Google is about to walk into the Republican chainsaw...

Robear wrote:

"Call now, and for a small donation to the RNC, our dedicated Cooglers will research your question for up to 3 minutes and tell you what they've found! Get a discount with your AARP or Medicare card."

That's true. Conservative Google would be Fox News plus a 1-800 number.

DSGamer wrote:
Robear wrote:

"Call now, and for a small donation to the RNC, our dedicated Cooglers will research your question for up to 3 minutes and tell you what they've found! Get a discount with your AARP or Medicare card."

That's true. Conservative Google would be Fox News plus a 1-900 number.

Fixed it for you.

Bloo Driver wrote:

It seems like it's more fact-by-consensus than some fact 'death panel' or whatever. Not saying that's necessarily better, but it's certainly not an issue of a few people deciding truth for everyone.

Scientist at heart, or was at one time maybe, majority deciding truth for everyone still sucks.

What about majority of experts on the subject? You'd need that to actually have a semblance of objectivity. Otherwise, Bing could always use more traffic, right?

Kurrelgyre wrote:

What about majority of experts on the subject?

Same diff.

in the sciences the authority of thousands of opinions is not worth as much as one tiny spark of reason in an individual man.

Roland, it's not "majority deciding truth for everyone else". Go take a look at the project info. Among other things, it's treating well-accepted scientific results as such, but not excluding alternatives, just ranking them *as* alternatives that may not be as strongly supported by existing evidence.

It's not nearly as simplistic as you imply above.

A practical example of Google's Knowledge Vault is something they just rolled out earlier this month: info about common health issues.

If you type in "measles" you now get the following sidebar of information showing up next to your search results:

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/P7bNfBB.png)

What's also nice is that I had to dig until page four of the search results to find a single anti-vaxxer reference (and that was just an Amazon link to that child's book about an irresponsible parent who hosts a measles party for her daughter).

OG_slinger wrote:

A practical example of Google's Knowledge Vault is something they just rolled out earlier this month: info about common health issues.

If you type in "measles" you now get the following sidebar of information showing up next to your search results:

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/P7bNfBB.png)

What's also nice is that I had to dig until page four of the search results to find a single anti-vaxxer reference (and that was just an Amazon link to that child's book about an irresponsible parent who hosts a measles party for her daughter).

How it spreads needs to include "Idiots who don't vaccinate their kids"

Hopefully mom already had measles or was vaccinated, otherwise I know who's getting measles next in that picture...

RolandofGilead wrote:
Bloo Driver wrote:

It seems like it's more fact-by-consensus than some fact 'death panel' or whatever. Not saying that's necessarily better, but it's certainly not an issue of a few people deciding truth for everyone.

Scientist at heart, or was at one time maybe, majority deciding truth for everyone still sucks.

How do you think Google works now? Their algorithms are mainly based on things like the text people write when linking to webpages and whether or not people commonly click a particular page when looking for info on a topic.

It's already driven by majority consensus and popularity.

Demyx, the new system will reference reference sources and the knowledge base to allow accuracy to trump popularity. It's a few steps beyond fancy link counting.

Robear wrote:

Demyx, the new system will reference reference sources and the knowledge base to allow accuracy to trump popularity. It's a few steps beyond fancy link counting.

Yes? That's what I was saying?

Demosthenes wrote:

Hopefully mom already had measles or was vaccinated, otherwise I know who's getting measles next in that picture...

The orthodox jewish kids her daughter goes to school with?

Robear wrote:

Roland, it's not "majority deciding truth for everyone else". Go take a look at the project info. Among other things, it's treating well-accepted scientific results as such, but not excluding alternatives, just ranking them *as* alternatives that may not be as strongly supported by existing evidence.

It's not nearly as simplistic as you imply above.

Not having read everything about it, yes, I'm aware of how it works and how google search works currently. It is a further step toward automating portions of thinking. This is incredibly powerful, useful, good, and still potentially misleading.
Seemingly by necessity, given the large amount of stuff in the world one should know about, and I'm pretty sure I've gotten stupider over time, it can be of benefit, but should never be a crutch.
What then, is the difference between a crutch and a scaffold allowing one to build humanity's monuments ever higher? I know not.

I think you're carrying the discussion way farther than the topic at hand.

...And it's already started the FUD machine on the right...

Anthony Watts wrote:

“I worry about this issue greatly… My site gets a significant portion of its daily traffic from Google,” Anthony Watts, who runs Watts Up With That, a popular blog that is skeptical of global warming claims, told FoxNews.com.

“It is a very slippery and dangerous slope because there’s no arguing with a machine,” he added.

Rich Noyes wrote:

“They’re very good at debunking myths if they upset liberals, but if it’s a liberal or left-wing falsehood, the fact-checkers don’t seem as excited about debunking it,” Rich Noyes, research director at the Media Research Center, told FoxNews.com.

