[ON HOLD] Combating Disinformation

[The Orwell Society]

Princess Rainbow Sparkles will support a resolution combating disinformation, but this is not an easy project you've taken on. Let's begin with the concept:

"Disinformation," similiar to misinformation, as false, unproven, and/or inaccurate information intentionally produced and distributed for a corrupt and unmoral purpose often associated with propaganda.

Quick note, similar is misspelled.

With that out of the way, this definition needs a lot of work. I don't know what a "corrupt and unmoral purpose" is. Defining it as "unproven" seems very problematic. Is the Bible disinformation, under this definition? What about the biochemical theory for the origin of life? I guess it depends on who you ask, what they think it means for information to be "unproven" (even the scientists would agree the biochemical theory has not been proven), and what they think it means to be produced and distributed for a "corrupt and unmoral" purpose.

I don't have easy answers to this problem. You've chosen an incredibly difficult topic to pursue. My advice is to try to define disinformation as objectively as possible and minimize value and purpose judgements as much as you can (unless and until you're prepared to develop a way to objectively identify values and purposes). Maybe something like this will get you started on understanding what I mean:

A person engages in promoting "disinformation" when they: (1) utter a statement; and (2) represent it to be a true fact; (3) with knowledge that the statement is factually untrue, or (3) with reckless disregard for the statement's truth of falsity.

Now, there's several more terms and principles in that you'd have to elaborate on. For instance, there would probably need to be some further explanation of what sort of evidence shows "reckless disregard" for truth or falsity. But hopefully this gives you a sense of where to start. (Or, at least, where I would start).

Good luck.

Aside: for what it's worth... I didn't mind the Bureau of Truth. Although it's an exceptionally risky political gambit to include such a reference. You'll hopefully want to do more than simply create a WA disinformation police force with this proposal.

Thank you for all your feedback, your help has been invaluable. My definitions seem to be the major problem with this proposal, and I will work on them and take your advice.

[Princess Rainbow Sparkles]

Thank you for all your feedback, your help has been invaluable. My definitions seem to be the major problem with this proposal, and I will work on them and take your advice.

No problem. I like to support and encourage new authors to pursue their interest when I can. Please do remember that this is ultimately a political exercise. You can write something beautiful but if you can't persuade enough people it doesn't matter how righteous your minority is.

I've tried to point you away from addressing the symptom of the problem (people believing misinformation) and toward the cause (people spreading it). I suspect that most will ultimately agree that spreading around untrue information knowingly or recklessly (which is just a basic form of fraud) is harmful and ought to be stopped. If you use that hook, maybe you can find a principle for a majority to rally around, and you can do something to stop the most pernicious kinds of disinformation while still allowing lots of room for the legitimate debate about uncertain matters (which others have correctly pointed out to you must be allowed to flourish).

And we must never forget that even what we accept as the truth, or deride as misinformation, may one day be revealed as wrong. Galileo is remembered both for the veil he lifted and for the way he was condemned in his time for speaking out about it. Socrates was forced to drink hemlock for "corrupting the youth" with his heretical views. We can sometimes afford to let truth and falsehood do battle, and trust truth to win the fight. We can also agree that lying is bad and breeds bad outcomes. When I say "good luck," I really do mean you'll need an awful lot of it to strike the balance you seek.

Edit: one other thing. The definition I suggested to you should not be taken as complete. A kid lying to their parents about whether they finished their homework would be “disinformation” under that definition. You’ll need further qualifiers to make it an international issue.

[Bistritza]

sorry mate, got annoyed by the amount of nitpicking and euphemisms used here by people who just want to push their own Res ideas

fully supporting this. null reason? don't care - condemn me.

if it doesnt get passed i'll help co-authoring it.

[West Barack and East Obama]

This is LITERALLY 1984

[The Orwell Society]

This is LITERALLY 1984

Am I going to have to report my own thread for being threadjacked?

[West Barack and East Obama]

This is LITERALLY 1984

Am I going to have to report my own thread for being threadjacked?

This resolution restricts the right of our Ministry of Education to present "alternative facts" to the citizenry to keep them in order. So yes, no rights, 1984, Jorge Allswell etc

[The Orwell Society]

Am I going to have to report my own thread for being threadjacked?

This resolution restricts the right of our Ministry of Education to present "alternative facts" to the citizenry to keep them in order. So yes, no rights, 1984, Jorge Allswell etc

Yes, it restricts "free speech", but total free speech is disastrous. Disinformation is not "alternate facts", it is purposely untrue statements with harmful intents. And this proposal is written from a mostly OOC perspective, as my nation's government would burn this.

[West Barack and East Obama]

This resolution restricts the right of our Ministry of Education to present "alternative facts" to the citizenry to keep them in order. So yes, no rights, 1984, Jorge Allswell etc

Yes, it restricts "free speech", but total free speech is disastrous. Disinformation is not "alternate facts", it is purposely untrue statements with harmful intents. And this proposal is written from a mostly OOC perspective, as my nation's government would burn this.

Dr Justin Obama, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs: Us? Harmful intents? Never!

