Keynote at International Conference on Computer-Human Interaction Research and Applications (CHIRA 2022), Malta, 27-28 Oct 2022.
https://alandix.com/academic/talks/CHIRA2022-keynote/
Politicians have always been economical with the truth and newspapers have toed an editorial line. However, never in recent times does it seem that confidence in our media has been lower. From the Brexit battle bus in the UK to suspected Russian meddling in US elections, fake news to alternative facts – it seems impossible for the general public to make sense of the contradictory arguments and suspect evidence presented both in social media and traditional channels. Even seasoned journalists and editors seem unable to keep up with the pace and complexity of news.
These problems were highlighted during Covid when understanding of complex epidemiological data was essential for effective government policy and individual responses.
If democracy is to survive and nations coordinate to address global crises, we desperately need tools and methods to help ordinary people make sense of the extraordinary events around them: to sift fact from surmise, lies from mistakes, and reason from rhetoric. Similarly, journalists need the means to help them keep track of the surfeit of data and information so that the stories they tell us are rooted in solid evidence.
Crucially in increasingly politically fragmented societies, we need to help citizens explore their conflicts and disagreements, not so that they will necessarily agree, but so that they can more clearly understand their differences.
These are not easy problems and do not admit trite solutions. However, there is existing work that offers hope: tracing the provenance of press images, ways to expose the arguments in political debate, tracking the influence of news on electoral opinion.
I hope that this talk will give hope that we can make a difference and offer challenges for future research.
9. intrinsically bad people, states, or media
… or just those on the ‘other’ side?
bad methods and/or bad information
inc. misinformation and hateful or violent content
sometimes tell the truth!
bad reasons – twisting facts, Astroturfing
maybe not not all bad
bad actors
11. good actors
don’t always tell the truth …
deliberate
– eg. war time … Glasgow blitz
accidental ….
12. BBC – fact check
poor numeracy … e.g. Greenland ice
hard to notice flaws when you agree
… academic papers?
13. outcomes …
mistakes – e.g. £350 million
spinning – selection, quote marks
emphasis – headlines vs. last paragraph
subtle language – passive vs active
images – misleading placement, cropping
sometimes deliberate
often simply human bias
14. I worry most about poor arguments
from those with whom I agree
loss of moral force
easy to refute
loss of confidence in media
16. an ecology of (mis)information
producers consumers
information
our side
other side
really bad
true
slanted
false
ignore
choose the
convenient
excuse
play
“swop the
politician”
17. feedback effects
downward spiral
exacerbated by internet
By Everaldo Coelho (YellowIcon); -, LGPL, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18332735
needs
audience
reaction
wants
instant
meaning
simplified
messages
21. echo chambers and filter bubbles
lots of work
– network visualisations of information flows
– counter-views … tend not to work if too counter
the ecology
– media – preaching to the converted
– public – idea that search is neutral
being liberal?
22. argumentation
fact checking sites
– out of context, misinterpreted
– state interpretation, show full source
– checking data … “beyond my pay grade”
teaching rhetoric?
– debating classes, flipping sides
– academic papers too!
argumentation systems
– gIBIS, QOC, Deb8
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/12/nyregion/salman-rushdie-attacked.html
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-62621509
https://healthpolicy-watch.news/violence-against-health-workers-exacerbated-by-covid-and-trends-continue-to-worsen/
The daughter of a close ally of Russia's President Vladimir Putin has been killed in a suspected car bombing.
Darya Dugina, 29, died after an explosion on a road outside Moscow, Russia's investigative committee said.
It is thought her father, the Russian philosopher Alexander Dugin, who is known as "Putin's brain", may have been the intended target of the attack.
Mr Dugin is a prominent ultra-nationalist ideologue who is believed to be close to the Russian president.
John Selwyn Gummer, Health Secretary, feeds his daughter burger
https://www.thenational.scot/news/15569440.how-britain-learned-the-shocking-truth-about-mad-cow-disease-20-years-ago-today/