Pinker: “News is a misleading way to understand the world” | Hacker News Reader

Pinker: “News is a misleading way to understand the world”

vox.com

176 pointsjseliger87 comments

I've found, for myself, traveling a good portion of the US by bicycle tempers my pessimism about the world.

Bad things happen, to be sure, and it is good (I think) to stay informed of the news, but it is also good to see how kind, generous and caring most people are, and also how people not of your political, religious, or cultural ilk are not exactly the ignorant or immoral monsters you may have thought.

Anh, this isn't a great model of humanity in my opinion. Most people seem pretty good when you talk to them, but we're all involved in massive negative externalities right now. Pinker might be right that we're less violent than we used to be, but we're just as greedy (if not more), and I think all that ill behavior is being channeled somewhere else. Where? The environment of course.

Wealth has spread and poverty has diminished in the world, but we really shot ourselves in the foot doing it. Unless a massive technological innovation comes along in the next 30 years Pinker's observations are going to seem moronic (sure we were less violent, but billions of people ended up dying).

Edit:

To prove my point do a Ctrl-F and search for "environment" or "climate" in this article, you won't find them.

I think it's misleading to infer too much from that. Most people are nice to strangers, face to face. Maybe it's that you're suddenly a member of each other's in-group, and forming a basis to exclude the other person (becoming enemies) requires some initial behavioral or ideological incompatibility and enough time for it to germinate into enough of a conflict to sabotage the automatic friendly social interaction. However, just because strangers generally get along when they meet randomly, that doesn't say anything about the major problems that cause people to not get along once they know each other—incompatible ideologies, behavioral patterns that the other person can't tolerate, and so on.

To pivot to another realm, a cop can be the nicest person in the world if you hang out with them at a neighborhood barbecue, and the next week they can be harassing people and ruining lives over drug possession.

I agree with you. And yes, in my travels I have met, for instance, racist cops who are quite nice to me. (I am white.)

Still. I see that the people who are the most afraid, the most angry, the most surprised that I would trust strangers not to kill me, are the people that watch the most news. They simply do not trust strangers, at all.

The answer, I think, is somewhere in the middle.

"If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you're mis-informed."

Mark Twain

The news is a method of attempting to become informed about the state of the world exclusively through the examination of outliers. It's broken by design.

very well put - concise and to the point!

well, IMO news should also cover the issues that affect the masses, yes, an accident in a refinery is an outlier but a vote on carbon taxes in congress is something that affect us all.

The problem with today's mainstream media is that they don't talk a lot about the big issues but those outliers. If we focus on the things that matter well yes we're not in the middle ages but we're not in the best shape possible as a civilization.

It is good to read the news if you have an understanding of what the media is trying to achieve. There should be a "News 101" class at every university to help students navigating the deluge of information - especially to help them understand what the media conglomerates are and how their business works. Mostly everything that is written follows an agenda that is set by advertisers, political positions of the owners of the particular media group, and national interests. If you don't understand this, reading the news is just like being brainwashed.

University? Try 3rd grade.

This analysis is called "deconstruction", i.e. understanding the cultural background and the advocacy of the author. This not only applies to news, but any media- movies, literature, art, etc. Supposedly people should learn how to do this in high school.

No it isn't. It's plain old `critical thinking` https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_thinking

Deconstruction is something else.

It could also be called taking a sociological view on the way the media works.

Newspapers used to make a healthy profit from tiny ads. Network news used to be run at a loss by the tv networks. The introduction of CNN made news into a huge money maker. Craigslist ate the lunch of most newspapers.

Now, the internet (especially social networks) has made everything a race for attention. Now the New York Times has to compete and worry about Buzzfeed.

All of these trends now just reward attention more than anything. The standards for journalism are eroded when outlets like Buzzfeed allow anyone to write content, get it indexed by Google and then track how popular that piece of content gets and automatically promote it.

In a world like that, we get the loudest, angriest, most emotionally wrenching things; context, nuance and facts be damned.

