Join us on November 1, when Visiting Exchange Professor Lutz Budrass (University of Bochum) will review the whitewashing of national histories, including a discussion about how the history of the German aircraft industry has been manipulated to conceal the participation of aircraft industrialists in Nazi crimes. See the event page for full details.
“Using Wikipedia in the Age of Alternative Facts: Creating Student Expertise” (October 18)→
/Join the CLASS Excellence in Teaching and Learning Committee (ETLC) on October 18 for an interactive workshop. This year, the ETLC is considering the president’s call to programs that display “rigor, relevance, and excellence,” particularly in light of the Critical Engagements theme “Fake News: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It?”
Our first workshop describes an assignment in Dr. Rachael Barron-Duncan’s African Art course which tackles the common internet conundrum: the most “relevant” and popular sources often lack rigor and excellence. Looking at the misinformation or complete dearth of information on English-language Wikipedia regarding African visual culture, Dr. Barron-Duncan’s students have set about to supply the expertise needed to curate those pages in an academically responsible way.
Join us to discuss an example of how discipline-based content assignments can build source-analysis and critical-thinking skills. Refreshments will be served.
Please RSVP by October 16 to class@cmich.edu.
“The Impeachment of President Trump: A Real Possibility or Just ‘Fake News’?” (October 15)→
/Join Central Michigan University faculty members on October 15 for a seminar-style discussion about the impeachment inquiry into President Trump and whether it’s a real possibility. Department of Political Science and Public Administration faculty members Kyla Stepp and Jeremy Castle will facilitate the discussion. Coffee and cookies will be provided.
See the event page for details, links, and resources.
Brace Yourself for the Internet Impeachment (NYT)→
/Kevin Roose, writing for the New York Times:
As impeachment looms, disinformation experts are bracing for a fresh cyclone of chaos, complete with fast-twitch media manipulation, droves of false and misleading claims, and hyper-polarized audiences fiercely clinging to their side’s version of reality.
“D’oh! Pioneers: Unraveling Founding Myths with a Twitter Thread” (Andrew Wehrman, October 8)→
/Please join us on October 8 for a presentation by Andrew Wehrman (Department of History, CMU), entitled “D’oh! Pioneers: Unraveling Founding Myths with a Twitter Thread.” With only a little help from Lisa Simpson, Dr. Wehrman will offer a historian’s perspective on truth, fiction, and the stories we tell about who we are and where we came from. Please see the event page for full details and more links.
“How to Be a Human Lie Detector of Fake News” (CNN)→
/CNN‘s David Robson on “How to be a human lie detector of fake news, according to the latest science” (September 16, 2019). Overview, analysis, advice, and useful links to “the literature.”
“Vaccination: When ‘Fake News’ Has Lasting Consequences” (September 18)→
/On September 18, 2019, faculty and community members from different disciplines will explore the history of vaccination, hesitancy to vaccinate, vaccination myths, the science behind vaccines, and its relation to autism. 6:00 PM, Anspach 162. Please see the event page for full details.
Fall 2019 Kickoff Event: CMU Faculty on Fake News and Post-Truth→
/Please join us on September 19 for the Critical Engagements Fall 2019 kickoff event, an introduction and open discussion featuring CMU faculty and staff on fake news, post-truth, how we know what we know in our disciplines — and how we talk about it in our research, classrooms, and communities. 7:00 PM, Anspach 161.
Reflection: Fake news and climate change
/While dwelling on the Critical Engagements theme for this year, Fake News, I cannot help but consider the thread of scientific distrust that is intertwined within this topic. I am a climate scientist.
I went to college for meteorology and to graduate school for climatology. I was trained to inspect and analyze data, think critically and logically, draw conclusions from the evidence, and present results with confidence bounds to a degree of detail that makes my work reproducible. I was trained to be a scientist. Sometimes people ask me how I feel about the “controversy around climate change”, or whether or not I “believe in climate change”. Every time I’m asked this I am left quite perplexed. For climate scientists and assuredly other scientists, there is no controversy, there is no belief. There is data, evidence, analyses, and conclusions. Scientists are trained to accept or reject hypotheses based on data, there is no controversy or belief.
To help clarify the scientist’s point of view, let me go over how scientific knowledge is created in a broad sense.
