00:00:00 ◼ ► First of all I think the pod cast is a place where I'm going to be wrong quite a lot. [TS]
00:00:09 ◼ ► and I'm going to guess maybe you're going to be wrong a lot as well unless you come prepared [TS]
00:00:16 ◼ ► I think you know me well enough to know that I have come prepared. But is that a bad thing. [TS]
00:00:36 ◼ ► when I make those videos you know that's that's why I like a podcast is a different kind of thing right I can just I [TS]
00:00:43 ◼ ► can just talk to you and the expectations the expectations are lowered. It's a different format. [TS]
00:00:48 ◼ ► So you think because well because you've written a script there's a new a new level of responsibility on you on the [TS]
00:00:55 ◼ ► Internet. If you're if you're making something for other people and it is it is a purportedly factual thing. [TS]
00:01:04 ◼ ► And if you're not just a total jerk there's some kind of burden on you to make sure that what you're saying is correct [TS]
00:01:13 ◼ ► and I think that that partly comes from just having having an audience of people who are interested in maybe hearing [TS]
00:01:20 ◼ ► what you have to say you have to make sure that what you're saying to them is is right because those people are then [TS]
00:01:32 ◼ ► and if you said something that's wrong it's like you're making the world worse because you put out like this this [TS]
00:01:38 ◼ ► incorrect piece of information that might also have a real chance of spreading to other people [TS]
00:01:43 ◼ ► and to their conversations. And there's just there's just no good and that would make me feel very guilty. [TS]
00:01:52 ◼ ► Yes yes are you wanting them to be really correct because you feel this responsibility to make the world. [TS]
00:02:08 ◼ ► I would say very honestly that that a huge part of it is actually that I just I don't want to be wrong in public right [TS]
00:02:24 ◼ ► Yeah there's a pride I guess the thing that I'm really the root that I'm really afraid of is if you go back [TS]
00:02:39 ◼ ► I am trying to convince people of something there. Or the video about the Electoral College. [TS]
00:02:56 ◼ ► but I'm trying to convince you that that the copyright system that we currently have is kind of a terrible idea. [TS]
00:03:01 ◼ ► and the thing that I live in terror of on those days the days that I have uploaded a I'm trying to convince you video [TS]
00:03:10 ◼ ► is that within the first thirty minutes someone is going to leave a comment that just demolish is my central argument [TS]
00:03:19 ◼ ► and that is that is a terrifying thing to to worry about because you know I've just made this video I've put it up on [TS]
00:03:27 ◼ ► the Internet a bunch of people are watching it right now I'm doing my best to try and convince you of something [TS]
00:03:39 ◼ ► and I'm very happy in casual conversations to try to change my mind and to discover that I am wrong about something [TS]
00:03:51 ◼ ► But to have that process happen in front of maybe hundreds of thousands of people is kind of terribly embarrassing. [TS]
00:04:04 ◼ ► or the little thing that slipped through the net because something that was said to me by a very wise man it was very [TS]
00:04:09 ◼ ► true that is when you're making an argument like the ones you're talking about there. [TS]
00:04:13 ◼ ► It can be the small thing that undoes you because someone might point out you said that that treaty was signed on [TS]
00:04:22 ◼ ► and suddenly they use that mistake to undermine every single other thing you said in your video your argument so you [TS]
00:04:29 ◼ ► wear if you're going to get you're going to trip over the small thing or are you worried about something so huge [TS]
00:04:37 ◼ ► I worry about everything but I do have to keep my own sanity I do have a kind of hierarchy of errors [TS]
00:04:45 ◼ ► and so at at the top of this the worst thing is what we've just been discussing is the your argument is invalid error. [TS]
00:04:57 ◼ ► There are lots and lots of factual errors that do creep into my videos and that it is just it is totally unavoidable. [TS]
00:05:09 ◼ ► but it's survivable if it's an error that doesn't relate to the main point necessarily so like you say the treaty [TS]
00:05:36 ◼ ► or if you're always doing something just a little bit off it does start to undermine your your main point. [TS]
00:05:41 ◼ ► And at the bottom of this hierarchy I have things like pronunciation errors which I have made an embarrassingly large [TS]