Whatever you think of his politics, Donald Trump wouldn't be where he is without his savvy use of the media. He has exploited the weakness in our current system all the way to top of one of the two major parties in the most powerful country in the free world. All to the horror, shock and dismay of the vast majority of people who work in the media disagreeing with Trump's politics.

You're disregarding the role of subscriptions in supporting newspapers. The internet obviously has made print news delivered to your doorstep obsolete. Even now, subscription-only news outlets are doing okay, such as the Financial Times, and niche papers.

One way to possibly fix this might be to start a #NoBloodMoney movement that would target advertisers who advertise in news segments about events where people have died.

People's deaths should not be used by the media company to make money, nor should people's deaths be used to try to generate interest in your product.

If enough people targeted the advertisers ("Ever since watching an ad for <your product> during a news segment about <an event in which somebody died> I just associate <your product> with death and sadness"), I think we could get the media companies to stop running an excess of these kinds of stories.

#NoBloodMoney - media companies should not profit off of other's misery.

I like your idea. I've felt this way for years. The news uses people's death and suffering to get eyeballs on advertisements.

Human misery isn't something most companies want to be associated with. For that reason, many companies don't want their ads to run next to content like that. I've personally had to quickly pull ads off a site because of that fact.

I've been occasionally fascinated that newspapers don't have a flag in their CMSs for articles that are crass to plaster with ads.

The New York Times seems to do this:

http://www.niemanlab.org/2015/03/an-ad-blocker-for-tragedies...

If a story is marked as sensitive, an option is set and ads aren't shown on it.

The Guardian has this too. And I've done this on a few sites I've worked with as well.

We developed that flag after the incident I referred too.

Gmail did something like this back when it had ads. If it detected an email related to a death, it would attempt to block related ads from displaying above the content, so you didn't get pestered with ads for funeral services while receiving news of a loved one's death. From my understanding, it didn't always work, but was an interesting first step.

I don't know if other Google services now incorporate similar behavior.

(This is the earliest reference I can find to the behavior: http://staugustine.com/stories/060504/bus_2366168.shtml)

If this works at all, it's likely to work to well, in that news outlets will tend to suppress stories because they mention suffering. Some of those stories are actually important. There's probably no easy solution; balanced news is probably not a stable equilibrium.

> #NoBloodMoney - media companies should not profit off of other's misery.

What about informing the public, though? The logical conclusion to this idea is that news organisations will have less incentive to cover news stories that result in human death. Is that really what we want?

Incidentally, a number of news organisations already have a CMS flag for content of this nature anyway, which in many ways presents more problems - how tragic is sufficiently tragic to block ads?

The real problem here is profit-based news. The answer is already out there in the form of the BBC and other public news outlets that do not depend on advertising. Alas, the US is not coming close to such a model any time soon.

> There has probably been a slight increase in the rate of violent crime in the US in 2015, and I say probably because the FBI figures are still not out for that year.

> But even then that wouldn’t even be as high as it was in 2012, just three years ago, and that itself is a huge decrease in the levels of '60s, '70, and '80s in the US, where violent crime has fallen by more than half. So there is probably an uptick for 2015 and 2016. But it’s just a wiggle in a curve that’s been going down, down, down.

I'm not a member of the NRA and I don't own a gun. Personally, I'm ok with a ton of gun-control laws. All the gun-control laws you wanna pass, I'm ok with. Second amendment rights are not high on my personal priority list.

But, still, I sometimes wonder why there is such a hard push for more gun-control laws every year given this decreasing level of domestic violence.

> But, still, I sometimes wonder why there is such a hard push for more gun-control laws every year given this decreasing level of domestic violence.

Another thing to ponder is why the focus on semiautomatic rifles, when 1, violent crime overwhelmingly uses handguns, and 2, the previous assault weapon ban was deemed ineffective by the DOJ. And what is the basis for proposing expanded background checks in response to, for example, the Orlando mass shooting when the shooter not only passed a background check, but had a security guard license (which itself has a more intensive background check).

