Playboy October 2008 issue and go to page 36 and 37 to read the whole essay.

Farhad brings up something I think we at the DailyPaul should always keep in mind at all times....for our own sanity.

She writes about an often repeated and famous psychology experiment, first conducted in the late 1960's. You recall the late 60's? The nation was widely divided on Vietnam, and as it turns out, the Gulf of Tonkin was all but a govt fictitious storyline about American warship getting attacked.

Well anyway, Timothy Brok and Joe Balloun asked undergrads to listen to a series of prerecorded speeches on several topics. The test subjects were told that the speeches have been recorded on cheap equipment, thus there was some static, but the students could REDUCE the interference for a few seconds by pressing a button in the testing room. Brock and Balloun monitored the students when they pressed the button (to get a closer listen) and when they did not press the button. The results were remarkable and in a dozen different ways have been tested and retested again and again.

RESULT? People tend to SEEK OUT information confirming their beliefs and AVOID information they find unpleasant. This idea psychologists call SELECTIVE EXPOSURE Bias.

Case in point. When the students listened to a speaker who said there was a link between smoking and cancer, some pressed the button, some did not. When another speaker said there was no link between smoking and cancer, others pressed the button and others did not.

So what was amazing? Prior student surveys told the researchers who had bias to believe one view or the other, prior to listening to the two speeches. Those students who already thought smoking was linked to cancer, (took action) Pressed the button, to hear it said. Those that did not already think so, let the button go and the static to remain..... And conversely, those that thought there was no link to smoking and cancer (took action) Pressed the button to listen to the speaker say there was no evidence for this.

So what Treg? So what? Well SELECTIVE EXPOSURE is a very big deal. It can cause us all to NOT see reality correctly, and for those that do not see it our way, we will be left scratching our heads asking ourselves, "Are they that dumb that they can't see all the evidence?"

The theory of SELECTIVE EXPOSURE bias applies to us all, each and every one of us, even more so in the internet decade. Google and Youtube is the enabler of the bias... .thus us internet geeks are particularly vulnerable.

Take any issue, say....autism and vaccines for example.

Hardly anyone comes to any issue 100% non bias... who likes getting a shot anyway? But even if you never ever heard of the controversy or the suggestion there was or was not a link causing the two, you would have about a 50% chance of traveling down one road of information versus the other road of information. Just a Google search would give you a hundred links to click on.

PERSONALITY TYPES. Now no two people are alike, I will grant you that. But certainly there are personality types. Those of us who are a little bit more nervous, concerned, worried, say, versus some of us who are all cheer, all smiles and laughs and not a worry in the world. Now what do you think what happens when these two types happen upon the Google search or youtube search about Vaccines and Autism? Do you think that those who are a bit more nervious would show a SELECTIVE BIAS to CLICK on something that told them there is a lot to worry about? Do you think those who are a bit to sun shinny will show a SELECTIVE BIAS to CLICK on something that reports all good news here, no connection between vaccines and autism ... move right along? Sure you do. So people will SELF GROUP themselves. The Paranoids over here, the Pollyannas over here, and each will go on Clicking and enjoying the loud streams of "evidence" Echo-ing around in their little world.

Now notice, the SELECTIVE BIAS says.... you will more often than not click on the links that take you down the path of information that you already agree with and or adds to your pre-click bias. In fact, you could spend hours, days, weeks, even years going down one path and be TOTALLY unaware that there was another path for those that thought otherwise.

That means you are in an "Echo chamber". We used to call it, "Preaching to the quire". Unlike real science, that is science that gets published and reviewed by professors everywhere WHO LIVE JUST TO CRITICIZE and thus vet it all out and down to zero....and if anything remains standing, then by default "its a fact or theory that holds up"...but at anytime can be shot down. The ECHO CHAMBER or Preaching to the Quire turns up the volume, Scientific Review shuts you up.

Echo chambers do not vet anything, they JUST AMPLIFY....

Real Science vs ECHO CHAMBERS.... what wins? What looses? Who wins? Who looses?

This essay is NOT about vaccines & autism, if you think it is, then start reading over. Now, back to the example of Vaccines & Autism as an EXAMPLE of the point of this essay. Now science in its journals and venues of vetting, has performed several tests to see if indeed there was a causal link, but the Theory of vaccine caused Autism comes up short every time. Even the most comprehensive study publish in 2007 by the New England Journal of Medicine concluded, "There is no causal association..."

