How do you get a Skeptic to beat Britney Spears, now that e-bay is bigger than god?

Obni

In making a point in a post, I conducted a web search for "Government controlled media" which produced 3.21 million hits. Political dissent is obviously healthy producing so many hits, for example 'nipple' produced slightly less at 3.19 million

A brief and very unscientific burst of search activity produced the following league table.
News 1,100 million
TV 266 million
Money 251 million
Science 219 million
Sex 107 million
E-bay 88 million
God 74 million
Evolution 34 million
Britney 10 million
Skeptic 0.9 million

With an Irish Skeptics meeting to be held soon "to discuss future directions and activities of the society", would anyone like to start kicking around ideas. Particularly, it would be interesting to hear from those not planning to attend the meeting.
For starters, can the cause of critical thinking be popularized in Ireland?

davros

OK, stay on topic. This is a good question:

Can the cause of critical thinking be popularized in Ireland?

robindch

> Can the cause of critical thinking be popularized in Ireland?

There's certainly a wide need for critical thinking, though arguably less so I think, than in other countries. Does anybody know of any research done in the area of public understanding of the worth of critical thinking, on a per-country basis? I would expect countries like Holland, and perhaps Denmark, Sweden, Germany to top the critical thinking list, but hard facts? [BTW, last night in a city-center pub, with Ian Rowland's worthwhile 'The Full Facts of Cold Reading' still open on the table, my companion and I fell to discussing psychics, me suggesting that it was embarassingly easy to take advantage of people in this way with a few well-chosen words, while my [normally intelligent and perceptive] friend then described a recent psychic encouter, following almost exactly the form as noted in Rowland's section 'The Set Up', on page 24 (if you're keeping notes), then she denied the possibility that she might be fooled. <sigh>]

But as to some means of popularizing the cause of critical thinking, or stomping on people's comforting beliefs as some would have it, there are a few ideas which might be worth developing:

1. Somebody at the last skeptics' talk suggested a weekly column in the Irish Times, and/or some other newspaper(s) -- excellent idea and there's enough talent within the ISS to be able to produce worthwhile articles.

2. I'd like to see it introduced in schools, perhaps has part of some nonse-subject like civics (is this still being done?), or perhaps on a time-for-time basis with, or even better, in place of, religious studies (if this is still being done, too). The Delphi Report contains a few useful pointers in this area.

3. Renaming the ISS -- this has come up several times before, but while the term 'skeptic' is understood positively by skeptics, it's rarely understood this way outside the group, and I think there's an arguable case for using a less inflammatory name. Suggestions?

4. More engagement in public debate with the purveyors of piffle.

5. Visit Cork, Waterford, Limerick, to give general-purpose talks there?

- robin.

davros

I've split off the posts on the meaning of "generally accepted". It deserves its own thread, as does soliciting practical suggestions for the promotion of critical thinking in Ireland.

davros

robindch wrote:

I'd like to see it introduced in schools

It depends on what guise you want to introduce it under. A skeptical examination of alternative medicine, psychics, etc. would never fly because it would have to get past all those in the Dept. of Education, teachers' unions, teachers and parents who subscribe to such things.

I favour the teaching of Rhetoric. Actually, I wonder if this was once part of Classical Studies or Latin and got thrown out with the bath water. Rhetoric would give students the tools to analyse arguments and persuasive words for themselves. The most important weapon in the arsenal is familiarity with logical fallacies.

I have gone through the entire Irish education system from primary to third level but never had the opportunity to study such things. In contrast, I did graduate study in the US and was impressed by the ability of American undergrads to pick apart an argument. That's purely anecdotal and might not be generally representative. Regardless, Irish students are under-equipped.

The teaching of Rhetoric would go hand-in-hand with a renewed emphasis on English language skills. I'm appalled by the level of reading comprehension and writing skills among too many of my compatriots. They are supposedly a well-educated bunch. I honestly believe it must hurt their heads to read a sentence with a subordinate clause.

Reading complex passages with practised ease is a prerequisite for critical thinking.

KCF

I think that the problem has very deep roots. Hopefully I'll get some time to pen a few thoughts at some stage, but for now just a suggestion about 'tone'. I think skeptics in the media can often come across to non-scientists as simply calling everybody stupid by concentrating on the unscientific nature of irrational beliefs, which might resonate with the already convinced but can actually drive people away towards belief systems that are less challenging. It is difficult to get around this, since we all know just how stupid (and common) many beliefs are. I think that it is a good idea to instead focus on the fact that the people peddling these various belief systems are exploiting the public and, most importantly, taking their cash. That could give people a reason to believe us with more emotional appeal than the purely logical one.

