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by powrtoch 5793 days ago
And what if the advice is "Here, drink this"?

You're correct that if we know with high certainty whether the info is true, the source becomes irrelevant (and the higher the certainty, the less weight the source's credibility carries). But if you extend that to areas of higher uncertainty... that's simply not a workable way of approaching the world.

1 comments

I am referring to information, (I used the word advice to your point of "fathers" or "Psychopaths" advice) you are referring to everything.

"Here, drink this." is not an information.

I said: "You should have your skepticism filter on by default at the same filter rate, regardless of the source of the information."

Edit: Clarification.

Replace "Here, drink this." with "This drink is good for you and you should drink it."

Better?

Information would be, "This drink is good for you and you should drink it."

The part, "This drink is good for you" is an information; and thus you should show some healthy amount of skepticism about it. Is the drink laden with high-fructose corn syrup? What do you know about the drink to take the claim "It is good for you" seriously or not? Whether the information is coming from your father or not is a moot point. Maybe your father is ill-informed about the drink, should you take his word for it?