*Dr Obama gestures to the Minister of Education, telling him to quickly hide the briefing paper with ‘Harmful Disinformation List’ scribbled at the top*

[The Orwell Society]

Yes, it restricts "free speech", but total free speech is disastrous. Disinformation is not "alternate facts", it is purposely untrue statements with harmful intents. And this proposal is written from a mostly OOC perspective, as my nation's government would burn this.

Dr Justin Obama, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs: Us? Harmful intents? Never!

*Dr Obama gestures to the Minister of Education, telling him to quickly hide the briefing paper with ‘Harmful Disinformation List’ scribbled at the top*

Lol. Any OOC feedback?

[The Orwell Society]

A few updates:

• I am planning on submitting this by the end of June or early July. Please, anyone: I NEED FEEDBACK! This proposal still is flawed, and I need help finding those flaws. Also, I need to know if people are for or against. I will make a poll, please vote and give feedback!
  
• Due to her immense load of feedback and suggestions, I am crediting Princess Rainbow Sparkles as a co author.

[Xuanzhang]

So in effect, whatever the government decides is fact becomes as such? This is a preposterous idea; for example, most economists agree that Keynesian economics is the generally correct framework for macroeconomic views in national economies, yet this could be very easily challenged as a false claim. Governments have no interest in eliminating this belief as Keynes justifies obscene state spending couched in the paradox of thrift but information countering this could be reasonably flagged as disinformation. No, absolutely not this is a terrible proposal that should never see the light of day.

Edit: Scientific, or historical, fact is not as simple as "this is disinformation" simply by virtue of researcher biases. The prevalence of statistical variance among populations (not to mention biased interpretations), revisionist readings, and the intrinsic bias of writing (a commonly accepted, and encouraged, fact in most all social science including political science theory, international relations theory, and historiography) each can be mutually discredited by opposing views as disinformation reasonably. A great scientific example might be those in opposition to climate change, they have valid points in that there are plenty of reasonable scientific studies which make valid claims questioning human influence, bolstered by the damning East Anglia emails which thoroughly called into question the research behind Inconvenient Truth among others. The point is that to claim a thing is disinformation, beyond the outright bizarre (human leadership is ruled by space lizards being a prime example) is very easy and can be politically motivated as truth is not so simple to define. This is especially the case in scientific studies, where even the most fundamentally accepted theories such as General Relativity have valid challengers.

[The Orwell Society]

So in effect, whatever the government decides is fact becomes as such? This is a preposterous idea; for example, most economists agree that Keynesian economics is the generally correct framework for macroeconomic views in national economies, yet this could be very easily challenged as a false claim. Governments have no interest in eliminating this belief as Keynes justifies obscene state spending couched in the paradox of thrift but information countering this could be reasonably flagged as disinformation. No, absolutely not this is a terrible proposal that should never see the light of day.

No, FACT works independent from a nation's government, instead being a body of the WA. It can and will work against a nation's government if said government is spreading disinformation compatible with the proposal's definition.

[Xuanzhang]

So in effect, whatever the government decides is fact becomes as such? This is a preposterous idea; for example, most economists agree that Keynesian economics is the generally correct framework for macroeconomic views in national economies, yet this could be very easily challenged as a false claim. Governments have no interest in eliminating this belief as Keynes justifies obscene state spending couched in the paradox of thrift but information countering this could be reasonably flagged as disinformation. No, absolutely not this is a terrible proposal that should never see the light of day.

No, FACT works independent from a nation's government, instead being a body of the WA. It can and will work against a nation's government if said government is spreading disinformation compatible with the proposal's definition.

So the WA gets to be arbiter of what's true and not? What gives them that right, to have their opinion take primacy?

[The Orwell Society]

No, FACT works independent from a nation's government, instead being a body of the WA. It can and will work against a nation's government if said government is spreading disinformation compatible with the proposal's definition.

So the WA gets to be arbiter of what's true and not? What gives them that right, to have their opinion take primacy?

Opinion has nothing to do with it.

[Xuanzhang]

So the WA gets to be arbiter of what's true and not? What gives them that right, to have their opinion take primacy?

Opinion has nothing to do with it.

Opinion has everything to do with it. What you claim to be fact, I can reasonably claim to be false; and even if I can't immediately prove it, does not denigrate the validity of that view. You have no right to even suggest shouting down opposing voices simply because you can generate "facts" from potentially invalidated data which no one will oppose.

[The Orwell Society]

Opinion has nothing to do with it.

Opinion has everything to do with it. What you claim to be fact, I can reasonably claim to be false; and even if I can't immediately prove it, does not denigrate the validity of that view. You have no right to even suggest shouting down opposing voices simply because you can generate "facts" from potentially invalidated data which no one will oppose.

Let's say that I said that Joe Biden is black and in his mid thirties. Would I be correct or incorrect, or would it be a matter of opinion?

[Xuanzhang]

Opinion has everything to do with it. What you claim to be fact, I can reasonably claim to be false; and even if I can't immediately prove it, does not denigrate the validity of that view. You have no right to even suggest shouting down opposing voices simply because you can generate "facts" from potentially invalidated data which no one will oppose.