00:05:48 ◼ ► number of times and things like typos where I do my best to just totally ignore those. [TS]
00:06:00 ◼ ► I'd rather not but I don't in my own opinion I don't think that really detracts from a central point but and [TS]
00:06:05 ◼ ► but enough little mistakes like Treaty years that's that's a bad sign right that doesn't that doesn't help. [TS]
00:06:11 ◼ ► So you'll be quite introspective here talking about you know how you feel about your videos [TS]
00:06:15 ◼ ► and errors in them how do you feel watching other people's videos their no other content on the internet does it. [TS]
00:06:22 ◼ ► Do you apply the same standards to other people that your blog here so often and get really upset [TS]
00:06:27 ◼ ► when people make mistakes or do you think this is just something you apply to yourself. [TS]
00:06:37 ◼ ► Almost every time the person talking right is an expert on this topic and I have no ability to judge whether [TS]
00:06:47 ◼ ► Right there's an asymmetry here so I would say you know most of the educational videos that I watch on on youtube. [TS]
00:06:55 ◼ ► I wouldn't even notice a mistake right the people who are making them are so much more integrated into the topic. [TS]
00:07:01 ◼ ► And they've done so much more on it that they're always going to be super aware of the stakes that come up whereas I [TS]
00:07:10 ◼ ► I'm going to guess that you get e-mails from people who are wanting to correct mistakes in your in your videos right [TS]
00:07:17 ◼ ► where you're then on the receiving end right you've made a video and you put it out there to the world [TS]
00:07:23 ◼ ► and you know someone in the world knows more about a topic or they think need a more about a topic than you do [TS]
00:07:32 ◼ ► I mean I think I mean I guess in most cases like you say I've been interviewing experts so I am a step removed so I can [TS]
00:07:46 ◼ ► and that is that hardly any of my videos are scripted or pre-prepared and I guess that I like conversations [TS]
00:07:52 ◼ ► and as we were saying at the start of this chat people forgive a lot more in conversations than perhaps they do in a [TS]
00:08:03 ◼ ► You can always say well hey you know there was no script we were just chatting how can you know he [TS]
00:08:08 ◼ ► or she didn't know what questions I was going to ask how could you possibly expect them to say everything perfectly so [TS]
00:08:15 ◼ ► I guess I have that extra level of protection that doesn't make the wrongness any less I think it makes it maybe less [TS]
00:08:23 ◼ ► embarrassing in a way. So in terms of dealing with it I guess that's another thing to talk about. [TS]
00:08:29 ◼ ► Once it's out there and it's wrong and it happens to everyone how do you deal with it. [TS]
00:08:37 ◼ ► So for me personally the way out the way I look at this is I try to keep a record of all the mistakes I've made on my [TS]
00:08:53 ◼ ► but with a correct mistakes from the previous day's paper like it's the best bit of the newspaper saying apologize for [TS]
00:09:05 ◼ ► but my favorite my favorite mistakes section is the one published in The Economist magazine. [TS]
00:09:14 ◼ ► Well it's normally hilarious because the errors they're correcting are so minor as to be laughable. [TS]
00:09:22 ◼ ► Write that and I do I do look it over and I mean sometimes they have genuine mistakes right. [TS]
00:09:29 ◼ ► but for the most part you know I think they have a deep apologies for every minor minor mistakes [TS]
00:09:40 ◼ ► That's probably really technically SMA too isn't it because you're probably thinking Gosh if they're apologizing for [TS]
00:09:45 ◼ ► that everything else must be correct because they let nothing slip through the net. [TS]
00:09:49 ◼ ► Yeah that is definitely it's a good P.R. Move. OK so I'm looking at my most famous video the U.K. [TS]
00:10:04 ◼ ► and I got some of these are just embarrassing to look at if I haven't looked at this list in a long time [TS]
00:10:09 ◼ ► and it is really uncomfortable. OK One of the very very top one I will tell you at the end. [TS]
00:10:21 ◼ ► God this is awful too this is not so much a mistake as it was just terribly insensitive [TS]
00:10:33 ◼ ► Yeah I was not aware of the political implications of coloring Northern Ireland orange [TS]
00:10:47 ◼ ► And so I have a note here that as you know in these are these are notes for if I ever redo this video do you know what [TS]
00:11:03 ◼ ► And also OK so a minor mistake was I was trying to do the national colors to some extent and I reversed England [TS]
