"Truth Is In The Ear Of The Beholder", written by collumnist Gregory Rodriguez, was published on September 28, 2009, in the Los Angeles Times newspaper. In this article, Gregory Rodriguez tries to persuade his readers that "Rumors and conspiracy theories can only thrive in the minds of people who are predisposed to believe them". One query addressed is whether people who believe rumors, against all evidence, are undereducated. Rodriguez refutes such a possibility with a 1994 survey that disproves the assumption . The survey discovers instead a corelation between insecurity and belief in illogical rumors. Rodriguez also introduces a 2004 experiment which shows that efforts at correcting rumors can sometimes backfire. After sharing legal scholar Sunstein's views on holding rumor-mongers accountable and dangers rumors pose to democracy, Rodriguez finally reveals his own solution which is "to do away with the insecurity and uncertainty that feed rumors in the first place." While Rodriguez presents an interesting and perhaps reasonable thesis, his argument to persuade the audience of this thesis is not a successful one. In addition to questionable accuracy and unfair use of cited information, Gregory rodriguez's argument falls victim to several logical fallacies.
The first criteria used to assess Rodriguez's argument is accuracy of information. His argument uses one 1994 survey on conspiracy theories which found insecurity about employment to be a factor in whether people believe rumors against evidence. The accuracy of this survey is questionable due to the fact surveys are often guilty of misguiding questions, biased samples, overgeneralization, and possibly discarded unfavorable data. Rodriguez also employs the theses of ps...
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...xhibited in "Truth Is In The Ear Of The Beholder", I find it safe to say that Rodriguez has made an unsuccessful argument to persuade. In this particular case, I believe Rodriguez would have failed even if he had made a valid argument for his thesis. My reasoning behind this is the tendency of people to deny being "predisposed to believe" anything, making Rodriguez's job of persuasion immensely difficult. While I personally believe that rumors thrive in the minds of those predisposed to believe them, I do not believe that to be the "only" place or reason they thrive. Also, I highly dissaprove of the 1994 survey meant to show no link between lack of education and belief in illogical rumors. It is fairly simple to think of at least one rumor that could thrive mostly due to lack of education, and therefore I am obligated to call into question the details of this survey.
An author’s main focus when writing a nonfiction piece is to persuade its audience of their beliefs, using claims to support them. With the effect of close consideration of claims and fallacies when reading non-fiction, the author is unable to persuade the reader due to inaccurate statements made by the author himself. The fallacies detected by a close reader discredits the author as well as their piece.
Falsehood could be a useful evil in politic, because, apparently, by means of falsehood, the risk of social turmoil could be efficiently minimized or even eliminated. Thus, the ultimate good of the whole,
Rodriguez believes that people hear what they want to hear. He thinks listeners are biased and will side with their predisposed belief system. He also claims that rumors are formed by our desires. I will use this source to help explain why people believe rumors even though the evidence suggests the rumor is false. I will also analyze how rumors confirm what people already expect to be
Clifford’s arguments for this conclusion is that if we are gullible enough to believe something without evidence then we are not only harming our individual credibility and intellect but also polluting the rest of society...
A good part of Outfoxed focuses on the company's blurring of news and commentary, how anchormen and reporters are encouraged to repeatedly use catch-phrases like "some people say..." as a means of editorializing within a supposedly objective news story; how graphics, speculation and false information are repeated over-and-over throughout the broadcast day until it appears to become fact, and in doing so spreads like a virus and copied on other networks. A PIPA/Knowledge Networks Poll points to glaring, fundamental misconceptions about the news perpetuated upon Fox viewers, versus information received from widely respected news-gathering organizations like NPR and PBS. Asked, for instance, "Has the U.S. found links between Iraq & al-Qaeda?" only 16% of PBS and NPR viewers answered "yes," but a frightening 67% of Fox viewers believed there had.
Another controlling method that is diffused through television, radio and written publications; is any reported information about world politics and news. Powerful political groups narrow people’s views of what is going on around them by tainting and twisting information to their own device. They decide what to say and when to say it, revealing as much or little information as desired, in ‘befitting’ instances; thus enabling them to hide information they consider deleterious to themselves, from the public. It also permits them to depict opponents in overly negative terms.