Same politicians accusing others using fear and ignorance seem to be using fear and ignorance vigorously

While I dislike describing these things ("He's a gun nut! He'll kill us! People like him should be locked up!" are common reactions to simple facts) there are multiple reasons rifles are lumped in.

- Any additional regulation sounds like progress to voters in favor of it. It can be nonsensical, unenforceable, make criminals out of previously law-abiding citizens (CA magazine size laws), be disregarded publicly by police departments, and they will still cheer for it.

- They are mostly used for target practice, hunting, pest control, and some home defense. People who vote for gun control typically don't do these things. Questions of the form "Why do you need (X number of rounds | optics | calibers | forward grips)?" sound reasonable to them; if you have ever faced a bear / pack of coyotes / intruders it's pretty self explanatory.

- They are the only real firearms that can present a significant threat to trained teams. Rifles can be aimed precisely, deliver a good sustained rate of fire, and punch through body armor, all from 500 yards.

- With a good amount of practice and .308-.50 rounds, you can take down opposing vehicles and assets (power stations, fuel tanks, etc), and have enough distance between you and the target to exit the area safely.

For those in favor of gun control (beyond what we have currently) on HN, let me ask: How well do you think you would fair in a large riot / national emergency / civil war armed with only a SAFE Act compliant handgun? These things do and will happen, maybe not in your lifetime, but certainly in the future. The laws we enact should not just be focused on making us feel safe. They should consider those that may have to justly defend themselves against a larger force.

This is the Democrats' abortion: an issue they have total ideological lock from in their core constituencies that they will never have to deliver on but can always use to fundraise.

Wow I never looked at abortion and gun control like that. What an interesting perspective!

Republicans have been successful in implementing measures for their cause, whereas gun control just seems to be a back and forth issue that, I believe, is tipping in the Republican's favor

> why there is such a hard push for more gun-control laws every year given this decreasing level of domestic violence.

I'm embarrassed to cite a Batman film, but the off-touted speech the Joker gives sums it up quite well. People are generally not concerned about death and destruction. As long as it is predictable people won't fear it, even if it is statistically extremely likely to hurt them like cars or alcohol. What we fear is unpredictable violence. In order to sleep well, we don't need to be safe, we just need to know that we performed our safety ritual. Random violence casts our safety rituals into question, making it harder to sleep. So we need a secondary safety ritual: ruffled conversations with our peers about gun control and the like, and how awful our opposition is for bringing chaos into the world. Impractical aims like gun control are perfect because we can perpetually blame the failure on opposition, which makes our secondary safety ritual indestructible.

“If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it’s all ‘part of the plan’. But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well then everyone loses their minds!”

We differ, I revere the second amendment as much as I love civil rights, free speech, etc. Polarization these days leads to condescension and slander if you don't agree, it's a very easy/lazy political tactic to deploy in our everlasting outrage culture, which is why politicians get away with very, very emotional and inconclusive arguments

I am a member of NRA and I originally come from India which has tighter gun control laws than colonial laws. (You need a license to own a low fps air gun, replica gun or a movie prop gun).

The real issue with guns in USA I think is that the people totally ignore the secondary benefits of a well armed population. The best use of a gun is when it is not used at all. It is inconceivable in USA that a band of 10 people will simply raid a farmer's farm and steal all his produce while the farmer watches helplessly. (Nearest cop is 10 miles away). In India I have seen that happening.

In India I have seen any random political movement with 2 goons as their head barge into a market and force a shutdown as merchants helplessly comply.

All it needs in this case is someone getting shot dead as a deterrent. I think the general respect of individual freedoms and private property in USA has made it prosperous and that respect mostly comes from the fact that Americans will not hesitate to take matters in their own hand.

While London might have Sharia courts running in their streets and various muslim populated beaches in India throw out tourist women if they are less modestly dressed but that wont happen in USA because there will always be one person in 100 with a shotgun in his hand.

If Americans lose their guns they will continue to lose their other rights one by one.

I don't think this is a fair characterization. This sort of marauding does not happen in any Western country, despite most Western countries having tighter gun control than India. The USA being the exception does not inspire much confidence in the argument.

