Ad Interwebium

[cal]

I haven't found anything covering this logical fallacy in depth, probably because it is newer and rather similar to other logical fallacies. The similar fallacies don't quite pervade the true depth of ignorance that this fallacy entails however, and thus I have opened this discussion on it. It's more common name is a self-descriptor, "It's on the internet, so it must be true", and the name and definition I've given it are workable if the hypography community feels it is inadequate:

 

Ad Interwebium

- Argumentation derived from the belief that information acquired from a website, no matter how credible, is true information simply because of such acquisition. Equivocated from such acquisition is the idea that if other more accurate sources exist, you are allowed to use what you may be unsure of as a source because it's inaccuracy can be cured by the accuracy of another potentially more accurate source.

 

The implications that this fallacy employs are more severe and perverse logic on deeper levels than the typical fallacies that follow the idea that information must be true because the source it is from is usually accurate, or that someone is wrong because they are usually wrong. It goes much, much deeper, and it is effecting our society in crippling ways (socially at the very least).

 

Ad Interwebium follows that the source of all sources, the internet, gives way to all possible information, and thus, that if your source is wrong, a quick google search will provide a different source with the correct information. The problem that this fallacy creates is that people no longer need to be sure of their sources, or the information their sources include, due to the availability of other credible and "probably" more accurate sources, as if everyone you spam with a link will either just openly accept the information provided on the link's page as unquestionably true information, or that the false information provided has placed the onus on the receiver of the link to find and verify the correct information themselves. This is in line with other logical fallacies, but almost as a working combination of them, and on top of this, Ad Interwebium is used for critical points to many discussions happening via the internet (you guys on hypography don't have it so bad since this forum is full of skeptics, but it still does happen here), where such discussions and the information they provide are critically fixed around links to web sources that are total bullshit and provide bullshit information for bullshit arguments for people who are just bullshitting other people.

 

We need to eradicate this idea that "I saw it on the internet, so it must be true", even if it is from a deemed "reliable" source like CNN.com or other news affiliates. The internet is an invention of man (an American man, mind you, **** yea America), and the information entered to it and accessed from it are done via human interaction and that human interaction tends to be very flawed. This should be kept in mind.

 

What say you hypography community? Also, my google searches did not find very much information on this, should the lack of information that the internet has (not everything is on the internet) be included in the descriptor of the Ad Interwebium? Let your voice be heard, speak on this topic, and link us to sites with less than credible information in your arguments refuting me!

Edited January 21, 2013 by Matthew Garon

[Eclogite]

It is an interesting thought you have, but I am unconvinced as to its relevance.

 

The conventional logical fallacies seem to me to have one common characteristic: superficially they appear to be logical and if presented carefully can, temporarily at least, fool even an astute mind. The concept that you are proposing be added to the list just does not seem to match that feature. In short, anyone using that argument is probably too dumb to be worth arguing with. Perhaps you can persuade me I am mistaken.

 

On a minor point, the internet was - as you say - invented by an American, but arguably the fallacy you speak of is most commonly found on the world wide web, the brainchild of a Brit.

[cal]

The conventional logical fallacies seem to me to have one common characteristic: superficially they appear to be logical and if presented carefully can, temporarily at least, fool even an astute mind. The concept that you are proposing be added to the list just does not seem to match that feature. In short, anyone using that argument is probably too dumb to be worth arguing with. Perhaps you can persuade me I am mistaken.

When presented with a news article, you read the article and say, "huh, so they're doing that in Europe today" usually without questioning weather or not the article has any legitimacy until it says something you believe to be improbable. For example, Iceland is having a media blackout right now because they uprooted their government and decentralized their banking system and had the people, their own people, rewrite their constitution. You will find very, very few bits of information about this on the internet right now unless you have a friend from Iceland. However, when told about this via facebook I simply took it to be true. And it is. But you won't find any sources for it anywhere. So how can you know it is true?

 

Look at how much is posted here on hypography that is simply not true, but the posts are backed up with links and arguments from all over the web supporting the falseness sustained by others' inabilities to do their own research. Is it not a logical fallacy to believe something simply because the source is viewed as a good source? I mean it's applicable to things outside of the internet, like people who believe the Bible simply because they are told it is the word of god. It is a logical fallacy, but sources tend to be most misrepresented or simply wrong via the internet, most people don't spread sources via books nowadays (at least not proportionately to internet sharing).

 

I see where you're coming from, being that logical fallacies are derived and implemented via conceptual errors, or verbal/textual errors, but this is a logical fallacy within the action. It is also a fallacy within the mind of the person committing the action, and the people who read and take part in the false information being posted.

 

Not all logical fallacies appear logical, otherwise they wouldn't be named "logical fallacies". Most of the major ones appear logical, but not all of them.

Like I said, however, we can rework the initial definition if it doesn't accurately ascribe this problem.

 

 

On a minor point, the internet was - as you say - invented by an American, but arguably the fallacy you speak of is most commonly found on the world wide web, the brainchild of a Brit.

Fair enough, then it is Britain's fault for causing this problem haha.