Also, I seriously doubt whether the Irish Times would allow a particular society to have a regular column. They would see this as opening the flood gates to every 'interest group' in the country demanding a column. Unfortunately, not everyone sees that scientific thought is a bit different from other sectional interests. It's worth a try, but I wouldn't hold out high hopes. On the other hand, I'd guess that Village magazine could be convinced. The chances would be greatly increased if they did not have to pay for the content too! For example, if the Skeptics society was to draw up a list of people, preferably with some scientific qualifications, who would operate some sort of rota system and commit to contributing a regular scientific skepticism column, either for free or for a very small fee, there would be a significant chance of it being accepted. If there is some interest in this idea, I could float the idea with them informally to see if it is worth seriously pursuing.

Danno

And... what kind of topics would be pushed???

davros

Danno wrote:

And... what kind of topics would be pushed???

If you are asking about article topics, I'd suggest that Bad Science in the Guardian is a good model.

KCF

Danno wrote:

And... what kind of topics would be pushed???

You know, biblical quotes, prophesies, that type of thing.

robindch

> > I'd like to see it introduced in schools
> It depends on what guise you want to introduce it under.
> I favour the teaching of Rhetoric. Actually, I wonder if
> this was once part of Classical Studies or Latin and got
> thrown out with the bath water.

I did both Greek and Latin in school -- and must, I suppose, have been one of the last to do so -- but rhetoric certainly wasn't on the syllabus back in 1985, nor for some time before that. In addition to wading through many pages of Caesar's Gallic ramblings, we did do Plato in the original, and anything which has people reading him is a good thing, IMHO. Socrates' deconstructions of his opponents are hugely entertaining pieces of prose, and are worth studying as much for their multi-level humor as for his underlying sharply analytic, and deeply skeptical, style of reasoning. So, yes, rhetoric would be useful, but I would call it something a little bit less antiquated, perhaps.

And on a related topic, what's the use of speech + drama classes? I've sat in on a few of them and find it strange that people seem happy to give hours of time to learning do declaim things (in a very weird manner) without also giving any apparent thought to *what's* being said. Perhaps the two could topics could go together -- Rhetoric becomes part of S+D? Hardly ideal, but it is one possible opening.

> The most important weapon in the arsenal is familiarity
> with logical fallacies.

Indeed. It's only on the rarest occasions that I've ever met anybody, in any country, who's even familiar with the notion that logical fallacies can, or have been, classified. It's one of these things, that once you study them and understand them, even a little bit, you start seeing the lovable little blighters popping up here, there and everywhere. Listen to Dubya speaking, for example, and one redlines almost immediately

Perhaps these could be introduced as part of either English (comprehension), or maths syllabuses?

> I'm appalled by the level of reading comprehension and
> writing skills among too many of my compatriots.
> They are supposedly a well-educated bunch. I honestly
> believe it must hurt their heads to read a sentence with
> a subordinate clause.

Whatever about reading a subordinate clause, it certainly must cause them pain to have to write one -- when was the last time that you received an email with one in it? <sigh>

> Reading complex passages with practised ease is a
> prerequisite for critical thinking.

Yes, but how many people do you know, in all honesty, who are genuinely interested in extending their ability in 'critical thinking', or are willing to put in the effort to read complex text? It's one of these things in which people kid themselves that their level of skill is adequate, when it almost never is. Are there any tests which students have to sit which test logical reasoning? At least, in doing a test, they might come to realise their own inadequacy (or possibly, otherwise).

It's a bit like a notion I had a while back in relation to drink-driving -- perhaps it's worth the state buying a bunch of driving simulators, then plying people with drink and asking them to drive around in the simulator for a while and demonstrate to them that their driving skills are *indeed* severly impaired when plastered, despite people's typical, and understandable, beliefs to the contrary.

- robin.

BrendanBurgess

I think the name skeptic should only be used within the skeptical community. It does put people off.

How about the "Irish Sensible Society" or some other name incorporating the word "sense". or "common sense"?

Sense is a very positive word and contrasts with all the non-sense which we are trying to counter.

Most people consider themselves sensible.

The expression "sensible society" conveys the idea of Ireland as a society which is sensible as well as being the name of a group of skeptics.