You're right that India has a lot of problems. Arming the Indian populace is not a solution, though, unless you hope to see a civil war break out.

> If Americans lose their guns they will continue to lose their other rights one by one.

Well that escalated quickly. The rest of your post almost had me (a Dutchman) believe guns aren't actually that bad.

> As long as media will give endless publicity to multiple murderers, they create a niche for people who want to make a difference for a political cause or their own ego.

Right on.

News is there to Entertain not Educate. IMO, the steady decline in reporting has a more to do with other forms of entertainment showing up and gaining traction than anything else.

I think a lot of news is there because it's influential. For example, the newspapers are totally awful money losing businesses, yet they stick around because of their political influence value.

Historically newspapers where money printing machines. Compared to say magazine's the industry has done very well over time and some of them are still rather profitable. However, this is a much broader trend even combining TV, Newspapers, Radio, and the internet we are simply employing fewer investigative reporters.

The question is, what less misleading alternative is there? Social media?

Unbiased ideologically neutral sites like Hacker News!

I'm so glad I had swallowed my coffee before reading this.

At least when you come to the comment sections, you get a whole load of competing individual perspectives, rather than the single one the original article purveys.

Most popular, pervading opinions are continually challenged, re-examined, and refined. Debates wholly grapple through the complete meaning of the issue from a wide range of perspectives without resulting to name calling, ad hominem attacks, tone policing, etc.

Within a narrow sphere, but the Hacker news audience is limited in diversity - and because of this so are the range of debates that go on here.

Generally speaking Hacker News focuses on upper middle class American issues. When we talk about the less well off its generally from the top looking down. Watch next time for the comments of the form "I'd gladly pay more taxes so XYZ wouldn't have to go through this". Few commenters ever truly see themselves personally getting into one of these situations.

In terms of politics this site is heavily westernized. Communism and the Chinese system does have some nice features (along with the bad), but its rare to see threads here explore the benefits.

None of this is necessarily bad, and I'd argue this site gives you a broader view of the world than reading traditional news. However its far from a zeitgeist of what's "really happening" in the world.

My comment was a heavy does of <sarcasm />. I wholeheartedly agree with your viewpoints though.

which is why comments in any major media are now completely polluted by professional influencers.

The ability to downvote doesn't help this.

I don't see why: if anything, I'd argue that it's just a layer of metacommentary. Just as not all articles are equally informative, not all opinions are equally informative.

The quality of the downvotes depends on the quality of the community.

Downvoting leads to groupthink in ways that upvoting does not.

It is true that upvoting leads to different kinds of groupthink.

Books, novels, non-fiction.

Low-latency mediums are usually event-based ("Breaking News! You can't guess what just happened!").

High-latency mediums have the time to be understanding-based.

Timing is an interesting component. Time certainly helps to separate fact from fiction, and important facts from not-so important facts.

However, I don't think it prevents bias, either from the authors own ideology or the status-quo at the time of writing.

EDIT: Also, access to past facts can be limited as well. History being written by the victors, etc.

I've seen this being used by people arguing that it is why they read the papers rather than get their news online, unaware that the articles are written to the same deadlines, so they are simply getting the same information, but late.

Read news magazines that are published weekly (like The Economist) or monthly (like The Atlantic or Foreign Affairs).

Both of those are online.

I think you are confusing:

"we must get the story online within 5 minutes of it happening"

and

"Story written over a few hours/days/weeks and then published online"

Even moving from daily to weekly publications will improve the quality of the information. There's usually still a distorting focus on outlier events but they can generally afford to take the time to provide more context and wait for more facts to come in.

My theory is that slow news, like slow food, is better for you. I think the quality of weekly news magazines (like New Yorker) is superior to daily newspapers, which are themselves superior to web sites. By my theory, social media is the worst of all.

Read annual reports on crime stats and other things from your local, state, and federal governments (or equivalent). The world does not change so quickly. The rare time when news actually IS of practical importance to you (like with Flint MI water or the NC water issues) someone will probably tell you about it. Most of the news focuses on the tails of the distributions of things that happen, otherwise it wouldn't be 'news.' Thus if you use the news as a measure of what happens you are taking it from a source of things that literally almost never happen.