Let's say that I said that Joe Biden is black and in his mid thirties. Would I be correct or incorrect, or would it be a matter of opinion?

Let's be honest and say that the disinformation board this is inspired by is not concerning itself with such blatantly obvious and absurd statements.

[The Orwell Society]

Let's say that I said that Joe Biden is black and in his mid thirties. Would I be correct or incorrect, or would it be a matter of opinion?

Let's be honest and say that the disinformation board this is inspired by is not concerning itself with such blatantly obvious and absurd statements.

What I'm saying is, the only disinformation that FACT will be dealing with is what can actually be proven wrong, like that flu vaccines cause developmental disorders when there is scientific evidence that they don't (just an example).

[Xuanzhang]

Let's be honest and say that the disinformation board this is inspired by is not concerning itself with such blatantly obvious and absurd statements.

What I'm saying is, the only disinformation that FACT will be dealing with is what can actually be proven wrong, like that flu vaccines cause developmental disorders when there is scientific evidence that they don't (just an example).

Yet there are peer reviewed studies, I can even reference them as I wrote a paper on this while a graduate student at Johns Hopkins University, showing that they do, which negates the argument that the flu vaccine does not cause developmental disorders. I don't agree with the assertion, I think most vaccines are fine (though I have issues with the COVID vaccine); however, does a minority perspective become shouted down if a majority of research suggests otherwise even though they may be in fact wrong? I said above in an edit that even General Relativity is questioned by a minority of astrophysicists. Now if you were to say the Flat Earth Society, sure, yet what right does anyone have to establish a block on them presenting their (idiotic) claims? See the danger in such a proposal?

(Keep in mind I'm not attacking you personally, just this)

[The Orwell Society]

What I'm saying is, the only disinformation that FACT will be dealing with is what can actually be proven wrong, like that flu vaccines cause developmental disorders when there is scientific evidence that they don't (just an example).

Yet there are peer reviewed studies, I can even reference them as I wrote a paper on this while a graduate student at Johns Hopkins University, showing that they do, which negates the argument that the flu vaccine does not cause developmental disorders. I don't agree with the assertion, I think most vaccines are fine (though I have issues with the COVID vaccine); however, does a minority perspective become shouted down if a majority of research suggests otherwise even though they may be in fact wrong? I said above in an edit that even General Relativity is questioned by a minority of astrophysicists. Now if you were to say the Flat Earth Society, sure, yet what right does anyone have to establish a block on them presenting their (idiotic) claims? See the danger in such a proposal?

(Keep in mind I'm not attacking you personally, just this)

I see your point. Once again, I am not scrapping this draft yet. I need to perfect it and then think about whether or not I should even bother submitting it.

[Xuanzhang]

Yet there are peer reviewed studies, I can even reference them as I wrote a paper on this while a graduate student at Johns Hopkins University, showing that they do, which negates the argument that the flu vaccine does not cause developmental disorders. I don't agree with the assertion, I think most vaccines are fine (though I have issues with the COVID vaccine); however, does a minority perspective become shouted down if a majority of research suggests otherwise even though they may be in fact wrong? I said above in an edit that even General Relativity is questioned by a minority of astrophysicists. Now if you were to say the Flat Earth Society, sure, yet what right does anyone have to establish a block on them presenting their (idiotic) claims? See the danger in such a proposal?

(Keep in mind I'm not attacking you personally, just this)

I see your point. Once again, I am not scrapping this draft yet. I need to perfect it and then think about whether or not I should even bother submitting it.

I wouldn’t dream of asking you to scrap it. I apologize, it may have seen like it but I’m more giving the concerns that I would if this were on the floor. You asked for OOC so I didn’t stylize it

[Equai]

So far I really like the sound and intend of the resolution. Federation of Equai gives its full support and is ready to assist in battling disinformation. We respect the move of combating disinformation being international rather then local enforcement. Additionally, we respect every resolution who aims to protect people from the predatory fallacy known as " absolute free speech". The topics that resolution covers all seem to be very worthy of protection against disinformation because those topics are the most vulnerable and easily manipulated by disinformation

[Saksoni]

The “Bureau of Truth” is an unfortunate name.

How so?

Don't mind the hidden 1984 reference. :p

We wont, but enemies of it can say its censorshisp, So change the name ASAP.

[The Orwell Society]

So far I really like the sound and intend of the resolution. Federation of Equai gives its full support and is ready to assist in battling disinformation. We respect the move of combating disinformation being international rather then local enforcement. Additionally, we respect every resolution who aims to protect people from the predatory fallacy known as " absolute free speech". The topics that resolution covers all seem to be very worthy of protection against disinformation because those topics are the most vulnerable and easily manipulated by disinformation

Thank you for the support!

[The Orwell Society]

How so?

Don't mind the hidden 1984 reference.

We wont, but enemies of it can say its censorshisp, So change the name ASAP.

It has been changed to FACT