Brendan

KCF

BrendanBurgess wrote:

I think the name skeptic should only be used within the skeptical community. It does put people off.

How about the "Irish Sensible Society" or some other name incorporating the word "sense". or "common sense"?

Sense is a very positive word and contrasts with all the non-sense which we are trying to counter.

Most people consider themselves sensible.

The expression "sensible society" conveys the idea of Ireland as a society which is sensible as well as being the name of a group of skeptics.

Brendan

I don't know about that. "The sensible society" conjures up images of a bunch of people with side-partings, clarks shoes, who live with their parents in their 40's and are unfailingly in bed by 10pm. I really can't see the public breaking down the door to sign up. That's not to say that I think there is anything wrong with the word sensible - it's one of the biggest compliments in my eyes, but it rather suffers the same 'image problem' as does skeptic.

To a large extent, I reckon that the question of 'branding' is avoiding the problem. We live in a world where scientific, critical thinking, if spread among the population, would be immensely damaging to many, many powerful interests. Advertising, consumerism and our extraordinarily superficial electoral systems all greatly depend on a glaring lack of tools for intellectual analysis among the majority of the population. In this context, any groups who work towards changing the situation will find themselves labeled as 'killjoys', 'moaners', 'nerds' and 'out of touch' and similarly dismissive connotations in mainstream discourse. Given the current organisation of society, whatever label skeptics choose to attach to themselves will attract negative implications in strict proportion to their success at gaining exposure for their ideas.

I only recently, to my great pleasure, found out about the existance of the ISS and the fact that it states exactly what it is, using an internationally and philosophically well-known and relatively unambiguous term like 'skeptic' was what allowed me to understand instantly the nature of the society and why I should join. If it had been called the 'sensible society' I would probably never have bothered to examine it in detail to see what it was about. The word skeptic has an ancient heritage and a unusually consistent and well-defined meaning for the last 2500 years. I think that it would be a shame to abandon that heritage for 15 minutes of fame. If a new name must be chosen, I'd suggest something like "Irish society for critical thought" which gets the idea across but wouldn't solve the problem as critical = whinger in mainstream discourse.

davros

robindch wrote:

And on a related topic, what's the use of speech + drama classes?... Perhaps the two could topics could go together -- Rhetoric becomes part of S+D? Hardly ideal, but it is one possible opening.

How about "Media Studies"? I don't know if that is a subject at second level but maybe it should be. And with the web, it would be easy to do things like examine the same story through the news media of different countries.

Yes, but how many people do you know, in all honesty, who are genuinely interested in extending their ability in 'critical thinking', or are willing to put in the effort to read complex text?

Right, that's why you have to get 'em young, while they are still at school. I'm not optimistic that you can change ingrained patterns of thinking among the adult population (it applies to myself as much as anyone).

Are there any tests which students have to sit which test logical reasoning?

I was going to suggest, as a model, the Analytical Reasoning test from the GRE (the standardised admission test to US graduate schools). But I see they have replaced it with "Analytical Writing". This test apparently examines the ability to:

• Articulate complex ideas clearly and effectively
• Examine claims and accompany-ing evidence
• Support ideas with relevant reasons and examples
• Sustain a well-focused, coherent discussion
• Control the elements of standard written English

Sounds great. If you could get an Irish college or two to start using this test as part of their admissions procedure (and I would not be surprised at all since we seem to be moving towards a more American model of third-level education) then students would have to prepare for it. Can't be a bad thing.

Myksyk

KCF wrote:

I think that it is a good idea to instead focus on the fact that the people peddling these various belief systems are exploiting the public and, most importantly, taking their cash. That could give people a reason to believe us with more emotional appeal than the purely logical one.

I agree. Skepticism must be pro-consumer and must sell this part of the message well. However, whereas this is of particular relevance to CAM it may not necessarily be relevant to topics such as creationism, revisionism, etc.

Also, I seriously doubt whether the Irish Times would allow a particular society to have a regular column. They would see this as opening the flood gates to every 'interest group' in the country demanding a column. Unfortunately, not everyone sees that scientific thought is a bit different from other sectional interests. It's worth a try, but I wouldn't hold out high hopes. On the other hand, I'd guess that Village magazine could be convinced. The chances would be greatly increased if they did not have to pay for the content too! For example, if the Skeptics society was to draw up a list of people, preferably with some scientific qualifications, who would operate some sort of rota system and commit to contributing a regular scientific skepticism column, either for free or for a very small fee, there would be a significant chance of it being accepted. If there is some interest in this idea, I could float the idea with them informally to see if it is worth seriously pursuing.

