Historical Novels, Period Dramas, etc. Should Not Exist!

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by GtrsRGr8

That brings us full circle to something that I said (or at least implied) in the O.P.: people don't care enough about the truth. That's why historical fiction and stuff like that proliferates. So what if Lincoln, or Twain, or Wilde didn't really say it????? The quote sounds good, we don't know who really originated it, so we'll make up somebody as the one who said it.

I rest my case.

Case dismissed. People don't spread spurious quotes because they don't care about the truth, but because they don't know what the truth is. Not caring about the truth isn't why people are interested in historical fiction. People are interested in what it was life was like in the past. If they sometimes read inaccurate historical fiction without knowing it is inaccurate, that's not an indictment against historical fiction, but an indictment against bad historical fiction.

As far as spurious quotes go, quite often what is said is more important that who said it.

[tubemonkey]

My favorite quote from grade school was about Washington chopping down the cherry tree

[badgoodDeb]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

My favorite quote from grade school was about Washington chopping down the cherry tree

Wasn't that the wood he used to make his false teeth?

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

Case dismissed. People don't spread spurious quotes because they don't care about the truth, but because they don't know what the truth is. Not caring about the truth isn't why people are interested in historical fiction. People are interested in what it was life was like in the past. If they sometimes read inaccurate historical fiction without knowing it is inaccurate, that's not an indictment against historical fiction, but an indictment against bad historical fiction.

As far as spurious quotes go, quite often what is said is more important that who said it.

Ivanka Trump's minions posted a quote from Hillel the Elder and attributed it to Emma Watson.

If you care about the truth, you look it up.

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

My favorite quote from grade school was about Washington chopping down the cherry tree

That's okay. The best cherries come from Washington State anyway.

[AnotherCat]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

Case dismissed. People don't spread spurious quotes because they don't care about the truth, but because they don't know what the truth is...

With your making that claim I am left wondering whether you do not care about the truth or whether you do not know what the truth actually is.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by AnotherCat

With your making that claim I am left wondering whether you do not care about the truth or whether you do not know what the truth actually is.

You can't infer either of those from what I wrote. It's pretty simple. If someone forwards a spurious quote, you can't infer that they don't care about the truth. People believed the claims about George Washington and the Cherry Tree for ages, but that doesn't mean they didn't care about the truth. You can assert they don't care about the truth, but say-so isn't evidence.

Note that I am not *defending* spreading spurious quotes. I am merely saying that disseminating spurious quotes doesn't mean they don't care about the truth.

Originally Posted by Catlady

Ivanka Trump's minions posted a quote from Hillel the Elder and attributed it to Emma Watson.

If you care about the truth, you look it up.

If you're making a political speech, it's a good idea to use extra care in in your quotes. In common use, people aren't going to look up all their quotes, and even if they do look them up, you often find spurious quotes when you attempt to look them up.

Sometimes it matters who said it. Quite often it doesn't.

[AnotherCat]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

You can't infer either of those from what I wrote. It's pretty simple. If someone forwards a spurious quote, you can't infer that they don't care about the truth. People believed the claims about George Washington and the Cherry Tree for ages, but that doesn't mean they didn't care about the truth. You can assert they don't care about the truth, but say-so isn't evidence...

I wasn't talking about other people's quotes, but was referring to what you claimed. I was interested what the truth was regarding your claim that:

Case dismissed. People don't spread spurious quotes because they don't care about the truth, but because they don't know what the truth is.

It turns out that there is ample evidence that people often do spread spurious quotes knowing them to be untrue; there are countless examples among the realms of activists, politicians, journalists, conspiracy theorists, etc. as most who have needed through necessity but not love to work with them will likely attest, and it is well established that the information (including quotations) promulgated by such groups is not seriously questioned, nor desired to be questioned by those who align themselves with the particular ideology, or whatever, that it relates to.