The Scientific Method
Inspired by Copernicus and Galileo’s use of observations and inductive reasoning, Francis Bacon was the first to formalize the idea of a scientific method in Novum Organumin 1620, advocating a method of systematic inductive reasoning for questioning observations in nature with a focus on experimentation to prove or disprove ideas. The idea of a universal scientific method was debated and modified by great thinkers from the 17th to the 19th century, at which point it was more or less accepted by the common scientific culture in the form we use today. It is essentially a list of general principles used in answering questions about the natural world in an inductive manner, in which observations lead to theories which lead to experiments, which prove or disprove the theories. The specific steps in the scientific method may vary by discipline and perhaps by question, but the basic components are fairly ubiquitous:
Scientists make observations (which we record and then call data). For example, Galileo made observations of the motion of the stars and Jupiter’s moons using a telescope. In a closer-to-home example, I study snowfall observations from around North America.
Scientists form hypotheses about their data, which are testable conjectures based on the observations. Based on his observations from his telescope, Galileo hypothesized that the Earth was not in the center of the solar system. Based on snowfall observations, I hypothesized that the extent of Arctic Sea Ice can impact North American snow storm tracks.
Scientists develop rigorous and reproducible tests (experiments) to determine whether or not they can accept or reject their hypothesis. Galileo observed the phases of Venus in such detail as to prove that it orbited the Sun and not the Earth, thereby accepting his hypothesis that the Earth was not in the center of the solar system. I conducted analyses on Arctic Sea Ice extent data and North American snowfall, to quantify the months and lag in which there was a quantifiable effect of sea ice on snowfall. Since my analysis showed that fall snowfall in the Pacific Northwest and Great Lakes regions are best described by the previous spring’s sea ice extent, I accepted my original hypothesis.
Scientists publish their results to undergo external review, and replication. The peer review process can be a gauntlet, whereby scientist’s work is evaluated by other experts in the field. Not just other scientists, but leading scientists in the small sub-area of specialty that your theory falls within. I underwent this process to publish my work in the International Journal of Climatology. Galileo had the added privilege of his work undergoing external review by the catholic church. In her Ted Talk (linked at the bottom of this page) Naomi Oreskes refers to this process as science being judged by a jury of geeks. I encourage you to watch her ted talk on why we should believe science (my students reading this post are required to watch it - you know who you are). We also publish so that others can reproduce our experiments. This is so they can confirm our results and extend them to ask and answer new questions about the natural world.
By the time a scientific paper is published it has undergone intense scrutiny by several different scientists, to confirm that the data and methods are sound and the conclusions follow from the analyses. This entire process results in relatively high confidence in the validity of scientific claims, especially when research is conducted by multiple independent scientists in different fields of study and they all result in the same conclusions (such as is the case with climate change).
The scientific process and the scientist are meant to be meticulous, and as exact as possible which allows for this component of reproducibility (replication of experiments). However, this training can have an unfortunate byproduct of making scientists sometimes difficult to converse with for non-scientists. For example, if you were to ask me if I think it’s going to be a snowy winter, I would first list the most recent observations from the equatorial Pacific to the Arctic to explain the data that goes into a winter outlook. I would follow that with interpretations of the mathematical models that generate a winter climate projection using the aforementioned data, and then finally give my conclusion based on this data. If I’m being a thorough scientist, I will then give you an estimate of my confidence and the potential error in my conclusions. This is usually enough to make a non-scientist totally tune out. But I feel that anything less would be inaccurate and make my comments appear as simple guesses.
I cannot help but wonder if scientists and non-scientists are effectively speaking different languages, which may serve to foster distrust. However, if you are a non-scientist and have read all the way through this blog post there is hope. You perhaps understand us a little better. When you talk to us, listen for the scientific method in what we say and how we say it. Ask us about the data or the evidence rather than how we feel about a controversy. Thank you for your interest in how scientific knowledge is created, perhaps this will be a step toward bridging the language gap and dissolving blind scientific distrust.
Daria Kluver (kluve1db@cmich.edu)
Reflection: "What is the cost of lies?"
