Re. the particulars of fact-checkers and discretion, I’m in favour of more precise processes for assessing possible meanings of ambiguous statements and then assessing the truth of those possible meanings. I think that this could remove quite a bit of the subjectivity.
In the case of the example you give, I would like to give Biden’s statement a medium penalty, and Trump’s statement a medium-large penalty. The difference is Trump’s use of the word “whatsoever”. This is the opposite of a caveat—it is stressing that the literal meaning rather than the approximate one is intended. To my mind pairs of comparably-bad statements would be:
Not bad:
Guns
“There were very few guns …”
“For the most part, there were no guns …”
Coronavirus
″… are less likely to spread it to you”
″… cannot spread it to you in most cases”
Somewhat bad:
“There were no guns …”
″… cannot spread it to you”
More bad (but still room to be more false):
Guns
“There were no guns whatsoever …”
“There were absolutely no guns …”
Coronavirus
″… absolutely cannot spread it to you”
″… can never spread it to you”
This is not to say that political bias isn’t playing a role in how these organisations are functioning at the moment, but I do think that we can hope to establish more precise standards which reduces the scope for bias to apply.
To my mind these have basically identical meanings: expressing that something is not physically possible. This is actually stronger that simplying saying it hasn’t happened. Consider:
I will not go to Liverpool this year (very likely true)
I will absolutely not go to Liverpool this year (very likely true)
I cannot go to Liverpool this year (false)
So if anything I would expect this analysis to point in the opposite direction.
Some content which didn’t make it into the paper in the end but is relevant for this discussion is a draft protocol for “counting microlies” (the coloured text is the instructions, to be read counterclockwise starting in the top left):
The idea is that one statement which is definitely false seems a much more egregious violation of truthfulness than e.g. four statements each only 75% true.
Raising it to a power >1 is a factor correcting for this. The choice of four is a best guess based on thinking through a few examples and how bad things seemed, but I’m sure it’s not an optimal choice for the parameter.
Re. the particulars of fact-checkers and discretion, I’m in favour of more precise processes for assessing possible meanings of ambiguous statements and then assessing the truth of those possible meanings. I think that this could remove quite a bit of the subjectivity.
In the case of the example you give, I would like to give Biden’s statement a medium penalty, and Trump’s statement a medium-large penalty. The difference is Trump’s use of the word “whatsoever”. This is the opposite of a caveat—it is stressing that the literal meaning rather than the approximate one is intended. To my mind pairs of comparably-bad statements would be:
Not bad:
Guns
“There were very few guns …”
“For the most part, there were no guns …”
Coronavirus
″… are less likely to spread it to you”
″… cannot spread it to you in most cases”
Somewhat bad:
“There were no guns …”
″… cannot spread it to you”
More bad (but still room to be more false):
Guns
“There were no guns whatsoever …”
“There were absolutely no guns …”
Coronavirus
″… absolutely cannot spread it to you”
″… can never spread it to you”
This is not to say that political bias isn’t playing a role in how these organisations are functioning at the moment, but I do think that we can hope to establish more precise standards which reduces the scope for bias to apply.
What distinction are you drawing between
cannot spread it to you
and
can never spread it to you?
To my mind these have basically identical meanings: expressing that something is not physically possible. This is actually stronger that simplying saying it hasn’t happened. Consider:
I will not go to Liverpool this year (very likely true)
I will absolutely not go to Liverpool this year (very likely true)
I cannot go to Liverpool this year (false)
So if anything I would expect this analysis to point in the opposite direction.
The distinction I’m drawing is that “cannot spread it to you” is ambiguous between whether it’s shorthand for:
Cannot (in any circumstances) spread it to you
Cannot (as a rule of thumb) spread it to you
Whereas I think that “can never spread it to you” or “absolutely cannot spread it to you” are harder to interpret as being shortenings of 2.
Some content which didn’t make it into the paper in the end but is relevant for this discussion is a draft protocol for “counting microlies” (the coloured text is the instructions, to be read counterclockwise starting in the top left):
(Unimportant: Why is falsity raised to the fourth power?)
The idea is that one statement which is definitely false seems a much more egregious violation of truthfulness than e.g. four statements each only 75% true.
Raising it to a power >1 is a factor correcting for this. The choice of four is a best guess based on thinking through a few examples and how bad things seemed, but I’m sure it’s not an optimal choice for the parameter.