00:11:10 ◼ ► and Wales I had. So England should be white whale should be red I had it reversed in the video. [TS]
00:11:17 ◼ ► I neglected to mention that the United Kingdom is part of the Commonwealth realm I think I described it as being sort [TS]
00:11:24 ◼ ► of above the Commonwealth realm like it rules over this thing not as part of the thing itself [TS]
00:11:29 ◼ ► but you know here's the thing I'm going to mess up again if they don't know how to do it right. [TS]
00:11:33 ◼ ► I mispronounced the Orkney Islands. Yeah that's right. Is that right is that right now. [TS]
00:11:38 ◼ ► Yeah although I notoriously mispronounced everything in the U.K. As well. I'll take your word for it. [TS]
00:11:44 ◼ ► Yeah I have got a house also Yeah I said the Church of England was the Church of the whole of the United Kingdom [TS]
00:11:51 ◼ ► but it is not as the name itself might specify it is just the Church of England it is not the Church of Scotland as [TS]
00:11:57 ◼ ► well. Don't do this to yourself. No it's I have I can feel your pain. Ah God This one this one just killed me. [TS]
00:12:08 ◼ ► I use the word sovereign in just the wrong way many times and I just I felt really dumb about that. [TS]
00:12:17 ◼ ► I called constituent countries sovereign and this is not the correct term to use it all to describe the situation. [TS]
00:12:29 ◼ ► Oh I know and then I have I have this hole that I messed up a couple of places in the order. [TS]
00:12:40 ◼ ► and there were a couple that I got out of order which is also just very painful. Let me tell you this. [TS]
00:12:46 ◼ ► OK I know this is about being wrong on the Internet and being wrong on the Internet is a bad thing [TS]
00:12:52 ◼ ► but as someone who used to work in newspapers I can promise you being wrong in newspapers is worse because it's printed [TS]
00:13:00 ◼ ► so many times and it's you know it's a hard copy everywhere and when you go out for a coffee break and you see piles [TS]
00:13:12 ◼ ► I'm page that has happened to me one of my first ever front page stories was about a big macho parade that was [TS]
00:13:19 ◼ ► happening in my hometown and I swear I get into work the next day Mr front page thinking I was all that [TS]
00:13:28 ◼ ► and I had the start of the parade happening at like nine P.M. Instead of nine A.M. [TS]
00:13:33 ◼ ► So all these people would turn up at the wrong time and it was this I when I went from hero to zero very quickly. [TS]
00:13:40 ◼ ► Oh the best example of this that didn't happen to may happen to my mom there was a solar eclipse. [TS]
00:13:47 ◼ ► And he was given the job of writing a story with labor you know he doesn't know too much about solar eclipses [TS]
00:13:53 ◼ ► and he obviously misunderstood something he was told and he wrote in the story on the front page of the paper. [TS]
00:13:58 ◼ ► Big big news today. Do not look at the solar eclipse. And unless you are wearing sunglasses. [TS]
00:14:06 ◼ ► Oh gosh you know look at it even if you are and it will set you to do that the newspaper had to like old T.V. [TS]
00:14:16 ◼ ► and have them put out these emergency broadcast saying don't do what it said in the newspaper today you will go blind. [TS]
00:14:29 ◼ ► You can't kill the web page you can't print newspapers. You've just made this mistake that is there in hard copy. [TS]
00:14:40 ◼ ► Those those two are particularly bad because you are compelling someone to action in an incorrect way [TS]
00:14:46 ◼ ► but eventually a permanently life changing kind of way. Yeah I'd rather have someone miss the parade and go blind. [TS]
00:14:53 ◼ ► But yeah definitely it's a it's a terrible thing yet so I will I will grant you that. [TS]
00:15:03 ◼ ► Yet to have someone not know the perfect order of the British territories populations that is less bad than missing a [TS]
00:15:11 ◼ ► Yeah I was going to like you know turn up to the wrong country because they misunderstood gravity. [TS]
00:15:21 ◼ ► Now compared to your story of potentially blinding people the error that burned in my soul is going to compare is going [TS]
00:15:33 ◼ ► So what's this one that's top of the list this is this is top of the list and I try not to think about it [TS]
00:15:42 ◼ ► and this mistake that I made in my first video will still just pop into my head and I feel great shame [TS]
00:16:00 ◼ ► So low so I thought I should go with the advice I give hard to even build up to this but. [TS]