More news sources, filtered separately by different biases, weighted by S/N ratio.

Read history, philosophy, psychology, travel and talk to people (not "important" people, just people). That will learn you everything about the how and why human world is today.

Read science. Actual science not studies paid for by X industry/gov. That will learn you everything else.

Yes, this is hard. Probably more than one person can do. Which is why it is safe to assume you, nor anyone else who is talking at you knows what they are talking about.

"Actual science not studies paid for by X industry/gov."

What science isn't funded by either industry or government?

It's very hard to find any scientific/academic communities not penetrated by industry/gov't groupthink. Even academia is political and bought and paid for.

There is a small amount of work that is funded by private philanthropic organizations (e.g., Simon, Templeton), but these come with their own biases. In principle you could look for places that shield researches from influence by guaranteeing funding regardless of results, but this is almost nonexistent. Even tenured professors are very much driven by the carrot of research funds to buy equipment, pay underlings, or buy-out teaching responsibilities.

There's difference between funding science and funding a study that shows "whatever thing you want people to believe to sell your product". The latter is typically what gets regurgitated by news as "science" and what I referring to.

My meaning was, that you should learn science. Not just listen to what people tell you that sounds "sciency".

I think it's good to follow niche topics that you have an interest in. For general news, I think it's better to follow certain journalists who've given a good picture of where things are going over time. I'm not going to mention any names, but if you listen to a lot of people and podcasts you'll eventually find trusted people who can read the news for you and find things that have real significance. The people I listen to on political and world issues put out stuff maybe a few times a month.

Sometimes it's good to listen to their old podcasts and read their old articles and ask yourself if anything in those old podcasts and articles is still relevant. Did they recognize events changing the world or where they just focusing on clickbait B.S. The mark of crappy news is that if you read news from it a year ago absolutely none of it will matter now.

If your job does not require you to be aware of 24/7 news, weekly journals can be a good alternative.

Automatically written articles drawing data from feeds. I just hope the inference engine doesn't take "likes" into account. (I'm going to be disappointed.)

  It’s always about events that happened and not about things that didn’t happen.

This conversation and the above quote in particular remind me of this article posted here a while back: "Why the world is not falling apart" (http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/foreigners/2...)

  We never see a reporter saying to the camera, “Here we are, live from a country where a war has not broken out”—or a city that has not been bombed, or a school that has not been shot up.

I'm all for the right for free speech, but that doesn't mean that deliberate fear-mongering shouldn't be reprimanded.

> deliberate fear-mongering [should] be reprimanded.

By whom?

That's a fair question and, not being hugely familiar with the legal system, I'm not sure what that would fall under. I'm thinking something along the lines of intentional deceit or unfair/manipulative representation of facts, but I'll admit to not knowing nearly enough about the law to point to anything in particular.

As long as it needs to be intentional, I could maybe see it. I imagine it'd be difficult to prove intent, though.

"Manipulative representation of facts" is tricky, because every representation aside from raw data has been manipulated in some way or another.

Yes news can be misleading, but I think there's a lot of truth in Rene Girard's idea of escalating mimetic rivalry... and Peter Turchin's fathers-and-sons cycle of violence.

I highly recommend Pinker's books. They will give you some rather politically incorrect view of the world. You may feel free to disagree with him but you will find them interesting read with potential to change how you look at the world.

Hence why I have a great deal of distrust of any media. They always bend the facts to twist their narrative, it's better to hear from the horses mouth or watch directly what happens around the world

Remember when Ezra Klien's Vox wasn't going to be just another left leaning content farm?

I wonder why they don't write about what happened there instead of just interviewing Pinker about the news?

I love Steven Pinker!

I love him more! :)

Oh, really? Could it also be that advertisements are misleading way to collect the facts and press releases are misleading way to evaluate performance?

Or perhaps it could be people asking leading (biased) questions that have no answers.

haha, but if they asked hard questions then their press credentials are revoked.

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