This has been discussed and is worth following up. Any informally garnered info is most welcome.

Myksyk

KCF wrote:

I don't know about that. "The sensible society" conjures up images of a bunch of people with side-partings, clarks shoes, who live with their parents in their 40's and are unfailingly in bed by 10pm.

Didn't you know KCF, these characteristics are mandatory for members?

Generally speaking I can say that the name of the society has been debated from the get-go. However, it was considered more important to educate people about the positive nature of skepticism than to abandon it in favour of a 'weaker' term. All opinions on this are most welcome.

Turley

Obni wrote:

In making a point in a post, I conducted a web search for "Government controlled media" which produced 3.21 million hits. Political dissent is obviously healthy producing so many hits, for example 'nipple' produced slightly less at 3.19 million

A brief and very unscientific burst of search activity produced the following league table.
News 1,100 million
TV 266 million
Money 251 million
Science 219 million
Sex 107 million
E-bay 88 million
God 74 million
Evolution 34 million
Britney 10 million
Skeptic 0.9 million

With an Irish Skeptics meeting to be held soon "to discuss future directions and activities of the society", would anyone like to start kicking around ideas. Particularly, it would be interesting to hear from those not planning to attend the meeting.
For starters, can the cause of critical thinking be popularized in Ireland?

The original question and the title of this thread is: How do you get a Skeptic to beat Britney Spears, now that e-bay is bigger than a god?

Obni has called our attention to what is, and what is not popular and specifically how to popularize critical thinking in Ireland.

I still think it is relevant to consider:
A. The nature of what is popular ( I used the phrase generally accepted )
B. How things become popular.

Since this thread has been split, my comments and those of others can be found at the thread, "What does 'generally accepted' mean?" (See my comments #1 and #5 over there)

BrendanBurgess

The ideas of appealing to emotions rather than logic is a good one.

Maybe there needs to be "branches" of the Irish Skeptical Society, dealing with CAM, spiritualism and creationism? We would have to use the language of the victims of CAM, for example to talk to them.

What words would a victim use to describe them:

healing
energy
safe
effective
alternative
spiritual
therapy


So you could have the Sensible Healing branch of the Irish Skeptics Society? That way you keep the name of the Society, but just change the branding as appropriate to the context.

Brendan

robindch

> How about "Media Studies"? I don't know if that is a subject
> at second level but maybe it should be.

I don't think there's any such thing, unfortunately. Though again, I seem to remember vaguely doing something vaguely like this in Civics about 800 years ago. Does anybody have any info on what people are doing in schools these days?

> And with the web, it would be easy to do things like
> examine the same story through the news media of
> different countries.

Yes, this would be good -- one could very usefully, for example, compare and contrast the UK Independent and the UK's Daily Telegraph coverage of just about anything! Or Fox News, and al-Jazeera, for an even more extreme example.

There was an interesting outfit, AFAIK Washington-based, which I came across a year or two back and whose name I've forgotten, who keep a tally of the number of opinion-based-sentences and fact-based-sentences in the main TV stations' news output -- this produced very interesting stats in and around election time, in the lead up to the Iraq war, and, of course, just after the WTC attacks, when aspirational news-reporting almost went off the scale.

> I was going to suggest, as a model, the Analytical
> Reasoning test from the GR

Sounds perfect. What do we do from here?

- robin.

KCF

robindch wrote:

> How about "Media Studies"? I don't know if that is a subject
> at second level but maybe it should be.

I don't think there's any such thing, unfortunately. Though again, I seem to remember vaguely doing something vaguely like this in Civics about 800 years ago. Does anybody have any info on what people are doing in schools these days?

It is often a subject on transition year syllabuses, which in practice probably means that it gets only a tiny amount of attention and is restricted to the wealthier.

Beyond that, schooling nowadays is almost entirely exam-focused and if a subject is not on the leaving cert there is no chance of it getting any quality class time. The nature of the leaving cert leads me to suspect that the only way in which something like media studies could possibly get onto the syllabus is if it was stripped of all its analytic content and turned into a list of facts to regurgitate, which would be rather missing the point. Similarly, the ubiquity of the CAO ranking system means that the only colleges who would even think for a second about using a non-leaving cert exam are the dodgy private degree factories - again missing the point somewhat.

