there is a disconnect between the stated mission of a free and open Internet and the reality of search algorithms, which come with all the messy biases of anything designed by humans.
This is an example of a negative consequence of algorithms working in society.
"People equate the position of search results with how true they are," Epstein explains. "What's higher is better. What's higher is truer."
This relates to the previous article for this week about search engines trying to find the best answer and using the most popular. Here, it is people who are assuming that what is at the top is the best and the most correct. However, as we know from the previous article and what the author is saying here, this is not the case.
Oftentimes, “best answer” means “top result,”
Best and most popular are not the same. Therefore, this means that picking the top result and using it as the best answer is not always going to be the same either.
the Amazon Echo–like home-assistant chatbot speaker that’s supposed to answer any question automatically and accurately (key word: supposed to).
This is important to emphasize, SUPPOSED TO. These search engines put out a lot of information and are supposed to be correct, but they are not always. The biggest problem with this is that most people believe everything Google puts out. Furthermore, as kids are becoming more reliant on these devices like the Amazon Alexa, they will only go to those search engines when they have a question and will take that answer as fact and never question it. Huge issue in my opinion.
. It not only allows you to share from a more authoritative source, which is good for society and the economics of publishing, but it allows you provide your readers helpful context
This shows another way that we as students, as well as researchers, can help create a better online environment. I am really glad that I know how to do this and I think if other students came to know this it would be greatly beneficial.
Comedian Amy Schumer may have contributed to the revival of this fake meme. She put it on Instagram, adding at the end of a lengthy message, “Yes this quote is fake but it doesn’t matter.”
This is a whole other problem in itself. Having people know something is fake but still sharing it because they want to not only encourages fake news, but it also perpetuates it for those readers that do not do these fact checking things.
Consider the source. In recent months, we’ve fact-checked fake news from abcnews.com.co (not the actual URL for ABC News), WTOE 5 News (whose “about” page says it’s “a fantasy news website”), and the Boston Tribune (whose “contact us” page lists only a gmail address).
I find it so crazy that websites go to such lengths to make them appear real. Additionally, I have never really thought about doing any of these things when reading any type of news or article that is shared that I end up reading. Really fascinating insight.
So enough of the “this isn’t great either”, enough of the “eh”. What’s your best option for spending that trust? Why?
I have never really thought about this and if I as a student do this myself. However, I think this article makes good points on how to evaluate your trust in sources and why it is beneficial. I also think the advice here to think about what our best option for spending that trust is and why is important as well as worthwhile.
“The key takeaway is really that content that arouses strong emotions spreads further, faster, more deeply, and more broadly on Twitter,”
I think this can be said for all content in the media.
How does the computer know what truth is?
Think this is a really good question that they asked and as a result it clearly made the study more accurate. We should all ask these hard questions when doing research.
“[Fake news] has become a white-hot political and, really, cultural topic,
I see this being true in that fake news does not only impact politics, but also culture topics as well. With that being said, it is a problem that it is so widespread and dominant in basically all information.
Fake news prospers, the authors write, “because humans, not robots, are more likely to spread it.”
This is a sad reality that it is in our human nature to spread falsehoods. I think that this is a realization that many would not want to come to, but it is one that needs to be stated. In making this fact more known it could make society as a whole be more aware of what we share and spread.
“This is not about doing gotcha with industry. It’s about how to restore trust.”
I think this is a great quote to end the article with because it shows the scope of what companies are doing. With that being said, companies are so convoluted in retaining profits that they are not doing what they are supposed to be doing, which is developing drugs to actually help people. I am blown away by the magnitude to which this is happening in the medical industry.
The researchers in the RECORD trial had many financial ties to the company, too.
Here again, the financial ties to these companies are a huge issue in distorting the truth. Maybe anyone who has ties to companies should not be allowed to conduct research about that companies drug and it would eliminate the amount of falsified information that is published.
The company, however, was aware of potential dangers.
This shows where the root cause is, which is not in the researchers, but the company's personal interests. Communication is clearly a huge element here.
“We don’t know. But we think we get most of them.”
I think it is important to realize that the editors of these journals are trying to find all the biases to the best of their ability, but there are some that they just do not see.