That being apparently so then hence my response to you of:

With your making that claim I am left wondering whether you do not care about the truth or whether you do not know what the truth actually is.

If you have such a high level of confidence in the honesty of your fellow beings you may like to investigate, for example, the results of surveys and the experiences of shop security specialists with respect to the proportion of the population that would shoplift if they knew that they would get away with it.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by AnotherCat

If you have such a high level of confidence in the honesty of your fellow beings you may like to investigate, for example, the results of surveys and the experiences of shop security specialists with respect to the proportion of the population that would shoplift if they knew that they would get away with it.

This is a non sequitur and a straw man. I made no claims that people were so honest. I did not deny that there are people who create spurious quotations knowing them to be false, but they are forwarded by people who actually believe them to be true. Your position would require that the general public to be much more informed than they actually are - they would have to know what this person did and didn't say. Propaganda works by getting people to believe spurious information.

People passed along the story of George Washington and the Cherry Tree for ages. Would you assert that they actually knew the story to be false?

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

This is a non sequitur and a straw man. I made no claims that people were so honest. I did not deny that there are people who create spurious quotations knowing them to be false, but they are forwarded by people who actually believe them to be true. Your position would require that the general public to be much more informed than they actually are - they would have to know what this person did and didn't say. Propaganda works by getting people to believe spurious information.

People passed along the story of George Washington and the Cherry Tree for ages. Would you assert that they actually knew the story to be false?

I cannot tell a lie, I have no idea on they, the story or false.

[AnotherCat]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

..People passed along the story of George Washington and the Cherry Tree for ages. Would you assert that they actually knew the story to be false?

In many instances, Yes.

To claim otherwise infers, as I laid out, an irrational trust in human honesty. I gave you an example of another situation (shoplifting) where surveys show that many of us are inherently dishonest. However, you discarded that opportunity to seek the truth on that, seemingly claiming that there is no reason to expect people dishonest in that way from being dishonest in the stories they pass on (and perhaps it did not suit your agenda to do so?).

Furthermore, I gave the example of politicians, activists, journalists, etc. I have the experience of working with those types of people for whom it is not uncommon for them to knowingly tell or write stories with content within them of no fact, or to misquote others in order to embellish the story, the article or their own case. I have then seen that material being represented dishonestly as being unshakable truths by those whose agendas were similarly aligned. It would also appear that large parts of the population agree with me as those professions are shown in surveys to be among the least trusted by others.

For example, while all polls say similar a just published Gallup poll finds only 32% of Americans say they have "a great deal" or "a fair amount" of trust in the mass media (and Americans are not alone in that). I take it you believe that the stories that journalists are writing, or the stories and the "quotes" they pass on are not known to them to often be in part false or misleading; that despite the fact that the majority of the population believe that material to be often in part false or misleading? And as I said, the readers of that material are often not above passing on what they know to be shady if it suits their own agenda to do so.

I'll leave it at that.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by AnotherCat

In many instances, Yes.

And how would they know the story was false? They've heard it told as if it was true.

To claim otherwise infers, as I laid out, an irrational trust in human honesty. I gave you an example of another situation (shoplifting) where surveys show that many of us are inherently dishonest. However, you discarded that opportunity to seek the truth on that, seemingly claiming that there is no reason to expect people dishonest in that way from being dishonest in the stories they pass on (and perhaps it did not suit your agenda to do so?).

I see you're playing logical fallacy bingo. Just what agenda might I have? That people aren't always honest simply is irrelevant. My assertion is simply that when the majority of people pass on spurious quotations, they believe that they are accurate. We aren't playing Knights and Knaves.

Furthermore, I gave the example of politicians, activists, journalists, etc. I have the experience of working with those types of people for whom it is not uncommon for them to knowingly tell or write stories with content within them of no fact, or to misquote others in order to embellish the story, the article or their own case. I have then seen that material being represented dishonestly as being unshakable truths by those whose agendas were similarly aligned. It would also appear that large parts of the population agree with me as those professions are shown in surveys to be among the least trusted by others.