Sorry for being such a wet blanket - the curse of the skeptic's existence

Obni

KCF wrote:

The nature of the leaving cert leads me to suspect that the only way in which something like media studies could possibly get onto the syllabus is if it was stripped of all its analytic content and turned into a list of facts to regurgitate, which would be rather missing the point. Similarly, the ubiquity of the CAO ranking system means that the only colleges who would even think for a second about using a non-leaving cert exam are the dodgy private degree factories - again missing the point somewhat.

Perhaps the ideal time to promote a media studies program would be the 'gap' year, an increasingly popular fixture in many schools.

Despite the nature of the most hotly debated topics in this board (creationism and holcaust-denial), I believe the main arena for debate and engagement in Ireland is the CAM industry. The biggest attendance at a normal meeting may have been on the topic of creationism, with a significant percentage of the audience made up of visiting creationists, but I don't see any fruitful outcome in engaging in public debate on this issue. The attendance was large because the people attending were sincerely passionate about their cause. A meeting about the JFK assasination or 9/11 might yield as big an audience, but would be equally pointless. The CAM issue has an impact on a greater number of people than creationism, but for most people they are not involved to the same passionate degree. This may leave them more open to reasonable debate, and therefore make any efforts on the part of ISS more fruitful.

If the only way to change someone's mind on a topic (creationism) is to alter the basis of their entire belief system, then you are on a hiding to nothing. If someone immediately gainsays every reasonable argument with an accusation of being brainwashed by those in 'authority', a debate is pointless. A well written article on some suspect CAM therapy in the Village, or similar, in the vein of 'Bad Science' sounds like a more promising avenue.

If that doesn't work, can we create a 'Man From Uncle' sytle logo using the ISS initials, and print some cool T-shirts. Then everyone will want to be in our gang.

Myksyk

The t-shirts are printed. Unfortunately, cerise pink in meejum and XL were all that were left but I feel that it'll go with the side-partings and Clark's shoes ... People will still want to be in our gang ... won't they???

Obni

Myksyk wrote:

The t-shirts are printed. Unfortunately, cerise pink in meejum and XL were all that were left but I feel that it'll go with the side-partings and Clark's shoes ... People will still want to be in our gang ... won't they???

Given my uncanny resemblance to the string-vested icon (left), I think my appearance in an XXL cerise vest would put people off being in a lift with me, let alone in a gang.

KCF

Myksyk wrote:

This has been discussed and is worth following up. Any informally garnered info is most welcome.

I had a chat with a friend who works as a sub-editor for them and he thought that the idea would go down well with VB and SB (boss and production editor IIRC). He also said that he'd be happy to give advice on any proposal pre-submission. He suggested that it would be useful to write a couple of sample articles to accompany any description of the concept.

Other than that, the same rules as always apply to media: short, readable, topical.

Myksyk

Thanks KCF. There has been another development regarding this which can be discussed on Saturday's member's workshop (not fully ironed out yet so keeping mum). If you're coming perhaps you'd fill us in more; if not I can bring it up.

KCF

Myksyk wrote:

Thanks KCF. There has been another development regarding this which can be discussed on Saturday's member's workshop (not fully ironed out yet so keeping mum). If you're coming perhaps you'd fill us in more; if not I can bring it up.

If you could bring it up, that'd be great. I'll unfortunately be away in Prague this weekend (well not really that unfortunate... )

ISAW

Myksyk wrote:

Didn't you know KCF, these characteristics are mandatory for members?

Generally speaking I can say that the name of the society has been debated from the get-go. However, it was considered more important to educate people about the positive nature of skepticism than to abandon it in favour of a 'weaker' term. All opinions on this are most welcome.

I think Brendan and KCF could go off and form the Skeptics Society of Ireland. the SSI - SPLITTERS!

seriously though the rest of this thread on the language/logic/testing is very interesting.

ISAW

Obni wrote:

Perhaps the ideal time to promote a media studies program would be the 'gap' year, an increasingly popular fixture in many schools.

Despite the nature of the most hotly debated topics in this board (creationism and holcaust-denial), I believe the main arena for debate and engagement in Ireland is the CAM industry.

Its called TRANSITION

I accept the CAM thing but ASTROLOGY must rate highly. I think a lot of people go in for astrology and tarot readings. I also have to rate the current onset of cold warm and hot readers. The fake medium pretending to talk to the dead and making money from it is one of the oldest gigs going. i could even accept a granny telling my fortune for a gag but i have a problem with people claiming to talk to dead people and exploiting bereaved relatives for money.