hello friends and welcome back to the channel in this video we're gonna be talking about two things first is how to vet your sources and second is fake news so we're going to be having a sa all about fake news sooner rather than later as part of our getting along online essay so you're going to be taking a look at that sooner rather than later and so some of this will have some crossover in that but the reason that I'm bringing this up now is because while we work on take-home essay number one you're going to be doing some research and because you're going to be doing some research you're going to need to understand how to vet that research and so that what I mean by that is how can you trust the research that you do on the Internet and the sad but simple answer is you can't everybody has an opinion everybody has an angle you sort of have to treat the idea of finding research on your topic like an episode of Game of Thrones it's like everyone's waiting to backstab the next person because they're jockeying for power whether that is trying to sell you something or rather that's trying to sell you an idea or both and that is because the way that the internet works and the way that the that news and pretty much any form of communication in the United States and pretty much in the world works is that it is all about trying to sell you something whether it's an idea whether it's a product or whether it's both so the only thing you can do is try to the only thing that you can do is try to combat that by checking your biases and checking the biases of your research there is no such thing as an unbiased source none they all have biases it's just a matter of which biases are you paying attention to so let's get started here this is a good this is a good metric for trying to decide whether or not a source is a good source for you so the as it says here the process of evaluating a source it includes examining the source itself and examining other sources by one checking for previous work has someone already facts checked the source so for instance if you see something on the internet and it seems like it's too good to be true is it it likely is finding the original source so if you see an article that links to something go to that article does it actually say when it says it says reading laterally what do other people say about this publication and author this is a very important trick so if you find this article by somebody who seems reasonable and then you look it up and then you can figure out that other people are saying this person isn't that reasonable that's an important thing for you to know or at least to know what other people say about this topic maybe this is a good author for you to use and but the fact that you know that other people don't trust him or don't trust her is a good thing for you to know and factor that in circling back how can you revise your original search to yield better results this isn't important to if you're trying to find research and you keep on keep on stumbling upon uh you know one direction go back try it again type in different keywords look in different areas and then finally checking your own emotions if your is your own bias affecting your evaluation and if you think why not biased yes you are if you're a human being you're biased and so one of the things that you're you know you have your opinions on issues whether that's social issues or political issues or interests you know there are things that you like and things that you don't like and so if you only find people who agree with you is that affecting how you're doing your research they're not just right just because they agree with you and that's something to keep in mind so here's a couple steps for you to be thinking of and you need to be asking yourself about this all the time whenever you're bringing a source in you need to be thinking can I trust this your default answer your default answer is no okay this is you this is what you need to be thinking about this is one of my favorite video commercials ever hey Mike did it with my state papa de Janeiro you can also get a quote and pay your premium with this thing so whenever you're on the internet and you're finding a source you should assume your default position is that you're tearing this guy Bob jr. does he look like a French model I don't think he's a French model assume that this guy is the guy who wrote the article that you're reading all right and he is lying to you unless he has proved otherwise all right that will help you because you need to make sure that you can vet who it is that is doing this who it is that's writing writing the article all right so purpose how and why was the source created this is the first thing to be thinking of why does this information exist is it to educate inform persuade sell entertained do the authors publishers or sponsors state this purpose or are they trying to hide it this is an important thing to be keeping in mind why was this information published in this particular type of source book article website blog who is the intended audience the general public students experts these are all important questions you know sometimes what you will see is a is a you will see a a source posted and it will seem like it's designed to inform but really it's designed to sell I'll give you an example and we're gonna go into the world of diet so for instance there was a movie that came out not too long ago called the game changers right game changers is a documentary about plant-based athletes so people who who is its documentary about the benefits of plant-based eating for athletes and though this is something that's that's important what you can do though is you you look at the some of the criticisms and you can find this China despite its overall perception the documentary came under heavy criticism not only from sports science and nutrition sectors but from defenders of plant-based diets critics pointed out factor in action here you go the film's executive producer James Cameron an outspoken vegan who founded plant protein company verdant foods alright by the way we're gonna continue down the rabbit hole with with with with diet it's one of the most fascinating places where you can't trust anybody just because of what of the weird funding but one of the things that you can find here is alright well James Cameron who has verdiant foods well you would think that this is a bit of film about health but really how much of it is about selling is plant protein good question maybe I can't trust this video that's the question you got to ask alright so back to proven next is the relevance of this topic okay is the type of source appropriate for how you plan to use it in your assignments requirements so relevance really does hinge on what you're planning to do and how you're planning on using it you know indeed are you writing an essay about social media influencers okay well maybe you need to maybe you need to cite a couple social media influencers while you're doing that right are you writing a an essay about racial injustice