00:16:14 ◼ ► Right so next year Great Britain we have the island itself the geographical entity just sitting to the west. [TS]
00:16:25 ◼ ► and so in the end the video I can't remember the exact phrasing and how to laugh my head [TS]
00:16:32 ◼ ► and I say OK we have this island which is Ireland we have Northern Ireland which is part of the U.K. [TS]
00:16:42 ◼ ► and then I move on to talk about the country that takes up the rest of the islands which I made a big point. [TS]
00:16:50 ◼ ► I hammered it home that the name of this country is the Republic of Ireland. Now here's the problem. [TS]
00:17:01 ◼ ► I am a citizen of this country. Yeah right. And I say is that the name is the Republican violence. [TS]
00:17:10 ◼ ► And immediately after the video goes up I have a whole bunch of people e-mailing me going that's not the Republic of [TS]
00:17:17 ◼ ► and I think this might even happen on a public forum that might be a record of this somewhere. [TS]
00:17:22 ◼ ► I got into an argument with a guy where I said I know the name of the Republic of Ireland. [TS]
00:17:32 ◼ ► That's the name and he says that's not the name. And I go Yes it is I have my passport in the other room. [TS]
00:17:38 ◼ ► I checked it before I made the video. That's the official name. He goes check again. I go fine I will. [TS]
00:17:44 ◼ ► I walk into the next room. I look at the passport and it says Ireland. It does not say Republic of Ireland. [TS]
00:18:00 ◼ ► You know people don't think it's called Ireland but it's you know it's really the Republic of Ireland [TS]
00:18:07 ◼ ► Right and I'm a citizen of this place and I got it wrong in such a public way and I thought I had checked it [TS]
00:18:16 ◼ ► but obviously my my brain was already pre committed to this piece of information and so [TS]
00:18:22 ◼ ► when I glanced at my passport my brain was like oh yeah it's the Republic of Ireland that's what it says in that piece [TS]
00:18:33 ◼ ► and God is just awful I'm getting I'm going to put in a few people are going to say. [TS]
00:18:40 ◼ ► or perhaps you know I guess I don't know if this is really obvious to people or not [TS]
00:18:46 ◼ ► or whether it's something that it's more people who make videos think that perhaps you should point out why you haven't [TS]
00:18:52 ◼ ► and corrected it would you know it was a hard thing to say technically your title right there there's a couple things [TS]
00:19:00 ◼ ► here. But but the technical side is that it is it is difficult on You Tube to do this. [TS]
00:19:16 ◼ ► I cannot submit a fixed version of the video and have You Tube replace it with and I'm like [TS]
00:19:27 ◼ ► And this is both a blessing and a curse because I've I've spoken to other You Tubers about this. [TS]
00:19:34 ◼ ► If You Tube did allow people to correct the video to upload an amended version I would still only have that one video [TS]
00:19:49 ◼ ► and changing a whole bunch of stuff in it because even if I watch it now there's a couple places where I know there's a [TS]
00:19:54 ◼ ► few little little visual glitches you know and then listening to it again I think I'll go. [TS]
00:20:00 ◼ ► What I have to just record the whole of the audio right which would then doubtlessly introduce some kind of additional [TS]
00:20:07 ◼ ► So if You Tube did allow me to replace the videos I would have only made one video so it is a blessing in the sense [TS]
00:20:17 ◼ ► but it is it's a curse because it forces you to live with your mistakes right which is which is why I think I tend to [TS]
00:20:25 ◼ ► obsess about the stuff so much because you know once it is up there you cannot change it. [TS]
00:20:31 ◼ ► Come up with something else out there that I want to talk to you about because I know you're a stickler for things [TS]
00:20:37 ◼ ► and I don't want to come across as the advocate for romance because I hate wrongness as well you know I think that obviously [TS]
00:20:43 ◼ ► I've obviously has to be your position right you're the advocate for wrong as you are making any kind of argument [TS]
00:20:51 ◼ ► Let me put this to you I don't know if it's a term you're familiar with but I mean I used to work for the P.D. [TS]
00:21:07 ◼ ► OK I'll give you an example say there's been some some catastrophe or something's happened something something serious. [TS]
00:21:13 ◼ ► Well I don't want to belittle serious catastrophes but they happen and there's a lot of interest in them and [TS]
00:21:33 ◼ ► and information until it's been you know triple checked and confirmed by the appropriate source [TS]