For example, while all polls say similar a just published Gallup poll finds only 32% of Americans say they have "a great deal" or "a fair amount" of trust in the mass media (and Americans are not alone in that). I take it you believe that the stories that journalists are writing, or the stories and the "quotes" they pass on are not known to them to often be in part false or misleading; that despite the fact that the majority of the population believe that material to be often in part false or misleading? And as I said, the readers of that material are often not above passing on what they know to be shady if it suits their own agenda to do so.

Fallacy of division. Just because people don't trust the media as a whole doesn't mean they don't trust parts of it. They trust the parts of the media that they listen to, and think the other parts of the media are untrustworthy. Many people believe that crime is terrible in every other neighborhood, but think their neighborhood is safe. OR they believe schools are bad, but their local school is the exception. Or they think Congress is terrible, but their representative is good.

Even if the original source is lying, this doesn't mean that the person who passes that on is lying when they pass it on. That requires irrationally believing that people are far more informed than they really are. To lie, you must know what the truth is (or believe that you know) and make a statement contrary to the truth (or what they believe to be true).

Consider Hanlon's Razor, which is often expressed as "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity" although I would replace "stupidity" with ignorance. It's simply more plausible that people are passing on spurious memes out of ignorance than that they know them to be false. Yes, they are sometimes created as deliberate lies, but the creation of a spurious quote is distinct from passing it on. I am not interested in the person who dishonestly creates a spurious quote, I'm only concerned with the person who passes it on.

Saying "I wouldn't put it past them" isn't evidence.

I'll leave it at that.

You nearly have 5 in a row in logical fallacy bingo.

[AnotherCat]

I wouldn't know where to start to respond to your rationales. However:

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

...Saying "I wouldn't put it past them" isn't evidence...

As your post is completely a response to and quoting of my post you are giving the effect of claiming that I said those words.

But I did not say them at all, so you have demonstrated that your rationales are totally unreliable and delusional, and have provided proof by exception that your case is without merit as you have knowingly misquoted me to serve your own purpose.

I have to say that this has been one of the very few occasions where someone has presented me a case that can be disproved by exception and that person has then gone on to provide that exception themselves, so disproving their own case .

In my opinion I conclude that you are only persevering as a time waster and so I'll leave you to waste that of others, not mine.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by AnotherCat

I wouldn't know where to start to respond to your rationales. However:
As your post is completely a response to and quoting of my post you are giving the effect of claiming that I said those words.

But I did not say them at all, so you have demonstrated that your rationales are totally unreliable and delusional, and have provided proof by exception that your case is without merit as you have knowingly misquoted me to serve your own purpose.

I have to say that this has been one of the very few occasions where someone has presented me a case that can be disproved by exception and that person has then gone on to provide that exception themselves, so disproving their own case .

In my opinion I conclude that you are only persevering as a time waster and so I'll leave you to waste that of others, not mine.

You said "And as I said, the readers of that material are often not above passing on what they know to be shady if it suits their own agenda to do so." How is that any different than "I wouldn't put it past them"?

You claim, without evidence, that when people pass on spurious quotes they do so knowing them to be spurious. Saying that people are dishonest isn't evidence to support that claim. For people to be dishonest is a necessary condition, but not a sufficient condition. For people to deliberately pass on false quotes requires that they be dishonest, but being dishonest does not demonstrate that they are deliberately passing on false quotes.

That some spurious quotes are deliberately created to deceive doesn't support your claim that the people who pass them on do so knowing they are false. For your claim to be true, people would have to be considerably more knowledgeable than they really are. People see quotes that agree with their agenda, accept it without question, and pass it on - they may think other sources are unreliable, but they trust the sources they use.

[HarryT]

Moderator Notice
Please let's return to the topic of this thread, which is the proposal that historical novels should not exist.

Thank you.