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snopes.com's David Mikkelson Interviewed
pipingguy writes "Online Journalism Review interviews David Mikkelson of the Urban Legends Reference Pages. While the Internet has taken its share of knocks for helping scammers perpetrate e-mail and Web hoaxes (the Bambi hunt reportedly was staged to sell videos on the proprietor's Web site), not enough credit is given to the folks who are using the Internet to debunk them. Snopes.com is the work of the husband-and-wife team of David and Barbara Mikkelson, who have taken their passion for urban myths to the Web since 1995."
There's a matter of trust I'm wary about, when it comes to sites like snopes.com. How easy would it be for them to be 'infiltrated' somehow by a hack attempt or by bribery and the like, and pass off something that is a hoax or scam as being 'real'. or perhaps pass off something that's a real and present danger as being just another net hoax?.
I know about half the mindless net followers will believe everything they read in email. Most of those who follow up to check if something is valid or not turn to snopes. That's a big responsibility.
from the interview:
MG: "What about the role of the Internet in hoaxes?"
DM: "I think in general, nothing's changed but the technology. There's a lot on the Internet that you can't trust. But frankly, there's a lot on your bookshelf and the library shelves that you can't trust either. There are books on UFOs and alien encounters that require some examination. There's never been a medium that you could inherently trust. You still have to look at who's telling you this and why are they telling you this. Is there anything else they should be telling you? That concept hasn't changed. The Internet has made it easier to debunk hoaxes while at the same time making it easier to perpetrate them. Nothing's really changed but the technology."
The only other thing he could have mentioned is that people trust TV news and newspapers way too much also. 'nuff said.
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Very true. I've seen half a dozen casses where Snopes makes an assumtion that someone with real expertise about the given subject could tell you is just plain wrong.
I've also seen a few too many cases where they take the most far fetched claims of a story and after disproving those claims state that the whole thing is false. Even most true stories get mangled somewhat after only a few retellings.
That said, they are doing a good job at a herculean task. They just need to talk to the experts in the given field more often.
Athiests are on the sturdiest ground. They say there's no verifiable evidence for the existance of god. Without such evidence, they take the reasonable action of not believing in a god.
You think it's unreasonable to dismiss a view like this, but really it's the only thing to do. What if I tell you that the world doesn't actually exist anywhere you're not looking or sensing? Do you take my word for it? What if I offer poorly documented third-party claims, and first-person claims from people who "just know" it's true, but are unwilling to try to prove it?
The only reasonable action to take is to act as if a claim like this isn't true unless you can get proof. This is how athiests view the claim of the existance of god.
You are either wrong or under a misapprehension as to the nature of science.
if by "exists" you mean "has effects on the physical world" then you're wrong: if something has effects then you can test it. If by "exists" you mean something else, then you're making a metaphysical claim which science isn't competent to test. Randi doesn't look at purely metaphysical claims (and nor could he).
if by an effect being "random" you mean "only happens sometimes, but more often than you'd expect if there was no effect" then this is a physical claim which is statistically testable (i.e. try to guess the flip of a coin 100 times - you don't need to get it right all the time for me to admit you're psychic).
If by "random" you mean "happens no more often that it would if there were no effect" then again you're making a metaphysical claim which is untestable.