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PHIL110 Critical Thinking – SPS CUNY Unit 7 Discussion Assignment Fake News and Logical Fallacies: A Creative Writing Assignment Background: At the present time, the pernicious use of disinformation is rising. It’s all around us: on social media, in advertisements, and especially amid electoral politics. “Disinformation tries to raise ... support by deliberately spreading falsehoods. It might describe an event which didn’t happen, or which happened differently than how it is described. It might accuse a person or group of doing something they did not do. It might warn of a threat from an enemy or a source of danger which does not exist, or which in reality is fairly trivial. It might discredit or divert attention away from well-evidenced facts or well-documented historical realities…. Disinformation is often extremely difficult to identify, at least at first. It often requires a lot of research, a lot of courageous questions, and a lot of time to pass, before the reality is revealed.” (Myers, B., Elsby, C., Zieba, A. [2017]. Propaganda and Disinformation. In Clear and Present Thinking [Second edition ed., pp. 166-167]. Gatineau,, Québec, Canada: Northwest Passage Books.). Fake news and disinformation also often employ bad arguments or fallacies. For this discussion forum assignment, you will start with a piece of fake news from the Snopes website, and then creatively rewrite it to exemplify one of the fallacies we've studied in this unit. Remember, these are fallacies of distraction, such as appeals to emotion (fear, pity, anger, spite, etc.), that are a type of argument that attempts to divert your attention and make you think with your heart -- and thus bypassing your brain! Before we get started, here are some resources for you: Fake News: CBS released an article that warned people of the Fake News Websites going around. To read about them, please visit: CBSnews.com Fact Check: There are also several organizations and news sites that are dedicated to reporting the truth and pointing out the lies: Factcheck.org politifact.com fullfact.org snopes.com Trusted news sites: NPR The New York Times Washington Post Reuters Democracynow.org List of fake news websites https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/dont-get-fooled-by-these-fake-news-sites/8/ https://www.factcheck.org/ https://www.politifact.com/ https://fullfact.org/ https://www.snopes.com/ https://www.npr.org/ https://www.nytimes.com/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/ https://www.reuters.com/ https://www.democracynow.org/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fake_news_websites https://www.snopes.com/ https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/dont-get-fooled-by-these-fake-news-sites/8/ https://www.factcheck.org/ https://www.politifact.com/ https://fullfact.org/ https://www.snopes.com/ https://www.npr.org/ https://www.nytimes.com/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/ https://www.reuters.com/ https://www.democracynow.org/ PHIL110 Critical Thinking – SPS CUNY Assignment Instructions: For this assignment, you will be offering your classmates an actual piece of fake news (or more, if you're so motivated), presented first as it originally appeared, and then reimagined (or exaggerated) in the form of one of the fallacies in this unit, for example, a fallacy of emotion. In other words, your task will be to select a story (or two) from the ‘Fact Check’ section of the Snopes website and present it in a form of a fallacy of flawed inductive reasoning that we learned about in this Unit. Use your creative juices to really stir up your readers! Step 1. Look for some fake news that piques your interest. It doesn’t have to be the most current news, so be sure to scroll all the way down on the page (there is a lot to choose from!). Fact Check’ section of the Snopes website Step 2. On the Discussion Forum, briefly explain and link to your news story. Give us a little background, especially how it was determined whether it was true or fake. Step 3. Select one of the logical fallacies from this list (be sure to review the definition, the logical form and the examples): Appeal to fear: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/32/Appeal-to-Fear Appeal to emotion: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/29/Appeal-to-Emotion Appeal to anger: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/20/Appeal-to-Anger Appeal to pity: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/39/Appeal-to-Pity Appeal to spite: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/211/Appeal-to-Spite Straw Man: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/169/Strawman-Fallacy Red Herring: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/150/Red-Herring Ad Hominem (abusive): https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/1/Ad-Hominem-Abusive Ad Hominem (guilt by association): https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/10/Ad-Hominem-Guilt-by- Association Step 4. Creatively reimagine or exaggerate your fake news in light of one logical fallacy. Be creative: what might someone think or say who holds this particular position? How would they argue, what would they say? Then use the Logical Fallacy form to guide your argument reconstruction. This is a creative writing assignment, so go ahead and be bold! https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/32/Appeal-to-Fear https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/39/Appeal-to-Pity https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/211/Appeal-to-Spite https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/169/Strawman-Fallacy https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/150/Red-Herring https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/1/Ad-Hominem-Abusive https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/10/Ad-Hominem-Guilt-by-Association https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/10/Ad-Hominem-Guilt-by-Association https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/32/Appeal-to-Fear https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/29/Appeal-to-Emotion PHIL110 Critical Thinking – SPS CUNY Step 5. Briefly reflect on your reaction to this assignment. What did you learn and what is your overall take-away? Step 6. Read and respond to two other students’ posts. Engage them in a conversation about the content of the fake news as well as their logical fallacies. Here's my example: Here is a fake news story that juxtaposes two images of Bret Kavanaugh, one as his younger self (supposedly passed out from excessive drinking in 1982), and another prior to his Supreme Court nomination in 2018. Based on some investigation, we know this is fake - the picture on the left is a stock image from Getty Images. I opted to represent this fake news as an appeal to anger. The logical form of appeal to anger can be represented as the following (LF): Claim A is made. You are outraged by claim A. Therefore, claim A is true/false. Here's my exaggerated version of the original piece of fake news: In light of some disconcerting news about Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, many questions have been raised about his alcoholism. On 9/27/2018, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard testimony from Christine Blasey Ford in which she detailed an alleged act of sexual assault against her by Brett Kavanaugh after some heavy liquor consumption on his part. A claim has been made that Brett Kavanaugh has a serious drinking problem. (Claim A is made) This is completely unacceptable and it infuriates me that a person with such an obvious character flaw - who also sexually assaulted a helpless young woman who begged him to stop his deviant advances -- has been nominated to be be a Supreme Court Judge of the United States of America. It's criminal! (You are outraged by claim A). Just look at this picture! This is exactly what I’m talking about. It’s true and here's the undeniable evidence for it! The guy is a first-class pervert and a hopeless drunkard. (Therefore, claim A is true). https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/brett-kavanaugh-wasted-photo/ https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/20/Appeal-to-Anger https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/national/wp/2018/09/27/kavanaugh-hearing-transcript/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/national/wp/2018/09/27/kavanaugh-hearing-transcript/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2018/oct/02/blog-posting/photo-brett-kavanaugh-passed-out-drinking/ mfitzgerald Underline PHIL110 Critical Thinking – SPS CUNY Here is what I learned by doing this assignment… (you'll write about what skills or knowledge you've picked up from this assignment). Now, don your creative hat and circulate some really vicious Fake News! Recommendations for Success and Grading Criteria: • Respond to the assignment with clear and detailed answers, organized thoughts. • Follow all assignment prompts and answers all prompt questions. • Incorporate relevant examples and evidence to support claims. • Write clearly and without errors a well-composed answer and post it on time. • Respond to other students with interesting comments and follow-up questions. Acknowledge all students who commented on your post.