00:21:37 ◼ ► and signed in triplicate. And then you get your T.V. Stations perhaps like in the U.K. [TS]
00:21:43 ◼ ► Sky which is you know a news network and they are perhaps a bit more cavalier about things [TS]
00:21:51 ◼ ► or what they hear speculation you know we're hearing that they could be five people dead. [TS]
00:22:00 ◼ ► So long and now I'll change and say well actually it turns out no one's died or that it might be. [TS]
00:22:05 ◼ ► Turns out it's even worse than we thought and this has happened and I used to work for the B.B.C. [TS]
00:22:12 ◼ ► and We used to sit in meetings sometimes and discuss this cavalier attitude and all the B.B.C. [TS]
00:22:16 ◼ ► People be very sniffy and smug and say what we would never do that and it's irresponsible to be incorrect. [TS]
00:22:22 ◼ ► But when these things happen when when a big story like this happens I find myself gravitating towards the sky [TS]
00:22:31 ◼ ► or the more gossipy the more gossipy ones because most of the time it turns out they're right and their rights are [TS]
00:22:40 ◼ ► and I think there's a case to be made for risking wrongness for the sake of sort of time and information. [TS]
00:22:51 ◼ ► Website you'll read some story that will say this politician has resigned in disgrace [TS]
00:22:57 ◼ ► and I won't tell you any more information and the first thing you do is you go straight to the tabloids and stuff [TS]
00:23:02 ◼ ► and if you find out this is what they're really going to have a mistress and I was with this celebrity and right right. [TS]
00:23:20 ◼ ► and I in this in this ten episode series we should see if we can do one on the news because I think we can have a whole [TS]
00:23:28 ◼ ► a whole separate conversation about that. Yeah but but for the fourth episode has done that. [TS]
00:23:41 ◼ ► I would say that the whole reason that those tabloids exist is because you're exactly right where the B.B.C. [TS]
00:23:49 ◼ ► Is all stiff upper lip and you know someone has resigned and we're not going to tell you why. [TS]
00:24:12 ◼ ► and I think I have a real problem with that just because of naturally people's short attention spans [TS]
00:24:24 ◼ ► and the way people memories work is that well sure a news organization can say that they're wrong but not for long. [TS]
00:24:34 ◼ ► But lots of people don't pay attention for the full duration of the story and they all know and I know why Sky [TS]
00:24:52 ◼ ► That's when I think of selling point what it was like What. So OK I I you know if I was if I was in charge of some T.V. [TS]
00:25:02 ◼ ► News organization I would try to resist that pressure but I'm not going to I'm not going to sit here [TS]
00:25:08 ◼ ► and say oh you know what those other news organizations are terrible for doing it. [TS]
00:25:12 ◼ ► I understand structurally why it happens. I would just say I think that that's that's not good. [TS]
00:25:29 ◼ ► but I do think this kind of is kind of segues into the issue of how much time can you spend researching anything. [TS]
00:25:42 ◼ ► but you are the worst person in the world to run a news network that something would happen [TS]
00:25:52 ◼ ► but I would like to hear about you know where is the where is the kind of point that is a that's a really interesting [TS]
00:26:13 ◼ ► or newspapers with a breaking story there on a certain they're on the cutting edge of one side of that the quick side. [TS]
00:26:20 ◼ ► But but even on the long side right so you know on average it takes me sort of five weeks to make the videos [TS]
00:26:32 ◼ ► and thought you know boy I had just the right amount of time I have always thought I could I could use another five [TS]
00:26:40 ◼ ► But you know I have to draw a line and say no you can't spend another five weeks on this. [TS]
00:26:50 ◼ ► and just record an animated over the weekend to just get it done right you can't continue to research. [TS]
00:26:58 ◼ ► but the the cost the way I look at it the cost of perfection is infinite in terms of time and in terms of resources. [TS]
00:27:11 ◼ ► So you're always going to have to make some judgment call about how reliable is the source [TS]
00:27:17 ◼ ► or how many experts do you want to contact before you're OK with this and I mean I will give you I will give you a. [TS]
00:27:29 ◼ ► I'll give you an example of a place where I thought my ten tendencies to continue to research [TS]