“On the one hand, there are a lot of important industry-funded studies that are accurate, relevant and useful,” said Jerry Avorn, a Harvard professor who has specialized in spotting adverse events from drug use. “There is also a multi-year history of abuse and distortion.”
This shows the difficulty that arises when funds are used incorrectly-it discredits the good work that was funded.
it has become a common practice that reflects the growing role of industry money in research.
This seems like a clear problem that is impacting the amount of accurate research being published. While money and funds are necessary to produce experiments and research at times, it becomes a problem when it is functioning in a way that is not to further the goal of providing new and truthful knowledge. It seems like this industry money is like interest groups in politics.
"The international literature show that when women submit work, there is no bias in it being accepted, but the likelihood of women submitting work may be lower,"
While I think this is an interesting explanation to the data, I am not sure if it is that clear cut to say there is no bias in it.
What's notable, says Mr. Bergstrom, is the way some of those differences mirror gender-role stereotypes.
I think this is a really interesting point and it is important to see how stereotypes can seriously hurt progress. Even being a woman college student has made choosing a major or minor hard with the stereotypes around certain subjects. For example, choosing to be an economics minor has shown me the few female students who choose to pursue study in this area. It should be encouraged for women to venture into these areas and the gap needs to be closed and I do think eliminating stereotypes will help this.
"If I'm writing with a man, he may be more likely to insist he be first," Ms. Correll says. "When women negotiate in general, they are less likely to be successful. People don't consider their requests as legitimate."
I never thought of this being an issue, but it is very much an issue in society with things like the wage gap. To see that it extends to things this specific and what the impacts of such are is really disheartening.
"This has never been done on this scale before," says Mr. West.
I think the fact that this article was published in 2012 and there had never been such research done before that time shows a problem in itself.
Then, we need to step back and listen.
I think this a key part that does not need to be overlooked. We need to listen, not just step back.
even if/when they have fellow Latin American colleagues whose work is more on point.
I think this is another issue that is again detrimental to our learning. It is hurting the audience who reads these works. They will reference the citations and be cut short because they are not aware that someone else actually produced better work but it was not allowed to be cited. As someone who looks at citations in other works a lot to find other sources, this bothers me because I would much rather have the work of someone who was more accurate. However, I see that this is not an option for these authors because they want to get their works published in the first place and doing so requires them to cite the other researchers.
Clearly this was an important issue up for discussion, one that the majority of the attendees wished to see addressed. But because it was not a priority for the white, colonial scholarly commons agenda, it was relegated, literally and physically, to the margins, ghettoized from the main discourse
This unfortunately seems to happen in a lot of different facets of our society and it is clearly detrimental to learning. In order to grow, we need to engage in all types of discussion, not just the ones we think benefit us the most or not. I think our class is doing a good job of challenging us to engage in discussions that deal with topics across the spectrum to really get us to think more critically.
“If there is an outcry, the question will be whether it ends up being significant enough that the system reverses course. I would be surprised if that happened.”
I agree in the fact I would be surprised if there was a lot of backlash just because, as the article mentions, there is other articles that Elsevier has published that is freely open.
she was impressed that an American university was able to "take a principled stand" and gain support for the move among its faculty members.
After understanding the scope of how much money institutions pay for journal articles, I think what UC did is very impressive because they took a risk in order to stand up for what they thought was right.
that taxpayer-funded research should be as “freely and widely available as possible.”
I was unaware of just how much funded research was not freely available to the public, which I think plays into the previous article we looked at about information privilege.
Questioning underlying assumptions takes effort, but effort is far more compelling than internalizing and reproducing obligatory tasks.
Again, I think this goes back to the issues of a grading system and that students just do what the teacher asks without really caring about what they are doing for their own personal curiosity. This is clearly also a negative impact of information privilege as well. Overall, I think students should try to engage with information and assignments with an intended goal to learn and gain something for their own personal benefit rather than just checking a box for a class or a teacher.
One facet of challenging information privilege is involving students in a process of leveraging institutional resources to create products that contribute to a broader public discourse (as opposed to ending up in recycling bins and/or behind closed institutional doors).
