Picture a group chat. Someone posts: drinking cold water after a meal is bad for you. Three people reply: I heard that too. Nobody in the chat has checked it. Nobody knows where it came from. By the end of the evening, four people believe it a bit more than they did at breakfast.
Somebody says it→Somebody checks it→It is a fact
A claim is a sentence that somebody says is true. A fact is a claim that somebody has checked against the world. Between the two is a step: somebody has to look. Most claims never get that step. They go from one mouth to the next, and each mouth adds a little weight.
Three friendsI heard that too
↓→
Checked ithow many?
Three friends reply: I heard that too. How many of them checked the claim?
All three, or they would not have agreed.
Not yet. Agreeing takes no checking. People agree with what they have heard before, and heard before is what all three are saying.
None. Hearing a claim is not checking it.
Right. Each of the three is passing on a sentence. Three people repeating one claim is one claim, said three times, and the step in the middle has still not happened.
At least one. Three people cannot all be repeating.
Not yet. They can, and they usually are. A claim that has reached three people has reached them by being repeated, which is how claims travel.
Seen oncefeels so-so
vsvs
Seen three timesfeels truer
Hearing a claim again does something to it. In a 1977 study, people read statements over three sessions, two weeks apart. Statements they had seen before were rated truer than new ones, whether or not they were true. A 2015 study found it still worked on statements people knew the right answer to.
Move the control to hear the cold-water claim more times. The feel is made up and round; the truth bar is fixed, because nobody in the chain has checked anything.
How true it feels3 out of 10
How true it is3 out of 10
Times you have heard it: 1
Heard once. It is a sentence somebody said. It feels like a maybe.
How true it feels5 out of 10
How true it is3 out of 10
Times you have heard it: 3
Heard three times, from three people. Nobody checked it. It feels more likely than it did.
How true it feels7 out of 10
How true it is3 out of 10
Times you have heard it: 10
Heard ten times. Still nobody checked. It now feels like common knowledge.
How true it feels9 out of 10
How true it is3 out of 10
Times you have heard it: 100
Heard a hundred times. It feels like something everybody knows. It is exactly as true as it was the first time.
After hearing the claim a hundred times, what has changed?
How it feels. The claim is exactly as true as it was the first time.
Right. Nobody in the chain looked at the world, so the truth bar never moved. The feel bar is what repetition builds, and it builds it on true and false claims alike.
Nothing. A sensible person is not moved by repeats.
Not yet. The 1977 and 2015 studies found the feel rising in everybody, including people who knew the right answer. The rise is not a choice.
Both. A claim a hundred people repeat is more likely true.
Not yet. A hundred people repeating is a hundred people who heard it. The step that moves the truth bar is a check, and a repeat is not one.
Move the control.
A teacher said it
++
A post said it
++
You saw it yourself
Almost everything a person believes came from somebody else. A teacher said it. A parent said it. A post said it. That is not a fault; nobody can check everything, and most of what we are told is right. The useful question is a different one: could this be checked, and has anybody done it?
Each is something a person believes. Was it checked against the world, or heard from somebody?
One card at a time. Tap the pile it belongs to.
Card 1 of 6
Water boils when you heat it on the stove. You have watched it happen.
A goldfish only remembers things for three seconds. A friend told you.
The 8:10 bus comes at about 8:10. You have caught it every day this week.
Sugar makes children run wild. Everybody knows it.
Lightning never strikes the same place twice. It is a saying.
Your cup holds about 250 millilitres. You filled it from a measuring jug.
Water boils when you heat it on the stove. You have watched it happen. → Checked
Not yet. Checked. The world was looked at, and the water could have sat there cold. It did not.
A goldfish only remembers things for three seconds. A friend told you. → Heard
Not yet. Heard. The friend did not time a goldfish; they passed on a sentence they had been given.
The 8:10 bus comes at about 8:10. You have caught it every day this week. → Checked
Not yet. Checked. Five mornings at the stop is five looks at the world, and the bus could have failed any of them.
Sugar makes children run wild. Everybody knows it. → Heard
Not yet. Heard. Everybody knows it is a count of how many people have heard it, not a look at any child.
Lightning never strikes the same place twice. It is a saying. → Heard
Not yet. Heard. A saying is a claim that has been repeated for a long time, which is all a saying is.
Your cup holds about 250 millilitres. You filled it from a measuring jug. → Checked
Not yet. Checked. The jug could have shown any number, and the cup was looked at.
3Checked
vsvs
3Heard
Right. Three were looked at and three were passed on. The three that were passed on feel just as solid from the inside, which is the whole problem.
Weighed4.1 kilos
vsvs
Toldheavy, I'd say
What a check is: a look at the world that could have come out the other way. Weighing a baby is a check, because the scale could have said a different number. Being told the baby is heavy is not a check, however kind the person. The world has to get its turn to say no.
Two million views
↓→
Checked bywho?
A video says scientists have proved that cold showers cure colds. It has two million views. By this lesson, what has the view count told you?
How many people saw it. Nothing about whether it is true.
Right. Two million views is two million hearings. The step that would make it a fact is a check, and the video has only told you how far the claim travelled.
That it was checked. You cannot say scientists proved it without proof.
Not yet. You can, and people do; the word proved is itself a claim somebody said. The video has named no study, and a name would be where a check could start.
That it is probably true. Two million people would have spotted a mistake.
Not yet. The viewers are hearing it, not checking it. In the 2015 study, people who knew the right answer still rated a false statement truer after a repeat, so a crowd is no check.
Lesson complete
A claim is said. A fact is checked. Repeating a claim changes how it feels, not whether it is true.