in the United States well is a social-media influencer the firt year first go to make not may be depends on how you want to use it maybe you're writing about online opinions of racial injustice in in the United States well now a social-media influencer and somebody on Instagram might be a good choice it all depends on what you're planning to do with it so this is something to be thinking about while you're looking at it you know is are you trying to cite something that's too advanced or too basic is it appropriate for the audience next objectivity now here's the deal like I said there's no such thing as an objective source everybody has an opinion but what you're looking at for is reasonableness and completeness so did the authors present information thoroughly and professionally do they use strong emotional manipulative or offensive language you'll see a lot of us where their time where sometimes an author will say okay well this is what needs to happen and then other times they're like well if you don't want this you're gonna kill grandma so for instance I'll give you an example is the Kovach 19 lockdowns there are some people who say you know who will look at all right here's the risks and benefits about whether or not we should lock down for kovat 19 and then there's other people who say well if they want you to lock down it's because they hate America there's other people who say well people who want who want to end the lockdowns they all want to kill your grandma those are not reasonable reasonable opinions the person who's saying you know whether they want to keep a lock down or lock down up the paper person who's saying let's look at the costs and benefits of this that's a more reasonable you hate America or you're killing grandma the authors publishers or sponsors have a particular political ideological cultural or religious point of view do they acknowledge it or try to disguise it this is the most important because they do have a particular political ideological cultural or religious point of view because they all do we all do but do they acknowledge it or try to disguise it if they acknowledge it that's good because they're saying hey look I'm a Democratic Socialist and this is what I think about immigration or hey I'm a Republican this is what I think about immigration but if they're like this is what everybody should think about immigration then you should be more suspect if they're trying to hide it and does it does it have to present fact or opinion alright is it biased it is biased but is it is it order lining on you know is presenting a opinion and fact or is it opinion or presenting fact as opinion this this is really difficult what you want to do here is is it clearly distinguishing its fact from opinion versus okay this is what's happening versus this is what I think about what's happening the more and more we get to it the harder this is in news organizations right next verifiability the accuracy and truthfulness of the information do does the source support their information with factual evidence do they cite or link to other sources can you verify the credibility of this sources and some some of this comes back to that idea of reading laterally can you find this information more than one place can you verify it you know if you look up this topic that says X Y & Z if you look it up in another place is it gonna say something similar if it is then that's good news if it's not then you might be more suspect does the source contradict itself to include false statements does it misrepresent other sources so if it's using if it's you know if it's saying if it's pointing to other people and saying well these people are idiots is that true these are thick questions you have to ask next expertise the authority of the authors and the source so what makes the author's publisher sponsors and sources authorities on the topic now this is difficult because a lot of times these days people will say well you know an expert says this and you know you can have a lot of experts but the question that I'm that I have here is what gives them credibility to talk about this you would be surprised how many times I find sources or students that have that will cite somebody who's like some dork on reddit or a student's paper that was posted online somewhere and it's like you just cited a seventh grader all right you really want to make sure that you understand what is the PERT what is the what is gives this person experts you know maybe they have a million degrees maybe they work for an educational institution maybe there may be there they work in the field I'm not sure but you want to be able to say all right why is this person an expert on what they're talking about if you don't have that there you go you know for instance Oprah all right Oprah is a really popular popular entertainer News personality you know she's the REIT there's a reason that everyone knows who Oprah is is Oprah and expert on nutrition well Oprah works for Weight Watchers because they cut her a big check but is that make her an expert on nutrition not particularly is Oprah an expert on being an entrepreneur in the media hell yeah she's a great expert on that you want to make sure that you're not clarity that you're not confusing expertise in one area for expertise in another here's another example dr. Phil dr.
Phil is an X he is a psychologist however he has not been licensed as a psychologist in many years what he does is he has a television show where he sort of kind of practices pop psychology but even yet when you go on a show he says like by the way this isn't therapy this isn't his psychological advice this is just sort of his random opinion may be informed by his psychology but he's not a licensed psychologist anymore he let his license lapse look it up you can see but is he necessarily an authoritative source not always so one of the things that you need to do is make sure that you that you understand what makes this person in a an expert on their topic all right and the last thing you need to look at is newness the age of the information now some things are timeless so for instance if I'm reading about an analysis of the play Hamlet ok Hamlet was written over 400 years ago and if I read an analysis of the play Hamlet from 1975 it's probably not a big deal however some topics are a lot more complicated because the newness really doesn't matter so for instance if I was going to write on topic about sexually transmitted diseases in the 70s one thing you might not know is that before the 1980s nobody knew what AIDS was you know the AIDS epidemic came around in the 1980s I would not want to be reading something from the 70s about sexually transmitted diseases because it was a whole new ballgame or how about Africans and African Americans and politics from 2006 well if I was writing about that there was kind of a big deal that happened in 2008 when President Barack Obama became the first African American president I wouldn't want to be citing something about African Americans and politics before then or maybe us u. s.