00:27:36 ◼ ► but for the last video about the CBOE effect I was really nervous about this because I felt a little bit responsible in [TS]
00:27:51 ◼ ► and I felt like there was a greater burden in a video that touches upon a medical topic to make sure that it's really [TS]
00:28:00 ◼ ► Yeah and so I ended up going through a whole bunch of research archives online trying to find papers from doctors [TS]
00:28:12 ◼ ► or researchers who had worked on this this know CBOE effect you know the opposite of the placebo. Yeah. [TS]
00:28:19 ◼ ► And I ended up sending out about twenty emails to people who had published a bunch of papers [TS]
00:28:24 ◼ ► and I ended up getting I think in the end I got six people to reply and they had looked over the script [TS]
00:28:31 ◼ ► and basically every one of them gave it a thumbs up and amazing for most of them I got a thumbs up [TS]
00:28:46 ◼ ► You know I can't have it be publicly known that I like gave is the thumbs up right because they face a similar kinds of [TS]
00:28:52 ◼ ► kinds of issues but they just say if I said the places where these people worked everybody would recognize the names. [TS]
00:29:00 ◼ ► But even after I'm getting thumbs up from people in the field I had this feeling of OK I have to [TS]
00:29:19 ◼ ► And I had to say OK I just have to stop there and I have a thumbs up from actual doctors. [TS]
00:29:28 ◼ ► but my nephew doing the tipping point for you kind of that kind of rational thought that you know well I can't do it [TS]
00:29:40 ◼ ► Well I mean that is the ugly side of the business is that at a certain point you have to pay your own bills. [TS]
00:29:46 ◼ ► Right which is which is what I don't exactly have but fairly close have a monthly cycle. [TS]
00:29:52 ◼ ► There is there is that pressure on one side of it right I can't release one video a year because I will be homeless at [TS]
00:30:01 ◼ ► but it is it is something I keep in mind very much that that the cost of perfection is infinite [TS]
00:30:14 ◼ ► and I think because of that I might not be doing another medical topic any time soon because that was a that was a very [TS]
00:30:21 ◼ ► stressful experience and I was very nervous when that one went live for quite a while. [TS]
00:30:27 ◼ ► I kept I kept waiting for some e-mail that would just you know make the whole empire crumble. [TS]
00:30:35 ◼ ► Let me ask you something else and I'm I'm not I mean I'm I'm conscious of time and we can't talk forever. [TS]
00:30:41 ◼ ► But you do talk there that sort of sources and I and this does tie into things wrong on the Internet. Yeah yeah. [TS]
00:30:56 ◼ ► and I know you spent a lot time in libraries and things like that. Is can the Internet be trusted. [TS]
00:31:00 ◼ ► The Internet represents a whole lot of things. So I think with where this comes up the most is like with Wikipedia. [TS]
00:31:10 ◼ ► when I used to teach kids there was there was a fierce debate between teachers on the pro vs the anti Wikipedia side [TS]
00:31:23 ◼ ► and I told my students if they were researching something for me like Wikipedia is totally OK copy [TS]
00:31:27 ◼ ► and pasting from Wikipedia is not. But there's no place to get a better overview from things. [TS]
00:31:34 ◼ ► You'd be amazed the number of times I've been with like top professors in the field in asking a question [TS]
00:31:39 ◼ ► and I said I'm not to sure about that let me check and gone straight to work. Yeah so. [TS]
00:31:51 ◼ ► and if if you just want to check some quick fact about something which is totally reliable there's reasons why you [TS]
00:32:09 ◼ ► but the thing that I am occasionally disturbed by is if I see something interesting on a weekly article for a topic [TS]
00:32:22 ◼ ► and try to find the original source of some comment that is mentioned in the Wiki article [TS]
00:32:28 ◼ ► or the original source of some statistic that is mentioned that extra material to talk to another day. [TS]
00:32:37 ◼ ► You can't you can't you know you can't just make a video from the Wikipedia page right. It's not possible. [TS]
00:32:43 ◼ ► But but the thing that is disturbing is the number of times that that source link doesn't go anywhere [TS]
00:32:52 ◼ ► and sometimes where the context of the source link says something that is completely contrary to the feeling that you [TS]
00:33:03 ◼ ► And so nothing in the world is perfectly reliable and it's it is hard to know when to trust a source completely [TS]
00:33:16 ◼ ► and you know for me again while the why we can have a conversation about newspapers all the time for me. [TS]