He cited a 2013 study by George Mason University researchers, which found that fact-checking site Politifact declared 52% of Republican claims it looked at to be false, but did the same to just 24% of Democratic claims.

Noyes added that he thinks the example the researchers use in their paper is telling.

“Barack Obama being born in Kenya is of course a false statement, but the fact that they use that example sort of says where their mindset is. What about using something that Rosie O’Donnell said about 9/11 being a conspiracy? Is that going to get equal prominence in this kind of search algorithm?” he asked.

Be fearful, be uncertain, and above all, DOUBT!

Of course there is zero possibility that 52% of Republican claims are false while 24% of Democratic claims are false.

Of course not, that wouldn't be fair or balanced.

“They’re very good at debunking myths if they upset liberals, but if it’s a liberal or left-wing falsehood, the fact-checkers don’t seem as excited about debunking it,” Rich Noyes, research director at the Media Research Center, told FoxNews.com.

He cited a 2013 study by George Mason University researchers, which found that fact-checking site Politifact declared 52% of Republican claims it looked at to be false, but did the same to just 24% of Democratic claims.

...wow, that is some serious reading comprehension failure there. He really thinks that means that Politifact did more work analyzing Republican claims than Democratic claims, doesn't he?

Noyes added that he thinks the example the researchers use in their paper is telling.

“Barack Obama being born in Kenya is of course a false statement, but the fact that they use that example sort of says where their mindset is. What about using something that Rosie O’Donnell said about 9/11 being a conspiracy? Is that going to get equal prominence in this kind of search algorithm?” he asked.

In that it will likely be shot to hell in terms of search results? Probably, yes actually. You're going to be about equally unlikely to run into Birther or 9/11 Conspiracy Theorists.

imbiginjapan wrote:

Of course there is zero possibility that 52% of Republican claims are false while 24% of Democratic claims are false.

Probability dictates a 50/50 split between true/false. The data indicates that republicans are responding randomly whereas democrats appear deviating from responding "naturally".

/s

Somewhat off topic, the idea of a "study" conducted on Politifact to give those ratios makes me think someone was hoodwinked out of some research grant money. "We're going to conduct a study that totally won't take five minutes because computers are a thing. Promise. Money please."

Tyops wrote:

Probability dictates a 50/50 split between true/false.

Buh-wuh? The responses are not random, why would you expect a 50/50 split? The split depends on the question.

For example, let's look at a different binary question. "Should you leave a burning building? Yes or No" is a good one. Do you expect a 50/50 split in the yes/no responses to that?

Robear wrote:
Tyops wrote:

Probability dictates a 50/50 split between true/false.

Buh-wuh? The responses are not random, why would you expect a 50/50 split? The split depends on the question.

For example, let's look at a different binary question. "Should you leave a burning building? Yes or No" is a good one. Do you expect a 50/50 split in the yes/no responses to that? :-)

Either it will happen or it won't, 50/50 chance: http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/hz...

Robear wrote:

Buh-wuh?

Tyops wrote:

/s

Robear wrote:

For example, let's look at a different binary question. "Should you leave a burning building? Yes or No" is a good one. Do you expect a 50/50 split in the yes/no responses to that? :-)

...Where does Obama stand on this leaving the burning building issue?

SpacePPoliceman wrote:
Robear wrote:

For example, let's look at a different binary question. "Should you leave a burning building? Yes or No" is a good one. Do you expect a 50/50 split in the yes/no responses to that? :-)

...Where does Obama stand on this leaving the burning building issue?

He didn't start the fire

Yonder wrote:
Robear wrote:

Buh-wuh?

Tyops wrote:

/s

So, I just learned what /s is recently. Here's the thing, it's not actually a standard in communication. When you use it you're going to have to accept that you're inevitably going to confuse some people and then you'll need to explain yourself better. If, like me, you type "/s" into Google it just tells you Sprint's stock information.

For everyone who doesn't know /s is a sarcasm mark. It's entered minority use and people appear to expect it to propagate via web-based telepathy.

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/IW8simF.gif)

I've only seen it used here. We've had *multiple* fights based on misread sarcasm, and the /s tag seems to have organically beaten the green font tag. Here, anyway.

It's not perfect but better than nothing!

I don't have a problem with it, but I've seen multiple people get really snarky/defensive when the person/audience they're addressing has no idea what it is. Or that it's something worth noting, as opposed to broken markup, in the first place.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:
Robear wrote:

For example, let's look at a different binary question. "Should you leave a burning building? Yes or No" is a good one. Do you expect a 50/50 split in the yes/no responses to that? :-)

...Where does Obama stand on this leaving the burning building issue?

Pretty much this... i assumed the absurdity of my statement would stand on it's own. Sorry about the derail.