IT has almost been a month since the Jan. 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol, yet a pre-occupation on this event lingers as reports of who got identified and arrested mount.
As journalists and scholars continue to examine aspects of this event, it is disturbing that participants, while predominantly white, come from a broad cross-section of American society. They include off-duty police officers, firefighters, Army veterans, an Olympic gold medalist, an occupational therapist, a county commissioner, a real estate broker, a medical doctor, a company CEO, and a member of a state legislature. Most disturbing of all is the reported participation of a former Navy Seal, who served in intelligence branches and was trained to evaluate the quality of the information and distinguish information from disinformation. Despite his training, he continues to believe conspiracy theories about widespread election fraud. How can this be?
As a college professor, I trade in information and knowledge. Like any self-respecting merchant, I have to carefully vet the goods that I trade in. Today’s internet has become a valuable and convenient source of information and knowledge. But it is also awash with rumors, misinformation and disinformation, not to mention outright falsehoods that appeal to our biases, implicit and explicit. It is now much more challenging to winnow the chaff from the grains of information and knowledge from this source. But it is not impossible, if we armor ourselves with the right tools. I offer two for this task.
1. Be aware of your biases.
“Know thyself” as Socrates would say. (The phrase actually predates even Socrates as it is one of the maxims inscribed on a pediment at the Greek temple of Apollo at Delphi.)
It is excellent advice, especially as the internet engulfs us in a tsunami of information, much of it is of questionable provenance. When it comes to filtering out good from bad information, we are often handicapped by our own biases, especially our implicit biases, for we are often unaware of them. Yet they predispose us for or against things that come our way. Self-awareness helps us keep these in check so we can be more objective in our assessment.
There is a particularly insidious form of bias, confirmation bias. It is our tendency to favor information that supports our beliefs and disregard others. We see it illustrated in those crime and detective stories where an investigator focuses on a suspect while ignoring other possible suspects. It is also the stock in trade of crime and mystery stories where we are set up to think that a particular character is the perpetrator of the crime only to be told otherwise at the final reveal. As readers, we are manipulated by the writer to ignore or miss other clues. Yet we often do this to ourselves as we ignore information that does not support our beliefs and focus on those that do.
Unchecked, this tendency can have dangerous consequences. As we cherry pick from the smorgasbord of information from various sources, we construct a reality with holes like a block of Swiss cheese. Sometimes we stub our toe on what we thought was not there; it hurts, but we take note, and move on. Less often but more seriously, we fall through bigger holes, like a manhole we did not see, into an abyss of ignorance or conspiracy theories. Or into an Alice in Wonderland rabbit hole where things are not what they seem, and words do not mean what we say.
Olivia Nuzzi, White House correspondent for New York Magazine, likens her experience of trying to cover the Trump administration like falling into an Alice in Wonderland rabbit hole:
“I don’t know how long it will take to get over how disorienting it has been to report on people who have no shared reality with you. It’s been weird to learn the language of liars and figure out how to decode what people say when they never say what they mean. It’s been four years of trying to navigate this universe populated entirely by people who have absolutely no commitment to the truth. I’ll be unpacking it in therapy for years and years to come.”
The internet, especially platforms like YouTube, Google, and Facebook have developed algorithms that track the sites you watch or visit and throw up “suggestions.” If you pursue these suggestions, you might find yourself in a huge echo chamber of information that supports your interests. We have all been there. I have clicked on a story or advert on Google or Facebook, and soon find my pages inundated with similar adverts or stories. I have clicked on a story about LeBron James, and in my next search find many more stories about LeBron than I care about. I click on an advert for a woodworking tool on my Facebook page and pretty soon more adverts for woodworking tools are showing up on my page. Based on a video you watch, YouTube will have a whole list of suggestions about additional videos to watch. YouTube and social media platforms have become very adept at feeding you information based on your “perceived” interests and biases. And if we passively follow these suggestions, a world can be constructed based on these. A critical awareness of what these social platform algorithms are doing is just as essential as being aware of our biases in order to build rails that will keep us grounded and keep us from falling into those rabbit holes
2. When it comes to information, the quality of the information, and its source matters.
In the early days of the pandemic, the internet, through Youtube and social media platforms was flooded with alleged cures and treatments, from blowing hairdryers into your nose to ingesting disinfectants, to the alleged efficacy of drugs like hydroxychloroquine. This last was spread by a Beverly Hills doctor who claimed in a video that she had effectively treated COVID-infected patients with this malarial drug. Trump was among those who retweeted her video. She was one of those arrested and charged for participating in the putsch at the Capitol.
YouTube as a media and social networking platform is an excellent source of entertainment, and information (think DIY projects, baking and cooking shows). It has also become a way of sharing ideas (think TED talks, and video blogs, and video channels). But as in movies and infomercials, the moving image is also highly constructed, so the admonition, “buyer beware,” applies.
In assessing the quality of information, the qualifications of the source matters. A judge or lawyer who warns me that I may well be engaging in a criminal act, would most likely be giving me sound advice about stuff that I am contemplating. If my accountant warns me that taking a tax deduction on a particular expense, might well trigger an IRS audit, I would be well advised to take his word for it. When the president of the U.S. alleges widespread election fraud, but is contradicted by his Attorney General, it would be wise to suspend judgment and await further confirmation for these conflicting assertions. And when in doubt, and taking a deeper dive, it is vital to be aware of the misinformation that abounds.
The process thru which the information was obtained or generated matters. Double blind studies are explicitly designed to eliminate experimenter bias and are critical when huge economic benefits (or loses) turn on the outcomes as in the current efforts to develop a COVID-19 vaccine.
There is a reason why treatments for diseases are supervised by health authorities, and are often required to undergo clinical trials before approval for general use. Clinical trials are the means thru which a drug is evaluated by enrolling hundreds if not thousands of test subjects under controlled conditions. It is thru these trials that outliers—untoward incidents—involving the drug are individually examined. Anecdotal stories are just that, a story about a sample of one, most likely in an uncontrolled environment.
It is important to always ask, “how did you know?” when given information. Theories, as in conspiracy theories, need to be taken, not just with a grain of salt, but with a shaker full of salt, for they have many moving parts that all need to be subjected to critical scrutiny.
Statistical projections are a good example of how the quality of the data impacts the results. “Garbage in, garbage out”, as the saying goes. In the case of hydroxychloroquine, for example, this is a drug commonly used to treat malaria, an illness caused by a parasite. It is generally available and relatively cheap in regions where malaria is common. But to suggest it is effective against COVID, is to say that it will help the patient get better. The basis of this, “will help” is critical. Is it based on anecdotal stories or controlled clinical trials?
Many of those who participated in the Jan. 6 putsch at the Capitol were most likely just misinformed, and uncritically fell for the disinformation and conspiracy theories spread thru the internet. Some may just have stubbed their toes, but others may find it difficult to regain a shared sense of reality with other Americans.
Constructing rails that will keep us grounded in reality is challenging. But we stand a good chance of success, if we are self-aware of our biases and rather than accepting information at face value, we take a moment to examine its source, and how it was generated. The latter is the essence of the scientific method; a method of knowing that has helped mankind get beyond the dark ages into the modern era. It can help us avoid the dark areas of the internet where misinformation and disinformation abound.
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The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Asian Journal, its management, editorial board and staff.
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Enrique de la Cruz is Professor Emeritus of Asian American Studies at Cal State University, Northridge.