I really like how the author here mentions this because it relates to what our class is trying to do now, which is create something that does not just disappear after the class is over. Furthermore, I do think that students in general write research papers or create class projects for a grade and then never touch those works again, which conflates the problem of grades that we have talked about with this idea of information privilege.
“Why can’t we use this stuff after we graduate?”
This is common phrase that myself and some of my friends have started to say as we approach graduation in a month. This statement also plays into what the article is getting at. I personally have never truly thought about the kind of information privilege I have, but reading this article and now seeing this statement I can see the concept at play in my own life.
“I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change. I amchanging the things I cannot accept.”
I think this quote really embodies what one should think about when wanting to be an activist. Student activism can be criticized for only pointing out the problems but not giving any ways to change them. While this quote does make it seem easier said than done, I do think there is an immense truth to it. While it is daunting to try to make change in a big world, it is the only way to address things that you do not agree with. Simply by pointing out the wrongs in society will not make them go away, but rather one needs to take those problems and work to fix them.
There is a lot of complexity in where one’s free speech ends and another’s begins. What if activismmeans banning speech you do not want to hear? What would be the short term and lasting implications ifall our demands for silencing voices and removing symbols we find offensive were totally met? How canwe help students understand the complexity of issues surrounding free speech?
In my opinion these are groundbreaking questions that need to be given more attention to in the context of student activism. One forgets at times that free speech extends to those who have a different opinion and therefore should not be barred from being heard. Additionally, as the author discusses in the above paragraphs, it is important to deliberate and discuss opposing views rather than only listening to one sides opinion. A lot of the time in our society we do not truly discuss everything going on, but only focus on parts of what is going on and I do not think that operating in that way will ever create full social change that is beneficial. Rather, doing so creates a fragmented picture for an audience that may or may not understand the topic at hand.
They have access to Internet and social mediatools we never imagined. In addition, they are far more broadly and deeply engaged in community service,through student organizations, faith communities, service-learning courses, alternative breaks, and numerousother organized activities.
As the author notes here, I think that the Internet and social media outlets has changed the scope of student activism entirely. Additionally, such media sources combined with engagement in community groups has led to a new thinking and imagining for students in this day and age. Whether these new sources can be deemed good for impacting social change is all about how one uses them and that is something I believe needs to be discussed more. For example, one can look to many different college campuses and see how social media has been used for good and has been used for bad.
But unlike in class when you can see the introverted learner listening and comprehending, online their presence is, well, absent.
One can easily assume that an introverted learner would be better suited for online learning. However, after reading this paragraph I can clearly see how false that can be. This statement shows how an introvert, by nature, would not want to appear at all in an online learning classroom and therefore no one would know or care to know if they were learning like they would in a face-to-face classroom. As someone who was very quiet at the start of college, I gained confidence to speak up through my face-to-face classes and not in online learning classes I took.
but how to reach students, how to create rigorous, invigorating discussions, how to build opportunities for peer-driven learning, how to grow academics in that space, or how to incorporate those more boundary-pushing pedagogies into digital teaching.
I think that this is something that needs to be prioritized in some face-to-face classes as well. For example, there are courses that are taught in a classroom that are taught lecture style with power points that are posted online so some students do not even take notes or pay attention and do not even speak to the students in their class. Therefore, there is no peer-driven learning or collaborative exercises. While I do agree that online teaching needs this more than face-to-face courses, I think that all learning environments should strive for this.
Sure enough, the children who were told to think about their performance now wanted to know how they had done relative to their peers; those who had been allowed to become immersed in the task were more interested in seeing what their peers had done.
This evidence shows a scary reality that grading systems make individuals care more about their own personal performance, which then hinders them from learning from their peers. From experience, exercises where we were peer evaluated but not given a grade made me more interested to see what my classmates had written in order to build on my own work. However, when I thought I was getting a grade regardless of the peer review comments, I cared more about what the teacher gave me than what my fellow classmate thought of my work.
because they’re “unmotivated” but because they’re rational.
I think that this statement provides a new insight to what could be perceived as a negative connotation towards students who do this. Often we hear the phrase "taking the easy way out", and view it as something that makes that person less intelligent or less motivated, as stated here. However, this reveals that really people are just being rational and using their own benchmark for how to achieve success.