Page 13 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - October / November 2018

The Brain Fake News Connection 13

How Your Brain Tricks

You Into Believing Fake
News

Katy Steinmetz

Sitting in front of a computer not long ago, a
tenured history professor faced a challenge that
billions of us do every day: deciding whether to
believe something on the Internet.
On his screen was an article published by
a group called the American College of
Pediatricians that discussed how to handle
bullying in schools. Among the advice it offered:
schools shouldn’t highlight particular groups
targeted by bullying because doing so might call
attention to “temporarily confused adolescents.”
Scanning the site, the professor took note
of the “.org” web address and a list of academic-
looking citations. The site’s sober design, devoid
of flashy, autoplaying videos, lent it credibility,
he thought. After five minutes, he had found
little reason to doubt the article. “I’m clearly
looking at an official site,” he said.
intelligence agencies. And on July 31, Facebook
What the professor never realized as he Check Out Some of These
revealed that it had found evidence of a
focused on the page’s superficial features is that International Channels On
political-influence campaign on the platform
the group in question is a socially conservative
ahead of the 2018 midterm elections. The
splinter faction that broke in 2002 from the
authors of one now defunct page got thousands
mainstream American Academy of Pediatrics
of people to express interest in attending a
over the issue of adoption by same-sex couples.
made-up protest that apparently aimed to put
It has been accused of promoting antigay
white nationalists and left-wingers on the same
policies, and the Southern Poverty Law Center
streets.
designates it as a hate group.
But the stakes are even bigger than
Trust was the issue at hand. The bookish
elections. Our ability to vet information matters
professor had been asked to assess the article as
every time a mother asks Google whether her
part of an experiment run by Stanford University
child should be vaccinated and every time a kid
psychologist Sam Wineburg. His team, known Bloomberg Television
encounters a Holocaust denial on Twitter. In
as the Stanford History Education Group, has Get TV
India, false rumors about child kidnappings that
given scores of subjects such tasks in hopes of SONY Movie Channel
spread on WhatsApp have prompted mobs to
answering two of the most vexing questions of Euronews
beat innocent people to death. “It’s the Fox News
the Internet age: Why are even the smartest
equivalent of a public-health crisis,” says Alan The ‘X’ Zone TV Channel
among us so bad at making judgments about
Miller, founder of the nonpartisan News Kids Central
what to trust on the web? And how can we get
Literacy Project. Dimensions – A Sci-Fi Channel
better? Sound Emerge
There is no quick fix, though tech
Wineburg’s team has found that American Music Channel
companies are under increasing pressure to
Americans of all ages, from digitally savvy Wide World Xtreme
come up with solutions. Facebook lost more
tweens to high-IQ academics, fail to ask Cowboy Theater
than $120 billion in stock value in a single day
important questions about content they Lifestyle
in July as the company dealt with a range of
encounter on a browser, adding to research on Prime Time Drama
issues limiting its growth, including criticism
our online gullibility. Other studies have shown Funnybone
about how conspiracy theories spread on the Reel
that people retweet links without clicking on
platform. But engineers can’t teach machines to SimulTV LIVE Events
them and rely too much on search engines. A
decide what is true or false in a world where Amazing Discoveries
2016 Pew poll found that nearly a quarter of
humans often don’t agree. Amazing Facts TV
Americans said they had shared a made-up news
In a country founded on free speech, Impact TV
story. In his experiments, MIT cognitive
debates over who adjudicates truth and lies Independent Cinema Network
scientist David Rand has found that, on average, Horror
online are contentious. Many welcomed the
people are inclined to believe false news at least Global Military
decision by major tech companies in early
20% of the time. “We are all driving cars, but ...And Many More!
August to remove content from florid
none of us have licenses,” Wineburg says of
conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who has alleged
consuming information online. Over 130 WORLDWIDE channels for
that passenger-jet contrails are damaging
Our inability to parse truth from fiction $9.99/Mo.
people’s brains and spread claims that families
on the Internet is, of course, more than an
of Sandy Hook massacre victims are actors in an
academic matter. The scourge of “fake news” Get Our Set Top Box with over 500
elaborate hoax. But others cried censorship. And
and its many cousins–from clickbait to “deep Games, over 130 channels, live events,
even if law enforcement and intelligence
fakes” (realistic-looking videos showing events movies on demand, download any game
agencies could ferret out every bad actor with a
that never happened)–have experts fearful for or app from Google Play, add your own
keyboard, it seems unwise to put the
the future of democracy. Politicians and SD card and so much more for only
government in charge of scrubbing the Internet
technologists have warned that meddlers are $129.99
of misleading statements.
trying to manipulate elections around the globe
by spreading disinformation. That’s what www.SimulTV.com
(Continued on Page 15)
Russian agents did in 2016, according to U.S.