/The HBO miniseries Chernobyl, an exploration of the 1986 cataclysmic nuclear meltdown, begins with this question as its opening salvo. Over five dense episodes, the audience follows the main characters as they live through, and sometimes try to fight, officials’ intricate machinations to cover up the disaster. It is a gut-wrenching watch from beginning to end as the truth is covered up, uncovered, covered up again, and thousands of bodies pile up. While there is hope at the end for some discovery of what actually happened, viewers’ emotions—and any truth that remains—are left in shards.
It is so very human to want to get to the bottom of things, to have the facts, to affirm (or to discover!) the truth (the Truth?). In the days leading up to the fall 2019 semester, the newspaper headlines underline this quest.
“Why Do People Keep Convincing Themselves That They’ve Solved This Medieval Mystery?” (Washington Post)
“Finding Amelia Earhart’s Plane Seemed Impossible. Then Came a Startling Clue.” (NYTimes)
“Mystery Solved: Why Cats Eat Grass” (Science)
Our desire to have answers is strong.
And yet we are clearly in a moment when we have anxiety over the truth. We write and talk about deepfakes, the deep state, and too many conspiracy theories to count. And, of course, there is the expression “fake news” itself, words irrevocably linked to a discussion about truth and lies as they relate to American politics, the media, and foreign interference in domestic affairs.
These worries are not limited to national and global politics. They touch many subjects we research and teach: vaccinations and autism, the replication crisis of scientific studies (e.g. the marshmallow test), and the purpose of walls in the Middle Ages. The nature of climate change, one of the most wicked problems of the 21st century, is hotly debated.
Whether a mistruth is malevolently crafted or a slight variation on a fact, what happens when we don’t have the truth or some version of it? We excuse the least of the untruths with expressions like “white lies,” “fibs,” or “innocent mistakes.” The worst, though, can have devastating consequences. Election fraud undermines the very basis of democracy. Measles—a disease up until recently eradicated in the United States—is menacing the vulnerable in places like Michigan. Lies and misconceptions about certain groups of people that spread in the media and social networks can lead to hate crimes, some even ending in the horrific mass shootings we’ve witnessed again and again.
At the heart of this year’s Critical Engagement explorations and discussions, then, is the truth. What do we know? How do we know it? What do we do with that truth once we have it? We will explore these questions this year with faculty research and teaching, student endeavors, staff work, and community voices. We have planned conversations, lectures, pop-up classes, and other activities throughout the year as we look at truth and lies through the lenses of journalism, postmodern philosophies, the scientific method, social media, and even the role of the university itself.
Because the truth really does matter. For some nations and peoples carrying the burden of a genocidal past, bearing witness to truths and facts of that time is an essential step in inching toward a reconciled future. Even if sometimes we ignore the truth because the facts can be inconvenient or damaging, to not be able to unearth any truth at all would be truly alarming.
Again, Chernobyl poses the problem bang on in the opening minutes of the first episode: “The real danger is that if we hear enough lies, then we no longer recognize the truth at all. What can we do then? What else is left but to abandon even the hope of truth, and content ourselves instead... with stories.”
Join in and help us search for some of the answers…. and maybe a little truth while we’re at it, too.
Christi Brookes (christi.brookes@cmich.edu)
***
And below is a trailer for Chernobyl. It has the Russian phrase “Внимание, внимание” (“Vnimaniye, vnimaniye”/“Attention, attention”) on loop. It’s a must-watch series for anyone interested in this year’s Critical Engagements theme.
The Broadcast On 'Truth' That Is Transfixing The Nation Of Gambia (NPR)→
/
News About Truth
In the West African nation of Gambia, people are tuning in — on TV, radios and cellphones — to testimony about alleged abuses by former president Yahya Jammeh. NPR’s Jason Beubien on the hearings of the Gambian Truth, Reconciliation, and Reparations Commission.
Playlist: Fake News
/This is a playlist inspired by this year’s theme of “Fake News.” The first, from reggae greats Toots and the Maytals, begins with the words “I want you to believe every word I say/I want you to believe every thing I do.” From there, most of the songs mention fakes or lies. The last one is, of course, from Chernobyl. (At least one of the writers on this blog is absolutely nuts about the series.) It’s Вічная пам’ять, or “Eternal Memory,” a Ukrainian take on the traditional Orthodox hymn sung at funeral masses, a response of sorts to the series’ opening question, “What is the cost of lies?”
What other songs should be on here?
