While no one person has the answers, each of us plays our part in solving life’s mysteries The American rapper GZA hit the nail on the head when he said, “Live a life full of humility, gratitude, intellectual curiosity, and never stop learning.” This is one of the greatest keys to happiness. No person has…
Telling someone to "do the research" may in fact do more harm than good
The expression that beauty, or art, is in the eye of the beholder means that it’s the viewer who decides. The same is true of the beholder of news stories. More simply, new research shows us, again, that news consumers see what they want to see. The latest research data comes from the ongoing conflict…
When it comes to the lust for power, the first victim is always the truth
The Trudeau government has taken #fakenews, #alternativefacts, #misinformation, and #disinformation to a whole new, breathtaking level. This week, the Liberals introduced legislation that will freeze the buying, importing, and selling of handguns and pretended gun owners won’t be affected. You may agree or disagree with that approach, but what is clear is that if you…
But what happens when disinformation campaigns run headlong into reality?
I’m not a fan of making predictions because there are usually way too many variables at play. Trying to guess the price of oil leaves me speechless despite the pathetically large number of hours I spend trying to understand the market. Yet, given the way 2022 is unfolding, I offer the following predictions as more…
Since 2020 Alberta chiropractors have been required to wear masks. Now one of them has had enough
Since last September, experts have testified at a tribunal hearing for an Alberta chiropractor on how well masks do, or don’t, slow the spread of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Unfortunately, the chiropractor’s college, YouTube and LinkedIn didn’t want you to know what was said because most of it contradicts what people have been told…
There is a growing comfort in institutional journalism to follow rather than question
Warning lights should always flash before our eyes whenever journalists mix raw numbers and percolating percentages in the same paragraph. Numbers clearly state actuality. Percentages are the ups and downs of context. Regardless of the axiom attributed to Stalin that one death is a tragedy and a million is a statistic, if two people die,…
Aims to help people find credible information online
The problem with combatting the misinformation swirling around COVID-19 is, according to University of Alberta health law professor Timothy Caulfield, that all fronts the fight takes place on are of equal importance. “For a long time there has been this tolerance of pseudoscience and misinformation,” said Caulfield. “But there are recent studies that show once people believe…
“Misinformation is a dire, imminent threat to the lives of all Canadians"
How do you respond to a deluge of COVID fake news on social media? If you ask Timothy Caulfield, he would say fight back with a tsunami of irrefutable science. That’s just what he and other notable influencers are doing with a new social media campaign called #ScienceUpFirst. So far, it seems to be working, with…
In a world where disagreement is misinformation, can debate even exist?
Before 2016, ‘misinformation’ was just another word in the dictionary. As soon as it became clear that Donald Trump’s straight-shooting presidential campaign was serious, and that he would likely become the Republican nominee, ‘misinformation’ became a strategy. Anything that left Trump’s mouth that media pundits or Democrats considered distasteful, or even just phrased in a…
Our 21st-century reliance on tech giants to supply us with information has resulted in fake news, clickbait and polarized societies
It’s not news to say that our consumption of media has changed dramatically in the 21st century. Perhaps it’s time to take a step back and look objectively at the impact of these changes and begin thinking about how our media can be improved. For most of the 20th century, the media was controlled by…