In the first part of the test the children who participated in the study were asked to respond “yes” when they recalled seeing the man visit their school and had to respond “no” to all other questions. On the second part the children were asked to answer “yes” to details they recalled hearing in the post event narrative and “no” to all other things. The results from Memon, Holliday, Hill (2006) indicated that the child would decline negative misinformation more than those who were given positive misinformation.
their neighbors," (Palmer, 311). Of course one cannot help but to want to believe them,
As the mind matures and grows, new opinions are formed with the help of the revolutionizing consciousness of humanity. The human conscious allows humanity to develop individually and gain unique cognitive patterns and thinking processes. However, these opinions can be manipulated by environmental sources, like the media. The media’s puppet strings can be used to influence the minds of the masses and control their overall thinking process. It takes away an individual’s freedom to think for themselves and form their own opinions. Manipulation is a key ingredient in attaining support for a side of an argument. News networks have this ability to twist the minds of their listeners and unconsciously force them to believe in their words. Two of the
This section was given in order to show why conspiracy theories are appealing to the average person and how anybody can create one. Next, research data on the general personality and mental state of conspiracy theorists was introduced with believers being more likely to be cynical and have low self-worth (Koerth-Baker 343). Afterward a brief explanation is given on the amygdala, a part of the brain which activates after fear is felt, and how it is crucial to the creation of the various theories we have today. There has also been research showing a correlation between theorizing and strong support of democratic principles due to the fact that conspiracy theories wouldn’t exist without real conspiracies coming to light (Koerth-Baker 344). Then, Koerth begins to talk about how an abundance of available knowledge on the internet has made destroying conspiracy theories even more difficult due to the constant use of confirmation bias. In 2006 scientists discovered an event called the “backfire effect” where any attempts to debunk a theory makes it more popular to the people, but the effect seems more noticeable when it supports a worldview or ideology (Koerth-Baker
Several rhetorical concepts are used to approach the readers of this article, these being proofs known as reasoning (logos), credibility (ethos), and emotion (pathos). Conspiracy theorists, such as Mock, often use logic or reason to attract readers. They understand that conspiracies are seen as lies and paranoia, so to build their audience they appeal to their logical side. In today’s society logic is everything, and being able to prove something is what is important. Making a reference to a factual document or book is always a source of proof. The reference towards a dictionary is used because it is something we use every day, something that is impo...
Judith Viorst is an American journalist. Her essay “The Truth about Lying”, printed in Buscemi and Smith’s 75 Readings: An Anthology. In this essay, Viorst examines social, protective, peace-keeping and trust-keeping lies but doesn’t include lies of influence.
The Other Side of Sadness: What the New Science Tells Us about Life after Loss, written by George A. Bonanno, illustrates the ways in which different people deal with loss in different ways and even so, most of us are resilient to loss. Death is an inevitable phase every person must face. Throughout one’s life, everybody is destined to confront the pain of death in his or her lifetime. But how do we cope? Is there a “correct” or “normal” way, or length of time we are supposed to use, to recover after a major loss? Bonanno delves into the ways in which we deal with grief and loss that are contrary to what people generally presume. We may be surprised, even hurt, by a loss, but we still manage to pull ourselves back together and move on. One of the recurring arguments made in The Other Side of Sadness: What the New Science Tells Us about Life after Loss is that resilience after loss is real, prevailing, and enduring. Bonanno is able to provide much compelling evidence to show the different patterns or trajectories of grief reactions across time shown by bereaved people. He also explains thoroughly how grief is not work by elucidating the ways emotions work to help us deal with demanding environments. Bonanno is successful in allowing the readers to be conscious of what people are grieving after a major loss – they don’t grieve facts, they grieve what they remember. In addition, Bonanno explains how death elicits both terror and curiosity to help his readers conceptualize death. Bonanno essentially articulates that resilience is both genuine and lasting because it is in our human capacity to thrive in the face of adversity.
But how can we be sure that the news is not biased? Are we receiving information accurately, with details being simple to understand? After further research on media framing, I’ve come to realize that it is not rare to be someone who is skeptical of the news. In decades before now, media did a better job serving the public interests inside their news stories (Callaghan, 2001, p.186). But now, journalists may mix up facts intentionally and build a different story (Callaghan, 2001, p.184). How can one feel safe after knowing the media changes stories to keep us interested? Boring stories may not keep someone excited or fully interested, but at least people would not be misinformed and can, in a way, better prepare for what they will face outside their
Attention Grabbing Title: Cognitive psychology tells us that the unaided human mind is vulnerable to many fallacies and illusions because of its reliance on its memory for vivid anecdotes rather than systematic statistics (Steven Pinker) (1).