Now Mrs. Manjoo brings up the case that we all loose when Echo Chambers are so loud, that no one can hear let alone find the science. She points out that John McCain at a town hall meeting was asked by a mother of an autistic child, "Do you believe between her son's condition and childhood vaccines?"....

Notice in today's world, the President is SUPER MAN and has INCREDIBLE POWERS OF WISDOM AND MEDICAL KNOWLEDGE about most anything and everything there is.... and thus, a vote hangs in the balance on what he says.... ....McCain, measured and concerned and wanting that vote deeply..."There is strong evidence that indicates that it's got to do with a preservative in vaccines," and soon saw the smile on her voting face and let it go....

Obama too is now en-wrapped inside the Echo chamber. Everywhere his campaign goes you can find large green signs that read..."GREEN our VACCINES". Barack Obama has called for more "work in that area" and "has a deep concern" but so far has found the vaccine-autism link, "inconclusive". Hillary Clinton continued on her campaign stumps, always plugging a mention "for the need for more research in this area".

The bigger the Echo chamber grows, politicians will follow the votes there and pander (TELL THEM WHAT THEY WISH TO HEAR) each and every time. Politicians will not Vet out the facts for the voters. Let me repeat that. POLITICIANS WILL NOT VET OUT THE FACTS FOR THE VOTERS. They will not say, yes I know that now 45 million Americans believe there are UFO's, but the fact is there is zero real evidence for it, so I do not believe it, nor will I vote to spend your money researching it, nor will I have it be taught in schools" --- No way, politicians do not talk like that. Should the Echo chamber for UFO's grow that large, 45 million believers... you can bet there will be funding, there will be lesson about it in schools, despite what those pesky atheist scientists say -- who listens to them anyway? Certainly not voters living inside their computer screens clicking away with SELECTIVE BIAS, at each and every click of the mouse.

Who is inside an Echo chamber? Well you know them. They send you things daily, weekly, and at all times are SHOCKED that you "just don't get it".

I have this one Bush-lover NeoCon Weekly Standard Reader who gets all his info from Faux news and of course, "The internet". What does he send me? Links that PROVE there really WAS WMD's in Iraq. Bush was right all along! When I try to send him other links that suggest otherwise, that are critical of his facts and links, ....do you think he reads them? Do you think he says to himself, "I must be honest with myself and admit that the evidence for WMD's in Iraq is indeed weak" Hell no! We Humans, for the most part, do not operate like logical Spocks. We need to get beat up, repeatedly, and hopefully with just words before we MAY come to our senses.

Scientists are NO BETTER. They will hold on to old test results, old theories, old notions and take them to their graves! Only by verbally whipping your "scientific peer" in a "peer paper review" so that all can see, read, concur, amend, or attack, will the vetting of what is true or not true begin.

We HUMANS are that Self Delusional. We truly are. We can see faces in clouds, when really, its just a cloud. The point is The Scientific method is a rational process, a double and triple blind and OUT IN THE PUBLIC process because we Humans are so self delusional. By doing "Good Science" we weed out our potential to see things, faces, patterns, when its just a cloud. Seriously, we humans can talk ourselves into any position, believe in ANYTHING really, and so its only by the sharp pens and words and facts of others do we get to come to our senses, if ever.
So the scientific process is great, we can collectively learn about reality, what is real and what is not. Our minds love to make connections, inferences, and guesses and assumptions. Its a short cut to reality. If by so doing we don't get pain, well then, it must be true! So make that rain dance, a lightening bolt did not stop you! It just may work next time.

Here is Mrs Manjoo, "Search engines can fuel SELECTIVE EXPOSURE bias. Type "Pentagon 9/11" into Google, for instance, and you're presented with different links pointing to two divergent stories abut the terrorist attack: either the official narrative -- a Boeing 757 struck the Pentagon -- or it was a missile that hit the Pentagon. You are free to jump down either Rabbit Hole. Like the smokers, you can decide, based upon your worldview, what version of "Truthiness" that you want to consume." Thank you Google.

She writes, "Technology evangelists have long argued that the Internet would liberate us from the lies and myths propagated by powerful media organizations. Increasingly, however, it seems as if digital technology is helping us all live inside ONLINE ECHO CHAMBERS built wholly of our own facts"

You may find the links provide here http://www.dailypaul.com/node/52918
a little against your SELECTIVE BIAS and even upsetting to your current worldview,...but sometimes its good to get out of the Echo Chamber once in a while.

In Peace & Liberty,
Treg