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Jason Mathias

The fact checking fallacy

"Fact checkers are are wrong, biased, not factual and are not to be trusted because of who funds them." 

Source F is funded by people G. 

Therefore source F is not to be trusted. 

Has anyone else ran into this logic while trying to fact check conspiracy theories and other false claims on the internet? They usually have their scapegoats like FB Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Soros that are called "the globalists" i.e their boogie men that justify their rejection of factual reality. 

Not sure how to fact check dangerous misinformation on the internet with this one. If you use a fact checker they just reject the fact checkers due to who funds them. However, I find that who funds them is irrelevant to whether or not the content is actually factual or biased or not. If you don't use a fact checker then they just say its a baseless opinion. If you copy a source for evidence they dismiss it because its copied and pasted suggesting you cant think for yourself. If you use a media source they dismiss it because the mainstream media are also funded by the scapegoats. Its truly a double triple bind. 

Anyone can see that on the fact checkers pages they have a transparent funding page, and those who fund the fact checkers don't have any influence over the editors fact checks. They do not take funding from political groups, and they are transparent with anyone funding over a certain amount. And those globalists who they claim fund them, the amounts are minuscule compared to their total funding which a lot comes from normal people donating. They also have a methodology page and have way more transparent and reasonable information than the conspiracy sites these people claim to be trustworthy sources and usually don't even have an about page let alone a transparent funding and methodology page. And a lot of the conspiracy sources they use are actually funded by political groups, political pundits and political think tanks. 

But when fact checking their conspiracy theory sources on the fact checkers they are rated as pseudoscience and propaganda. The problem is that they take that as evidence that the fact checkers are biased and corrupted by the elite globalists. Also, when FB censors what they post because it was fact checked by an independent fact checker they also take that as evidence that the fact checkers are a liberal bias conspiracy against their so called truth sharing.  

 

asked on Thursday, Jun 18, 2020 11:03:49 PM by Jason Mathias

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Michael Hurst
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I can point to a number of logical fallacies in Bo's taxonomy that would apply, in whole or in part, to this form of argument. Some, such as Appeal to Authority, require flipping the argument, i.e., the argument is false because of the authority used, rather than true because of the authority used.

Fact-to-Fiction Fallacy
Conspiracy Theory
Argument by Pigheadedness
Appeal to Authority, or False Authority,  Argument from False Authority
Ad Hominem (Guilt by Association, or Circumstantial)
Fallacy of Opposition
Genetic
Identity Fallacy
Poisoning the Well
Proving Non-Existence
Righteousness (Self Righteousness) Fallacy
Shifting the Burden of Proof
Willed Ignorance

answered on Friday, Jun 19, 2020 11:59:08 AM by Michael Hurst

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TrappedPrior (RotE)
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Genetic Fallacy. The truth of the source is evaluated based on where it came from, rather than on its actual content. This is a fallacy of relevance, since the source origin doesn't matter, what the source itself says does.

This is simply used to dismiss true information that contradicts one's views. Furthermore, often such people even lie about the origin. 

answered on Friday, Jun 19, 2020 06:06:53 AM by TrappedPrior (RotE)

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Jason Mathias writes:

Yeah, my first thought was the genetic fallacy, could also be a Ad Hominem (Guilt by Association) Fallacy too. 

Seems conspiracy theorists make conclusions based off funding rather than doing an analysis of the actual arguments being presented. And they believe this is critical thinking and a how good logic is done. 

posted on Friday, Jun 19, 2020 08:14:21 AM
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TrappedPrior (RotE) writes:
[To Jason Mathias ]

And if anyone disagrees, it's proof that they're brainwashed/a shill/or wrong.

[ login to reply ] posted on Friday, Jun 19, 2020 02:34:53 PM
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Jason Mathias writes:

Yep, that also seems to be a core value as well. 

posted on Friday, Jun 19, 2020 03:10:23 PM