Edited January 21, 2013 by Matthew Garon

[Eclogite]

I may attempt a longer response later, but for the moment I shall acknowledge that I may be sidetracking you on an issue of definition.

 

I agree that some people at least some of the time definitely accept the internet as a reliable source. I further agree, very strongly as it happens, that this is foolish and undesirable.

 

What I am less convinced of is that this should be considered a logical fallacy. I prefer to think of it as "just dumb".

 

I think part of the problem lies in my subjective approach to things. You said "When presented with a news article, you read the article and say, "huh, so they're doing that in Europe today" usually without questioning weather or not the article has any legitimacy." And there is the crux of the matter - I do question it. I ask on what basis is this known? How reliable is the source? What is the extent of the evidence? Is this independently validated? What are alternative epxlanations of the observations? So I tend to take an elitist view of anyone who doesn't bring some scepticisn to their studies and thinking.

[CraigD]

I haven't found anything covering this logical fallacy in depth, probably because it is newer and rather similar to other logical fallacies. The similar fallacies don't quite pervade the true depth of ignorance that this fallacy entails however, and thus I have opened this discussion on it.

I think this idea is well documented under the search phrase “if it is on the Internet it must be true” and variations. It’s a pretty popular one, appearing in catchy picture presentations like these:

 

and major company’s TV advertisements like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmx4twCK3_I

 

I think the new term (and it appears to be truly new – no search engine I tried found reference to it anywhere but in this thread!)

Ad Interwebium

- Argumentation derived from the belief that information acquired from a website, no matter how credible, is true information simply because of such acquisition.

isn’t just similar to the venerable argument from authority (argumentum ad verecundiam) , but is a subclass of it. So while argumentum ad interwebium is an amusing and thought-provoking phrase (though I’m wary of a fallacy for which I know no term: “I wrote it in Latin, so it must be true”), and an apt observation about much bad information that can be found via a computer using the internet protocols, when philosophizing about why such arguments are logically invalid, I think it’s best to refer back to its more general supercategory.

 

Digging deeper (such as via the preceeding wikipedia link), we can see that logicians don’t consider argument from authority per-se to be a logical fallacy, but rather to be vulnerable to fallacious use. Practically speaking, we must rely on authorities, not just humans, but machines like the electronic calculators built into computers, because it takes too long, and is often beyond our ability as individuals, to thoroughly, skeptically check every natural language assertion and calculation result they provide to us. The trick is knowing which authorities to trust, a trick complicated because a single authority can be good for some subjects, but bad for others.

 

We need to be on alert for when the authority appealed to is not a reliable one – what conventional logicians call a fallacious appeal to authority, characterize by the “authority” being referenced lacking recognition as an expert in the subject matter by many others, which I like to call the “here’s my addle-brained idea, with a link to the webpage I made about it” fallacy – or even a completely fabricated or misrepresented one - what a business/personal development training class I had years ago called “coming from MSU – Making Stuff Up”.

 

This is where I’ve found the central feature of the WWW and the browser software that implement it on the client side, the hyperlink, to be wonderfully valuable – reference checking that in the 1970s and ‘80s could take hours or days of walking stacks, pulling and reading paper, microfiche and film, now takes only minutes of cursor pointing and button clicking (combined into a single finger move with a touchscreen). Reading and language skills remain important, though with ubiquitous text-to-speech and translation programs, we don’t absolutely need to be able to read, or know a given language. Using a web browser is like moving through a huge library at fantastic speed with an entourage of narrators and translators. I love it.

 

It’s also critical, I think, that we be mindful of the limitations of the approach to determining the truth of propositions by declaring them true when we can find no logical fallacy in an argument for them. Science is, I think, more a social, consensus-gathering process than a formal logical one. It’s difficult to form a correspondence between algorithmically provable expressions and useful natural language propositions and the deeply buried neurological states that underlie them, so we must ultimately be content, I think, in the faith that is we share and discuss ideas openly, effectively, and friendlily, we can reach a consensus guess of the truth, which, right or wrong, is shared.

 

Sharing is, I think, at the heart of being human.

[Rade]

Ad Interwebium

- Argumentation derived from the belief that information acquired from a website, no matter how credible, is true information simply because of such acquisition. Equivocated from such acquisition is the idea that if other more accurate sources exist, you are allowed to use what you may be unsure of as a source because it's inaccuracy can be cured by the accuracy of another potentially more accurate source.

Not all mistakes in reasoning count as being a logical fallacy, and Ad Interwebium is one such mistake. To be a fallacy the type of reasoning must be potentially deceptive, it must be likely to fool at least some of the people some of the time. Ad Interwebium fools no one. Moreover, in order for a fallacy to be worth identifying and naming, it must be a common type of logical error, again, Ad Interwebium fails the test. I find Ad Interwebium to be in the same set of mistakes in reasoning as Ad Flunkebium, the argumentation derived from the belief that because you flunk a course in intro to logic, no matter how credible, it is true that you will breeze into a School of Law, simply because you flunked the course. You hold this belief until it is cured by the rejection letter mailed to you. Edited January 24, 2013 by Rade