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by wolco 2175 days ago
Is non-verbal communication with an animal too crazy of an idea for you? Because animals don't speak or obey (looking at you cat) humans too well but can sense things and act on that information.

From there animal telepathy isn't too far of a stretch for someone to make.

I haven't seen scientific proof and I don't think anyone has. But I would still expect others would make sites and claims.

But you feel there is a harm in there. Because it is reenforcing what a mental ill person believes.

I'm not sure what the best compromise is. The core problem is the fact that there are communities who want to talk about animal telepathy doesn't work with your worldview. Asking sv to exclude them makes the web a smaller more corporate place. I'm not sure that's the best approach.

In your situation you need a censored google. A google to match your worldview. In fairness google has been trying to show you you-centric search results if you are logged in. In your case this is a one-time transaction so history wouldn't place a factor.

But I come back to why is this a sv problem? The root of the problem is your family member isn't taking his medicine or it is not working or he is right and you won't listen.

If I had a family member like that I would just go along with it. Things don't need to be 100% correct in life. People need to believe in something. No harm here.

1 comments

The problem here is that false information spreads quickly and is validated though sites like Google and Facebook through higher exposure. This has real consequences like the rise of anti-vaxers and other anti-science movements.
Didn't anti-vaxers exist before facebook?

There are areas now facebook and google doesn't service like hacking/cracking sites but those sites still exist.

When you try to hide information and the person discovers the truth it becomes so much more powerful because you are telling them this is forbidden knowledge that only a few have heard exists, you were right.

Before facebook, anti-vaccine sentiment mostly spread through newspapers and TV. There were big scares, but they were only ignited after at least some "experts" found the anti-vaccine argument credibe, and public sentiment could be restored by the same experts declaring it safe. So the threshold for irrational/gossip-driven antivax sentiment was far higher, and mitigation was far easier.

See, for instance, the UK pertussis vaccine scare and whooping cough epidemic in the 1970s... [1]

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccine_hesitancy#UK,_pertussi...