False Authorities
Some more thoughts and hints about recognizing false or misleading information.
So much information is passing through our lives that we most of the time have to rely on the word of somebody else in deciding what is true or false. Often it is relative strangers talking to us about events and people far away. Journalists, scientists, public officials telling us about what goes on in Iraq, on the moon, in laboratories, or many other places where we can't easily go and verify the story. And we usually wouldn't know how to verify it.
So, what we do is:
We examine the story itself, to figure out if it is internally consistent. I.e. does it agree with itself?
We look at the presented credentials of the people who present the story to us. I.e. does their position or qualifications seem to match the story they're telling us?
We look for any claims of endorsenment or verification from people we might know or trust. I.e. who else says this is true?
We assess the presentation of the material. Body language, writing style, tone of voice. Is it consistent with somebody telling the truth?
None of that is really any evidence of whether we're being told the truth or not. But they act as initial, superficial steps of due dilligence in trying to verify whether something is real or not. In many cases we don't have time to do anything more than that.