00:33:25 ◼ ► News that that is the absolute bottom of the barrel for me right that is that is if you want an accurate representation [TS]
00:33:35 ◼ ► of knowledge of the state of the world that is the worst place that you could possibly start discussing a whole bunch [TS]
00:33:46 ◼ ► Yeah maybe don't share this with them most of my best friends though so I try to write so that that is at the bottom of [TS]
00:34:00 ◼ ► And it is ultimately going to have to come down to some judgment call that I have to make [TS]
00:34:08 ◼ ► when you're looking at statistics the organization producing those statistics has some agenda right there pro [TS]
00:34:19 ◼ ► and I think on the Internet too often people will just dismiss that they'll say oh you can't trust it is that from that [TS]
00:34:27 ◼ ► But an interesting question is maybe they're pro whatever because because of those statistics. [TS]
00:34:41 ◼ ► And so there's going to be some organization that is advocating for that thing because of those statistics [TS]
00:34:50 ◼ ► and that is yeah I don't have a solid answer for that it ultimately just comes down to a judgment call [TS]
00:34:55 ◼ ► and it is very very hard sometimes to know who to trust. And at one point what point you have to stop. Stop looking. [TS]
00:35:05 ◼ ► I will just mention one one last thing here quickly which is I wish I could come up with an example off the top of my [TS]
00:35:16 ◼ ► and I come across information about how some historical figure the existence of this person is not certain [TS]
00:35:28 ◼ ► and I think history is a topic in particular where the realm of the unknown is very large. [TS]
00:35:35 ◼ ► And here's a case where I won't I won't venture venture to be wrong I'll just be vague. [TS]
00:35:40 ◼ ► Yeah I know this is true for one of the Greek philosophers that there is there is a serious debate over whether [TS]
00:35:49 ◼ ► or not they existed or whether they were just a debating tool in the writings of other philosophers. [TS]
00:35:56 ◼ ► And that's probably not going to ever be solved. Yeah right. We'll never know maybe if if you know Greek philosopher X. [TS]
00:36:04 ◼ ► Was real or not real or if they were just a rhetorical device that was used by everyone at the time or an amalgamation. [TS]
00:36:10 ◼ ► Robin Hood has sort of said today this amalgamation of a whole bunch of different rogues around at the time [TS]
00:36:19 ◼ ► Right that's the same kind of thing an infinite amount of research is never going to make that situation any more clear [TS]
00:36:36 ◼ ► or stating something too clearly which is one of the reasons why I can say my videos take a very long time because I [TS]
00:36:43 ◼ ► think sometimes if you listen to my wording I have chosen very careful wording to not explicitly say something [TS]
00:36:52 ◼ ► when I run into those kinds of situations where you know maybe maybe we don't know maybe there's some amount of uncertainty [TS]
00:36:59 ◼ ► and so I think very hard about how to get past something without necessarily bringing this up is a big problem. [TS]
00:37:06 ◼ ► And I mean I guess the other thing about internet wrongness that sort of flows from that in some ways is that we [TS]
00:37:12 ◼ ► haven't touched on is the amazing ability now for incorrect information to propagate replicate. [TS]
00:37:20 ◼ ► Spread wildly and it's become this crazy Google searches show that all the time day he went to so [TS]
00:37:30 ◼ ► Oh just happened so quickly and so you know pervading. Yeah you come across these this sort of information. [TS]
00:37:38 ◼ ► Infinite loops where the citations just go in a circle and that is very disturbing. [TS]
00:37:45 ◼ ► Or it's very hard to find out the original source of the thing because it's just so convoluted [TS]
00:37:50 ◼ ► and it makes you think of the quote right which jumps right into my head which is that you know the a lie gets halfway [TS]
00:37:54 ◼ ► around the world before the truth has a chance to put pants on which is usually quoted to Winston Churchill. [TS]
00:38:11 ◼ ► The origin of it is also uncertain and I think that's those kinds of things which is very interesting sometimes [TS]
00:38:24 ◼ ► or one hundred percent I mean unless you're a mathematician I guess mathematicians know one hundred percent. [TS]
00:38:29 ◼ ► I think there's one thing we know almost one hundred percent and that's that at times pretty much come to an end. [TS]